''Sailing Alone Around the World'' is a
sailing memoir by
Joshua Slocum in 1900 about his
single-handed global circumnavigation aboard the sloop ''
Spray''. Slocum was the first person
to sail around the world alone. The book was an immediate success and highly influential in inspiring later travelers.
Background
Captain Slocum was a highly experienced navigator and ship owner. He rebuilt and refitted the derelict sloop ''Spray'' in a seaside pasture at
Fairhaven, Massachusetts, over 13 months between early 1893 and 1894.
Between 24 April 1895 and 27 June 1898, Slocum, aboard the ''Spray'', crossed the
Atlantic twice (to
Gibraltar
Gibraltar ( , ) is a British Overseas Territories, British Overseas Territory and British overseas cities, city located at the southern tip of the Iberian Peninsula, on the Bay of Gibraltar, near the exit of the Mediterranean Sea into the A ...
and back to South America), negotiated the
Strait of Magellan, and crossed the Pacific. He went on to visit Australia and South Africa before crossing the
Atlantic (for the third time) to return to Massachusetts after a journey of 46,000 miles.
The book
Slocum attracted considerable international interest by his journey, particularly once he had entered the Pacific. He was awaited at most of his ports of call, and gave lectures and lantern-slide shows to well-filled halls. His journal was first published in installments before being issued in book form in 1900. The book was lavishly illustrated.
Slocum tells his story as a sequence of adventures, understating his own part and giving credit always to the ''Spray''. He invents a crew-member, a supposed pilot of Columbus' ''
Pinta'', to take credit for the safety of the vessel while he sleeps.
The trip itinerary was as follows:
Fairhaven,
Boston
Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...
,
Gloucester
Gloucester ( ) is a cathedral city, non-metropolitan district and the county town of Gloucestershire in the South West England, South West of England. Gloucester lies on the River Severn, between the Cotswolds to the east and the Forest of Dean ...
, Nova Scotia,
Azores
The Azores ( , , ; , ), officially the Autonomous Region of the Azores (), is one of the two autonomous regions of Portugal (along with Madeira). It is an archipelago composed of nine volcanic islands in the Macaronesia region of the North Atl ...
,
Gibraltar
Gibraltar ( , ) is a British Overseas Territories, British Overseas Territory and British overseas cities, city located at the southern tip of the Iberian Peninsula, on the Bay of Gibraltar, near the exit of the Mediterranean Sea into the A ...
, (
Morocco
Morocco, officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It has coastlines on the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to Algeria–Morocc ...
),
Canary Islands
The Canary Islands (; ) or Canaries are an archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean and the southernmost Autonomous communities of Spain, Autonomous Community of Spain. They are located in the northwest of Africa, with the closest point to the cont ...
,
Cape Verde Islands, Pernambuco,
Rio de Janeiro
Rio de Janeiro, or simply Rio, is the capital of the Rio de Janeiro (state), state of Rio de Janeiro. It is the List of cities in Brazil by population, second-most-populous city in Brazil (after São Paulo) and the Largest cities in the America ...
,
Maldonado,
Montevideo
Montevideo (, ; ) is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Uruguay, largest city of Uruguay. According to the 2023 census, the city proper has a population of 1,302,954 (about 37.2% of the country's total population) in an area of . M ...
,
Buenos Aires
Buenos Aires, controlled by the government of the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires, is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Argentina. It is located on the southwest of the Río de la Plata. Buenos Aires is classified as an Alpha− glob ...
,
Strait of Magellan,
Cockburn Channel, Port Angosto,
Juan Fernandez,
Marquesas,
Samoa
Samoa, officially the Independent State of Samoa and known until 1997 as Western Samoa, is an island country in Polynesia, part of Oceania, in the South Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main islands (Savai'i and Upolu), two smaller, inhabited ...
,
Fiji
Fiji, officially the Republic of Fiji, is an island country in Melanesia, part of Oceania in the South Pacific Ocean. It lies about north-northeast of New Zealand. Fiji consists of an archipelago of more than 330 islands—of which about ...
