The ships and sailors of old Salem

The work compiles ship logs, journals, and contemporary documents to chart Salem’s maritime ascendancy, detailing long-distance voyages, privateering, shipbuilding, and merchant ventures. It profiles notable captains and merchants, recounts early visits to distant ports and islands, and describes encounters with pirates, naval seizures, and wartime risks. Technical topics such as navigation, charting, and vessel construction are discussed alongside institutional life—marine societies, custom houses, and wharves—and illustrated by authentic records. Combining narrative episodes with economic and social context, it presents a rounded portrait of a vanished era of seafaring commerce and the practices that made a small port globally prominent.