Sea Shall Embrace Them: The Tragic Story of the Steamship Arctic, The

Sea Power, Aug 2003 by Gardner, Sherry L

THE SEA SHALL EMBRACE THEM: The Tragic Story of the Steamship Arctic, by David W. Shaw, New York, N. Y.: Free Press, May 2003. 256 pp. $14.00 (paperback). ISBN: 0-7432-3503-7. Shaw brings decades of experience as a seaman to his work as an author to this book about the fate of the Arctic, one of the largest and most luxurious passenger vessels of her time.

A generation before the sinking of the Titanic, the September 1854 collision at sea of the Arctic with the Vesta, a smaller French steamship, set in motion one of the most harrowing events in maritime history. Shaw puts the reader on deck as the crew mutinied and took control of the life rafts, leaving all the women and children to perish. Nearly 400 people died that day; only a handful of crew members and male passengers survived. Shaw tells the story of crew and passenger alike using the firsthand testimony of survivors and eyewitnesses. The result is a compelling look at a relatively obscure episode in American history. With 12 black-and-white illustrations, two maps, appendix, glossary, bibliography, and index.