Kirjahaku

This book uses the experience of three generations of the Earle family to throw light on the social and economic history of Liverpool during its rise to prominence as a great port, from 1688 to 1840. The focus is on six members of this successful family, John who came to Liverpool as apprentice to a merchant in 1688, his three sons, Ralph, Thomas and William, who all became merchants specializing in different branches of the trade of the port, and William’s two sons, another Thomas and another William, who consolidated the fortunes of the family and began the process of converting their wealth into gentility. The approach is descriptive rather than theoretical, and the aim throughout has been to make the book entertaining as well as informative. Where sources permit, the book describes the businesses run by these men, often in considerable detail. Trading in slaves was an important part of the business of three of them, but they and other members of the family also engaged in a variety of other trades, such as the import-export business with Leghorn (Livorno) in Italy, fishing in Newfoundland and the Shetland Islands, the wine and fruit trades of Spain, Portugal and the Azores, the import of raw cotton for the industries of the Industrial Revolution and the Russia trade. Other family interests included privateering, art collection and the trade in art, a sugar plantation in Guyana, and the emigrant trade. While the book is mainly a work of economic history, there is also much on the merchants’ wives and families and on the social history of both Liverpool and Livorno.

This book uses the experience of three generations of the Earle family to throw light on the social and economic history of Liverpool during its rise to prominence as a great port, from 1688 to 1840. The focus is on six members of this successful family, John who came to Liverpool as apprentice to a merchant in 1688, his three sons, Ralph, Thomas and William, who all became merchants specializing in different branches of the trade of the port, and William’s two sons, another Thomas and another William, who consolidated the fortunes of the family and began the process of converting their wealth into gentility. The approach is descriptive rather than theoretical, and the aim throughout has been to make the book entertaining as well as informative. Where sources permit, the book describes the businesses run by these men, often in considerable detail. Trading in slaves was an important part of the business of three of them, but they and other members of the family also engaged in a variety of other trades, such as the import-export business with Leghorn (Livorno) in Italy, fishing in Newfoundland and the Shetland Islands, the wine and fruit trades of Spain, Portugal and the Azores, the import of raw cotton for the industries of the Industrial Revolution and the Russia trade. Other family interests included privateering, art collection and the trade in art, a sugar plantation in Guyana, and the emigrant trade. While the book is mainly a work of economic history, there is also much on the merchants’ wives and families and on the social history of both Liverpool and Livorno.

Investigating the fascination pirates hold over the popular imagination, Peter Earle takes the fable of ocean-going Robin Hoods sailing under the "banner of King Death" and contrasts it with the murderous reality of robbery, torture and death and the freedom of a short, violent life on the high seas. The Pirate Wars charts 250 years of piracy, from Cornwall to the Caribbean, from the 16th century to the hanging of the last pirate captain in Boston in 1835. Along the way, we meet characters like Captain Thomas Cocklyn, chosen as commander of his ship "on account of his brutality and ignorance," and Edward Teach, the notorious "Blackbeard," who felt of his crew "that if he did not now and then kill one of them they would forget who he was." Using material from British Admiralty records, this is an account of the Golden Age of pirates and of the men of the legitimate navies of the world charged with the task of finally bringing these cutthroats to justice.

"Sailors" is the history of the English merchant seaman in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries; a period during which England rose to dominance in world commence and became the greatest naval power in the world. Drawing on primary documents and memoirs, renowned naval historian, Peter Earle, explores every aspect of the sailor's life: conditions of service, wealth and possessions, life aboard a ship, the perils of the sea, discipline and punishment, sickness, desertion, mutiny and morality, and the role of the sailor in wartime. Peter Earle addresses the popular image of sailors: handkerchiefs knotted round their heads and a cutlass in their hands, as they stare into the blue yonder, on their way to romance and adventure; and introduces us to a diverse range of characters: some diligent, industrious and fearless; others drunk, difficult and careless. We discover that life on the waves was not just about storms and tyranny, piracy and plunder, but harmony and comradeship, the attractions of travel and adventure, and the joys of fine-weather sailing.

"Treasure Hunt" is the story of a national obsession. Dreams of Spanish treasure, of unearned gold at the bottom of the sea, have been a part of the English psyche since long before effective diving equipment was invented. In 1687, Captain William Phips weighed anchor in English waters with an incredible cargo - nearly forty tons of silver and gold, the treasure of the Spanish galleon Concepcion, wrecked over forty years before on a coral reef in the middle of the ocean. This treasure in coins and bullion had been raised by naked divers, unaided by breathing equipment. The great British treasure-hunting boom had begun. Over the next two hundred years, many such adventures, most based on extremely dubious information, were begun, with many fortunes and lives lost in the process. The real boom for underwater treasure hunting took place in the 1690s, with the invention of crude, very dangerous diving equipment. And, with the advent of the stock market, gambling and treasure-hunting became closely connected to the birth of modern capitalism. In the 18th and 19th centuries, treasure-hunting became a professional occupation, with a new breed of diver emerging to salvage the wrecks of English and Dutch East-Indiamen carrying treasure to finance purchases in Asia. World-renowned naval historian Peter Earle returns with an extraordinary and little-known history of a peculiarly English phenomenon - of outstanding bravery, of exceptional recklessness, and above all, of dreams of treasure.