Skeletons on the Zahara: A True Story of Survival
Skeletons on the Zahara: A True Story of Survival book cover

Skeletons on the Zahara: A True Story of Survival

Hardcover – March 1, 2004

by
Price
$30.92
Format
Hardcover
Pages
320
Publisher
Little, Brown and Company
Publication Date
ISBN-13
978-0316835145
Dimensions
6.5 x 1.75 x 9.5 inches
Weight
15.2 ounces

Description

Some stories are so enthralling they deserve to be retold generation after generation. The wreck in 1815 of the Connecticut merchant ship, Commerce , and the subsequent ordeal of its crew in the Sahara Desert, is one such story. With Skeletons on the Zahara: A True Story of Survival , Dean King refreshes the popular nineteenth-century narrative once read and admired by Henry David Thoreau, James Fenimore Cooper, and Abraham Lincoln. Kingx92s version, which actually draws from two separate first person accounts of the Commerce 's crew, offers a page-turning blend of science, history, and classic adventure. The book begins with a seeming false start: tracing the lives of two merchants from North Africa, Seid and Sidi Hamet, who lose their fortunesx97and almost their livesx97when their massive camel caravan arrives at a desiccated oasis. King then jumps to the voyage of the Commerce under Captain Riley and his 11-man crew. After stops in New Orleans and Gibraltar, the ship falls off course en route to the Canary Islands and ultimately wrecks at the infamous Cape Bojador. After the men survive the first predations of the nomads on the shore, they meander along the coast looking for a way inland as their supplies dwindle. They subsist for days by drinking their own urine. Eventually, to their horror, they discover that they have come aground on the edge of the Sahara Desert. They submit themselves, with hopes of getting food and water, as slaves to the Oulad Bou Sbaa. After days of abuse, they are bought by Hamet, who, after his own experiences with his failed caravan (described at the novels opening), sympathizes with the plight of the crew. Together, they set off on a hellish journey across the desert to collect a bounty for Hamet in Swearah. King embellishes this compelling narrative throughout with scientific and historical material explaining the origins of the camel, the market for English and American slaves, and the stages of dehydration. He also humanizes the Sahrawi with background on the tribes and on the lives of Hamet and Seid. This material, doled out in sufficient amounts to enrich the story without derailing it makes Skeletons on the Zahara a perfectly entertaining bit of history that feels like a guilty pleasure. --Patrick O'Kelley From Publishers Weekly When the American cargo ship Commerce ran aground on the northwestern shores of Africa in 1815 along with its crew of 12 Connecticut-based sailors, the misfortunes that befell them came fast and hard, from enslavement to reality-bending bouts of dehydration. King's aggressively researched account of the crew's once-famous ordeal reads like historical fiction, with unbelievable stories of the seamen's endurance of heat stroke, starvation and cruelty by their Saharan slavers. King (Patrick O'Brian: A Life Revealed), who went to Africa and, on camel and foot, retraced parts of the sailors' journey, succeeds brilliantly at making the now familiar sandscape seem as imposing and new as it must have been to the sailors. Every dromedary step thuds out from the pages with its punishing awkwardness, and each drop of brackish found water reprieves and tortures with its perpetual insufficiency. King's leisurely prose style rounds out the drama with well-parceled-out bits of context, such as the haggling barter culture of the Saharan nomadic Arabs and the geological history of Western Africa's coastline. Zahara (King's use of older and/or phonetic spellings helps evoke the foreignness of the time and place) impresses with its pacing, thoroughness and empathy for the plight of a dozen sailors heaved smack-hard into an unknown tribalism. By the time the surviving crew members make it back to their side of civilization, reader and protagonist alike are challenged by new ways of understanding culture clash, slavery and the place of Islam in the social fabric of desert-dwelling peoples. Maps, illus.Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. From Booklist This shipwreck-and-survival saga occurred in 1815 in the wind-tortured territory of the modern Western Sahara and was promptly written down by American brigantine captain James Riley. So popular it appeared in six different editions, Riley's account is revived here with the benefit of author King's journey to retrace, in part, the 800-mile desert trek of Riley and his shipwrecked crew. King provides animated descriptions of the desert environment while covering the events Riley related, which included being sold into slavery. The dramatic incidents are supported with relevant details, such as the way the body reacts to dehydration and sun poisoning. Perhaps the story's most intriguing element is the mutual understanding that developed between Riley and his eventual master, Sidi Hamet. A debt Hamet owed to his father-in-law propels the entire drama, as Hamet spirits his slaves through lands of scimitar-swinging brigands for ransoming to a Western consul. This is both a forcefully visceral and culturally astute account. Gilbert Taylor Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved "...an amazing, mind-boggling story of courage and endurance, rivalling Shackleton's drama and surpassing Krakauer's climb on Everest...a desert epic..." -- Doug Stanton, author of IN HARM'S WAY "...incredibly true tale...best of al...are the sweet notes of nobility and kindness that transcend culture...and the burning sands..." -- Charles Slack, author of NOBLE OBSESSION "A grand book..." -- Dr. DJ Ratcliffe, Emeritus Reader, History, University of Durham Dean King is the author of numerous books, including the highly acclaimed biography Patrick O'Brian: A Life Revealed, and has written for many publications, including Men's Journal, Esquire, Outside, New York magazine, and the New York Times. He lives in Richmond, Virginia. From The Washington Post The latest in the recent spate of true disaster tales, Skeletons on the Zahara should come with a warning sticker like those on prescription drug bottles: Do Not Take With Food. Dean King, author of a well-received biography of novelist Patrick O'Brian, recounts the tribulations of a crew of American sailors who were shipwrecked off the coast of Africa in 1815, captured, sold into slavery, fed almost nothing, forced to drink camel urine, and then schlepped all over the desert sands. Joking aside, Skeletons is a page-turner, replete with gruesome details about thirst, a diet of dried locusts and animal bone marrow, relentless exposure to the sun and the changes in bodily functions that result. King's plot is right out of Homer: Will the stalwart captain and his mates ever see home again? He has structured it in such cinematic terms that one can almost see the words "An Anthony Minghella film" superimposed on the opening scene -- a caravan of 1,000 Arab merchants and their 4,000 camels stretched across the Sahara, caught in a howling sandstorm. One merchant, Sidi Hamet, had made repeated trips from Morocco to Tombucktoo (King prefers older spellings of place-names, hence the "Zahara" of the title), ferrying loads of barley, cloth, salt and other goods to be traded for gold, exotic items such as ostrich feathers and slaves. He happened upon a nomad's tent camp, where a bedraggled slave who turned out to be an American sea captain made him an enticing offer: Bring him and his scattered crew to safety in a northern settlement, and they would be ransomed for "many pieces of silver." Hamet was in a quandary. Unsure of whether to trust the word of a "Christian dog," he prayed to Allah for guidance. Flash back to