Page 20 - Boca Club News - October '24

Page 20, Boca Club News

The Arts
The Arts

Book Review… “American Sanctuary: Mutiny, Martyrdom,

and National Identity in the Age of Revolution”

By Nils A. Shapiro At the time the mutiny took place—
I cannot recall ever enjoying a after the United States had already won
scholarly work of early American the Revolutionary War several years
history so interestingly and vividly earlier and declared itself an independent
told, so extraordinarily researched and nation—one of the most objectionable
impressively detailed, exciting as any policies of the British crown and its navy
novel, and as timely in subject as next was the practice of “impressment”: the
month’s presidential election! stopping and boarding of other nations’
The date was September 21st, vessels, capturing members of their crews
1797. The event was a vicious mutiny by the crew of a British and forcing them to sail and work as
naval vessel, HMS Hermione, in the Caribbean off the coast seamen on British ships, most likely never
of Puerto Rico. Little remembered today, its aftershock was to see their families again.
to lead directly to the election of Thomas Jefferson over the Such was the case of many on the of impressment on the high seas and the idea of
incumbent John Adams as President of the United States… Hermione’s crew as it sailed near the island turning over to Britain a claimed American citizen
and the resulting lasting image of America as a sanctuary of of Puerto Rico on that September day in 1797. Adding to what who “had the right to regain his freedom after having been the
freedom for those fleeing from persecution in other lands—an was already a tinder box of a situation was the fact that this victim of such impressment” and return home.
issue that dominates today’s political campaigns just as it did ship’s captain, Admiral Hugh Pigot, was a disciplinarian so stern Adams’s decision to turn Robbins over to Britain—where
the one in 1800. that whipping and other punishments for minor crew offenses he was executed by hanging without a trial—Adams’s
I must admit that, although it was published in 2017, I became unbearable and sparked the bloody insurrection that Federalist Party’s defense of his decision, and the consequences
had never heard of “American Sanctuary” and was fortunate ended in the death of the captain and other officers. of Jefferson’s Republican Party’s national electoral campaign
to come across it by accident on a table stacked with books One of the main leaders of the mutiny was a man whose focused on driving the public’s anger, form the major part of
while shopping in a market. Its author, A. Roger Ekirch, is a name throughout this book varies between Thomas Nash (if this compelling story.
professor of history at Virginia Tech, has written four earlier he was actually Irish) and Jonathan Robbins, depending upon Eventually—and critical in light of today’s political climate
books, received a Guggenheim Fellowship and is widely whether his claim to have been an American from Connecticut and immigration crisis—the American people eventually
recognized as one of our finest historians. was true or not. decided that, whether or not Jonathan Robbins (or Thomas
The details that enrich this narrative, garnered from Eventually, after the mutiny Robbins made his way to Nash, if that was his real name) was in fact an American
the author’s extraordinary research, add enormously to the the U.S. and was tracked down by the British government, citizen, anyone fleeing from oppression should be able to
overall experience, as do the many contemporary portraits and which demanded that President John Adams turn over the find sanctuary in the United States and not have to fear
illustrations from that period. “mutineer and murderer” to Britain for punishment. It was being turned away. It is to this day at the heart of our nation’s
Revolutionary and early American history being one of my awkward timing, for Adams was then in the process of self-image, symbolized by the Statue of Liberty in New York
preferred reading tastes I was surprised never to have heard ratifying an economic trade treaty with Britain that had just Harbor and the inscription on her base addressed to “the
of the very significant event that is the pivotal subject of this been negotiated. huddled masses yearning to be free.”
book: the mutiny aboard HMS Hermione. Nor, shockingly, Adams had to weigh the success of the treaty against the This is the story of how and when that all started. I loved
was it ever mentioned in any class, even through college. American public’s anger about the British policy and actions every word of it.
Film Review…“Remembering Gene Wilder: A Documentary”

By Nils A. Shapiro his mother had a serious heart condition, could not bear any producer Mike Medavoy and Ben Mankiewicz, among others.
Almost 20 years ago stress, and that it was important for the boy to try instead to It is all here, in this documentary: his loves—which
I read, and thoroughly make his mother laugh as much as possible. That was the included an earlier marriage to the Saturday Night Live
enjoyed, “Kiss Me Like moment and motivation that set the boy on his life path. As comedienne Gilda Radner, and tragic loss of her to cancer—
a Stranger: My Search he later relates, “I didn’t think the name Silberman seemed and his extraordinary successes as an actor, writer and
for Love and Art,” the right for the job. I wanted to be wilder!” And that is how the director. Now this documentary of his life has won numerous
memoir written by actor, rest of the world came to know and love him. awards, among the most recent the Best Documentary Feature
writer and director Gene Among those who appear in this film to discuss the Gene at the 2024 Boca International Jewish Film Festival.
Wilder, who in those pages Wilder they knew are his widow, Karen Wilder, Mel Brooks, Remembering Gene Wilder. You won’t forget it for the
came across as one of the Alan Alda, Carol Kane, Harry Connick Jr., Dick Cavett, many memories it will bring back to you. On Netflix.
sweetest, gentlest and just
plain nicest human beings
ever to have graced the American theater and screen.
Like millions of others I had for many years enjoyed
his performances as a vulnerable, zany, hilarious comedian
in such films as: Young Frankenstein; Blazing Saddles;
The Producers; The Woman in Red; The Frisco Kid; Willy
Wonka and the Chocolate Factory and others–and paired
with Richard Pryor in See No Evil, Hear No Evil and Silver
Streak. (I should add that after I had moved from New York 561-989-0611
to Los Angeles in 1981 as a magazine publisher and ran into
Wilder in a restaurant the physical image I had of him from EXCEPTIONAL HOMECARE SERVICES
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