, Sydney,
Melbourne
Melbourne ( , ; Boonwurrung language, Boonwurrung/ or ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city of the States and territories of Australia, Australian state of Victori ...
,
Tasmania
Tasmania (; palawa kani: ''Lutruwita'') is an island States and territories of Australia, state of Australia. It is located to the south of the Mainland Australia, Australian mainland, and is separated from it by the Bass Strait. The sta ...
,
Cooktown,
Christmas Island, Keeling Cocos,
Rodrigues,
Mauritius
Mauritius, officially the Republic of Mauritius, is an island country in the Indian Ocean, about off the southeastern coast of East Africa, east of Madagascar. It includes the main island (also called Mauritius), as well as Rodrigues, Ag ...
,
Durban
Durban ( ; , from meaning "bay, lagoon") is the third-most populous city in South Africa, after Johannesburg and Cape Town, and the largest city in the Provinces of South Africa, province of KwaZulu-Natal.
Situated on the east coast of South ...
,
Cape Town
Cape Town is the legislature, legislative capital city, capital of South Africa. It is the country's oldest city and the seat of the Parliament of South Africa. Cape Town is the country's List of municipalities in South Africa, second-largest ...
, (
Transvaal),
St Helena,
Ascension Island,
Devil's Island,
Trinidad
Trinidad is the larger, more populous island of the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago, the country. The island lies off the northeastern coast of Venezuela and sits on the continental shelf of South America. It is the southernmost island in ...
,
Grenada
Grenada is an island country of the West Indies in the eastern Caribbean Sea. The southernmost of the Windward Islands, Grenada is directly south of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines and about north of Trinidad and Tobago, Trinidad and the So ...
,
Newport, Fairhaven.

Highlights of the journey included perils of sailing blue water, such as fog, gales, danger of collision, loneliness, doldrums, navigation, fatigue, gear failure. Other perils of coastal navigation included
pirates, attack by 'savages',
embayment,
shoals and
coral reefs
A coral reef is an underwater ecosystem characterized by reef-building corals. Reefs are formed of colonies of coral polyps held together by calcium carbonate. Most coral reefs are built from stony corals, whose polyps cluster in groups.
...
,
stranding, and shipwreck.
Passing by
Tierra del Fuego, he was warned that he might be attacked by the indigenous
Yahgan Indians in the night, so he sprinkled tacks on the deck. He was awakened in the middle of the night by yelps of pain. He was proud of resourcefully defending himself.
He devised a system of lashing the wheel into what a later era might call a kind of mechanical
autopilot
An autopilot is a system used to control the path of a vehicle without requiring constant manual control by a human operator. Autopilots do not replace human operators. Instead, the autopilot assists the operator's control of the vehicle, allow ...
. He took pride in the fact that the ''Spray'' sailed 2000 miles west across the Pacific without his once touching the helm.
1950s attempt to recreate Slocum's voyage
In the mid-1950s, Robert Carr of
Monkton, Vermont, built a replica of the ''Spray'' using the shipbuilding methods of the late 1800s. He announced his intention to sail around the world recreating Slocum's voyage. While one article reported the replica ''Spray'' and Carr's announcement, there is no documented evidence that he made a circumnavigation.
"On the Trail of the Spray"
'' Popular Mechanics'', June 1956, pp. 78-81/242.
References
Further reading
*
External links
.
''Sailing Alone Around the World''
available at Internet Archive
The Internet Archive is an American 501(c)(3) organization, non-profit organization founded in 1996 by Brewster Kahle that runs a digital library website, archive.org. It provides free access to collections of digitized media including web ...
. Illustrated by Thomas Forgarty and George Varian. Pan-American edition. New York Century Co., 1901.
''Sailing Alone Around the World ''
available at IBiblio. Illustrated.
* .
*
Joshua Slocum Society
Sailing Alone Around the World
available at BookBrainz
Sailing Alone Around the World
available at MusicBrainz
{{Works about sailing
1899 books
Sailing books
Books about sportspeople