Middletown, Conn., a bustling New England shipping center, at the close of the War of 1812. Capt. James Riley and his crew of 10 were preparing the merchant brig Commerce for an ambitious journey. They would go first to New Orleans, then the West Indies and on to Gibraltar and the Cape Verde islands off the African coast, where they would buy salt, a commodity that should earn a handsome profit back in the United States. Once the ship is under sail, the story gathers force. King has based his account on Riley's own narrative, which was published in 1817 and had a wide readership throughout the 19th century. (King says that Abraham Lincoln was among its fans and never forgot the saga of Riley's ordeal.) In Gibraltar, the crew was almost drowned before the action began, as a wave washed over their longboat after a visit with another ship. King quotes Riley as writing ominously, "We were spared in order to suffer a severer doom." Indeed, doom hovered over the ship when it ran aground off Cape Bojador in the middle of nothing, just north of the Tropic of Cancer. When the sailors made their first foray onshore, they were driven away by a band of wild local folk. They escaped in their longboat, only to be shipwrecked again farther south. Soon, fierce nomads captured them, stole most of their clothes and split them up among different bands to be bought, sold and bartered as property. At this point, the Sahara becomes the star of the story. King does a fine job of bringing readers up to speed at judicious intervals on the customs of the time both in the seafaring world and in global geopolitics. However, the knowledge he shares about the hostility of the desert climate, the brutality of the warring tribes that inhabit it but cannot tame it, and the toll it takes on people and animals alike is graphic and scary. One captive went temporarily blind from the sand and sun. Sores on bodies reduced to skin and bone made walking and even sleeping agonizing. A swarm of locusts carpeted the landscape; the nomads gathered and ate them. A former slave reportedly gnawed on his own limbs for sustenance. The castaways on "Survivor" and contestants on "Fear Factor" wouldn't have lasted an hour. As King writes, "the Saharan climate was arguably the most extreme on earth. Its temperature could sizzle at more than 120 degrees Fahrenheit in the shade, the ground temperature soaring 50 degrees higher in the sun; at night, the thermometer could plunge as much as 85 degrees. . . . While only about a tenth of the Sahara is covered in barren sand dunes . . . almost equally formidable are its stepped plains of wind-stripped rock covered in boulders, stones, and dust." Thirsty yet? King interrupts his tale just long enough for vivid discourses on how humans suffer through various stages of dehydration; the gastrointestinal workings of camels; Saharan customs (no matter who finds food, anyone in the vicinity can elbow his way into a meal; thieves are entitled to take anything left unwatched by its owner); and nomads' dietary preferences (they don't like fish and, being Muslim, won't eat pork). The redoubtable Riley promised Hamet a reward from a friend in Swearah (known today as Essaouira, in southern Morocco) if Hamet could get the dispersed sailors there safely. The question became: Could Hamet sneak past not just other marauding bands, who would love to rob him of his bounty, but also his nasty father-in-law, Sheik Ali? Early on, Riley had a dream that, after many trials, he would encounter his savior, a man in Western dress on horseback. As the story's unremitting barbarism continues, not just the Commerce's crew but also the reader is likely to pine for the greenery of Connecticut. Even armchair adventurers satiated with exotic travelogues will appreciate heroism amid adversity in this fast-paced account of slow torture -- and an almost-happy ending. Reviewed by Grace Lichtenstein Copyright 2004, The Washington Post Co. All Rights Reserved. Read more

