The Golden Ocean

Plot summary

In spring 1740, Peter Palafox, his friend Sean O’Mara and Sean’s uncle Liam are riding from Connaught to Cork so that Peter can join the Royal Navy as a midshipman. Sean decides to join, too, so Liam will take the horses back home. They meet Peregrine FitzGerald at the market fair, another boy heading for HMS Centurion. Both lose their money. FitzGerald meets Lord Culmore who loans him ten guineas, solving their money problems. They meet the brig Mary Rose, at Cove of Cork and reach HMS Centurion at Spithead on time. Peter is wearing all his best clothes, including a green stone given to him as a “luck giver”. On board Peter learns he must have a sea chest and a uniform. Mr Walter, the chaplain, recognizes the emerald pinned to his neck cloth, which can supply all that Peter needs. The emerald from a Spanish ship of the Armada now helps Peter as England fights Spain. Peter likes the ship HMS Centurion, but takes time to be at ease with naval discipline. Peter knows the Irish names for the parts of a ship, but not yet the English names. At dinner with Commodore Anson he meets officers on his ship and others in the squadron. Neighbor to Peter is Captain Callis, a man who loved Peter’s mother long ago and lost her to Peter’s father. Anson remarks on the terrible decision by the Admiralty to include the Chelsea pensioners (500 infirm sailors) as part of his crew.

Peter tells the chaplain that he knows the ship’s destination, to the golden ocean, the Pacific, to fight the Spanish. Anson is disappointed that his secret mission is common knowledge on the Irish coast. Common knowledge also knows that the Spanish have a squadron of the same number of ships, under Pizarro. The true voyage begins, after the squadron escorts merchant ships heading east. Six weeks of contrary winds keep them in the English Channel, long enough for the landsman to be used to the sea. FitzGerald, wounded in his fight with Ransome, is now ready for duty, assigned to a watch. When sent to the topmast, FitzGerald can barely do it. Ransome helps him down, so FitzGerald apologizes to him. Peter is at home up on the masts, with no fear of heights or the motion of the ship. At Funchal in Madeira in November, FitzGerald returns to England, carrying a letter from Peter to his father, and many gifts for his siblings. Mr Elliot, midshipman, teaches Peter the trigonometry, by the example of a stick of known height and its shadow, a tree whose shadow is paced out, thus the height of the tree is calculated; Peter understands it and succeeds in his classes on board. Before the equator, Peter gets a delirious fever, lasting until they land at Saint Catherine’s island off Brazil, where they stay past Christmas. Many die of tropical diseases. Mr Ransome is friendlier with him, but still calls him Teague, an insulting name for an Irish boy. Rounding Cape Horn is fierce. They meet with high winds, thick fog, bitter cold and storms, naming several rendezvous points in the Pacific. Pearl rejoins after having fallen in with five Spanish ships, the fleet Peter described to Anson. In March 1741, they reach 52 degrees 32 minutes south. Peter is glad for the warm clothes from FitzGerald. None agree on the longitude in waters uncharted by the English. Peter's ribs are broken from a rope that froze in this cold, windy weather; he feels lucky he was not tossed into the sea like so many others. Mr Elliot is taken by the scurvy in April, a sore loss to Peter, just after they lose Pearl and Severn.

Centurion, Gloucester, Wager, Tryal and the pink Anna think they are west enough to turn north. Hopelessness pervades. Commodore Anson appears to be made of “iron and oak”, a little more affable the worse the weather gets. Sean is captain of the foretop, as he performs well, being sure-footed and brave with frozen sails and ropes. Centurion reaches Juan Fernandez, staying there a few months to fix ships and heal the men with good food there. Peter spends a second birthday as a midshipman, having learned the tone of authority and grown out of his best clothes. Peter computes the losses of crew on Centurion, Gloucester and Tryal since leaving England: 961 sailed out, 626 dead after reaching Juan Fernandez. Tryal takes a prize, a Spanish merchant ship, which vessel replaces the damaged Tryal. Spanish passengers are well-treated, a wise move. Wager never makes this rendezvous. Reduced squadron sails north, reaching Paita. Centurion and Tryal crews take the town, made easier by the fear of the locals, who flee on seeing them. An Irishman living there tells Peter where the huge merchant treasure is. They take the ship with the merchant treasure, truly great wealth. All the crew become experts on the rules of sharing prizes, happy with the share they will see. They keep sailing north, aiming for the Acapulco Galleon, which sails between Manila and Acapulco with treasure. Missing the galleon, the Commodore sails west to Manila. Storm damaged Gloucester is burned at sea, and her crew taken aboard Centurion, the only ship of the squadron now.

