Summary of Nathaniel Philbrick's Sea of Glory

Everest Media

Description

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book.
Sample Book Insights:
#1 The South Sea, or the Pacific Ocean, was named after Vasco Núñez de Balboa, who first crossed it in 1513. It was James Cook who first crossed the Pacific, discovering islands at almost every turn.
#2 The city’s wealthiest merchant, John Jacob Astor, had made his fortune with these ships. American China traders, many of them from Boston and Salem, set out around Cape Horn in search of otter skins. They anchored somewhere in the vicinity of Vancouver Island’s Clayoquot Sound.
#3 The War of 1812 was a extremely exciting time for Charles Wilkes. It was difficult to appreciate the level of patriotism felt by those of Wilkes’s generation, many of whom were fathers or grandfathers who had fought in the Revolution.
#4 Wilkes was a young man who was receiving little help from his father, who wanted him to become a businessman like himself. Wilkes was enrolled as a day student at a preparatory school for Columbia College, and he was showing remarkable promise in mathematics and languages. But he was always fascinated by the sea, and he wanted to become a captain.

Sujets

• United States
• 19th century

Informations

• Publié par: Everest Media LLC
• Date de parution: 28 mars 2022
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781669372257
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Insights on Nathaniel Philbrick's Sea of Glory
Contents Insights from Chapter 1 Insights from Chapter 2 Insights from Chapter 3 Insights from Chapter 4
Insights from Chapter 1

#1

The South Sea, or the Pacific Ocean, was named after Vasco Núñez de Balboa, who first crossed it in 1513. It was James Cook who first crossed the Pacific, discovering islands at almost every turn.

#2

The city’s wealthiest merchant, John Jacob Astor, had made his fortune with these ships. American China traders, many of them from Boston and Salem, set out around Cape Horn in search of otter skins. They anchored somewhere in the vicinity of Vancouver Island’s Clayoquot Sound.

#3

The War of 1812 was a extremely exciting time for Charles Wilkes. It was difficult to appreciate the level of patriotism felt by those of Wilkes’s generation, many of whom were fathers or grandfathers who had fought in the Revolution.

#4

Wilkes was a young man who was receiving little help from his father, who wanted him to become a businessman like himself. Wilkes was enrolled as a day student at a preparatory school for Columbia College, and he was showing remarkable promise in mathematics and languages. But he was always fascinated by the sea, and he wanted to become a captain.

#5

Wilkes was eventually promoted to midshipman and sent on a cruise of the Mediterranean with the USS Guerriere. While he did not enjoy the debauchery and drunkenness of his fellow officers, he did not have any enemies or any that he was not in the best of terms with.

#6

Wilkes was assigned to the Franklin for a cruise to the Pacific in 1821. He was about to encounter the ocean he had been dreaming about since he was a young boy.

#7

The Pacific Ocean was a huge ocean that was not yet adequately surveyed and charted. There were hundreds of little-known islands surrounded by reefs of razor-sharp coral. In the absence of a published chart, a captain might rely on a handwritten map given him by a mariner who had recorded his not always trustworthy impressions.

#8

The sea otter population in the Northwest dropped catastrophically due to overhunting, and New England merchants were forced to look elsewhere for trade goods. In the Hawaiian Islands, they found sandalwood, which was prized by the Chinese for making incense and ornamental boxes.

#9

In the 19th century, it was believed that what we now call the Antarctic Peninsula was a group of islands. But two American sealers, John Davis and Christopher Burdick, thought differently, and recorded their suspicions in their logbooks in 1821.

#10

By the mid-1820s, the South Shetlands had been stripped of seals, and commercial interest in the region waned. The question of whether a continent or a group of islands existed to the south would be unresolved for decades to come.

#11

The United States was beginning to expand, and in 1825, President John Quincy Adams proposed a voyage of discovery to explore the Pacific Northwest. Congress refused to fund any of his proposals.

#12

Symmes’s theory of the Holes in the Poles began to gain popularity in the mid- eighteenth century. He traveled by horse and wagon across the states of Kentucky and Ohio to lecture on it, and some even gave him their cautious approval.

