The Voyage of the Catalpa

the long version

"Setting out from New Bedford, Massachusetts, on April 29, 1875, the American whaling barque, Catalpa, undertook a secret year-long mission of international rescue. American sea captain George Anthony risked his career - and his own freedom - to liberate a group of Irishmen known as "The Fremantle Six" from an Australian prison. Martin Hogan, James Wilson, Thomas H. Hassett, Michael Harrington, Thomas Darragh, and Robert Cranston were soldiers in the British army when they took the secret Fenian oath and pledged their well-honed martial skills to the cause of Irish independence, including armed insurrection against the British military. The six were arrested in 1866, tried for treason against the Crown, and sentenced to imprisonment and slow death in a hellish foreign land. After eight years languishing in Fremantle Gaol, through a worldwide network of Irish nationalists, undercover agents from America, and their prison chaplain, the Fremantle Six escaped to the Australian coast where Captain Anthony was waiting to escort them on their long voyage to freedom. The obstacles they overcame, from armed British vessels and a furious sea storm, made their escape the stuff of international headlines and legend.". "This saga of American, Irish, British, and Australian history is the first full telling of the voyage of the Catalpa in one hundred and twenty-five years. Fearing capture by the British Navy, Captain Anthony would never again venture into international waters. His rescue mission, made mostly without the use of a functioning chronometer, is one of the greatest feats of seamanship in nautical annals and one of the most daring deeds performed by an American in the name of Irish independence."--BOOK JACKET.