Arthur Phillip Sailor Mercenary Governor Spy - LAST COPY

As a captain in the Georgian navy Arthur Phillip's integrity, intelligence and persistence made him perfectly suited to the role that history and circumstance presented to him in 1788, but landing the First Fleet at Botany Bay was only one of many achievements in a captivating life.

His is a story of political intrigue, eighteenth-century sailing ships, and the race for economic and geographic advancement in a world that was becoming truly international. It is a tale of ambition, of wealthy widows and marriage mistakes; of money and trade, espionage and mercenaries, hardship and illness. Beyond the facts of discovery and exploration, this book reveals the extraordinary idealism and the influence of the Enlightenment on the founding of Australia.

Michael Pembroke provides a compelling portrait of Arthur Phillip. He carefully weaves together the little-known facts and projects us into life in Georgian England – a time when newly discovered territories were the road to untold wealth.

About the author:

Michael Pembroke is a writer, historian, naturalist and the author of the acclaimed historical biography Arthur Phillip – Sailor, Mercenary, Governor, Spy (2013), which was short-listed for the Prime Minister’s Literary Awards and runner-up in the National Maritime Museum history award. He was educated at the Universities of Sydney and Cambridge, is the son and the father of army officers, and has lived and travelled extensively throughout the world, including in East Asia. His father, an infantry platoon commander during the Korean War, was awarded the Military Cross for his role in a battle described as 'one of the finest battalion attacks in British history'. The research for this book has taken Pembroke to Moscow, Beijing, Pyongyang, Washington DC, Princeton and Cambridge. In 2016, he travelled through North Korea from the Yalu River to the Demilitarised Zone. He has been a judge of the Supreme Court of New South Wales since 2010.

Find out more about Governor Arthur Phillip here.

Michael Pembroke
Published June 2014
Paperback
304 pages 
230mm x 150mm
ISBN 9781742708058