William McFee

Born in 1881 and raised in a seafaring family, William McFee was an English writer whose life closely matched the world he wrote about. He was born aboard his father's ship, was educated in England, trained as a mechanical engineer, and later went to sea as a marine engineer. That practical background gave his fiction and nonfiction a grounded, lived-in feel.

McFee became best known for sea stories and novels that drew on his years in maritime service. Reference sources describe him as a writer of sea stories, and archival collections note that he wrote novels, short stories, essays, and journalism, much of it connected to the sea. Among the works most often associated with him are Letters from an Ocean Tramp and Casuals of the Sea.

He later made his home in the United States and continued writing for decades. McFee died in New Milford, Connecticut, in 1966, leaving behind a body of work valued for its quiet intelligence, technical realism, and deep feeling for life at sea.