Hampton SidesReviews

Chronicle of Captain James Cook's voyages of discovery

Oh, and he couldn't SWIM. ? I guess that's common but good grief, common on Captain. I am pretty clueless about the trajectory of voyages of all these explorers, so I love how I thought this was going to be all cold and Alaskan and it ended up being all tropical and Hawaiian.

nonfiction/history - Captain Cook's ill-fated voyage to find a passage through northern North America, and his interactions with various native peoples along the way -- as thoroughly researched as known resources and records will allow, and pretty balanced in light of not having as much to go from on the natives' sides.

well done and very interesting look at a man who wasn't perfect, but who is often given the short stick.½

In The Wide, Wide Sea, Hampton Sides tries to present a factual and unbiased account of Captain James Cook’s third and ultimately fatal voyage. Using as many first-hand accounts as possible — including oral histories from the indigenous people — Sides does an admirable job of not deifying or demonizing Cook, but trying to ascertain his true actions and motives. Sometimes heavily documented texts can get boring, but Sides keeps things moving, and the actual voyage is too fascinating to ever become dull. I really enjoyed this book, and recommend it to readers of nonfiction who like sea voyages, exploration, and history.

It is a pleasure to read a book that accomplishes exactly what the author intends.

Highly recommended!

There is nothing quite like a thoroughly researched, well-paced, well written non-fiction account of some jaw-dropping event that it seems hardly possible actually happened. Such books are inevitably difficult to put down and ‘The Kingdom of Ice’ is an exemplar of the genre. Hampton Sides (who has an Arctic explorer-esque name himself) recounts the extraordinary voyage of the USS Jeannette, whose crew intended to reach the North Pole. But wait, you might ask, how were they supposed to get there in a boat? It seems that in the 1870s a popular theory, espoused by some otherwise well-regarded scientists, held that there was a warm ocean at the North Pole surrounded by a circle of ice. The rationale for this bizarre hypothesis was that warm currents such as the gulf stream converged there. The experiences of the USS Jeanette were to comprehensively debunk this idea. The crew aimed to break through the supposed circle of ice via the Bering Strait, rather than trying to reach the pole via Greenland as previous unsuccessful expeditions had.

Sides carefully puts the reader on tenterhooks by extended scene-setting and background for the voyage, its funder, and its crew. As generally seemed to be the case for polar explorers, everyone involved was at least a little eccentric. The newspaper millionaire who funded the expedition was such a memorably odd person that his name is apparently the origin of the exclamation, “Gordon Bennett!” I always wondered where that came from – it was something I picked up from my Nana. Such fascinating tidbits are to be found throughout the text, to the point that I wondered why I’d never heard of the Jeanette expedition before. (Probable explanations include: I’d come across mentions but forgotten about them, successful expeditions loom largest in history, and British museums like to imply that British men did all the exploring.) The writing style is a great mixture of journalistic and historical, conveying the risk and danger of events without hyperbole or sensationalism. The use of letters from the expedition captain’s wife to her absent husband throughout the narrative is well-judged and moving. I also appreciated the liberal inclusion of maps. It gets on my nerves when accounts of long journeys limit the reader to a single map, sometimes even relegated to the endpapers. Maps provide a welcome sense of perspective to the distances described.

I’ve got two paragraphs in without mentioning the outcome of the expedition itself, nor the fates of the men on it. This is a deliberate choice: I began the book without knowing anything about what happened and thus found it a thrilling, enthralling tale. I will mention that the Jeannette doesn’t manage to sail to the North Pole, which is hardly a surprise. The actual outcome of the expedition is chastening as an example of Western hubris during the exploration age, as well as exciting as a tale of humans pushed to their limits. There is an edge of dark humour also, particularly evident in Captain de Long’s diary of the voyage. He displayed an incredible gift for understatement, reducing the most appalling circumstances imaginable to deadpan phrases like, ‘Our outlook was not encouraging’. The account is equally fascinating as a historical snapshot. The USS Jeanette took with them prototypes of Alexander Graham Bell’s telephone and Edison’s arc lights, both of which failed to function in freezing Arctic temperatures. The adventurous inclinations of some of the crew were seemingly stoked by having been slightly too young to fight in the American Civil War. Yet there is an oddly contemporary feel about the media obsession with the expedition and its fate. Transatlantic telegraph cables already allowed the expedition’s sponsor to run his New York newspaper from Paris; Bennett was at the vanguard of international news, sending reporters worldwide in search of exciting stories. As well as history, this a vivid portrait of a unique geography. If you have any interest in snowy wastes, as I most definitely do, descriptions of places like Wrangel Land will beguile you.

