MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - New Leaf August 2018 Discussion • The Great Halifax Explosion by John U. Bacon

gmw · 08-21-2018, 12:27 PM

Thanks for taking the time to explain, issybird, I was curious.

The port and starboard thing did stand out, didn't it. And not in any good way. If I tried to use that I'd probably manage to forget something I've known since I was a kid.

The Portsmouth, Maine navy prison did not exist prior to 1908. The text in question is: "his privateering great-grandfather [...] while serving a few months in the Portsmouth, New Hampshire, prison, 104 years earlier." This text was relative to 1915, so 1810 ... which is a slight problem because the earlier description dated the imprisonment as 1813.

I expect you are right about the Willis & Bates error, but while it seems unlikely it is conceivable that the company had a factory in Canada too. (Just saying that I wouldn't hang him for it without further evidence.)

I can't think of any excuses for getting VAD wrong.

I find your list interesting because there were half-a-dozen items that I checked up on as I was reading, out of curiosity, and they all checked out okay.

This is certainly not a book I'd ever re-read, nor recommend to others, and I do wish we'd done the Kitz book instead, but it obviously didn't rub me the wrong way as much as it did for you and Bookpossum. Funny the different things that will irritate us.

08-21-2018, 12:27 PM	#64
gmw cacoethes scribendi Posts: 5,818 Karma: 137770742 Join Date: Nov 2010 Location: Australia Device: Kobo Aura One & H2Ov2, Sony PRS-650	Thanks for taking the time to explain, issybird, I was curious. The port and starboard thing did stand out, didn't it. And not in any good way. If I tried to use that I'd probably manage to forget something I've known since I was a kid. The Portsmouth, Maine navy prison did not exist prior to 1908. The text in question is: "his privateering great-grandfather [...] while serving a few months in the Portsmouth, New Hampshire, prison, 104 years earlier." This text was relative to 1915, so 1810 ... which is a slight problem because the earlier description dated the imprisonment as 1813. I expect you are right about the Willis & Bates error, but while it seems unlikely it is conceivable that the company had a factory in Canada too. (Just saying that I wouldn't hang him for it without further evidence.) I can't think of any excuses for getting VAD wrong. I find your list interesting because there were half-a-dozen items that I checked up on as I was reading, out of curiosity, and they all checked out okay. This is certainly not a book I'd ever re-read, nor recommend to others, and I do wish we'd done the Kitz book instead, but it obviously didn't rub me the wrong way as much as it did for you and Bookpossum. Funny the different things that will irritate us.