Pursuing the Leviathan

""An exciting story of mutiny and murder, well told by a meticulous researcher.""—Joan Druett, author of Island of the Lost""Few people understand the difficulty in finding information on the importance of whaling and then producing it in such an interesting book. Pursuit of the Leviathan, is a unique tale that reads like a novel about Benjamin Clough’s life and his single handedly saving of the whaleship Sharon, beset by a rare mutiny.""—Skip Finley, author of Whaling Captains of Color ""There have been historical studies of the whaling industry, of whaling voyages, of whalemen as a class, and of the women they left behind. There have been a handful of whaling captains' memoirs, mostly from the last, Arctic-centered years of the industry. Paul Magid gives us something we have never had before: A full-length study of a whaleman's life in the mid-nineteenth-century Golden Age of offshore whaling. And what a life it is! A young man leaves Maine for Massachusetts seeking adventure; rises through the ranks of a dangerous business; becomes the swashbuckling hero of a brutal mutiny; finds wealth, fame, and love; and retires as a respected citizen of his adopted hometown. Magid chronicles Ben Clough's extraordinary career with a historian's careful attention to time and place, and a novelist's sharp eye for detail. It is both an important contribution to American maritime history, and an engrossing tale, well told.""—A. Bowdoin Van Riper, research librarian, Martha's Vineyard Museum In 1835 when 16-year-old Benjamin Clough left the family farm in Monmouth Maine to sign on a whaleship as a foremast hand it is unlikely he imagined he would be at sea, with some brief interruptions, until 1867. For 22 of these years, he served as Captain of 5 separate vessels. Based on Clough’s journals, Paul Magid carefully recounts those years and Clough’s life after “swallowing the anchor” on Martha’s Vineyard. The dangers, drudgery, boredom, and opportunities for advancement and economic success which the farm boy from Maine experienced, including his role in retaking his ship after a mutiny, offer a personal look into the realities of life at sea on a 19th century whaleship. —Matthew Stackpole, former executive director, Martha's Vineyard Museum