"A couple of years ago, I stumbled across a most unusual story from the annals of old San Francisco. It concerned a 19-year-old woman named Mary Ann Patten who spent two months captaining a 216-foot-long clipper ship after her husband fell deathly ill during an around-the-world journey. In that time, Patten squashed an on-board mutiny, won the loyalty of the crew and kept her husband alive. The kicker? She did all of this while pregnant with her first child."
"But there was clearly so much more to her story to tell. This month, New York Times bestselling author Tilar J. Mazzeo is honoring Patten with an entire book. The Sea Captain's Wife: A True Story of Mutiny, Love, and Adventure at the Bottom of the World brings Patten's story to vivid life and makes clear just how much terror and tribulation were involved in her remarkable journey."
"At times, The Sea Captain's Wife plays out like a good, old-fashioned, around-the-world adventure. The "forest of masts" at San Francisco's Gold Rush-clogged shoreline. The floating, lamplit brothel boats that greeted Neptune's Car in Hong Kong. The teeming warehouses of London's docklands. The gardens and church steeples of New York City. Mazzeo describes each new city in ways that transport the reader back to the place, era and, frankly, the smells."
Mary Ann Patten assumed command of a 216-foot clipper during an around-the-world voyage when her husband became gravely ill, leading the ship for two months while pregnant. She suppressed an on-board mutiny, secured the crew's loyalty, and maintained her husband's survival under extreme conditions. Seafaring life in the mid-19th century included crowded Gold Rush harbors, lamplit brothel boats in Hong Kong, teeming London docklands, and distinct urban smells and sights. Maritime hierarchies, navigation tools, shipping politics, and brutal hardships shaped voyages and crew behavior during long ocean passages.
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