author
Nicholas Mellen
Best remembered for a vivid firsthand account of the wreck of the Nottingham Galley, this early writer helped preserve one of colonial New England’s most dramatic survival stories.
1 Audiobook
A True Account of the Voyage of the Nottingham-Galley of London, John Dean Commander, from the River Thames to New-England
by Christopher Langman, Nicholas Mellen, sailor on the Nottingham galley George White
About the author
Nicholas Mellen is known today for A True Account of the Voyage of the Nottingham-Galley of London, a narrative connected with the disastrous voyage and wreck of the Nottingham Galley on the New England coast. Public book records and Project Gutenberg listings credit him as one of the writers associated with that account, alongside George White and Christopher Langman.
Very little reliable biographical detail about his life is easy to confirm from standard reference sources. Based on the surviving records available here, he is best understood less as a well-documented literary figure and more as a historical witness whose name endures through a single remarkable sea narrative.
That gives his work a special kind of appeal: it reads not as polished fiction, but as part of the lived record of danger, endurance, and early Atlantic travel. For listeners interested in shipwrecks, colonial history, and real-life adventure, Mellen’s name is tied to a story that has lasted for centuries.