Centurion stops at Tinian Island in September 1742. Peter is carried ashore. His health is improved by the fresh food. Centurion sails to Macau, next to Canton, to refit the ship. Peter spends two years of pay in less than a month. They lose Mr Walter and some officers, who take a merchant ship on the well-travelled route back to England, to report progress and carry mail and gifts home. Refit and rested, Centurion is homeward bound. Commodore Anson, once at sea, informs the crew of 227 that they will try again for the Acapulco Galleon, before she reaches Manila. Sailing east, Centurion waits for the galleon, engaging her in close battle on June 20, 1743, taking her and her cargo of silver and gold. Mr Saumarez sails the prize and both ships stopped in Macau to transfer the treasure to Centurion. Sean is promoted to bosun’s mate, guarding the treasure aboard the prize and Centurion for the year’s voyage home. Truly homeward bound, they put in at Prince’s Island, Cape Town (gaining Dutch seamen), speeding to England through a fog in the Channel where they pass unseen French ships, now at war with England. Peter and Sean are paid their shares of the prizes. Peter gives his father the good round sum of 1,000 pounds, which will double his yearly income. All of his family is on the lookout for him, for a joyous reunion after four years away.

Characters

Ships

Anson's squadron

Spanish

Reviews

Reviews collected were written in 1994 when W. W. Norton republished the 1956 novel, and more than half of the Aubrey-Maturin series novels had been published. Reviewers viewed the novel as it stood and in contrast to the author's later level of accomplishments in that series.

Publishers Weekly, writing in 1994, says this first sea novel by O'Brian "can stand on its own as an entertaining and psychologically astute narrative".

Originally published in 1956, this is O'Brian's first novel of the sea. But it is more than just a curiosity from the author of the 16 wonderful Aubrey/Maturin books, most recently The Wine-Dark Sea; it can stand on its own as an entertaining and psychologically astute narrative. Based on British Commodore George Anson's four-year circumnavigation that began in 1740, the book focuses on young midshipman Peter Palafox. A younger son of a poor Irish parson, Peter is sweet-natured, impetuous and innocent (though well educated: he knows English, Irish, Latin and Greek). Much of the narrative follows his evolution into a capable seaman with a talent for leadership and--after the capture of large sums of Spanish gold and silver--into a rich man. This early work has practically all the naval lore and sense of place that grace the Aubrey/Maturin books; the scenes in China are particular standouts. Shipboard life rings true, the story never flags and humor abounds: "Well, he is a wonderful poacher for a Protestant," observes one Anglo-Irishman. O'Brian says he wrote the book in about six weeks, "laughing most of the time," and one believes him. Though the splendid characters of Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin are absent, fans will gladly use this story to fill the time til the next episode of their adventures. (Apr.)

Kirkus Reviews finds this novel not a mature work:

An early novel by the author of the popular seafaring series starring Capt. Jack Aubrey and ship's surgeon Stephen Maturin (The Wine-Dark Sea, 1993; The Truelove, 1992, etc.). Originally published in the U.S. in 1956, the story features young midshipman Peter Palafox, who ships out in 1740 on the Centurion with Baron Anson for a four-year circumnavigation of the globe. Not a mature piece of work, but appealing enough to satisfy fans of O'Brian's naval sagas.

