Stephen Puleo

Voyage of Mercy is a history of a United States mission to deliver food to the starving people of Ireland during the Great Hunger. Approved by Congress, the military ship U.S.S. Jamestown sailed from Boston to Queenstown (Cobh) to deliver the good in the spring of 1847. A naval ship was chosen to the unavailability of merchant vessels and the U.S.S. Constitution was even considered for the journey.

According to Puleo, the Jamestown mission was the first example of foreign aid and serves as a show more model of international disaster relief efforts. The book focuses on two key characters. Robert Bennet Forbes, an experienced merchant ship captain from the Boston area (born in Jamaica Plain and buried in Forest Hills cemetery, and I coincidentally passed his former home-become-museum in Milton on the day I finished this book), captained the Jamestown and was recognized for his good character and generosity. Father Theobald Matthew of County Cork, a noted temperance leader, organized the relief operations on the Irish side.

The book is good but if it has flaws it is Puleo's tendency to be about the goodness of the people behind the relief effort. Nevertheless, despite the success of the mission it did face challenges that later international relief efforts also suffered from. Distribution of the food stuffs was controversial as to whether it should be retained in County Cork or throughout Ireland. There was also the issue of the limits of charitable contributions to address deep, structural problems, in this case the colonial exploitation of Ireland by the United Kingdom. I couldn't help seeing parallels in the indifference and cruelty of the British government's response to the potato famine to the current day response of the Republican Party to the Covid Pandemic in the United States.

This is a good and well-researched history, although I feel that Puleo stretched it out where a shorter book may have been sufficient. Also, while I don't know where my Sullivan family ancestors originated, it is a common name in County Cork, so I could very well owe my existence to mission of the U.S.S. Jamestown. show less

Charles Sumner was twenty-seven, on a European tour in France when he observed students of different races, “jaunty” “men of fashion”, interacting as equals. He at once understood that education, and not nature, had divided black from white. He dedicated the rest of his life fighting to fulfilling the promise of American equality. At a time when abolitionists were disdained radicals he spoke out for the end of slavery, and when the North finally embraced abolition, he pushed for even show more more radical laws protecting equality and conferring voting rights.

The story of Sumner’s career is also the story of America’s division and its awakening and embracing the humanity of the enslaved. Sadly, with every victory and advance came a whiplash of brutality and violence, and the conflict over race and equality continues to this day.

This is the story of single-minded commitment to justice. After Sumner was caned nearly to death on the floor on congress, taking years to physically recover and left with post traumatic stress syndrome, he persevered in his mission. And, it is the story of America’s original sin and its legacy.

Sumner was an imperfect man, a lonely man, who could be cold and difficult, and he was a failed husband. He held lifelong deep friendships with luminaries like Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and his wife, was a close advisor President Lincoln and stayed with the dying president, and was a dear friend to Mrs. Lincoln, supporting her through the loss of her son and helping to secure her a pension after her husband’s tragic death.

I had been reading around Sumner’s life in various books, and was thrilled with every page of this revealing biography, impressed by the depth of Sumner’s impact on American history.

Thanks to the publisher for a free book. show less

Once you read this book, never again will you put any credence in that old saying, “as slow as molasses in January.” On January 15, 1919, a torrent of fast-moving, sticky molasses burst from its confines in a fifty-foot tank. Within seconds, the beginning tidal wave, 25 feet high and 160 feet wide, pulverized the entire waterfront and a half-mile swath of Commercial Street, where the tank had been located. This comprehensive and well-researched account of that tragedy is a gripping tale show more of those whose lives were snuffed out and of those who survived but suffered the ill effects for the remainder of their days. Author Stephen Puleo has written a clear and well-organized account of the flood in this book that reads like a novel but is all too true. He gives an overview of the history of that time period, of the politics and the anarchists who made headlines, of the flood itself, and of the trial that ensued. It’s a tragedy that changed lives, but it also changed laws and the way big business is viewed by society. Puleo has captured the heart of the neighborhood and the horror of the disaster waiting to unfold in this compelling read. show less

A remarkable tale about a little known, regrettable incident in American (and, particularly, Boston) history. On January 15, 1919, a 90 foot tall tank of molasses, destined for distillation into industrial alcohol for munitions manufacture, flew apart, sending a 25 foot high wave of the dark sticky substance racing through the crowded North End at speeds up to 35 mph. (So much for 'slow as molasses!') The first third of the book supplies background of the molasses trade, Boston at the turn show more of the century and introduces us to those who played a significant role in the tragedy. Most harrowing is the central portion, detailing the enormous failure of the tank and the unthinkable destruction it wrought, with attendant suffering and near misses. The last third is a chilling courtroom drama, pitting the mostly immigrant plaintiffs against a large corporation, USIA.

This story has long played at the edges of Bostonian folklore, but has never received "spotlight" treatment. Stephen Puleo rectifies this oversight with an absolutely gripping volume. The story is amazing in its own right. Puleo goes further, placing it in the context of the political and economic exigencies faced by WWI America. While the author doesn't do so, I found echos resonating to our modern era. Anti-immigrant feeling, persecution for political expression, worker safety concerns, questions over the ability of Big Business to police itself (and its culpability when it fails to do so), lack of government regulation and the effects of military/industrial spending are all issues with which we continue to struggle. This book continues to have relevance beyond the events of a near century ago.

Puleo draws largely upon primary sources, including the 25,000 page transcript of the legal proceedings. One wishes for careful footnoting or end notes, particularly where Puleo ascribes inner thoughts and feelings to someone. Puleo notes that there is little prior written work work on this topic. All the more important in the interests of history and future researchers, I would think, to carefully note one's sources. This is admittedly nit-picking. As a Bostonian, I found this book particularly intriguing. However, I think that it would have broad appeal. show less