The Wager: A Tale of Shipwreck, Mutiny and Murder

When Cheap assumed command of the Wager, his shipmates were wary of him: “No longer was he one of them; he was in charge of them, responsible for every soul onboard” (61). With Cheap as captain, Anson’s squadron arrived at Drake’s Passage, the name for the sea passage that went to Cape Horn. Geographically situated between South America and Antarctica, Drake’s Passage was notorious for its dangerously strong currents and winds, which were not blocked by any land. The American novelist and one-time sailor Herman Melville compared Drake’s Passage to the “descent to hell in Dante’s Inferno” (62).

Another problem was determining distance through longitude, since in the 18th-century methods of measuring it were unreliable. Cheap and his crew were stuck using “informed guesswork and a leap of faith” (65). Drake’s Passage was also the site of various islands and abandoned settlements where earlier famous explorers like Ferdinand Magellan and Francis Drake had set foot. These sites included places where their mutinous sailors had been executed.

While sailing, the Wager faced a storm. However, Cheap managed to safely navigate the ship through the weather.