Tom Clark writing in the Los Angeles Times says that "evidently in keeping with an aim of appealing to a younger audience, the darker aspects of the crew's experience are played down in favor of a robust and exhilarating rendering of the great adventure of it all." It is a first sea novel with a young boy as the main character, but "if there's any character in The Golden Ocean with heavyweight potential, it's the sea itself, whose power as a kind of fate is rendered with the Conradian force that shows where O'Brian was headed as a narrative writer." Clark notes that "At least two of those accounts, those of Anson's chaplain, Richard Walter, and of a young Irish midshipman, John Philips, appear to have supplied O'Brian much of what he needed to paint with charming pictorial realism the life both above and below decks on Anson's flagship Centurion."

Related novels by O'Brian and contrasts to them

The same expedition is described from the perspective of two on one of the ships in the squadron that did not make it around the globe in O'Brian's The Unknown Shore. It focusses on the ship HMS Wager and different main characters, including John Byron, then a midshipman, age 18.

Mr Walter the chaplain wrote his own account of the voyage of Anson, noted by Clark (above) as one of O'Brian's historical sources for this novel and the interactions among the officers and crew. An original copy was at auction in 2009.

In 1969, O'Brian published Master and Commander, the first book in a 20 novel series, known as the Aubrey-Maturin series. It is set in the Napoleonic Wars, begins in 1800, and features a pair of men who become the closest of friends, Captain Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin, physician and natural philosopher. In Post Captain, the second novel of the series, Aubrey recalls Anson, and asks Maturin if he has read Anson's book. Maturin has, but finds Anson's journey wasteful, as Anson noted nothing of the natural world that he saw on the journey. Aubrey is impressed that Anson made the journey and succeeded in it. The Royal Navy has changed since Anson's voyage, as have the politics of the world, with the thirteen British colonies in North America now the nation of the United States of America, the War of the Austrian Succession over, including the exit of France from nearly all its North American colonies, the French Revolution in the past, and the Irish Rebellion of 1798 also a past event. The Royal Navy and physicians have learned the need for fresh food and citrus to combat scurvy, a disease which killed so many in Anson's squadron, before this connection was made between scurvy and fresh food. The Napoleonic Wars endured so long, that they make a broad canvas of history against which the author sets the lives of his main characters, still keeping a sharp eye to historical detail and period language, which is a different structure than The Golden Ocean, which tells the tale of one long and daring voyage. In one sense, O'Brian views the long eighteenth century as the setting of his works, putting this novel in the same time period as the later series, while technically happening in two different centuries, the 18th and the 19th. They are both set in the Age of Sail, an even longer period of time than the long eighteenth century.

Allusions to history and real places

The story is based on a real event, George Anson's voyage around the world that began in 1740. Places named in Ireland, England, Madeira, the Pacific coast of South America, Manila, Macau and Canton in China are real, including St. Catherine's Island off Brazil at 24 degrees South latitude, shown on this map.

The Spanish galleon Nuestra Señora de la Covadonga, after the battle, was sold at Macau and the treasure transferred to Centurion, which proceeded to England after a brief rest, arriving there in June 1744.

Narrative point of view

This novel was aimed at younger readers, as well as adults, and takes the viewpoint of a new midshipman joining the Royal Navy on HMS Centurion in 1740 on this voyage. The boy is on the one ship that makes the entire voyage, and he is one of the survivors. Seen by the midshipman Peter Palafox, the sense of the adventure is depicted, as he sees the world and learns the discipline, hardships and rewards of the Royal Navy. The hardships of the voyage are not dismissed, with counts of the deaths from scurvy, whose cure was not yet understood, and the problems of navigation without the precise knowledge of location gained by chronometers to measure longitude, depicted in detail.

Publication history

List of editions, except for first one in 1954, from Fantastic Fiction and Amazon for the e-book information.

Rupert Hart-Davis published many of O'Brian's works, including translations (e.g., Papillon and Banco: The Further Advancement of Papillon in 1970 and 1973), The Road to Samarcand, The Golden Ocean, The Unknown Shore and short stories from 1953 to 1974.