The Wreck of the Wager

In 1741, amidst the treacherous waters of Cape Horn, on the southernmost tip of South America, the British warship HMS Wager pushed through a violent storm, hoping to carry out a mission against the Spanish to alleviate them of one it’s trade ships, enriched with gold and silver, and bring the bounty home to England. It was a time of great pomp amongst the British Navy, whose continual wars with the Spanish were prompting the great rise of British Sea Power. Surely nothing could possibly go wrong. Years later, the same men sent out to fight the Spanish, were arriving back on English shores, after making a perilous escape attempt from a deserted island, following a harrowing ordeal of starvation, disease, and mutiny and murder. Far from the great victory that the admiralty had imagined, it had instead turned into a nightmarish tale of human endurance in the face of the bleakest of situations. SOURCES Grann, David (2023) The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny & Murder. Simon & Schuster Ltd. NY, USA. Marshall, P. J. (1998) Rodger, N. A. M., 'Sea-Power and Empire, 1688–1793 in The Oxford History of the British Empire: Volume II: The Eighteenth Century. Oxford University Press. Oxford, UK. River Editors, Charles (2016) The HMS Wager: The History of the 18th Century’s Most Famous Shipwreck and Mutiny. Createspace Independent Publishing. USA. Bulkeley, John & Cummins, John (1757) A voyage to the South Seas. Jacob Robinson, London, UK. Byron, John (1768) Narrative of the Hon. John Byron; Being an Account of the Shipwreck of The Wager; and the Subsequent Adventures of Her Crew. London, UK. ------- This episode is sponsored by BetterHelp, check out betterhelp.com/darkhistories to get 10% off your first month.   ------- For almost anything, head over to the podcasts hub at darkhistories.com Support the show by using our link when you sign up to Audible: http://audibletrial.com/darkhistories or visit our Patreon for bonus episodes and Early Access: https://www.patreon.com/darkhistories The Dark Histories books are available to buy here: http://author.to/darkhistories Dark Histories merch is available here: https://bit.ly/3GChjk9 Connect with us on Facebook: http://facebook.com/darkhistoriespodcast Or find us on Twitter: http://twitter.com/darkhistories & Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/dark_histories/ Or you can contact us directly via email at [email protected] or join our Discord community: https://discord.gg/cmGcBFf The Dark Histories Butterfly was drawn by Courtney, who you can find on Instagram @bewildereye Music was recorded by me © Ben Cutmore 2017 Other Outro music was Paul Whiteman & his orchestra with Mildred Bailey - All of me (1931). It's out of copyright now, but if you're interested, that was that.       Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices