In the Great Days of Sail: 14 Sea Stories

Archibald MacMechan revelled in the tales of worldwide adventure, pirates, storms, fires, rescues, and tragedies. MacMechan’s collections, all popular successes in their day, have been out of print for several years. Now In the Great Days of Sail brings fourteen stories together for a new generation of readers. Edited and with an introduction by Halifax author Elizabeth Peirce, the book displays the very best of this master chronicler’s work. MacMechan’s stories reflect the pride Nova Scotians took in locally built ships, and the legendary tenacity of the captains and crew who sailed them. Among others, we encounter George Churchill of Lunenburg, who had to rebuild his rudder eight times during a voyage from Quebec to Scotland, Captain Samuel Bancroft Davis of Yarmouth, who dreamed the precise latitude and longitude of a distressed ship before steering off his coarse to rescue it, and a routine trip from LaHave to Halifax that made an unplanned detour all the way to London, England.