Reviews Seaman Garneray: Voyages, Aventures et Combats, translated by Roland Wilson (Argyll Publishing, Argyll, Sco tland, 2003, 285 pp, maps, illus, gloss, margin no tes, ISBN 1-90283 1-63-2; $38 he) Those of us who aren't multilingual scholars rarely get to read "the good stuff'' -histories from the other sidebecause foreig n language acco unts can sometimes prove an insurmountable barrier. Furthermore, naval histories we re ge nerally written by the victors and those possessing the prerequisite literary skills to reco rd their versions of an event o r time. The result? A skewed representation of our past, which often neglects the view from the lower ranks-on a ship, this means the fo'c'sle.
Seaman
Garneray
is therefore a real treat. Roland Wilson delivers a wonderfully readable translation of seaman Louis Garneray's account-often tragic, often humorous-of his service in the Republican Navy. Born in Paris in 1783 to a pai nter of some renown, Garneray was expected to take up his father's craft. Seduced by the potential for adventure, fame, and fortune made possible by a life at sea, the young Garneray signed onboard a warship as an "apprentice seam an" at age 13. (Ultimately, his naval service only delayed his career as an arrisr.) Ga rneray's narrative is ch arming and candid in its portrayal of life as a yo ung green hand : storms, combat at sea, failure of French battle tactics, the questionable value of his nation's allies, and the beginning of his artistic career. In the co urse of his adve ntures, Garneray served aboard military and privateering vessels. In the latte r capacity, he served under the famous privateer captain Robert Surco uf in the Indian Ocean and was captured in 1806. H e survived the next eight years aboa rd prison hulks in Portsmouth. While the acco unts of ship-to-ship combat are exciting, the true gem s of Wilso n's translation are the reoccurring observati o ns of everyday experiences aboard
SEA HISTORY l l 0, SPRING 2005
ship. Works about life in the French Napoleonic Navy are so few that Garneray's account is that much more valuable. Wilson provides annotations and battle diagrams in the margins to assist the reader. Of great value is Wilson's "Introduction" placing Garneray in context with the time and place. Reading but a segment of his life, one wants to know more about him. Why didn't he rry to publish his memoir? Wilson conjectures: "One reason may well have been the demands of his painting and engraving career. By the 1830s seascapes had become popular and Garneray's work was recognized. He had a full-time job (1832-37) running the Rouen Museum." A minor distraction, and perhaps unavoidable in translation, is the spouting of English slang by 18th- and 19th- century French nationals. On his deathbed, Garneray's friend utters: "By Jove Louis, hey lad and me that had so many things and taradiddles to tell you." Mon Dieu.
Seaman Garneray: Voyages, Aventures et Combats is an entertaining and instructive read that leaves one wishing Garneray had written more or that a volume two was in the works. P ETER SORENSEN
Old Mystic, Co nnecticut
End of Voyages: The Afterlife of a Ship, by Michael Stammers (Tempus Publishing Ltd., Brimscombe Port, Gloucestershire, 2004, 189pp, illus, photos, biblio, index, ISBN 0-7524-2999-X; fl7 .99pb) What occurs at the end of a ship's useful life is not a topic often addressed in historical or archaeological literature. Indeed, such a topic is not one many of us consider, other than tales of maritime mishaps and catastrophic shipwreck events so central to m ari time history. As Stammers explains in End of Voyages: The Afterlife ofa Ship, many wa tercraft come to fulfill a great variety of special fun ctions following yea rs of service-the life of a ship can end in many ways. With
this theme, this work is probably the first extensive publication dedicated to the theme of the "hereafter of a ship." While this subject may seem a little obscure, the research provides a missing piece of a largely-forgotten aspect of maritime history. The co re of Stam mers's research focuses o n the many fates of wa tercraft th at plied the wate rways of human hisrory over the last few millennia. Over innumerab le centuries, an incalculable number of vessels were scrapped, left to rot, or restored to former glory as museum ships. Many ships were converted into unremarkab le support vessels (s uch as barges and lighters) or transformed into almost freakish reflections of their pas t form and function. This includes the conve rsion of unwanted vessels into a number of curious creations such as floating orphanages, churches, homes, nightclubs, and theaters, to name a few. Then, there were the vessels used as hulks for storage of goods (s uch as coal, grain , and gunpowder), as foundations of infrastructure (sheers hulks used as crane mounts) , and as repositories for human cargos. This last category is a particularly engross in g aspect of Stammers's research , which focused on the role of hulks in public scandal and moral reform during the convict ship era with the use of unwanted watercraft as reformatories for children. Stammers's research makes extensive use of archaeological literature, drawing together many classic stories of reutilizatio n of watercraft; the transformation of the ship Niantic into a warehouse following its abandonm ent in San Francisco during the Gold Rush is o ne example. Indeed, while the book mostl y focuses on the British Isles, it cites many examples of historical and archaeo logical research from aro und the globe, including N igeria, So uth Africa, Australi a, and the United States. End of Voyages also includes many general discussions related to its core subject matter. Pivotal to the book's focus is dialogue co ncern ing the emotional attachm ent that people have with boats, as well as
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