Reviews Brutality on Trial: "Hellfire" Pedersen, "Fighting" Hansen, and the Seamen's Act of1915 by E. Kay Gibson (Universiry Press of Florida, Gainesville, FL, 225pp, photos, notes, appen, biblio, index, ISBN 978-08130-2991-7; $34.95hc) Many authors have commented on the difficulry of understanding historical protagonists "against the canvas of [their] own times." Modern readers, for instance, can hardl y understand why sailors accepted mental and physical cruelry without objection. We cannot fathom a situation in which, under law, an uprising against ill-treatment could only be mutiny and taking a ship away from abusive officers could only be piracy. "The Red Record," compiled in the 1890s, was an unusual public acknowledgm ent of brutaliry endured by seamen under sail, yet, even today, its existence is largely apocryphal. Few copies survive and they are by no m eans easy to access. Author E. Kay G ibso n has performed a valuable service by reviewing events aboard one of the worst "hell ships," the four-masted barkentine Puako, and the successful prosecution of her master, Adolph "Hellfire" Pedersen , and three other employees of Hind, Rolph & Co . of San Francisco, under the provisions of the Seamen's Act of 1915 . Before the passage of the Seamen's Act, sailors had no option but to endure abuse-even when shipmates were driven overboard in desperation, even when a man was beaten blind and yet returned aloft, using little but the touch of his hands and feet upon fam iliar rigging. 1he Seamen's Act differed from all previous legislation by linking responsibiliry for abuse, not on ly to captains and officers, but also to shipowners, who could be made fin ancially liable for their employees' wrongdoing. Brutality on Trial is a damning account of brutal conditions in the confined space aboard ship and also a reco rd of how this 1915 law finally began to balance the distribution of power aboard vessels at sea. ROBERT LLYOD WEBB
Phippsburg, Maine SEA HISTORY 119, SUMMER 2007
The Sack of Panama: Captain Morgan and the Battle for the Caribbean by Peter Earle (St. Martin's Press, New York, 2007, 292pp, maps, notes, biblio, index, ISBN13: 978-0-312-36142-6; $25.95hc) Disclaimer: I have grown weary of books about pirates . What part of piracy in the Caribbean have we fai led to cover that warrants yet another publi cation ? We've looked at their codes of conduct, their demographics, their methods, the archaeology of pirates, the economy of piracy, the politics that fed it and ultimately quashed it, and how we have misunderstood them. Without a doubt, the populari ry of the subject is huge and growing still, thanks in part to a few Hollywood movies and heaps of paraphenalia to inspire th e boys and girls of the next generation to keep it going. Why then wo uld I choose to read Professor Peter Earle's US release of The Sack ofPanama? Once I discovered, way back when, that the Captain Morgan on the rum bottle was a real historic figure, I felt motivated to find out what he did to warrant such immortalization. I learned the basic facts and read the discussions of whether he was technically a pirate or a privateer, which depends a lot, of course, on whose side is telling the story. What I like about Earle's book is that he uses solid research and good storytelling to put Morgan in context with the perpetual volleying berween Spain and England in the Caribbean in the second half of the seventeeth century. Morgan's famous raid against Panama in 1671 is covered in detail, details so horrid they instantly wipe out any sense of romanticism we might harbor for the swashbucklers. Using letters and reports, including a thorough examination of Spanish records and documents, Earle provides a view of the events from both sides. The Sack of Panama analyzes the poli ci tal scene, allowing us to understand how and why the environment was ripe for the attack and how it was that Morgan, sent to England after
the raid in chai ns for violating a treary berween Spain and England, returned to Jamaica, having been knighted and made lieutenant governor. A swashbuckling tale it is, and, yes, another book about pirates, but it is certainly a worthy read if most of what yo u know is the general picture pun ctuated by the usual suspects . DEIRDRE O'REGAN
Cape Cod, Massachusetts
Uriah Levy: Reformer ofthe Antebellum Navy by Ira Dye (Universiry Press of Florida, Ga inesville, FL, 2006, 299pp, illus, biblio, notes, index, ISB N 0-81 30-3004-8; $59.95 hc) According to G. B. Shaw, "The reasonable man adapts himself to the world; the unreasonable one persists in trying ro adapt the world to himself. Therefo re, all progress depends on the unreaso nable man." Commodore Urial1 Levy was a protorypical "unreasonable man" who changed the United States Navy and conceivably nineteenth-century American sociery. Ira Dye, in his well-written chronicle of this very human and often Aawed character, drew upon a vast co llection of sources. H e has written an authoritative biograp hy of Uriah Levy, a complex som etimes-arrogant man, a six times courtmartialed unpopular officer who obtained his commission through the "hawse pipe" as a former sailing master and became the first Jewish-Am erican flag officer. In his career, Levy fought religious bigotry and the cruelry of the navy's corporal punishm ent policy, while becoming a financially successful real estate entrepreneur. H e also helped create Thomas Jefferso n as an American icon and preserved Monticello. Dye meticulously researched Levy's life, but, at tim es, the text is repetitious and co ntains surprising errors, such as 47