Jacket blurbs:

The journals of Captain Philip Saumarez were written while he was aboard the Centurion, flagship of Anson's fleet, which circumnavigated the world in 1740-44. The circumnavigation was one of the great voyages in the history of exploration and was distinguished from the Elizabethan buccaneers in that it was a naval expedition, sanctioned to capture the Spanish Acapulco galleon and harass the Spaniards to the best of its power. The treasure captured during the four year voyage amounted to about fifty million pounds (in today's currency), the biggest prize of all time. The fortunes of the Centurion's officers were assured and, among others, Piercy Brett, van Keppel, Charles Saunders and Hyde Parker all went on to achieve flag ranks and further distinction. The tragically ironic exception was Saumarez , who was killed by a cannonball during a battle off Cape Finisterre in 1747.

His four log books of the voyage, long thought lost, were recently discovered in a cardboard box in the Saumarez manor in the Channel Islands. With the logs were numerous letters and documents that gave an unusual insight into the voyage and its leaders: Anson (the father of the British Navy) and Saumarez.

Saumarez's journals were used to provide information for the popular account of the day, by Richard Walter, and that source has become the standard work on the expedition, with its mistakes perpetuated by commentators ever since. With the accurate, daily accounts of the voyage and supporting documents, Leo Heaps has edited and compiled the hardships of the circumnavigation in the original words of the Centurion's Captain, one of the most able and sensitive naval officers of his time.

The author:

Leo Heaps in his early days was a paratrooper and organiser in the Dutch Resistance who worked with MI9 and MI5. After WWII the Israelis requested his help, and many of the small striking units in operation in that country are a result of his experience in the British Special Air Service. During the Hungarian Revolution he organised a special rescue squad under the auspices of the International Rescue Committee and brought across the border many hundreds of fleeing refugees.

A novelist and historian, Leo Heaps is also a playwright and has had a number, of works-performed in London, where he now lives. He is a keen ocean sailor and an avid student of the great and early sea voyages. However, by choice and training he is best known as an art historian who has discovered in Europe and America rare art treasures and manuscripts on behalf of important collectors.

CONTENTS

List of Illustrations

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