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Before the Wind: The Memoir of an American Sea Captain, 1808-1833
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Before the Wind: The Memoir of an American Sea Captain, 1808-1833
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by Charles Tyng
Sales Rank : 800168
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Paperback: 288 pages
Publisher: Penguin Non-Classics June 5, 2000
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0140291911
ISBN-13: 978-0140291919
Product Dimensions:
7.7 x 5.1 x 0.6 inches
Shipping Weight: 6.9 ounces
From Publishers Weekly
What's not to like in a narrative that features pirates, rude seamen and exotic ports? Tyng (1801-1879), who rose from cabin boy to captain and prosperous merchant, wrote this account of his early sailing days in later life. In 1996, this memoir was found by his great-great-granddaughter, Susan Fels, who edited the 419-page handwritten manuscript. An unruly boy sent to live in various homes by his rather forbidding father, Tyng first shipped on a merchant vessel at the age of 13. He hated it. But he loved his second voyage and soon became one of the youngest captains in the American merchant fleet. As Tyng tells of voyages around the world carrying cargoes of bullion, tea, linseed oil, molasses and other items to Holland, China, Cuba and other destinations, he writes with understatement, modesty and a deadpan humor that might or might not be intentional. Consider this description of an aborted mutiny: "The cook who was standing near the cambose with an iron ladle in his hand struck Williams a stunning blow with the ladle which put him down." Of Havana's dangerous streets, he writes: "There were placed along the back of the Palace, a row of wooden benches, for the deposit of bodies of those who had been assassinated in the night and picked up in the morning, that their friends might find them." Tyng's voyages frequently struck a tangent to history: he met Lord Byron in Italy, was intercepted by a British man of war guarding the imprisoned Napoleon at St. Helena and saw the first Atlantic steamship. His collection of salty anecdotes will make a pleasing diversion for fans of Patrick O'Brian.
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Library Journal
When Tyng (1801-79), not quite 14 years old, embarked from Boston as a "sailor boy" on the merchant ship Cordelia for a year-and-a-half voyage around the world to China and back, it was an event that shaped an incipient "black sheep" into an enterprising and determined young man who became a successful captain and ship owner in the tea and sugar trade. His memoirsAonly recently discovered and edited by great-great-granddaughter Fels, an editor in Washington, DCAcompare favorably with Richard Henry Dana's Two Years Before the Mast (1840). Tyng describes his unhappy childhood, recalls the varied ups and downs of his maritime trading experiences, and gives sharply detailed accounts of storms, shipwrecks, mutinies, and other near-death adventures at sea. His distinctive voice, at once dramatic, informative, and intensely personal, re-creates the world of the early 19th century in a true-life account that C.S. Forester or Patrick O'Brian would find difficult to match. Recommended for all public libraries.ARobert C. Jones, formerly with Central Missouri State Univ., Warrensburg
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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