#13

Symmes’s theory began to catch on in the United States in the 1820s, and in 1824, Jeremiah N. Reynolds became one of its biggest promoters. He began to develop a different perspective on the theory: instead of exploring the North Pole, he wanted to explore the South Pole.

#14

Charles Wilkes was a lieutenant in the US Navy, and he was very interested in science. He spent time with Jane and her mother, and he took in mathematics, languages, drawing, and science. He would not go back to sea for 15 years.

#15

Wilkes wanted desperately to be a part of the exploring expedition led by Jeremiah Reynolds. His unusual naval career was well suited to such a voyage, but he hadn’t yet established any kind of scientific or naval reputation.

#16

The expedition of 1828 was not successful, as it was met with the opposition of Senator Robert Y. Hayne from South Carolina, who worried that the expedition might encourage the creation of a distant colony.

#17

Wilkes was assigned to a survey of Rhode Island’s Narragansett Bay in 1831. He was very critical of Hassler, his teacher, and suggested that Hassler be required to report to a board of navy and army officers. He was not altogether anxious for Wilkes’s services.

#18

In 1833, Wilkes was ordered to take over the Depot of Charts and Instruments in Washington, which was where the navy’s fifty or so chronometers were tested and maintained. He built a new observatory, just a small box, fourteen by thirteen feet and only ten feet high, with two-foot-wide doors on the roof that could be opened to the sky with a system of pulleys.

#19

When Andrew Jackson came to office in 1829, he began to see the importance of science and exploration to the United States. He could not help but respect a man like Ferdinand Hassler, who was as ornery and determined as himself.

#20

The United States launched an expedition to the Pacific in 1836, led by Jeremiah Reynolds, who had spoken about the mystery lurking to the south in Congress back in 1828. He spoke of the expedition’s civilian corps expanding beyond the naturalist and astronomer who were to have sailed on the voyage in 1828.

#21

The American squadron would have to include at least half a dozen vessels. Assembling a specially equipped squadron of this size would require a great deal of planning and cooperation on the part of the U. S. Navy.

#22

Charles Wilkes, the commander of the expedition, had spent the last four years as the undisputed master of his own private domain at the Depot. He had become personally acquainted with the scientific greats of Europe, and was an honored guest at a Royal Astronomical Society dinner.

#23

The Exploring Expedition was not good in 1837. In June, one of the most talented writers in the country, Nathaniel Hawthorne, was unable to secure a position on the ship because of political infighting.

#24

In May, the American economy fell into chaos, and the U. S. Exploring Expedition, a tenuous enterprise in good economic times, struggled to become a reality. Wilkes was able to complete the survey in two months.

#25

After the survey of Georges Bank, some of Wilkes’s staunchest advocates were the passed midshipmen who had served under him. He had acted as if he were one of them, and they followed him to his next assignment.

#26

The falling out between Charlie and Wilkes occurred when Charlie returned to the navy yard in Boston to pick up his letters after they had been thrown into the river by a passing schooner. Wilkes had suspected that Charlie had taken the opportunity to enjoy himself in Boston, and he punished the boy by whipping his backside with a colt.

#27

The American Expeditionary Force was a vortex of petty personal and professional differences, aggravated by competing political alliances. Only an individual of extraordinary resilience, passion, and determination had any hope of survival.

#28

The Expedition was an embarrassment, and no navy captain wanted to lead it. So Poinsett found an officer willing to consider it: Charles Wilkes.

#29

In 1838, William Reynolds was a midshipman in Washington. He was lonely, and he wanted someone to talk to about what he had seen and read. His two best friends in the service had recently left town, and he was now almost totally without society.

#30

Charles Wilkes was appointed commander of the U. S. Exploring Expedition in April 1838. He was planning to get over a recent love affair by shipping out on the Ex. Ex. He did not want to leave the Porpoise and his young and enthusiastic group of officers, but he had to go to Washington.

#31

Wilkes was offered the command of the expedition, and he accepted it. He was going to lead an expedition that would last at least three years, and his wife was five months pregnant.

#32

The controversy surrounding Wilkes’s appointment as commander of the expedition continued long after the squadron had sailed. The navy’s pride was at stake, and many officers opposed Wilkes.

#33

Wilkes needed to find comma