User Reviews
Rating: really liked it
This is basically an overview of 1066-the accession of Henry II, and the switch from the Conqueror's bloodline to the Plantagenet dynasty. The pivot of that is obviously the White Ship disaster but it takes up maybe ten pages in the actual telling here. This is a bit odd when you consider I've read more detailed accounts of the White Ship in books that were not called
The White Ship.
It's a good intro to the period, told in a lively and very readable way, and I'd absolutely recommend it if you happen to be on an early Angevin kick *side eyes self* but 'a book about the White Ship' it is, basically, not.
Rating: really liked it
The sinking of the White Ship is one of the greatest disasters in English history. Here, Sunday Times bestselling author Charles Spencer tells the real story behind the legend to show how one cataclysmic shipwreck changed England’s course. In 1120, the White Ship was known as the fastest ship afloat. When it sank sailing from Normandy to England it was carrying aboard the only legitimate heir to King Henry I, William of Ætheling. The raucous, arrogant young prince had made a party of the voyage, carousing with his companions and pushing wine into the eager hands of the crew. It was the middle of the night when the drunken helmsman rammed the ship into rocks. The next day only one of the three hundred who had boarded the ship was alive to describe the horrors of the slow shipwreck. William, the face of England’s future had drowned along with scores of the social elite. The royal line severed and with no obvious heir to the crown, a civil war of untold violence erupted. Known fittingly as ‘The Anarchy’, this game of thrones saw families turned in on each other, with English barons, rebellious Welsh leaders and Scottish invaders all playing a part in the bloody, desperate scrum for power. One incredible shipwreck and two decades of violent uncertainty; England’s course had changed forever.
Charles Spencer has penned a magnificent tour de force and the perfect-fitting celebratory read to mark 900 years since the fateful voyage. This book is an intricate portrayal of the complex machinations involved in power, how much easier it is to lose than acquire, and the extraordinary and often inexplicable lengths people will go to in order to hold power over others. Told in endlessly dramatised fashion, with all the violent skirmishes, backstabbing, deceit and duplicity you would expect of these times, this is a fascinating and eminently readable piece of historical nonfiction which manages to read with the flow, shocks, twists and surprises that tend to only be present in our most accomplished fictional novels. It is abundantly clear that the research undertaken in order to be on the button, as it were, must have been extensive on the authors part. Compelling and perhaps even bordering on compulsive, this is a must-read for those who enjoy absorbing and well written exposes on times long passed and whose happenings still echo down the ages. Exciting, exhilarating and quick-paced, a brilliantly entertaining and knowledgeable book. Highly recommended. Many thanks to William Collins for an ARC.
Rating: really liked it
This book is not quite what I expected. Given the title, I thought the text would cover the sinking of the eponymous vessel and the events that followed. A portion of The White Ship does deal with these happenings. However, the overall work is principally a biography of Henry I.
Henry lead an exciting and interesting life and Spencer generally tells his story well. Nevertheless, combining such a full life with a description of The Anarchy that followed Henry's death is a too tall an order for such a slim volume. Parts of the book are overly abbreviated, often involving little more than a flurry of names and barebone descriptions of major events. The White Ship may be a good introduction to this period in British history, but it will not satisfy anyone seeking to actually learn about these times.
Rating: really liked it
DNF at 25%, when it came due at the library (new book). As you will see from the review excerpt below (and the publisher's blurb), the book starts well: drunken English aristos on a party boat from France come to grief when they stupidly get the ship's crew drunk too. But that opening was squandered in an endless laundry list of people and places I'd never heard of, in an England of almost a millennium ago. I imagine that Brits will get more out of this book, or people who already know something about this period in history. The book didn't help its case by including sparse maps. Anyway, I'm done. Not for me!
Good WSJ review, which led me to read the book: https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-whit...
(Paywalled. As always, I'm happy to email a copy to non-subscribers)
Excerpt:
"Just before midnight on Nov. 25, 1120, the White Ship left the northern French harbor of Barfleur, bound for the English port of Southampton. On board the stately vessel were nearly 300 passengers, including the aristocratic elite of the prosperous Anglo-Norman realm then ruled by Henry I. Foremost among them, and the focus of Henry’s dynastic hopes, was his sole legitimate son and heir, the 17-year-old William Ætheling.
Warmed by several barrels of wine, the White Ship’s boisterous company anticipated a swift and uneventful crossing of the English Channel. But the crew and helmsman were also tipsy, and the voyage had barely begun before it ended in catastrophe. Just a mile offshore, the White Ship struck the notorious Quilleboeuf rock, keeled over and foundered in the frigid sea. There was only one survivor, the humble butcher Berold. As the White Ship went down, Berold testified, William Ætheling’s bodyguard hustled him aboard the lone rowboat. But when he heard the anguished cries of his half-sister, Matilda of Perche, the prince insisted upon turning back, and the dinghy was swamped and sunk."
