Barrow's Boys

Rating:
Summary: Survival of the fittest
Review: For 41 years John Barrow manipulated the Royal Navy and the British Government to pursue his own fixed ideas on geography.
His mistaken belief that there was an open, ice-free sea at the North Pole, a permanently clear North-West Passage and that the Niger emptied into either the Nile or the Congo, caused the deaths of unknown numbers of men, the loss of ships, the expenditure of a king's ransom and the physical and mental breakdown of many of Britain's elite officers.

This is the story of that prolonged tragedy; the irony of it is that it fathered the most amazing feats of endurance and privation, that they are regarded today as the pinnacle of human endeavour - only the similarly ill-equipped expeditions of Scott come close.

Barrow's 'Boys' are his hand-picked officers (strangely, they were usually totally ill-suited to the tasks he set them) who are either ambitious, incompetent, zealots or plain insane (or any combination!) and Barrow goes out of his way to ignore all the best advice from those with the real experience, to either under- or over-equip the expeditions, seemingly never hitting the right balance.
The internecine rivalry of the officers, the badly-picked crews, the obstructions of companies and kings, all combine to produce farce after explorational farce. On top of this, each failed expedition only fires his zeal, perversely convincing him that he is right, so off goes another doomed expedition.

If anything tells us that inhabitants of ivory towers have no idea of the real world, it is this book ... Get it and enjoy!

Rating:
Summary: Absolutely Riveting! This is living on the edge!
Review: For an exciting summer read there is none better than Barrow's Boys, the story of British explorers who left the shores of England under the auspices of the Admiralty to explore the Artic, the Antartic and parts of Africa. The book is both well written and well researched, and keeps the reader entrhalled with tales of 19th Century explorations by "extreme adventurers" to use the author's own phrase. And the reader will have to agree with part of the subtitle that some of the tales demonstrate "outright lunacy" on the part of the hero-explorers. This is a book that I did not want to end, and was sorry when I finished it and had to put it down. But the memories still linger, and the stories have made great conversation for many weeks now. I recommend it wholeheartedly to all book lovers.

Rating:
Summary: Too much time in England, not enought in the Arctic
Review: Good book, but it spent too much time in England peering behind the political scenes and not enough time in the Arctic. It is very interesting to learn of the behind the scenes "politicing" required to carry off such pointless acts of courage, but most of the officers come off looking like political hacks instead of the incredibly courageous explorers that they were. These men sailed in the face of fear and came home heroes, but a self-serving bureauocrat makes it to the title of the book. While Barrow deserves much of the credit for getting the machinery in place behind these men, sometimes he did not even do that. I may be trasferring some of my deep personal distaste for the man (Barrow) to the book, but I did enjoy the book very much. I just wish it spent more time on the expeditions and a little less on the politics.

Rating:
Summary: "A Stirring Story of Daring, Fortitude, and Outright Lunacy"
Review: I bought this book to read about Barrow's role in John Franklin's career and several Arctic expeditions, but was pleasantly surprised to find information on aspects of Barrow's enthusiasm for exploration that I don't believe I'd ever really heard about before.

The same (really remarkably influential) gentleman who sent the Royal Navy into the Arctic in search of the Northwest Passage also sponsored several expeditions into Africa to discover, among other things, the course of the Niger river.

This book forms a very nice summary of the history of the Royal Navy's attempts to discover that all-important Northwest Passage, giving form and coherence to series of expeditions that otherwise rather boggle my brain. The most pleasant surprise for me, however, was reading about the African expeditions; new information for me, and engagingly presented as well.

You will find it well written and striking a nice balance between presenting sufficient information to communicate the gravity of the issues faced by "Barrow's boys," and overwhelming the casual reader with too much information.

The history of the interactions between Barrow and those Rosses is particularly engaging, and tempts me to revisit M.J. Ross' very thorough joint biography of Captain John Ross and Sir James Clark Ross (Polar Pioneers : John Ross and James Clark Ross).

An interesting book, beautifully written, and full of unexpected wry humor, light but not light-weight; I enthusiastically recommend this book to persons interested in British polar exploration, the Franklin expeditions, and the decades-long animosity between Barrow and Captain John Ross.

