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Product Description
Review
"Cassie Brown has done a magnificent job. It's been a long time since the appearance of a Canadian book that so graphically describes the horrible abuse and disdain with which the working man was treated in the early part of this century."
-Calgary Herald
"Death on the Ice succeeds not only in capturing the essence of the event, but maintains an atmosphere of taut suspense up to the climactic rescue. A thriller."
-Financial Post
"A compelling reconstruction of the 1914 'Newfoundland' disaster...invites comparison with The Naked and the Dead..."
-Newfoundland Herald
-Calgary Herald
"Death on the Ice succeeds not only in capturing the essence of the event, but maintains an atmosphere of taut suspense up to the climactic rescue. A thriller."
-Financial Post
"A compelling reconstruction of the 1914 'Newfoundland' disaster...invites comparison with The Naked and the Dead..."
-Newfoundland Herald
Book Description
Each year, for generations, poor, ill-clad Newfoundland fisherman sailed out 'to the ice' to hunt seals in the hope of a few penniew in wages from the prosperous merchants of St. John's. The year 1914 witnessed the worst in the long line of tragedies that were part of their harsh way of life.
For two long, freezing days and nights a party of seal hunters--one hundred thirty-two men--were left stranded on an icefield floating in the North Atlantic in winter. They were thinly dressed, with almost no food, and with no hope of shelter on the ice against the snow or the constant, bitter winds. To survive they had to keep moving, always moving. Those who lay down to rest died.
Heroes emerged--one man froze his lips badly, biting off the icicles that were blinding his comrades. Other men froze in their tracks, or went mad with pain and walked off the edge of the icefield. All the while, ships steamed about nearby, unnoticing. And by the time help arrived, two thirds of the men were dead.
This is an incredible story of bungling and greed, of suffering and heroism. The disaster is carefully traced, step by step. With the aid of compelling, contemporary photographs the book paints an unforgettable portrait of the bloody trade of seal hunting among the icefields when ships--and men--were expendable.
For two long, freezing days and nights a party of seal hunters--one hundred thirty-two men--were left stranded on an icefield floating in the North Atlantic in winter. They were thinly dressed, with almost no food, and with no hope of shelter on the ice against the snow or the constant, bitter winds. To survive they had to keep moving, always moving. Those who lay down to rest died.
Heroes emerged--one man froze his lips badly, biting off the icicles that were blinding his comrades. Other men froze in their tracks, or went mad with pain and walked off the edge of the icefield. All the while, ships steamed about nearby, unnoticing. And by the time help arrived, two thirds of the men were dead.
This is an incredible story of bungling and greed, of suffering and heroism. The disaster is carefully traced, step by step. With the aid of compelling, contemporary photographs the book paints an unforgettable portrait of the bloody trade of seal hunting among the icefields when ships--and men--were expendable.
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Most helpful customer reviews
4.0 out of 5 stars
Death on the Ice,
By "raptor18" (Toronto, Ontario) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Death On The Ice: The Great Newfoundland Sealing Disaster Of 1914 (Paperback)
I read Death on the Ice because of a novel study in my class, which I ended up doing a book report on. Death on the Ice is a wonderful reconstruction of the 1914 'Newfoundland' Sealing Disaster. It's very slow, almost boring for the first 6 of 18 chapters, but after that it is an exciting and detailed retelling of that horrifying event, in which two hundred fifty-three men died, most of them because of a string of stupid mistakes. It's also a very sad book in some parts. I liked it very much, and would definitely read it again.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
4.0 out of 5 stars
Death On The Ice,
By Liam Herringshaw (St John's, NL) - See all my reviews
This review is from: Death On The Ice: The Great Newfoundland Sealing Disaster Of 1914 (Paperback)
I knew nothing of the 1914 sealing disaster before I bought Death On The Ice, but the reviews looked good, so I took the plunge. I'm glad I did. The story is a fascinatingly tragic tale - of bravery, greed, fear, stupidity, human error, and dreadful weather. I read the book in a couple of days, then went back and read it again.As a liberal British landlubber, I feared I'd find it difficult to empathize with the sealers, but Cassie Brown makes it clear that few, if any, regarded sealing with much pleasure. It was pretty much the only opportunity available - if they wanted to make enough money to survive till the summer, they had to take a berth on a boat. The boat owners and, in some cases, the captains were the villains of the piece, caring little for anyone's welfare but their own, and hoping only to bring the most pelts back to St John's. That said, I did feel as though Brown wasn't quite able to fully address the reasons behind the Newfoundland disaster, and I also found myself wanting to know more about what happened to the sealers that survived. Nonetheless, Death On The Ice is an excellent book about an event that happened less than a century ago, yet seems in many ways as though it could have occurred in the Middle Ages. Highly recommended.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful
5.0 out of 5 stars
A harrowing tale of the courage of Newfoundland sealers.,
By A Customer
This review is from: Death On The Ice: The Great Newfoundland Sealing Disaster Of 1914 (Paperback)
This is a tale of the loyalty and courage of Newfoundland sealers in the face of greed, arrogance, inhumanity and stupidity. The book moves slowly for the first 40 pages of background information and then it becomes a can't-put-down tale of inhumane treatment,unimagineable hardship,courage and tragic miscommunications. The arrogance and coldheartedness of the merchant captains and ships' owners are not to be believed.The story haunts me still.
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