Finally, I approved of Sides’ comment that the warm Polar sea theory may have been dead wrong in the late 19th century, but at the rate greenhouse gas emissions are accumulating in the atmosphere, temperatures are rising, and polar ice is melting, it may yet become true. ‘In the Kingdom of Ice’ was a moving, informative, generally very high quality piece of escapist non-fiction. Thank you Rae for recommending it to me!

I’ve read several books by Hampton Sides, and I’ve enjoyed every one of them. This is the story of one of history’s most venerated British adventurers, Capt. James Cook. Cook was an explorer and was a talented (and accurate) cartographer, something that during this time in history was very important. The book is about Cook’s third and final trip attempting to find a “northwest passage” from the Atlantic to the Pacific Ocean thereby saving months of travel, heartache, and exposure to violent weather. Life most explorers looking for this path, Cook found that route equally brutal, although he merely visited the route before turning back to return to Hawaii where his met his untimely and violent death. Sides is a talented journalist and this book will keep historians and non-historians alike interested to the very end. I highly recommend it.

"The Wide, Wide Sea" by Hampton Sides is the story of Captain Cook's final voyage. The mission was to sail the Resolution and the Discovery in search for the Northwest Passage and return native Tahitian Mai to his homeland laden with animals and gifts. King George III hoped to Tahiti into a more "civilized" society through Mai. On the way they would encounter native Tasmanians (who would become extinct within 100 years) and lead a particularly brutal encounter in Moorea. After an initial somewhat peaceful greeting, an act of petty theft convinced Cook to order a fiery decimation of the native village. On one hand, the English believed in private property. Period. But the Polynesians believed a person must be worthy of their possessions, or share communally. Clever thievery was an act of skill, not necessarily of maliciousness. This major cultural difference was one that Cook wouldn't acknowledge, and ultimately proved to be his downfall in Hawaii.

I wasn't a fan of how Sides handled Cook's attack on Moorea. Not defensive of his actions specifically, but quick to explain it away as a bout of mental illness. Sides quotes Cook's defenders and suggests that a battle-hungry Mai was partially to blame, but doesn't posit the idea that maybe Cook was acting on personal pride. Sides also made the mistake of wondering why the natives didn't fight back. Fear and cultural destruction are powerful tools and Cook knew how to utilize them effectively. I'm still not convinced that Cook was "unique" in his respect for Indigenous peoples, for his acts of violence prove he really was no different than any other 18th century Royal navyman. His treatment of Mai doesn't make for a fair argument because Mai had been indoctrinated as a beneficial tool for colonialism. However, if you can overlook these flaws, you will learn the finer details of Cook's final voyage in a detailed, accessible and compelling way. I do enjoy Sides' narrative voice very much, I only wish they had been a bit more critical and objective of Cook. Since this book only covers Cook's final voyage, the reader is given minimal insight into Cook's mindset on the previous two. If a reader is already fully familiar with Cook, perhaps some his actions would appear more "out of character."

Bought this book in 2022 purely because I loved the author's book called "On Desperate Ground" and hoped this book would draw me in as much as that one did. I read it during the summer of 2022 and finished it while on my way to exercise NATIVE FURY in Saudi Arabia. It's a good book and does a great job displaying the struggles these POWs went through during WWII that helped put things into perspective for me during an easy exercise in Saudi. I would only recommend this to someone who is very interested in this specific story, one of its characters, or WWII in the Philippines.

**Mom found the hardcover version of this book in 2024 somewhere cheap and bought it for me to replace my paperback version.

