American Literature of the Sea and Great Lakes

CARSE, ROBERT (1902-1971). A Great Lakes* sailor at seventeen, Robert Carse later worked salt water, attaining the position of chief mate. He sailed most of the world and developed a reputation as an expert seaman and maritime historian. Carse claimed to have spent half of his life on water, and he must have spent the other half writing about it. In short stories, serials, articles, and nearly fifty books, Carse wrote for both children and adults. In There Go the Ships (1942) and A Cold Corner of Hell (1969), Carse drew from his own experiences as a merchant seaman in the Murmansk Convoy, which lost half its ships during its 1942 run. The Beckoning Waters (1953) recounts a fictional immigrant’s struggle to become a Great Lakes captain around the turn of the century. Other works include Deep Six (1946), The Twilight of Sailing Ships (1965), and The Great Lakes Story (1968).

Donald P. Curtis