BOOK REVIEW
SlaviSh Shore : The odySSey
of richard henry dana , Jr . by Jeffrey L . Amestoy Cambridge , MA : Harvard University Press , 2015
Reviewed by Paul S . Gillies , Esq .
Jeffrey Amestoy — Chief Justice of the Vermont Supreme Court ( 1997-2003 ), Vermont Attorney General ( 1984-1997 ), Commissioner of Labor and Industry ( 1982- 1984 )— we thought we knew him , but after his public service was over , Jeff Amestoy became a biographer , and a good one . His subject is the writer of the classic Two Years Before the Mast , Richard Henry Dana , Jr . Richard Henry Dana , Jr . was a man who became a successful Boston attorney , abolitionist , and prominent citizen , and who enjoyed great success but suffered the troubles that come with success . The book is intriguing and provocative — a worthy read . The biography will give you a respite from the cares of your life , and will engage and entertain you for a few hours .
You might wish to read ( or reread ) Two Years Before the Mast to prepare for Mr . Amestoy ’ s own journey .
It all began with a sea voyage . Dana was 19 , had started at Harvard , but had taken a leave of absence due to ill health and bad eyesight , when he boarded the sailing brig , the Pilgrim out of Boston in 1834 . Two years later he disembarked . His sea chest was lost , containing his journal , but he recreated it and published his first book in 1840 , after graduating from Harvard Law School . Naturally , he practiced admiralty law , and wrote The Seaman ’ s Journal in 1841 , among other works . He became a leading abolitionist whose public opposition to slavery brought him both notoriety and opprobrium . Unfortunately , Dana spent his last years as a defendant in a suit that drained his ambition and distracted him from his career .
Biography is challenging , both to read and to write . Chronology — the timeline
of a full life — is a demanding structure to maintain . It is a true test of endurance and ethics to try to make sense of a person ’ s full years , while simultaneously resisting the temptation to judge or to contour the arc of the story into a meaningful pattern . Everybody ’ s life is interesting — but how much should be told , how much should be left out , how much must you elaborate ? These are the tough questions a biographer has to answer when writing , since nobody really knows the inner life of another person , always brimming with details .
So much of a life is prosaic . But in details , in incidents and scenes , a character is revealed . Dana was a dutiful husband , father , attorney , and citizen , who was raised to become another member of the elite , but who had the wisdom to choose an alternative course and the courage to defy the expectations of his class . His first and most daring choice was to become a common seaman . The experience of life on a sailing ship democratized Dana , who came aboard with neither privilege nor history of manual labor , and who climbed the rigging on his first day at sea to share the hard lot of sailors for a brace of years . He never got over it .
He was a good writer and a good , clear thinker . The sea held him in its grip for his whole life , and it pulled him away from his law practice and his family at regular intervals , when he would travel to foreign places for months at a time , alone , to keep his sanity and cure the wounds inflicted by the cold world of business .
In his story , as we bump into Daniel Webster , Emerson , Longfellow and Melville , the mid-nineteenth century world of politics , law , and literature never seemed so small or intimate a space . In his life , Dana had many trials , legal and personal . He won and lost big cases . He prosecuted Jefferson Davis on behalf of the government , for treason , and lost the motion to quash the indictment before the U . S . Supreme Court . He defended seamen in their claims against ship owners as well as fugitive slaves who sought their freedom .
Dana was a man who made mistakes , took the world too literally , believed too much in the goodness of men , and accumulated regrets over his working life . His literary fame was established before he was 24 , and from that time forward his life was a series of disappointments . Dana sold his rights to Two Years Before the Mast to Harper and Brothers for $ 250 and 25 copies , one of the worst business decisions ever made in the literary world . The book made the publishers a fortune , and Dana a lasting place in American literature .
His English publisher , feeling guilty at making so much money on the sales , sent Dana $ 500 , having paid nothing for the right to publish it under the laws of the time .
Dana failed at elective office in a quixotic race for Congress . He failed to attain the office of minister to England after President Grant nominated him , as the Senate failed to confirm his appointment . His life was complicated , and he was often disappointed , but his “ spirit was too buoyant to sink in self-pity ,” according to Amestoy , his first serious biographer .
Dana ’ s story , as told by the former Chief Justice of Vermont ’ s highest court , is worthy of a place in the library of American biography . You learn about two men in its reading , both Richard Henry Dana , Jr . and Jeffrey L . Amestoy . You can ’ t spend so many hours with an author without insights into the author ’ s character . Amestoy does not write this book as a judge or a lawyer , or even as an historian . He writes it as an act of faith and out of respect for his subject . He signed up for his voyage into biography with the same courage Dana displayed in 1834 when he walked onto the deck of the Pilgrim . Amestoy is a good man to have aboard .
You likely wouldn ’ t have known or cared about Dana if this book hadn ’ t been written . You might have seen that old worn copy of Two Years Before the Mast on a shelf , and vaguely remembered the pleasure of reading it . You might even have regarded it as everything you needed to know about Dana . Amestoy has brought him back to life for us delightfully , and that is no small achievement . ____________________ Paul S . Gillies , Esq ., is a partner in the Montpelier firm of Tarrant , Gillies & Richardson and is a regular contributor to the Vermont Bar Journal . A collection of his columns has been published under the title of Uncommon Law , Ancient Roads , and Other Ruminations on Vermont Legal History by the Vermont Historical Society .
www . vtbar . org THE VERMONT BAR JOURNAL • SUMMER 2016 39