The Terrifying Story of the Real Moby Dick

this video is kindly sponsored by keeps find out more later in the video hey 42 here throughout the 19th and 20th centuries the world powers scrambled to paint the last empty spots on their maps for every successful expedition there was an equally ill-fated one from mungo park's second african expedition that ended in his team being murdered by an onslaught of arrows to scott's fatal mission to the south pole and shackleton's endurance but it could be argued these all pale in comparison to the tragic voyage of the whale ship essex our journey begins in early 19th century nantucket this tiny island off the coast of massachusetts was once the global epicenter of the vast and extremely profitable whaling industry crude oil extraction as an industry didn't yet exist and so whale oil was the must-have commodity used to lubricate machinery and illuminate city streets it literally greased the cogs of the industrial revolution which if you haven't heard was quite important the ocean contained a seemingly unlimited bounty of whales brimming with oily goals and many an intrepid salty sea dog was keen to risk life and limb to obtain it in nantucket's harbour an endless procession of whaling ships embarked as others returned from far-off lands one of these ships was the essex captained by george pollard jr and manned by a crew of 20. essex was 20 years old by this point and had seen many profitable whaling voyages and so as it had before on the 12th of august 1819 she set sail for the south pacific on a round trip the crew expected to take between two to three years but the voyage seemed doomed from the start if you get lost at sea you'll be glad you still have all your hair thanks to keeps you know i've had people close to me start to lose their hair as early as their 20s and it's always been an upsetting experience if you're in the same boat then you're not alone did you know two out of three guys will experience some form of male pattern baldness by the time they're 35 but 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order after only two days at sea and still thousands of miles from its destination the essex encountered a storm and almost sunk the storm was brief but the ship was badly damaged losing two of its five whaling boats repairs were made but a seed of doubt had been planted in the crew's minds who now began to wonder if the storm was a bad omen unfortunately for them the man in charge captain pollard waved off their concerns as unfounded superstitious nonsense and elected to continue with the voyage the essex made slow progress encountering many more storms and very few whales one of the crew members henry dewitt decided enough was enough and deserted the essex during a routine stop-off on the ecuadorian coast a decision i doubt he ever came to regret the essex continued to fail in its efforts to seek out any decent whaling action finding most of the known whaling ground to have already been depleted eventually they ran into other whalers who told them of a newly discovered hunting ground a mere 2500 nautical miles away where there was supposedly more whales than you could shake a harpoon at buoyed by the news captain pollard and his crew set course for this new destination on the way they decided to drop in at the galapagos islands to stock up on supplies this of course didn't mean popping into the local service station for a few scotch eggs and a chocolate bar it meant helping themselves to the local population of tortoises 360 of them to be exact tortoises made for the perfect food on long voyages at sea not only were they tasty and nutritious but they could also be stacked conveniently on their shelves where they would continue to live a miserable existence without food or water for upwards of a year unbeknownst to the crew of the essex they would soon have more in common with those tortoises than they would ever have hoped before leaving the galapagos islands the essex crew not content with devastating the tortoise population decided to take one last crap on mother nature a playful prank caused a small fire which soon escalated into a huge fire that engulfed the entirety of charles island almost completely stripping it of its flora and fauna it's believed this fire caused the extinction of quite a few species on the island the crew quickly raised anchor and vacated like a bunch of abashed schoolchildren captain pollard was furious at the damage they'd caused the fire only fueled to the belief that the essex was cursed but by now it was too late to turn back on the 20th of november 1820 more than a year after leaving nantucket the essex finally reached the hunting grounds they'd been told about the crew weren't disappointed the ocean before them was bustling with whale activity it appeared their luck had changed the men lowered the whaling boat into the ocean and immediately gave chase to a large pod of sperm whales whaling in the 19th century was a brutal occupation whalers would row their boats as close as possible to their intended target before throwing a harpoon into it as hard as they could once harpoons the whale would pull the whaling boat along with frightening pace in what whalers referred to as a nantucket sleigh ride as you can imagine the whales were less than keen on these sleigh rides much preferring to be left alone to do whatever it is that whales normally do one particularly large sperm whale seemed to take great offense at seeing his mates being repeatedly harpooned by the crew of the essex and so decided to take matters into his own hands and no i didn't just mistake my mammal appendages whales actually do have hands inside a whale's flippers are finger bones remarkably similar to that of a human anyway this particular bad tempered whale was about 26 meters long and weighed roughly 80 tons it tied up the port side of the essex before charging it like an enormous battering wrap the crew aboard the essex initially presumed it to be an accidental collision whales aren't typically known to be aggressive but to their horror the dazed whale resurfaced and appeared to gather his senses before taking game and charging them for a second blow this time he rammed the ship right in the port bow before disappearing into the murky depths of the ocean presumably to buy a whale-sized headache tablet unfortunately for the crew of the essex the damage had already been done and the ship began to take on water the whale hunters who'd earlier departed on whaling boats returned to the essex to be greeted by their panicked comrades captain pollard immediately sensed that something terrible had taken place in his absence he asked his first mate owen chase what happened to which he grimly replied we have been stoved by a whale realizing no time could be spared they boarded the sinking essex and salvaged all they could this amounted to a few tortoises a musket 65 gallons of fresh water and 600 pounds of heart attack a type of flavorless biscuit made from flour and water not fancying their chances of rowing across thousands of miles of ocean they grabbed material and tools so that they could fit the whaling boats with makeshift sails most importantly they retrieved captain pollard's navigational equipment which would be essential if they stood any chance of making it back to dry land as the essex continued its one-way journey to the ocean floor the crew gathered in the free whaling boats to divide their lackluster supplies they estimated that if each man lift off half a pint of water and one biscuit a day they could make the provisions last for 60 days the nearest islands were about 1 200 miles away in french polynesia captain pollard believed these