author
Basil Lubbock
1876–1944
A sailor, soldier, and maritime historian, he became one of the best-known writers on the final years of commercial sail. His books draw on first-hand sea experience and helped preserve the stories of clipper ships and windjammers before they disappeared from living memory.
3 Audiobooks
Jack Derringer : A tale of deep water
by Basil Lubbock
The Colonial Clippers
by Basil Lubbock
Round the Horn before the mast
by Basil Lubbock
About the author
Alfred Basil Lubbock (1876–1944) was a British maritime historian whose work focused on the last generation of commercial sailing ships. He is widely remembered for detailed books on clippers, windjammers, and other merchant vessels from the closing years of the Age of Sail.
His authority came partly from experience. After being educated at Eton, he went to Canada during the Klondike gold rush and later sailed home round Cape Horn as an ordinary seaman, an experience he turned into Round the Horn Before the Mast. He also served in the First World War and was awarded the Military Cross.
After the war, he devoted much of his energy to documenting merchant sailing ships, contributing to maritime scholarship and to The Mariner's Mirror. For listeners interested in sea history, his work stands out for combining research with the eye of someone who had known life under sail firsthand.