In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex

While many know the story of the sinking of the Titanic, fewer have heard the story of the Essex, a whaling ship that was sunk after being repeatedly rammed by an enormous whale during a whaling expedition in 1820. At one time, however, the story of the Essex was the most famous story of maritime tragedy in the United States, even inspiring certain aspects of Herman Melville’s novel Moby-Dick. Nathaniel Philbrick’s account of the journey of the Essex in In the Heart of the Sea attempts to carry on its legacy for new generations. Philbrick’s narrative draws on several first-person accounts, one of which—from a 14-year-old cabin boy named Thomas Nickerson—was unavailable to the public until 1984. This study guide uses the 2000 Penguin Random House edition of In the Heart of the Sea: The Tragedy of the Whaleship Essex.

Content Warning: The source material contains extensive discussion of survival cannibalism as well as violence against animals.

Summary

Weighing in at 238 tons and measuring 87 feet in length, The Essex set sail from the Massachusetts island of Nantucket in August 1819 to hunt whales in the Pacific Ocean. The book begins with a discussion of various aspects of Nantucket’s history, explaining just how the island grew to be such a major player in the whaling industry. The island’s white settlers, who arrived in the mid-17th century, initially developed an agricultural economy. However, once it was realized that whale blubber could be converted into oil, the economy shifted to focus on the whales that regularly migrated through Nantucket harbor. Whale hunting became a way of life among those in Nantucket; children trained to hunt whales from an early age. As the whaling industry grew larger, Nantucketers, who were also largely members of the Quaker religion, came to form an insulated community, preferring to work only with other islanders. Meanwhile, the eradication of the whale population in and around Nantucket harbor forced Nantucketers to travel farther and farther in pursuit of whales. At the time the Essex set sail, whaling ships were not expected to return home for at least two years. The great risk of setting off on a whaling expedition was returning home without enough product to generate a profit.

The majority of the crew aboard the Essex were native Nantucketers, including the ship’s captain, George Pollard, and first mate, Owen Chase. The latter’s memoirs (along with those of Nickerson) serve as one of the primary sources Philbrick used in researching his book. Also among the crew were some men from the mainland, including several African Americans. Although most whaling expeditions were crewed exclusively of Nantucket natives, the Essex was setting out late in the season with a freshly minted captain, so she had to settle for those who were available, many of whom had little prior experience serving on whaling expeditions. The ship was heavily segregated, with Nantucketers, especially higher-ranking ones, receiving much better living accommodations and much better monetary compensation for the journey.

As Philbrick tells the story, the voyage of the Essex was fraught with misfortune and poor decision-making from the start. Not long after leaving the harbor, Captain Pollard failed to take necessary precautions to brace for an approaching storm: The ship was nearly overturned by the wind, and the storm took out all but three of the ship’s whaleboats while causing great structural damage to the Essex itself. Rather than return for materials to repair the ship properly, Captain Pollard decided to make do with materials available on the ship, fearing that a return to Nantucket harbor would prompt many of the crew members to abandon the mission.

The Essex sailed on toward the Pacific Ocean. Several months passed without the crew sighting a single whale. The crew set a course for a region known as the Offshore Ground, a breeding spot for whales located many thousands of miles away from land. It was, in late November of 1820, that a sperm whale rammed into the Essex, sinking the ship. The crew split up into three small whaling boats captained by Pollard, Chase, and second mate Matthew Joy. They then headed toward South America in search of food and shelter.

Over the next three months, the survivors would endure countless storms and more attacks on their boats—once by a killer whale, and another by a shark. Roughly a month into the journey, they happened across a deserted island (Henderson Island) and refreshed their store of water. The island lacked the resources to truly replenish their supplies, but three of the crew nevertheless elected to remain behind while the others resumed their voyage. Within a couple of weeks of leaving the island, crewmembers had started to die and Chase’s boat had become separated from the other two. Shortly after this—approximately two months after the wreck—the survivors of all three boats began to resort to cannibalizing the dead. Pollard’s boat and Joy’s (now captained by Hendricks) eventually drifted apart as well; although those who remained in Pollard’s and Chase’s boats would be (separately) rescued by late February, everyone in the third boat disappeared and was presumed dead.

Following the rescue of Pollard and Chase’s crews, a rescue mission was dispatched to Henderson and the three crewmembers who had remained there were recovered, bringing the total number of survivors to eight. These men eventually made their way back to Nantucket after a span of almost three years’ time. For the most part, they reintegrated into society; Chase eventually became the captain of a whaling ship, and Pollard—following another disastrous voyage—became Nantucket’s night watchman. Over the next few decades, the whaling industry in Nantucket declined, though by the end of the 19th century, the island had experienced a revival as a tourist destination.