I'm John Baxter with the author Richard Snow.

His new book is a naval mystery, sailing the graveyard sea, the deathly voyage of the summers,

the U.S. Navy's only mutiny, and the trial that grip the nation. Spencer, 18 years old, Cromwell, 30 years old, small,

indeterminate, or dead. The Navy holds what is an inquiry, not a court-martial, an inquiry

into these events beginning in January. And one very famous author, Richard Dana, who will later on become a very prominent name

during the Civil War.

He's already famous because he's written two years before the mast, which is an astonishing

good seller in America at the time.

He writes brilliant prose.

He goes on board the USS North Carolina.

No, just the North Carolina. They don't use USS yet. He goes on the North Carolina, where the

hearing is being held. And Dana is partial to McKenzie. What does he write, Richard, to favor McKenzie?

He is with McKenzie right along.

He says what, what everybody was saying about McKenzie in the beginning before the more facts began to come out that he's a gentle, more honorable man,

never drew breath on the quarter deck of an American ship, that he is saintly and his sagat and

infinitely wise. Dana's forum all the way through and thinks that anybody isn't is sort of scoundrel.

And he remains deeply loyal.

I mean, the two men had no connection, but he was recognized as an expert on maritime affairs, and it meant something that he was

sure that McKenzie had behaved properly at every moment.

The inquiry is headed up by Commodore Stewart of Old Ironsides, and the prosecutor or the

representative of the court is Ogden Hoffman, an attorney at the time.

This is not a court marshal.

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