Review: In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex

 Everyone knows the story of Moby Dick, the great white whale chased by Captain Ahab, that succeeds in sinking Ahab’s ship. Apparently, Herman Melville based the story on a real event, although the sperm whale was not white, merely an enraged, but also seemingly cunning, bull sperm whale. It’s this story of the whale ship Essex, and of the grim events that faced the sailors who left Nantucket in 1820, that Philbrick tells of in rather horrifying detail .

The Essex’s Captain Pollard was on his first command and was only recently married when they sailed for the Pacific whaling grounds. The voyage did not get off to a good start when only a short while after their departure, he insisted on maintaining studding sails during a regular blow that resulted in a knockdown, the ship being blown over on its side by a strong gust of wind. That it ever righted itself was extraordinary and a testament to the seaworthiness of these vessels that were crewed usually by some twenty to thirty men. His crew was still quite green and the experience must have been unnerving, to say the least. Nantucket was populated by Quakers who never quite adjusted to the presence of offislanders, i.e., anyone not born on the island. They were also, despite their professed pacifistic nature, a rather savage lot. There was a “blood lust and pride that bound every mother, father and child in a clannish commitment to the hunt. . . . There was rumored to be a secret society of young women on the island whose members pledged to marry only men who had already killed a whale.” Be that as it may, they were not having much luck initially, but after a difficult passage around the Horn, they managed to find a pod of whales and begin filling the hold. Philbrick provides rich detail of the whaling industry and the lives of the men who crewed the ships.

The book is worth reading for just that minutiae alone. In any case, two of the eventual survivors recorded the events in detail, so Philbrick has some evidence to help ground his narrative. It appears this bull sperm whale, estimated to be 85 feet long, quite large, only two feet shorter than the ship itself, drove head-on into the ship. Initially the crew suspected it must have been an accident, but this guy lined himself up and headed back in for a second shot, this time staving in the planks by the forecastle, causing water to rush in below the waterline and the ship to begin sinking. They managed to save three whaleboats and a substantial amount of provisions and water. Regretfully, the captain was not a forceful man, for his plan to sail westward to the Marquesas Islands probably would have saved many lives. That coupled with his inadequate navigational skills, particularly as they related to finding one’s longitude, and the crew’s fear of suspected cannibalism on those islands – an ironic fear, given what was to follow – forced his decision to follow the first mate Chase’s advice to sail for the west coast of South America, several thousand miles farther than the Marquesas. Cannibalism was an accepted reality among shipwrecked sailors, and, in fact, most of those who survived long voyages at sea following a shipwreck often had a time convincing their rescuers that they had not indulged in the practice. 

Philbrick’s description of the eventual eating of one’s fellow crewmen – they even cast lots to see who would die and be eaten – would make Stephen King proud and bring new meaning to the word “gross.” Had the crew adopted the practice of another shipwrecked crew, they might have survived without having had to indulge in the practice. This other crew cut up a sailor who died from hunger and used his parts for bait, catching many sharks that provided enough sustenance to get them through the ordeal. The Essex survivors never caught any fish. The story of what happened to the survivors after their rescue is as interesting as the rest of the book.