NavList:

Norm, you wrote:
"Attached is a photo from Ann Spencer's book on Slocum."

That's "Alone at Sea: the Adventures of Joshua Slocum". Here it is on amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/Alone-Sea-Adventures-Joshua-Slocum/dp/1552093948/. It's the best biography of Slocum ever written. She achieved a synthesis of Walter Teller's exhaustive research, which Teller himself never managed to do.

You wondered:
"Why does the author refer to this as 'rudimentary'."

Probably because contemporary reports from everyone else who had visited his vessel did so. I recall one report saying that his sextant was terribly corroded. Of course appearances do not necessarily reduce the instrument's accuracy, and these visits were all some years after Slocum had completed his circum-navigation. Both he and his vessel were in a state of disrepair by c.1900, and I would guess that his navigational instruments were not doing any better.

You wrote:
"I don't see the tin clock, but everything else seems to be there. Not sure what the empty box to the right of compass is."

I would imagine he junked the tin clock after he returned to the USA. It was just a simple thing with no navigational value. The 'empty' box may be another compass --one that's seen better days.

-FER

----------------------------------------------------------------
NavList message boards and member settings: www.fer3.com/NavList
Members may optionally receive posts by email.
To cancel email delivery, send a message to NoMail[at]fer3.com
----------------------------------------------------------------