Awards

• Joint winner for John Lyman Book Award: US Maritime History 2007.
• Joint winner of John Lyman Book Award 2008 (United States)

Overview

Nor'easters, blizzards, and hurricanes. Spanish galleons, German U-boats, and presidential yachts. Pirates and privateers. The ephemeral and deadly nature of islands, dunes, inlets, and shoals. The history of the Delmarva Peninsula's Atlantic coast is rich with tales of fantasy and adventure, heroism and tragedy, greed and charity. Claiming more than 2,300 vessels since 1632, it rivals North Carolina's Outer Banks for the infamous title ""The Graveyard of the Atlantic."" Maritime historian Donald G. Shomette brings these stories to life. Featuring the accounts of twenty-five ill-starred vessels-some notorious and some forgotten until now-this anthology provides a fascinating history of a local maritime culture and charts how the catastrophic events along this shore significantly affected U.S. merchant shipping as a whole. Shomette weaves together history, folklore, and legend in accounts of the tragic loss of the 1750 Spanish treasure fleet, the British blockade of the Delaware in the American Revolution, the depredations of Confederate commerce raiders during the Civil War, the Billy Mitchell affair, the Hurricane of 1933, and the Nazi U-boat offensive of World War II. His appendix provides a complete catalog of all 2,300 recorded wrecks, including coordinates and location descriptions where available. A vivid montage of seafaring adventures and pivotal events in American history, this volume makes an essential contribution to the library of the history buff, wreck diver, and local adventurer.

Full Product Details

9780801886706

Table of Contents

Reviews

<p>This book is an extremely valuable contribution that further raises the author's status as a premier historian of the maritime traditions of the Chesapeake region.--Brian J. Cudahy Steamboat Bill (01/01/0001)

Each relatively brief chapter is an intelligent, stand-alone story making it a good traveling companion... Shomette does an admirable job of stripping away layers of myth grown up around some events. -- Susan B. M. Langley Nautical Research Journal 2008 Solidly researched and vividly told, this book is a wonderful read. -- Michael F. Dove Northern Mariner 2008 [Shomette] serves up yet another inspired volume... a well-produced, painstakingly researched, and wonderfully written work of enormous value. Choice 2008 Shipwrecks, Sea Raiders, and Maritime Disasters is well written and interesting... provides invaluable research information. -- Cindy Vallar Pirates and Privateers 2009 This book is an extremely valuable contribution that further raises the author's status as a premier historian of the maritime traditions of the Chesapeake region. -- Brian J. Cudahy Steamboat Bill 2009 Shipwrecks, Sea Raiders, and Maritime Disasters is an impressive, well-researched volume that will be of value both to those interested in the maritime history of the east coast of the US and those who simply find tales of disaster at sea fascinating. -- Gregory D. Cook International Journal of Maritime History 2008 For those interested in details of shipwrecks along the Eastern seaboard, this is an indispensable book. -- Rick Sauer Blue and Gray Magazine 2008 Well written and filled with details and facts that bring the story of the campaign to life. -- James Greathouse Nautical Research Journal 2010

Shipwrecks, Sea Raiders, and Maritime Disasters is well written and interesting... provides invaluable research information. -- Cindy Vallar, Pirates and Privateers

Author Information

Donald G. Shomette is a marine archeologist and cultural resource manager in Dunkirk, Maryland. He is the author of many books, including Maritime Alexandria: The Rise and Fall of an American Entrepot; Lost Towns of Tidewater Maryland; Ghost Fleet of Mallows Bay and Other Tales of the Lost Chesapeake; and Pirates on the Chesapeake: Being a True History of Pirates, Picaroons, and Raiders on Chesapeake Bay, 1610-1807.

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