islands were their best hope for survival but his crew weren't keen on the idea believing this area of the south pacific to be rife with cannibal tribes oh the irony instead they chose to head towards chile which was further away but still achievable within their 60-day limit the extra distance however left very little room for error days and nights of sapping hunger dehydration and sunburn followed the whale boats were continuously battered by storms compounding the crew's misery to make matters even worse during the whale attack the tack bread became sudden with sea water and now it had dried out it was infused with salt and exacerbated their already excruciating first a month of this torture passed by then quite by chance they spied a speck of land on the horizon they rode towards it as fast as their starving frames would allow desperately hoping to find food water shelter and maybe even civilization but once ashore it soon became apparent that this wasn't the island paradise they'd hoped for the sailors had found themselves on the uninhabited henderson island and outside of a few small birds and crabs the only food in great abundance was pepper grass which did little to satiate their overwhelming hunger captain pollard and his crew were forced to face the reality that they were rapidly exhausting what little provisions this tiny spit of land had to offer and with the knowledge that the island was far away from any known trade routes or fishing lanes they knew their chances of being discovered were pretty much non-existent their only hope for survival was to continue their journey to chile which was still thousands of miles away this would certainly mean more arduous days alone at sea with little food or water but with the island running on empty they were left with no other choice three crew members opted to stay behind presumably because the force of seeing their days out munching on grass seemed marginably less terrible than taking their chances on the ocean once again the 17 remaining crew members loaded up the boats with island provisions before setting sail for easter island on the west coast of chile little over a week later the men had eaten the meager supplies from the island and once again the hard salty tack bread was their dish of the day more bad news came when they realized they drifted further south than they'd meant to and were now way off course their only hope was to change their destination and head for masatiera these days known as robinson crusoe island only a few days later second mate matthew joy succumbed to illness and died he was buried at sea as was the custom it's hard to imagine what must have been going through his surviving crewmates minds as they watched their friend's body disappear into the dark depths of the ocean little did they know that joy was one of the lucky ones a few days later just when it seemed morale couldn't get any lower another storm hit the free whaling boats in the melee one of the boats were separated from the others as the storm subsided owen chase alongside fellow crewmen richard peterson isaac cole benjamin lawrence and thomas nickerson desperately scanned the ocean for the others but the search proved fruitless the group was now divided in two the five men on chase's boat would have to continue their journey alone i say five men it wasn't five for very long as the oldest member of the crew richard patterson decided that he too preferred the murky depths over salty biscuits and sunstroke and julie popped his clogs like matthew joy before him his body was sewn into his clothes and plunged into the ocean another month of relentless misery passed before isaac hall became the next crew member to die only this time the three surviving men were hesitant to follow seafaring customs and collectively made a chilling decision despite his body now resembling an emaciated bag of bones coal suddenly looked awfully tasty to the starving men who wasted no time in preparing his flesh before digging in finding the meat a little sinewy they focused their attention on his heart liver and lungs they made the best of what was left of him before committing his remains to the ocean meanwhile the other two whaling boats had also become separated one of these boats carrying three of the essex crew would never be seen again although months later a very similar looking whaling boat containing free skeletons did wash up on ducy island which all seemed a little too coincidental if you ask me over in captain pollard's boat they too had resorted to cannibalism and had begun eating their dead crewmates unfortunately the four surviving men were now stubbornly refusing to die of natural causes how inconsiderate meaning there was an obvious lack of dead bodies for the desperate men to consume so they decided to draw lots to see which of them would be sacrificed and eaten so that the others may stand a small chance at survival captain pollard's cousin the aptly named owen coffin drew the short straw the young lad was a mere 17 years old this was his first and ultimately last whaling trip the captain who'd been sworn to protect him offered to take his place but coffin stoically answered no i like my lot as well as any other lots were drawn again to determine his executioner and coffin's close friend charles ramsdale was fated to carry out the unthinkable deed coffin was shot in the back of the head and his body consumed a few days later basilee ray died of natural causes and he too found himself on the menu 89 days after the essex had been attacked by a sperm whale owen chase benjamin lawrence and thomas nicholson would be rescued by a ship called the indian which had spotted their whale boat drifting aimlessly in the ocean four days later the other whale boat containing captain pollard and charles ramstall was also discovered this time by a fellow nantucket whaler the dophon the captain and ramsdell were found gnawing on the remains of their deceased crewmates it is said that by this point the men were so delusional that they attacked their rescuers in a desperate attempt to protect their precious cargo of bones a subsequent rescue mission was sent out to henderson island where the three crew members had opted out of returning to sea miraculously all three men were alive and well this took the survival count of the essex up to eight twelve had died seven had been consumed by their shipmates amazingly captain pollard would return to the ocean and survive a further two shipwrecks before eventually concluding that sailing the seven seas probably wasn't the best occupation for him after hanging up his sextant he lived to the ripe old age of 78. until his death he would commemorate his fallen crewmates by fasting each november the 20th the anniversary of the devastating whale attack first mate owen chase also returned to the ocean and for almost 20 years forged out a successful career as a whaler unsurprisingly he never got over the events of the essex and lived out the remainder of his days in a mental institute but perhaps the biggest legacy left by the true story of the whale ship essex was by the perpetrator of the attack the infamous giant sperm whale which succumbed pollard and his crew to their cannibalistic fate news of the whale's attack and the subsequent events of the voyage quickly spread around the globe and eventually found their way to author hermann melville melville was captivated by the story of the essex and in particular the barnacle-ridden leviathan that had sunk it eventually immortalizing the whale in his 1851 novel moby dick thanks for watching

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Length: 20min 33sec (1233 seconds)

Published: Mon May 10 2021