Another excellent history by Hampton Sides - a thorough and thoughtful account of the last voyage of Captain James Cook (apparently the inspiration for the name James T. Kirk!). I found the descriptions of 18th-century Tasmania, various Pacific islands, and Alaska before the extinction of the Tasmanians, the reduction of the sea otter population to about 1,000 individuals by 1900, the Exxon Valdez disaster, etc. to be especially moving. It is also interesting to think about the degree to which we take our knowledge of geography for granted. Cook was the first to cross both the Antarctic and Arctic circles and among the many things that he was famous for included that he had shown that there was no Antarctic continent (he didn't go far enough south), and that ice formed in the Arctic Ocean from seawater and there could be no Northwest Passage.

Finally a readable Captain Cook book written in modern narrative nonfiction form. Hampton Sides is one of the best of this genre. The pacing and proportion it's like a 14 hour movie that never flags. Captain Cook you can't get away from, he is named dropped all over the place, in places and in books. Yet, try to find good books about him and they are either hagiography or so detailed as to loose sight of the forest for the trees. He is a difficult subject because of the evils of colonialism; and Cook left very few written records other than ship logs, he was a reserved character in real life. Sides shows Cook to be a man torn by self-knowledge of despoiling native cultures, but also with no choice because of his mission. These contradictions drove Cook a little crazy in the end as he vacillates between benevolent bringer of civilization, and destroyer of worlds. Despite the evils of colonization, it still captures the imagination exploring at a continent-scale for the first time. Cooks third voyage was the longest distance and time wise of any exploratory journey to that time. This is a wonderful book about an amazing story by a remarkable writer.½

Exploration,Captain Cook,Polynesia,Hawaii,Alaska,New Zealand

In Ghost Soldiers, author Hampton Sides tells not only the story of the rescue of the last prisoners of the Bataan Death March, but of the men involved- the battle for Bataan that was lost by the American's, the surrender, the march itself, and the imprisonment. Sides weaves the story of this epic rescue with an engrossing narrative of how it all came to be. He uses personal accounts as spoken/written by the actual participants to paint a vivid story of three years of hell in this Japanese POW camp. He pulls no punches when it comes to discussing/describing the life of these men.
As you read, you become acquainted with many of the individuals whose lives were irrevocably changed during this time.

Sides tells what is known not only of the POW's, Rangers, and Philippine scouts, but also of some of the Japanese involved, and (for me) he tells the story of a woman I had never heard of- a woman who had the. code name of Side Pockets. Claire Fisher was an American living in Manilla when the Japanese took over. Through a series of events described in the book she became a life saving espionage agent who not only passed information she got from the Japanese to the Americans, but also was able to secret lifesaving food and drugs to the camp for the benefit of the POW's.

This book is a must read for anyone with any interest at all in the Pacific Theater WWII experience. I don't see it as just a story of this one episode but as an overview of what the fighters in the Pacific Theater were against.

This fascinating and engaging history of James Cook’s last voyage presents a complicated man. He had extraordinary skills and abilities that had brought great fame and success, and yet fatal errors in judgement toppled the great man to his death.

After two voyages into uncharted waters, surveying and mapping unknown lands and making first contact with human societies across the Pacific, Cook was preparing for a comfortable retirement. But his king had another task for him: a third voyage with the mission of seeking a Northwest Passage. First, he was to return a man to his native homeland in the South Seas. In England, Mai became a celebrity and a dandy, and Cook resettled him with his numerous gifts, including livestock and plants from the king who wanted to display British civilization and superiority.

The voyage was filled with challenges. The Resolution’s subpar repairs resulted in leaks. There was the vagaries of the sea and weather to contend with. They met unfamiliar human societies both friendly and hostile. Life was complicated by Cook’s sometimes aberrant behavior and bad judgement.

Making first contact with Hawaii altered Cook’s luck. He arrived as the islanders were celebrating the god Lono, perfectly timed to for Cook to be considered the return of the god, and he was worshipped as Lono. The Resolution required extensive repairs resulting in the men overstayed their welcome, draining the island paradise’s resources. Meantime, the islanders were mad for anything made of iron, resorting to stealing it in their greed.

Cook sailed further than any man before, rounding the coast of Alaska and crossing the Arctic Circle. But he encountered ice instead of a northern shortcut and quickly turned back before the ships became encased in the ice. He returned to Hawaii for repairs and provisioning, but became embroiled in the conflict that ended his life. This visit, the islanders discovered that Cook was no god.