Features & Highlights

  • Chronicles the hardships encountered by twelve American sailors who, in 1815, were shipwrecked on the coast of North Africa, captured, sold into slavery, and sent on a difficult odyssey through the perilous heart of the Sahara.

Customer Reviews

Rating Breakdown

★★★★★
30%
(630)
★★★★
25%
(525)
★★★
15%
(315)
★★
7%
(147)
★
23%
(483)

Most Helpful Reviews

✓ Verified Purchase

Desert Heroism

As a boy, Abraham Lincoln read the memoir of Captain James Riley, and never forgot its story of slavery in the Sahara (or Zahara, as Riley would have known it). Thoreau knew the book. It was an international bestseller, and it might have been one of the few books besides the Bible in some American homes. Riley was a legend in his own time, but no longer is in ours. He is back, brought to us by Dean King, who read Riley's memoir of his adventure in the Sahara, and then read a narrative of the same adventure from a fellow crewman of Riley's, and then himself traveled in the still inhospitable and dangerous regions described in the two books. King has produced _Skeletons on the Zahara: A True Story of Survival_ (Little, Brown), a wonderful account of fortitude under the most extreme conditions at sea and on the desert. This is one of the great adventure stories, full of the tortures by man and nature, and of course of the success of an indomitable spirit.
Captain Riley and his "good Yankee crew" of eleven left Connecticut for an ordinary merchant voyage in 1815, and eventually foundered on the west coast of the Sahara, six hundred miles south of Morocco. They were beset by hostile, thieving nomads, but briefly escaped by taking to sea in the ship's longboats. They were eager to be away from the Sahara, which everyone knew was a realm of death but which was at the time uncharted, mysterious, and full (so the stories went) of cannibals. They ran out of provisions at sea and were forced to make for Sahara land south of Bojador, and their prospects were just as bad. Other tribesmen captured them, took their goods, and made them slaves. There are many pages devoted here to pain, extreme sunburn, thirst, hunger and other travails. The means of relieving these tortures are often unpleasant to contemplate as well; the way the captors and crew made do eating unmentionable parts of camels as well as snails and locusts are detailed here. Riley's eventual captor was a desert merchant Sidi Hamet, who was in financial trouble. Riley assured Hamet that he had important friends at the British consulate, hundreds of miles away. He insisted that these friends would buy him and the crew back for a high price. Of course, there were no such friends, and Riley was bluffing; Hamet insisted that if the ransom price was not paid, he would slit Riley's throat, and perhaps he was bluffing as well.
The hapless Riley and the hapless Hamet make the core of this tale, and King cannot be faulted that his source narratives don't have enough details to describe Hamet fully. He emerges, however, as a friend and savior, even if he was initially only after the ransom. Riley could not have known it, but there was indeed a procedure for ransoming slaves, and a British consular official made it happen, becoming Riley's lifelong friend. A measure of the two months in captivity is that Riley normally weighed 240 pounds, and when he was ransomed he weighed less than ninety. Not all of his crew made it back, and some of them may have spent the rest of their lives as slaves. King's exciting and surprising narrative ends with the speculation that Riley may even have had an effect on his own country's slave trade. He became an active abolitionist, easily able to discuss the immorality of slavery; and perhaps since Lincoln admired Riley's book, it may have done its little part to bring emancipation about.
126 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Real survivors

In 1815 a New England merchant brig foundered in rocky seas off North Africa. Its crew survived though perhaps they later wished they hadn't.
In the first days, hostile nomads drove them to escape back to the sea in a small boat with a broken oar only to suffer such dehydration and starvation that even enslavement by the dreaded nomads seemed preferable - until it happened.
After a slow, thoughtful start laying out the background of the men and the voyage, Dean's story of the crew's ordeal reads like a runaway suspense thriller with torture. And it's well written and chock full of information you didn't know you needed - the camel, for instance, is an astonishing physical specimen, a creature with a face built for sandstorms; an animal that doesn't sweat or pant, but stores its heat for the cold nights when it becomes a kind of living stove.
Dean's book is based largely on two firsthand accounts - one by ship's captain James Riley, and another by crewman Archibald Robbins. Dean also retraced much of Riley's trek, and his selected bibliography is lengthy.
Near death, the crew puts back into shore and, unable to find water, throws themselves on the mercy of the first nomads they encounter. The men are immediately stripped naked, then parceled out as slaves - after a bloody and protracted fight among the desert dwellers. Their first guzzle of water and sour camel's milk rips through their intestines, a cycle that is to be repeated throughout their ordeal.
Separated, sunburned, depleted, still naked and unable to keep up, the men are put on camels. "It is no coincidence that a camel's gait is called a `rack'." Blood was soon dripping from chafed thighs and calves.
The ordeal goes from horror to worse. The nomads themselves often have nothing to eat or drink; bloody encounters and thievery are common. The sailors are worth rather less than a lame camel. Less than a good blanket, in fact.
The physical suffering is enough to make you marvel at their will to live, but Dean also conveys the helplessness of slavery. Purposely dehumanized, their lives are entirely subject to commerce or whim. Riley, a man of his time who, Dean speculates, may have planned on acquiring a slave cargo, became a fervent abolitionist on his return.
Riley comes alive on the page as a man of indomitable will, who takes his responsibilities to his men to heart. Eventually he strikes a bargain with an Arab trader, a promise based on a lie and a gamble that develops into something more personal, if precarious. The denouement is a protracted drama of danger, diplomacy and daring that will keep you on the edge of your seat.
Riley's book was a best selling sensation, which remained in print long after his death, so a certain amount of skepticism is necessary. But the later events of his life bear out his energy, strength and charisma. Dean's ("Patrick O'Brian: A Life Revealed") stirring account, fleshed out with information about the desert, the people, their history and the cultural importance of Islam, as well as the extremes the human body can endure, is as culturally informative as it is exciting.
51 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Original is better

A friendly librarian suggested I might like this book. I read it and in so doing found there is a 2000 reprint available. I bought that and far preferred James Riley's account of his sufferings to this third-person account.

