A Bride's Passage: Susan Hathorn's Year Under Sail

In 1855, Susan Hathorn set sail with her new husband Jode, captain of a three-masted cargo ship. She recorded their trip from Philadelphia to Savannah, Georgia, and on to Cuba and London in a diary. En route, the beauties of a moon rising over Cuban mountains, shipboard duties, and the pleasures of socializing with other seafarers are interspersed with reports of sea squalls, bedbugs, and a too-lively crew. "Strange doings in the galley," she notes amusingly. "Stewardess drunk as a beast--thinks her husband so--had a regular fight." Her diary entries are knit together by Catherine Petroski's sometimes dry, but often enriching comments on sea life, shipping, and Hathorn's background.