John Bulkley and the Speedwell

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John Bulkley and about 80 men left Captain Cheep on Wager Island, along with his two remaining supporters, and headed for Brazil. You have to imagine these are men who have battled typhoons, tidal waves, scurvy, shipwreck. They are then on an island for months starving. Many of them died of starvation in the party that was on the island. And now they have to get on this little boat, pack so tightly that they can barely move.

There’s an old sailors’ saying about the ocean at the southernmost part of the world — “below 40 degrees latitude, there is no law; below 50 degrees, there is no God.”

David Grann brings us the story of what happened when five British warships set off on a secret mission to steal a ship filled with treasure. They’d have to sail around the very bottom of South America — at 56 degrees south.

David Grann’s book is The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder.

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Artwork by Julienne Alexander.

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