The original is reputed to have been one of the few books available to Abraham Lincoln as a youth and to have helped shaped his ideas about the evil of slavery.

The first-hand account also includes Riley's account of a trading caravan told to him by his owner, who took him to civilization and sold him back to freedom.

This tale of indescribable suffering is far more riveting and significant in the words of the man who lived through it. I recommend you read "Sufferings in Africa" by James Riley instead of this book.
41 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Original is better

A friendly librarian suggested I might like this book. I read it and in so doing found there is a 2000 reprint available. I bought that and far preferred James Riley's account of his sufferings to this third-person account.

The original is reputed to have been one of the few books available to Abraham Lincoln as a youth and to have helped shaped his ideas about the evil of slavery.

The first-hand account also includes Riley's account of a trading caravan told to him by his owner, who took him to civilization and sold him back to freedom.

This tale of indescribable suffering is far more riveting and significant in the words of the man who lived through it. I recommend you read "Sufferings in Africa" by James Riley instead of this book.
41 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

A Stunning Book

In most survival epics, man's battle against nature is enough to keep you on the edge of your seat. Here, not only do shipwrecked Americans face the ultimate tests of nature's cruelty, they must also deal with man's -- as slaves on the desert.
Dean King is already an established authority on maritime literature. Consider Skeletons on the Zahara his shot across the bow. King is no longer interpreting classics of the sea, he's adding to their ranks. You won't believe what these men endure. Except King's research is so thorough you DO believe it. Every word. Halfway through you'll wonder why they don't just curl up and die. By the end you'll be cheering for them, and swelling with vicarious pride at their will to live.
12 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Of Brutality and Nobility

Apparently the true story of Captain James Riley and his ill-fated crews' tale of shipwreck and subsequent capture and slavery was a popular story of the 19th century, mentioned even in the boyhood readings of Abraham Lincoln. Thanks to Dean King, this incredible story of survival, determination, and the range of the human spirit are rekindled in "Skeletons on the Zahara." In the summer of 1815, Riley and crew of the Commerce, a US merchant square-rigger home ported in Middleton, Connecticut, while heading from Gibraltar for the Canary Islands, shipwrecked off the treacherous coast of northwest Africa. Were it not for corroboration from a number of sources, including the published memoir of crewmember Archibald Robbins, this harrowing narrative of bondage and torture at the hands of the barbarous nomadic tribes of the Western Sahara Desert would simply not be believable. But through painstaking research, including his own journey through the desert retracing Riley's steps of nearly two centuries before, author King does an extraordinary job of detailing the tribulations and sufferings of the "Commerces", as well illuminating the customs and culture of the Islamic tribes of a desolate corner of the planet that to this day is mostly forgotten and hardly changed since Riley's fateful voyage. King wisely refrains from over-dramatizing the plight of Riley and his men; from the depths of depravity to the peaks of bravery and loyalty, of suffering and redemption, this story is best told unembellished.

"Skeletons on the Zahara" is highly recommended for anyone with an interest in adventure, American history, nautical lore, Islamic culture, and the triumph of the soul over the body, and is yet additional proof to the old adage: fact is indeed stranger than fiction.
10 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Moving and heartbreaking story

As despicable as slavery was in my mind, I never imagined it could be this bad. And to contrast this we have Riley's hope as he strived to save his men from a morale exhausting situation. To see what the men were put through and what they had to survive is a testament to the strength of mankind.

The book was written and reads like a novel, flowing from beginning to end. I know I didn't want to put it down. The tale iteself almost defies what we would imagine could/would happen if someone were captured, and at times you can only think that this is made up. But the story is well documented and supported, which gives credence where disbelief sets in.

