"Captain's Dinner" | Reviewed by William Winkler

In May 1884 the Mignonette, a 52-two-foot yacht, set sail from England to be delivered to its new owner in Australia. Many thought the Mignonette was too frail a vessel to withstand the seas it would encounter in its 122-day voyage to Sydney. Nevertheless, the ship was manned by a captain with extensive seafaring experience, two mates with similar backgrounds, and a 17-year-old cabin boy.

Several weeks into the journey the ship encountered heavy seas in the south Atlantic, suffered extensive damage, and was lost. The 4-man crew escaped into the lifeboat, a 13-foot dinghy. In the rush to escape the sinking yacht the captain attempted to save as much of the food and water as he could, yet the speed of the vessel’s sinking limited his ability to do so.

Sixteen days after the loss of the yacht, the food and water had run out and the four sailors in the yacht were growing desperate. The captain suggested invoking “the custom of the sea,” a tradition by which seamen in such a position would draw lots to see which of them would be sacrificed to provide meat and drink for the others.

The young cabin boy had succumbed to the temptation to drink sea water to slake his thirst, a folly which the others knew would prove fatal.  His health and strength were rapidly waning, and the captain took it upon himself to decide the young boy’s fate. He chose not to draw lots, but rather to take the cabin boy’s life.

The flesh of the young man sustained the three remaining crewmen until they were rescued five days later by a German barque.

The bulk of Adam Cohen’s book, “Captain’s Dinner,” details the consequences the crew faced on their return to England. The “custom of the sea” had never before been considered a criminal act, but in Victorian England the tenor of the times was changing. Two of the three were tried for the murder of the cabin boy.

Cohen, an attorney and journalist, presents extensive documentation from the days of the shipwreck and subsequent legal proceedings. His narrative demonstrates the conflict between two opposing schools of cultural philosophy, utilitarianism and individual human rights and in an afterword points out how this conflict persists into the present day.

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