- Paperback: 512 pages
- Publisher: Grove/Atlantic; Reprint edition (Mar 1 2001)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 0802137946
- ISBN-13: 978-0802137944
- Product Dimensions: 22.9 x 15.1 x 2.9 cm
- Shipping Weight: 689 g
- Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars See all reviews (15 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: #316,488 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
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Product Details |
Product Description
From Amazon
There's something about the overwhelming emptiness and terrifying beauty of the polar regions that never fails to attract. They are the most powerful symbols we have left of a world where human-made laws and values count for nothing; no one conquers the frozen wastelands--they merely learn to live by the rules nature dictates. It is easy to see how for a long time the lives of the polar explorers were shrouded in quasi-mystical and heroic terms. This all changed in the 1970s with the publication of Roland Huntford's magnificent biography of Scott and Amundsen, now called The Last Place on Earth, in which he systematically and methodically revealed the levels of incompetence and arrogance with which Scott's expedition was riddled.
In Barrow's Boys Fergus Fleming takes us on an incisive and witty journey through the landmark years of British exploration from 1816 to 1850, marveling at both the bravery and the stupidity involved. Fleming is a historian first and foremost, so he begins by placing exploration in its context. It wasn't some high-minded idealism or wacky sense of adventure, as is often suggested, that placed Britain at the forefront of discovery, but economics and self-interest. At the end of the Napoleonic wars, the British Navy was too large for its peacetime needs. Officers were laid off and advancement was slow, so the Navy needed to find itself a role. Charting the unmapped areas of the world seemed as good an idea as any.
Step forward John Barrow. Barrow was only the Second Secretary at the Admiralty--not normally a position of great influence--yet he was a skilled politician, and he managed to carve out a niche for himself by organizing expedition after expedition. He started inauspiciously by sending Captain James Tuckey off on an ill-fated jaunt up the Congo in search of "Timbuctoo," which was at that time imagined as some African El Dorado, and he ended in failure with the loss of Franklin's expedition to find the Northwest Passage. In between he courted triumph and tragedy; Ross discovered Antarctica, Parry opened up the Arctic with his attempt on the Pole, and Captain Bremer failed to establish northern Australia as the new Singapore.
Fleming has a great feel for the telling detail. He doesn't get lost in endless minutiae that distract from the narrative, but he never fails to remind us of the surrealism of British 19th-century exploration--cocked hats and reindeer-drawn sledges in the Arctic, frock coats in the Sahara. When put like this, it makes it all too easy to see how Scott could have been allowed to botch his journey to the South Pole quite so catastrophically. --John Crace, Amazon.co.uk --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From Publishers Weekly
A sure bet for fans of Caroline Alexander's The Endurance, this captivating survey of England's exploration during the 19th century illuminates a host of forgotten personalities, principal among them John Barrow, Britain's Second Secretary of the Admiralty from 1816 to 1848. Though Barrow never achieved the historical fame of subordinates William Parry and James Ross, he was one of the most influential organizers behind the massive program of globe-trotting that allowed these men to make their names. When he suggested the conversion of idle naval ships into vessels for exploration, Barrow had two driving obsessions: to discover the fabled Northwest Passage through the Arctic Ocean and to chart the course of Africa's Niger River. Barrow was certain that the Northwest Passage existed and that the Niger eventually joined the Nile; if so, their mappings would have profound commercial ramifications. With the air of a dictator, Barrow dispatched officers and crews to the extremes of the world in order to prove the notions he thought to be true, becoming more irritated if the explorers reported evidence contrary to his liking than if they died in his service. Alongside tales of grueling endurance, gross incompetence, cannibalism, jealousy and dirty politics, the explorers themselves are wonderfully reconstructed through quotes from journals and correspondence. They include the stalwart John Franklin (more popularly known as the "Man Who Ate His Boots"), Gordon Laing ("The Madman of Timbuctoo") and a bilious captain named Belcher. Though many perished and Barrow was ultimately wrong about both of his assumptions, readers will enjoy Fergus's (a former writer and editor at Time-Life Books) clever chronicle of their exploits. 40,000 first printing. (Apr.)
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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First Sentence
'To what purpose could a portion of our naval force be, at any time, but more especially in time of profound peace, more honourably or more usefully employed than in completing those details of geographical and hydrographical science of which the grand outlines have been boldly and broadly sketched by Cook, Vancouver and Flinders, and others of our countrymen?' Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
'To what purpose could a portion of our naval force be, at any time, but more especially in time of profound peace, more honourably or more usefully employed than in completing those details of geographical and hydrographical science of which the grand outlines have been boldly and broadly sketched by Cook, Vancouver and Flinders, and others of our countrymen?' Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Most helpful customer reviews
5.0 out of 5 stars
One man ambitions leads thousand to disaster...,
By
This review is from: Barrow's Boys: A Stirring Story Of Daring, Fortitude, and Outright Lunacy (Paperback)
Barrow's Boys is about a man ambitions who lead thousands others to disaster and death. Barrow, based on some geographers opinions, though that the Polar Sea was "open". So, ships could navigate through the North Pole or the hypothetical North West Passage and reach China faster then going around the Cape of Good Hope. Or so he thought.So, over the course of 40 years, he send ships after ships to their doom. Barrow's Boy is about the misfortune of those sailors, who Barrow condemned to cold, starvation and misery. The story of John Frankin alone is well worth your time. The book also includes some African expedition attemps, but even if those are indeed interesting, they only are really an afterthought when compare to the energy, time and hope placed on the numerous Arctic Expedition. Fleming organized all this into a clear, fascinating picture.
5.0 out of 5 stars
One of the best histories written,
By Faronicus (Mankato, MN) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Barrow's Boys: A Stirring Story Of Daring, Fortitude, and Outright Lunacy (Paperback)
Fleming is an excellent writer, period. The pages just fly by. One could almost place this book in the Humor section. Unlike most historians, he is quick to judge (and smear) a protagonist. John Barrow, the backbone of these stories, is continually chided. He makes great use of journal entries, many of which were written under great stress--could many write in that wordy, superfluous 19th-century prose while holed up in Saharan Africa? Not likely.
5.0 out of 5 stars
A great look at exploration,
By
This review is from: Barrow's Boys: A Stirring Story Of Daring, Fortitude, and Outright Lunacy (Paperback)
If you are a lover of adventure and exploration you'll love this book. Fergus Fleming has done a marvelous job of relating tales of British explorers of the early 1800's. Fleming has a knack for telling the story with great wit and you'll often smile as he brings these characters to life. From the Sahara to the Arctic and to the Antarctic and Australia Barrow (Second Secretary of the Admiralty) sends his "boys" in search of glory for the British. Many of these stories have been written about before but bringing them together as Fleming has done, puts this period of exploration in prospective. It was a great time for England even though most of these epics ended in disaster and failed to prove much of what Barrow was looking for.
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