Wreck, Scandal & Mutiny on HMS Wager
Dan Snow's History Hit
00:00
The Legend of George Ants
In its day this expedition what happened to the wager was a scandalous sensation and when this was going on there accounts would become the equivalent of bestsellers in the day. The story influenced philosophers like Voltaire and Rousseau it influenced Charles Darwin who brought some of these accounts with him on the beagle. It influenced two of our greatest novelists of the sea Herman Melville and Patrick O'Brien but over time it really like so many stories fades from history.
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