Rating: really liked it
One suggestion: Add a family tree line to refer to and a timeline with important dates
Rating: really liked it
I know I'm not the only historian who was surprised when Spencer, very well-known for his popular and riveting books on seventeenth-century Stuart history, suddenly said he was going to write about the 1100s. What?! Spencer, to me, is just synonymous with the Stuart period, so it seemed an odd move. That said, I'm really glad he wrote this because I probably wouldn't have read a history about this period otherwise. I had a vague understanding of the Conquest of 1066, that some ship sank killing an heir, and the chaos of the Anarchy, but this book fully engaged and enlightened me. I now wholly appreciate the significance of the sinking of the White Ship, which truly changed so much.
This book was downright horrible, and I mean that in the sense that it was full of horrible, violent, petty, and devastating events, figures, and situations. I literally had to put it down because it was so graphic and unsettling at times. The amount of gouged eyes...*shudders*
In a nutshell, he's done it again. This is another superb work of history by Charles Spencer. What will he surprise us with next?
(The full version of this review is at: https://www.andreazuvich.com/book-rev... )
Rating: really liked it
Wow! So I have known for decades that Henry VIII felt compelled to divorce Catherine of Aragon because of what happened the last time a woman was the only legitimate heir to the throne of England, and I knew it involved a terrible civil war ... but this book finally gave me that full story. Loved the larger structure (opening with the ship sinking, the taking us back through the lead-up to better contextualize the consequence) and the smaller structure (sequencing of the information). Admittedly, there was a LOT! And since so many names were same or similar, it could be a little hard to follow - which has been my husband's complaint for years about my Tudor stories! Rather, the ones I tell over dinner, not when they're set down in my books ;)
Rating: really liked it
“No ship that ever sailed brought England such disaster” William of Malmesbury.
Never was a truer word written then or now. The loss of The White Ship with all but one on board re-set not just English history, not just French history, but arguably all western European history from then onwards. Not only was William the Ætheling, heir to the throne of England and the Duchy of Normandy lost in the sunken ship. His half brother and half sister drowned, and also many scions of Anglo-Norman aristocracy and military leaders, including 18 women. The ship’s loss was caused not by storm, not by rough sea but by drunkenness of the crew with the steersman hitting well known rocks. The details of how and why the ship carried so many of Anglo-Norman young elite and why the crew were drunk is well covered together with why William Ætheling was so important and what happened subsequent to William’s death.
The first 87 pages cover how William the Conqueror's youngest son, Henry, came to become King of England, his intent of legitimising Norman rule of England by marrying Edith of Scotland, who was a direct descendant of King Ælfred and Cerdic of Wessex and even giving his only legitimate son (he had 22 bastard children) the English title of “Ætheling”, how Henry out manoeuvred his eldest brother to become Duke of Normandy together with how Henry out fought the French King.
The next section of the book deals with William Ætheling and The White Ship, though it is not till page 148 that the actual loss of The White Ship is dealt with.
With William Ætheling’s death Henry was left with only one legitimate child, a daughter, Matilda, who was married to the King of the Germans (and claimed the title “Empress”). On Henry I’s death she should have ruled, albeit as Regent for her son by her second marriage to Geoffrey of Anjou. However, many in England did not want a woman to rule over them and elected Henry’s nephew, Stephen, King of England and thus ignited a civil war when, it was said, Christ and all his saints slept. Eventually Matilda’s eldest son did get the throne and became Henry II and this is dealt with from page 290.
If he had lived, would William Ætheling have made a good King of England and Duke of Normandy? He was said to have remarked that the English were naturally inferior to the Normans and that he would bend their necks to the plough and treat them like beasts of burthen. Maybe, but the result of his death was to bring to the throne Henry II and the involvement of England in the politics of France, an involvement that didn’t even end with The Hundred Years War and the bloodshed involved in that calamitous period.
Overall the book is well written and reads almost like a novel. I recommend it not just too those unfamiliar with the period, but to any with an interest in English history.
Rating: really liked it
Spencer uses the White Ship itself as an anchor for the story of one of the most tragic events in English history - in fact Spencer writes, "... there as not a part of Henry's Anglo-Norman realm that remained shielded from the impact of the catastrophe ...".
In this tale, Spencer takes you the reader on a tour of the timeline of events from William the Conqueror leading up to the tragedy at sea, and the repercussions for the English throne beyond this.
