Messages from the Sea: Letters and Notes from a Lost Era Found in Bottles and on Beaches Around the World

by Paul Brown

Messages from the Sea is a collection of letters and notes found washed ashore on beaches and bobbing in water, in corked bottles and wax-sealed boxes, carved onto wreckage and in the bellies of sharks. They tell of foundering ships, missing ocean liners and shipwrecked sailors, and contain moving farewells, romantic declarations and intriguing confessions. Some solve the mysteries of lost vessels and crews, while others create new mysteries yet to be solved. Dating from a lost era of seafaring, they demonstrate the brave, lonely and fragile nature of life on the ocean waves. Included among these 100 messages a clue to the fate of the missing White Star liner Naronic; a murder confession found in a bottle off the White Cliffs of Dover; an update from John Franklin’s lost Arctic expedition; a poem about a newborn baby found inside an 11ft shark; an unlikely apology from fleeing fraudster Violet Charlesworth; evidence for the unnecessary loss of the steamship London with 220 souls; the truth behind the mysterious grave robbery of the Earl of Crawford; and a message from the deck of the sinking Titanic.

Genres: Nonfiction

200 pages, Paperback

Published August 31, 2016

About the author

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Reviews

[my.bookshelf.87 · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fascinating book for anyone with an interest of all things nautical!

This is a compilation of various messages in bottles found washed up on the shore between the 1800s and early 1900s. Not just pleas for rescue but also suicide notes, confessions of murder and sometimes just for fun. I liked that there were lots of footnotes too with explanations to what happened after the notes were found.

[Monkleton · Rating 3 out of 5]

A lovely little book, but it didn't really need the Basil Exposition bits, as it felt like padding. I personally would have preferred more messages. But a nice quick read.

[Jan · Rating 3 out of 5]

Some were sad and some were simply hoaxes.

I thought this was going to be more entertaining that it actually turned out to be.

Quick read anyway.

[Sara Donaldson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Messages from the Sea is a wonderful little book. Snippets taken from newspapers around the world lead us into the lives, and deaths, of seafaring men and women from a lost era. Their stories are captured in a way that leaves more questions than answers, although Paul does give us some answers along the way. From salutations thrown overboard to heartrending final messages, this book brings home the grim reality of sea travel before the days of radio contact. It leaves you wondering, did any of these poor souls actually get home, or was their fate as they saw it … to be consigned to the deep.

It’s a book I know I will be dipping into again even though I have read it from cover to cover.

(bought direct from the publisher as no. 29/100 of a limited hardcover edition)