It is sad to think about what those seven went through, but it is even worse to think about what the ones who weren't so fortunate had to go through, and how much longer they had to endure living as a slave. The whole story is sad, yet you are lifted by the perseverance of Riley and his men.

Read this book. Be prepared to be aghast at what was happening to them, and be prepared to be in disbelief. A great book that everyone should read at least once in their lifetime.
7 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Top Notch Survival Story

This story ranks at the very top of adventure literature and despite a slow start it is a compelling read. It is an updated retelling of the bestselling memoirs of Captain James Riley of the Commerce who with his crew encounter and overcome unrivalled bad fortune.

Mr. King's book is enhanced by his careful presentation of the historical context of the story. Captain Riley and crew knew very little of the dangers of the Sahara Desert but, as shown, they soon learned that all the terrible stories about Saharan shipwrecks were true.

If you liked the story of Shackleton and the Endurance--you will appreciate Mr. King's description of how Captain Riley and several of his crew overcome dehydration, slave traders, cultural ignorance, and with the help of some smart decisions and fortunate encounters manage to return home. As with all good adventure literature the story reinforces the importance of maintaining a positive attitude and conveys the crucial lesson that there is always hope no matter how bad the situation.

The author also reminds us of the value of personal honor and integrity; attitudes and obligations that were taken for granted among the British and Americans in Captain Riley's day that have now been lost--are we the better for it? Or, does our culture now more closely resemble that of the brutal slave-trading Saharans?
7 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Utterly absorbing tale of survival

I have read a number of true adventure and survival stories, and this one stands out as one of the most extraordinary feats of survival I've read. The deprivations and hardships of Riley's crew make for fascinating reading, and the odds of their survival -- never mind making it back to civilization -- are truly extreme. Riley is a highly intelligent, loyal, and sensitive captain, and he gambles a risky deal to save his life and his crew.

And the author has clearly done his research, determining many details of locations that Riley has visited. Between the research and the surviving first-hand accounts, many extraordinary details of the journey survive, making this a rich story indeed. The book also offers a number of interesting anthropological and social insights into Arab culture ca. 1815, much of which we are told remains unchanged today.

Weaknesses? Well, the book is not particularly well-written. It's not *poorly* written, but the author does not have the style or flair that might make this a truly outstanding book. Finally, the names of many of the Arab characters are confusingly similar. Not the author's fault, to be sure, but a minor problem for the reader.

In this election year, I did take away from this book one small insight. Perhaps the well-known "liberal" bent of the New England seacoast states stems, in part, from generations of well-traveled seaman like Riley, who experienced firsthand the cultures of the world and made contacts with people from many nations.
7 people found this helpful
✓ Verified Purchase

Once Again: Stranger Than Fiction

I know when I've got a real keeper when a book inspires me, hungry for more details, to go back and read the primary sources! What makes this book so incredible is that this fascinating, well-written true story is so unbelievably terrible. I know portions of this harrowing story will continue to resurface in my thoughts and dreams as I remember the subhuman conditions these American mariners experienced in the hands of tribal desert dwellers. These seamen were literally treated like animals -- expected to sleep outside their masters' tents curled up like dogs, naked, and trying to survive on leftover or unwanted food parts their masters threw at them, such as camel entrails, a camel fetus, and bones. King does an admirable job describing the primitive conditions under which even the captors lived, subsisting on little or no food at times, going for days without water, and utilizing every scrap of any slaughtered animal. Next: Imagine these once hardy seamen as slaves in these conditions, with naked Caucasian skin burned over and over, cracking open, bleeding under the Saharan sun, delirious and desperate to survive; some simply praying for death instead. For someone like me, who can't even stand sand in her bathing suit or under her fingernails, this was history I soaked up like a sponge.

Very scholarly and thorough bibliography; great detailed index; helpful small glossary of unusual words.
7 people found this helpful

Related Books