Benjamin Rundel is sent as first leftenant aboard the Gadfly which is under the command of the son of an M.P. who has bought his son's commission as 'captain.' But the young man is not interested in the sea, the war or sailing. He is a frustrated actor who is addicted to opium and has no idea of the duties of captain.Ben must face charges of mutiny in order to safeguard the ship as he assumes the duties of captain. He manages to capture a number of French merchantmen and destroys s...

Ben leaves a happy ship, the Faithful, to join a most unhappy ship, the Hawk, under Captain Sharp who is suffering from syphilis but will not admit it. Ben, who is only 15, is asked to serve as acting surgeon's mate on a ship with no surgeon. He is faced with 'lubbers', an alcoholic second lieutenant, an insane midshipman and tropical fevers. He is shanghaied aboard a slaver, escapes and later is taken with ten of his crew aboard a Spanish pirate ship. He manages to capture the pirate ship...

Captain Benjamin Rundel suffers through the frustration of convoy duty. Then he runs into a nest of ship wreckers and he and his men manage to capture the lot and bring them to justice. On his next assignment, he manages to capture a Spanish ship a day after a peace treaty was signed by the English and Spanish.Ben is clearly in trouble when the Spanish Captain challenges him to a duel. Dueling is forbidden in the British Navy. Ben insists on naming the weapon. He decides on a drink...

This is book six of the nine book series, set in the years 1803-1806. Ben endures blockade duty and finds a novel way to overcome the boredom suffered by his crew. He is aboard the H. M. S. Victory under Admiral Lord Nelson. He and Tom survive the Battle of Trafalgar and see their hero, Lord Nelson fall and die.Ben helps get the fallen Admiral back to London for burial. He is put in charge of the Navy's part of the funeral and the procession of barges that take the Admiral's body t...

The great battles in the Mediterranean are over and Ben is asked to assist with the assault on a castle on shore at St. Elmo. He is assigned to a bomb boat and with his friend, Tom Murphy, they learn how to sail the bomb boat and handle the mortars. When Commodore Troubridge is sent to explore Rome, Ben finds himself suddenly left sitting in the hot seat while the commodore returns to his ship. His friend Tom, has considerable trouble with exams and Ben helps him through his stressful Left...

Napoleon's army of 600,000 has decided not to invade England and is headed to Russia. The Admiralty want to know what happens to Napoleon and his man in Russia. If they survive, they may return to France with over a million fighting men to attack England. If they fail, then England will be safe for a time. News travels slowly by land but faster by sea.Ben and his ship are sent to the White Sea to the Solovetsky Islands to rendezvous with an English spy. Ben is warned to return as s...

The Story of a Little Boy Growing Up at Sea, 1778This is the first of a series of nine books about the life of one fictitious person, Benjamin Rundel. We experience the Napoleonic Wars through his eyes and those of his friend, Thomas Murphy.Rundel was born in 1780 and is orphaned at age one. He is raised for a time by a friend of his mother's but does not know his real name. When Auntie Jo has to leave to care for a sickly relative, Benji is cast adrift and wanders from one...

This novel is set during the Napoleonic Wars. Benjamin Rundel fights in the Battle of Cape St. Vincent after a nerve-wracking sail through the French fleet in the fog. He suffers at the hands of a loud Italian lady whom he has been sent to rescue from her French paramours. Her children nearly drive his entire crew crazy. He is there when Commodore Horatio Nelson loses his right arm in battle at Tenerife and later becomes his scribe. He and his crew are captured when their ship is driven as...

Ben has suffered injuries to his feet and is partially crippled. He has made port admiral, but hates the constant string of petitioners and the paper work that he must sort through daily. He learns of the capture of Napoleon at Waterloo and the plans to exile him on St. Helena. He and Tom lay plans to get the Admiralty to send them off to escort Napoleon to St. Helena. Aboard ship Ben asks the little Emperor some pointed questions and gets some equally surprising answers. Then it is back t...

The Knights of Oak presents yet another theory concerning the fate of the Knights Templar after their initial arrest by the King of France, Philip IV in 1307. No one knows for certain what happened to the vast treasure that they had accumulated and especially to the Golden Menorah of King Solomon, the Ark of the Covenant, and the Holy Grail which they are thought to have kept hidden for centuries. This book describes one logical path that these treasures might have taken and how they might...

T.T. Green was a country girl, a tom boy. She spent over twenty years planning to build her dream log home by studying 'How To...Books.' She build seven smaller log buildings for practice. She forged ahead and was met with an incredible sequence of almost impossible obstacles. Everything that could go wrong, did. This was Mrs. Murphy illustrating the principle of 'Murphy's Law' perfectly. In the first portion of the book she tells what went wrong and how these problems can be avoided. The ...

Shadow Kings is about the lives of two orphan Irish boys who manage to become part of the court of Henry III (!216). One is a talented archer and swordsman and is able to serve Henry in his army. The other is a scholar with command of several languages and a strong artistic skill which made him perfectly suited to the position of scribe. His shared interest with Henry on the matter of architecture, which was changing at that time and tending strongly towards the Gothic style with much orna...