The Strange Last Voyage of Donald Crowhurst

by Tomalin, Nicholas; Hall, Ron; Raban, Jonathan

• ISBN13: 9780071376129
• ISBN10: 0071376127
• Edition: 2nd
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2001-06-25
• Publisher: MCG

Summary

In the autumn of 1968, Donald Crowhurst set sail from England to participate in the first single-handed nonstop around-the-world sailboat race. Eight months later, his boat was found in the mid-Atlantic, intact but with no one on board. In this gripping reconstruction, journalists Nicholas Tomalin and Ron Hall tell the story of Crowhurst's ill-fated voyage, up to his apparent decision to take his own life rather than be discovered as the would-be perpetrator of one of the biggest hoaxes in sailing history.

Author Biography

Nicholas Tomalin was literary editor for the New Statesman and a featured columnist for the Daily Express, the Sunday Times, and the Evening Standard of London. He was nominated Reporter of the Year for his coverage of the war in Vietnam. He was killed on the Golan Heights in 1973 while covering the Yom Kippur War Ron Hall is a leading British journalist. He was cofounder of the Sunday Times' (London) "Insight," where he was editor from 1964-66, and he became joint managing editor of the Sunday Times in 1969

Table of Contents

Introduction by Jonathan Raban

Authors' Preface

Prologue

One. The Bravest Boy of Them All

Two. The Great Race

Three. The Revolutionary Boat

Four. The Maiden Voyage

Five. Teignmouth

Six. The Last Letter

Seven. The First Two Weeks at Sea

Eight. Two Conflicting Testimonies

Nine. The Fraudulent Record

Ten. The Plan

Eleven. Christmas

Twelve. Silence and Loneliness

Thirteen. The Secret Landing

Fourteen. "Heading Digger Ramrez"

Fifteen. Midnight Oil

Sixteen. Win or Lose?

Seventeen. The Inescapable Triumph

Eighteen. Into the Dark Tunnel

Nineteen. The Cosmic Mind

Twenty. The Great Beauty of Truth

Epilogue. And the World Said . . .

Appendix 1. Donald Crowhurst's Navigation

Appendix 2. The Design of Teignmouth Electron

Appendix 3. Teignmouth Electron by Richard C. Newick

Afterword by Robin Knox-Johnston