The book presents Cook, the good and the bad, and his legacy, the good and the bad. Cook had a scientific attitude, observing and recording the cultures and people he encountered without judgement. He was careful to protect the islanders from sexual disease, but he also left a ship load of rats behind. Cook’s emphasis on fresh foods resulted in no losses of crew to scurvy, while he was more diligent and brutal in his punishments. His discoveries of new lands gave his country impetitus for colonization to claim the natural resources, while missionaries arrived to enforce Christian beliefs and morality.

It was so interesting to learn about the many cultures Cook encountered, from New Zealand to the Inuit of Alaska.

Thanks to the publisher for a free book.

Excellent. With a story like this, how you organize and. Present the facts is everything. Sides slowly builds interest, developing the chars ters, making you care about what happens to them, and then taking you along for the trip

A really interesting , if more than a little, disturbing account. War tends to bring out the extremes people are capable of, bith good and bad, and this book illustartes that very clearly

I really enjoyed the book if one can use the word for something so tragic. It answered alot of questions, though the big ones of motive and whether or not Ray acted completely alone still seemed up in the air.

The amphibious invasion taking place off the jetties and docks of Ichon - an action officially known as Operation Chromite - was among the boldest and most technically complex engagements in modern annals. The man who conceived the invasion, prevailing over enormous doubts in Washington was General Douglas MacArthur, and his name would forever be associated with it. But the officer most directly responsible for executing the details of the initial landing, the unsung and largely unknown architect of the marine assault, was in many ways MacArthur's opposite. He was Oliver Prince Smith, commander of the First Marine Division, one of the great underrated generals in American history.

Mr. Sides is an eloquent writer and shared an exceptional story. His vocabulary and writing skills are remarkable.

In my quest to better understand the history of the Southwest and of New Mexico, in particular, and the Indian Wars, this book was enlightening, not so much because it was about Kit Carson, but because of the "rest of the story," and the author's vivid descriptions and story-telling skills.

An entertaining and mostly thrilling account of this famous arctic adventure. Some of the preliminary and by the way material seemed gratuitous, but maybe I was just eager for the story to begin. The story of the idea of the open polar sea is another fascinating look at what we are willing to believe strongly despite all evidence to the contrary.
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It has occurred to me, since I wrote this review, and as Christmas approaches and I read Chris Van Allsburg's Polar Express to my grandson, that the idea of a mystical place at the north pole where Santa Claus can work with his elves, might be somehow tied up not just with the north pole's remoteness, but also with these other 19th century ideas about what might be there (e.g. a hole into the center of the earth and prehistoric creatures).

Great info on Navajo indians, Kit Carson and New Mexico. I don't like to notice the trouble the author had putting a book together while I am reading it.

Quite good history of the search for James Earl Ray. The author claims he used the techniques of a novelist without his license, as described by Shelby Foote. In a discussion of the FBI's decision to concentrate on reviewing fingerprints from convicts instead of their larger file, the author says that this reduced their work by "several orders of magnitude", but the reduction was from 53,000 to 1,900, clearly a reduction of a single order of magnitude.

This was a fascinating voyage. I could not put it down.

What a fascinating historical account of an attempt to find the North Pole in the late 1800's! I love a good outdoor adventure story, and this one is well told by Mr. Sides. It would have been five stars except there was just a bit too much set up for my taste, but the book title really exemplifies the second half of the story, and it was riveting.

Captain de Long and his 33 person crew attempt to sail a specially fortified ship, the Jeannette, to the North Pole. Unfortunately, one of the main theories of the time was that the North Pole was surrounded by a warmer circle of ocean, and if you could just break through the ice barrier and get to that part of the ocean, all would be well. So that's what the Jeannette tried to do, and needless to say, it wasn't smooth sailing.

A subplot of the book is the touching love story between the captain and his wife as revealed through her letters to him.

I look forward to reading more books by this author. His account was detailed (perhaps sometimes too detailed), but very well told.

The story of the battle of the Chosen Reservoir from The First Marine Division point of view. Surrounded by 300,000 Chinese soldiers who streamed across the border into what would be known as North Korea. General Douglas MacArthur and his underestimated the desire and will of Chairman Mao and his country. MacArthur sent 20,000 Marines disregarding what others were telling him to be surrounded by a Chinese trap. This story is the how the Marines fought their way out. The greatest battle of the Korean War.