Like countless Gloucester fishermen before and since, Howard Blackburn and Tom Welch were trawling for halibut on the Newfoundland banks in an open dory in 1883 when a sudden blizzard separated them from their mother ship.
A longtime sailor, he and his wife, Helen, live on the Eastern Point shore of Gloucester\'s outer harbor..
Garland, a former newspaperman, has written extensively on social, maritime and medical history, including thirteen books about Gloucester and Boston\'s North Shore and some 350 columns in the Gloucester Daily Times.
About the Author: Joseph E.
Lone Voyager is a Homeric saga of survival at sea and a thrilling portrait of the world\'s most fabled fishing port in the age of sail.
Incredibly, though Blackburn lost his fingers to his icy misadventure, he went on to set a record for swiftest solo sailing voyage across the Atlantic that stood for decades.
Yet his tests had only So begins Joe Garland\'s Extraordinary account of the Hero Fisherman of Gloucester.
He rowed five days without food or water, with his hands frozen to the oars, to reach the coast of Newfoundland.
Welch soon succumbed to exposure, and Blackburn did the only thing he could: He rowed for shore.
ALone on the empty North Atlantic, they battled towering waves and frozen spray to stay afloat.
Like countless Gloucester fishermen before and since, Howard Blackburn and Tom Welch were trawling for halibut on the Newfoundland banks in an open dory in 1883 when a sudden blizzard separated them from their mother ship