His narrative is casual, almost conversational, as if he were giving you a conducted tour of Althorp. Yet this same narrative, with the gentle resonance of Spencer's voice, is concise, informative not dry or stuffy. For me, this is well-worn ground - however, I at no time found my attention waivering only eagerly looking forward to the build up to the disaster and to the fate of England, left without a legitimate
male heir for the concept of a woman ruling in the 12th century was anathema in both England and Normandy. Spencer takes us through an abridged version of what became known as "The Anarchy" finishing up with the settlement of succession onto Henry Plantagenet.
Spencer finishes with this rather poignant quote from William of Malmesbury "... no ship that ever sailed brought England such disaster ..."
Highly recommended and one I will be adding to my shelves (upon which I already have two of Spencer's books).
Rating: really liked it
England is notable for its disastrous sinking of large ships. One only has to remember King Henry VIII’s
Mary Rose or in more recent modern time: the
Titanic. Another ship that can be added to list is King Henry I’s
White Ship which met its end on November 25, 1120 after striking heavy boulders. Carrying Henry’s heir to the English throne, William; the sinking of the
White Ship changed the course of English history. Charles Spencer highlights this period in history and the traumatic loss of the ship and all those aboard in, “The White Ship: Conquest, Anarchy and the Wrecking of Henry I’s Dream”.
Spencer’s “The White Ship” begins laying the foundation of the Norman Conquest under William the Conqueror (Henry’s father), the political landscape of the reign and the arguing between the brothers (William’s sons) Robert, William Rufus and Henry. Although this coverage is necessary to dissect Henry’s adult self and understand how the
White Ship came to be fruition; “The White Ship” feels lost without a solid purpose and dusty in its premise. Are we discussing William? His sons? The reign, overall? It is difficult to see Spencer’s point which can be argued that he wasn’t aware of, himself.
This causes an entire host of issues with the main being the slow, dry recap style of Spencer’s writing. Those familiar with Spencer’s other works will not find this surprising but the lack of emotive flow/narrative and insistence on presenting the material as, “Event A happened, then B and then C”; results in “The White Ship” failing to be ‘sticky’ with readers and is often skimmable especially with Spencer’s habit of running off on tangents. Spencer is simply not doing any favors to the subject on hand.
That being said, even though Spencer’s hypothesis is lost; the information he does offer is clean and concise. The problem, as previously stated, is that it is not memorable and therefore doesn’t truly educate or impact the reader. “The White Ship” is also riddled with repetition and occasional back-and-forth jumps in chronology resulting in frustration and confusion. Spencer does well with eschewing the urge to offer opinions, biases and speculation but this is canceled back to zero with the excessive quotes from sources without strong credibility dated much after the events (at least Spencer mentions when sources are post-dated).
None of the figures (not even Henry I) or the events discussed in “The White Ship” come ‘alive’ and therefore the straight-forward academia is all that merits “The White Ship”. Occasionally, Spencer debunks some myths by suggesting alternate theories matching puzzle pieces to provide a rounded, macro view of the period adding some strength to “The White Ship”.
It takes 150 pages for Spencer to bring Henry I to the forefront and begin analyzing the
White Ship . Finally, the text becomes vivid, compelling, and rich with historical storytelling; quickening the pace of “The White Ship”. Spencer explores every aspect of the tragedy from the actual event, logistics and important figures who met their deaths in the cold seas; to the psychological and political aftermath (such as the court positions up for grabs from those who passed) and the impact on the monarchial landscape. “The White Ship” is worth reading at this juncture and suggests new information even to those readers familiar with the topic. The issue is that it takes too long to reach this crescendo which tends to be a typical Spencer habit in his writing. Plus, this height of excitement comes and goes like a lightning bolt and Spencer returns to simply recapping historical events of the period post-sinking of the ship.
Even though the discussion of the actual
White Ship is brief; Spencer highlights the political maneuverings and machinations of Stephen of Blois (future King Stephen) and the battle for the throne against Matilda which will satisfy those readers interested in such events and also of the future King Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine. In this regard, “The White Ship” is a theory piece concerning the cause and outcome of the ship’s sinking. This angle has its own merits as a written text but isn’t the initial presented intent and strays from reader expectation.
Spencer “tries too hard” to conclude “The White Ship” in a dramatic manner expressing the impact of
White Ship on 900 years of English history. However, in essence, “The White Ship” fails to execute such theatrics and prove the thesis resulting in a ‘meh’ finality and work, overall; leaving the text compromised.