Rating:
Summary: From Biblio To Bio
Review: The Author explains that this book originated as the name of John
Barrow is to be found in the Bibliographies on English Expeditions of
Discovery, for a good portion of the first half of the 19th
Century. Those that lead or were notable participants in these
ventures have books written by them, and about them, many times
over. Evidently this is the first time the man who was a driving force
behind these events has been profiled alongside the voyages. Just some
of these events include the search for The Northwest Passage, the trek
for The North Pole, documenting the North and South Magnetic Poles,
and exploring Antarctica. And when you have frozen through these epic
travels, the writer takes you to Australia, and the overland marches
in search of Timbuktu, the beginning and end of The Niger River, and
many other historical firsts.

Along with the details of the trips and
the men that participated, the Author also explains the construction
of the ships, how these wooden vessels were able to break through ice
instead of their being broken. There are remarkable details noted,
such as there was a black member of the group that first crossed the
Northwest passage from West to East, and also a man of color when the
North Pole was attacked. The tales range from remarkable folly when
officers were to wear dress uniforms when crossing the desserts of
Africa to maintain the pride of Britain, to other men who adopted not
only the dress of The Muslims, but also learned to speak their
language!

In his position at The Admiralty and other distinguished
posts, Barrow not only could direct what expeditions took place, but
also those that were to lead them. With this power he made or
destroyed the reputations of many brave men whose only failure was
that they did not succeed according to Barrow. Most of his beliefs
about The Northwest Passage, The North Pole, and the rivers and cities
of Africa were wrong. Despite this, his persistence and those that
shouldered these journeys filled in the voids on the worlds map that
had until then been blank. But while alive he was a bitter taskmaster
who would brutally discredit the same men he had sent to destinations
never before seen by a European, if he did not gain the information
and confirmation of the beliefs he held to be true.

Different readers
will select those actions they find to be the most remarkable, for me
it was those trips that in futility sought The Northwest Passage by
ship. These ships and crew would at times be gone for 2, 3, or even 4
years depending on the whims of the ice. During one such voyage after
surviving another brutal winter a vessel again made its way toward
home. When once again locked in the ice for yet another winter the
ship had traveled a distance that a man could easily walk in 2 hours!

These winters, which occupied most of the calendar, were filled with
activities to literally keep all members healthy and sane. Seamen who
could not read or write came home literate, and the majority of the
time scurvy was kept at bay by Captains that truly seemed to care for
their men. There were of course Captains whose sanity could be
questioned, and at least one who was certifiably a mental
misfit. However these were the exception and not the rule. The Author
also shares the first human encounter that an isolated group of
Eskimos had experienced in 400 years. The story will contradict every
evil cliché that has been too easily attached to those who set out on
these voyages.

The book is a remarkable piece of work, and pays
tribute and passes judgment when appropriate. A wonderful piece of
scholarly work that is a privilege to read.


Rating:
Summary: A very well researched document--unbelievable
Review: The hugeness of the undertakings described in this book leaves one to believe that it could only be fiction. No one is this brave--or crazy. The explorations that John Barrow's (Second Secretary of the Admiralty)intrepid recurits undertook were a profound example of hardships in the extreme. Hardships beyond anything most sci-fi authors could dream up. Yet the truth of these adventures has been well documented, and the presenation by Mr. Fleming caused me to alternate between freezing in my chair to sweating copiously. If you like historical fiction, you'll love unbelievable historical TRUTH.

Rating:
Summary: RIDE THE GLOBE!
Review: This was a well written book on the many Polar and African interior explorations that were sponsored by the British in the first half of the 19th centry. From trying to find the North-West Passage above North America to searching for the legendary "city of gold" called Timbucto in Africa this book kept me interested throughout. Never before or for that matter since has such a group of explorers been assembled. The man responsible for these quests was John Barrow, a man who had a dream of mapping uncharted areas of the world. He set into motion the largest and most expensive series of explorations in the history of mankind. This is a story of courage and determination like no other that I have read before. This book recounts the stories of men who spent years stuck in the freezing cold in their dreams of being the first to find a passage across North America. The book also details the adventures that other men had in their quest to map the interior of Africa. Other stories of different areas in the world that were explored are also included. John Barrow might not have been as successful as he would have liked but his dream inspired later explorers and set a benchmark that carried on into the 20th century.