Here is one of the books, that is in my library, Robert C. Leslie – A Waterbiography (1894)
Of course, only those, that are related to the topic of Shanties (directly or indirectly). I found out reference to this book in Stan Hugill’s book The Bosun’s Locker, in one of the discussions. In mentioned discussion, Stan Hugill mentioned another title written by the same author “A Sea-Painter Log”. While searching for this book, I came across this title. I would like to mention that my copy has an original letter stuck in, written by the author itself. This fact helped me in the decision to buy it, as it turned out the seller also had the second-mentioned book, so, fortunately, I became the owner of both items.
“A Waterbiography” is unique for many reasons
This is a book that describes the sailing life of the author who lived in the London area in the 19th century, it is unique that his sailing biography is written with the experience of sailing his own, relatively small yacht, so something very similar to our current sailing because it really is few of us has a chance to sail a tall ship. The author’s yacht (his first yacht) is shown in one of the photos and its name is “FOAM”. The book also has coded illustrations, and a summary at the beginning of each chapter (very characteristic of books from the 19th and the turn of the 20th century). This copy is the first edition (1894) of this title.
Do you want to be more involved?
You can find excellent records of sea shanties here. If you want to discuss this book or share your opinion you can do it in my Facebook forum here, or below post in the comment section.