author
Arthur E. Knights
A sea captain with a gift for vivid storytelling, this memoirist turns a working life at sea into a string of sharp, memorable episodes. His best-known book offers firsthand glimpses of rescue, danger, long voyages, and everyday maritime life in the late 19th century.
1 Audiobook
Notes By the Way in a Sailor's Life
by Arthur E. Knights
About the author
Arthur E. Knights is known for Notes by the Way in a Sailor's Life, a memoir drawn from his experiences as a ship's captain. In the book's introduction, he explains that while in Hong Kong in 1898, the editor of the China Mail encouraged him to write down some of his seafaring recollections, which later became the basis of the volume.
The book presents a series of incidents and reflections from a life at sea, including rescues, difficult passages, and encounters in ports around the world. One episode records that the British Government awarded him a telescope for gallantry in saving life at sea, suggesting the respect he had earned as a mariner as well as a storyteller.
Little biographical information about Knights was easy to confirm beyond what appears in and around his book, but his writing still leaves a strong impression: practical, observant, and shaped by long experience aboard ship. For readers interested in maritime memoirs, his work offers a direct voice from the age of sail and steam.