“The White Ship” is a well-conceived book in theory but completely misses its target and rather offers a slow text lacking cohesive strands making it one of Spencer’s weaker works (the worst one, in my opinion). “The White Ship” is recommended for readers who
must read all text concerning this period of English history but otherwise, it can be passed over entirely.
Rating: really liked it
This was a good read focusing on the period immediately following William the Conquer's death and his (two) sons' feuding for the throne of England and control of Normandy. The cleverness of the book centres on the unexpected consequences of the disastrous sinking of the White Ship, an episode which singularly destroyed Henry I's succession plans which were so hardly fought for and won in the brotherly stuggle for power. A confusing, bloody but riveting read if you can keep track of who's who in this historical Game of Thrones scenario. Fun facts and spoiler alerts: Henry I was the king whose demise came by a surfeit of lampreys. His daughter Matilda is the one who escaped by scailing down Oxford castle one freezing wintery snowy evening and making her escape to Wallingford and whose son eventually became the first Plantagenet King, Henry II. A strong 3.5
Rating: really liked it
"The White Ship" is about the accident that changed the course of history: on 25 November 1120 Henry I's son and heir, William Adelin, drowned on the White Ship together with some 300 other people. His death led to a succession crisis and a period of civil war in England known as the Anarchy.
The book is divided into three parts. Part 1, "Triumph", tells the story of Henry I's path to the throne. Part 2, "Disaster", is about William Adelin's death and its impact on Henry I's private and political lives. Part 3, "Chaos", recounts the events that occurred following Henry I's death: the Anarchy, the war between Henry's daughter Empress Matilda whose royal inheritance was stolen from her by Stephen of Blois.
"The White Ship" is my first book by Charles Spencer and I immensely enjoyed his writing style. He recounts this amazing story with great skill, but also shows that these historical personages were people: human beings who lived and loved as we do today. Spencer is very compassionate in his portrayal of William Adelin's death and his father's reaction to it.
This is a book that you simply cannot miss. It's different than other accounts of this story because it concentrates on one even. The subtitle is very apt: "Conquest, Anarchy and the Wrecking of Henry I’s Dream". It is an amazing story told with such vividness, I could picture being there.
Highly recommended.
(I received this book for review via NetGalley. I would like to thank the publisher for the opportunity to read "The White Ship" before it was published.)
Rating: really liked it
A very well researched historical book. From 900 years distance, I can see why Charles Spencer, had to write it as historical fact to set the scene, rather than more emphasis on the drama & and colourful life /relationships of the time. Also, there is probably little or less facts known about the individual relationships in the story.
An interesting read, as I have learnt stuff about Stephen, Matilda & the 19 years anarchy.
Rating: really liked it
Well written take on a well known disaster. Not the fault of the author, but hard to follow who’s who sometimes as there are so many similar names!
I think it covers too much of the (many) years before the sinking of the White Ship and not enough given over to the long shadow cast by the disaster. I was more interested in the Anarchy and Henry II’s accession than how Henry I got the throne in the first place.
Rating: really liked it
Yes, the author is that Charles Spencer. Princess Diana’s brother. After I finished, I tried to see if we could trace their family tree back to Henry I and… yep you can!
I’ve tried to read this book multiple times, and it only clicked with me this week. A couple things at play here:
-The queen’s death. Most of this book is about the setup for a situation where England very nearly had a queen regnant all the way back in the 12th century. It was unthinkable then, which is wild since so many of England’s most iconic rulers have been women. Love them or hate them (and there’s a lot of reason to hate them.)
-I’ve been enjoying House of the Dragon, which is basically just a fantasy retelling of the Anarchy.
-A podcast where Spencer talked about a weird situation in which courtiers knew about the white ship crash ahead of the king and we’re afraid to tell him, so they had to hide their own grief until someone mustered up the courage to tell him.
I’ll be honest, I read this book thinking it would have more about the White Ship incident itself. I fell down a Titanic rabbit hole back in the spring and so I’m used to reading about agonizingly slow ship wrecks. But no, this one was the equivalent of a DUI. The passengers went from partying hard, to being tossed into the sea and dying within seconds. You really can’t get a minute by minute account if that. In the end the white ship incident is like the climactic event that divides a play into two bits; Henry I’s rise and then the chaos that followed him.
It speaks to the strength of this non-fiction book that I went in expecting one thing, got something else, and was riveted. I’ve never been particular interested in the British monarchy until around Henry II but this changed my mind.
I mean… How can you not be fascinated by a historical time period that has the illegitimate daughter of a king trying to kill him with a crossbow and then jumping into the moat to avoid retribution? And then later being welcomed back into the fold with gifts of silver? Give me this tv show, please.
