The wager, the ship that gives the title to your book. They run into some trouble around the horn. What happens to them? Around the horn is these ships which are their homes or with this squadron. The ships are kind of breaking apart. At one point, the wager loses one of its mass. So, it's just plunging and pitching in the sea. And they're firing their guns on all the ships trying to signal a location. Remember, they didn't have communication. There was no walkie-talkies or iPhone.
David Grann is a staff writer at The New Yorker and the acclaimed author of "The Lost City of Z" and "Killers of the Flower Moon." In his new book, the #1 New York Times bestseller "The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny, and Murder," he tells the story of an 18th-century British warship that crashed on a godforsaken island off the coast of Patagonia. Stranded and starving, the men descended into murderous anarchy. Years later, when a handful of the survivors returned to England, their heroes' welcome was quickly swamped by questions about what really happened on the island.
Host: Caleb Bissinger
Guest: David Grann