Hell Around the Horn

Introduction

Hell Around the Horn is a work of fiction inspired by a particular voyage around Cape Horn by the windjammer British Isles in 1905. (I think that British Isles is a horrible name for a ship so, in the novel, I renamed her Lady Rebecca.) While all the characters in the novel are fictional, many were inspired by the real officers and crew aboard the British Isles. Captain James Pratt Barker, his wife Mary and their children sailed aboard the ship as did, Apprentice William Jones, Mate Rand, Second Mate Atkinson, the Welsh sailor G.H. Harhy, the sail-maker Pugsley and the carpenter Gronberg. The American sailor, Fred Smythe, is a composite of many of the young educated sailors who sailed before the mast in the latter days of sail. He was inspired most directly by Fred Harlow but was also borrowed in part from Richard Henry Dana, Herman Melville, Felix Riesenberg and Basil Lubbock, among others.

The novel itself was directly inspired by "The Log of a Limejuicer: The Experiences Under Sail of James P. Barker, Master Mariner," by James Barker and Roland Barker; "The Cape Horn Breed," by Captain William H. S. Jones and "The War with Cape Horn," by Alan Villiers. Specific scenes were inspired by "The Brassbounder," by David W. Bone and "By Way of Cape Horn" by Paul E. Stevenson.

If you are challenged by the nautical jargon or terminology, there is a glossary in the back of the book for your reference. It is linked to in the Table of Contents.