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WEST WIND
With Britain at war with France, Spain and Holland, Ortho Penhale is recruited to captain a privateer for his brother’s friend Burnadick. After a disastrous assault on a Dutch man-o’-war, Penhale is imprisoned in Spain. Ortho Horse dealer. Smuggler. Barbary slave. Barbary lancer. Navy crewman. Slave trader. Privateer then smuggler again. First published in 1926, The West Wind follows Ortho Penhale the fugitive as he travels across Spain heading for his beloved Cornwall. His past returns to haunt him as he embarks on his final triumphant act. New edition, revised and edited by Spencer Smart. “The great wind that thunders through these pages would flap and droop if the folk whom it blows about the world were creatures not of flesh and blood” The Observer, January 1927 “Recommended” Aberdeen Journal, September 1926 “One of Mr Crosbie Garstin’s most eventful stories.” Yorkshire Post, December 1926
Hardcover
First published January 1, 1926
4 people want to read
About the author
Crosbie Garstin
21 books3 followersCrosbie Garstin (7 May 1887 – disappeared 19 April 1930) was a poet, soldier, traveler, and novelist who died young. At an early age he left his native Cornwall to work in the gold fields and lumber camps of northern Canada and later as a ranger in British East Africa. He returned at the start of the Great War and took a commission in the cavalry. His writings, mainly poetry and memoirs of the front lines, began to appear after the war. His claim to literary fame came between the years 1923 and 1926 with the publication of his Penhales novels — "The Owls House", "High Noon", and "West Wind" — a trilogy of swashbuckling adventures that roamed the 18th century from Cornwall to the Caribbean.
With the success of his popular novels, Garstin bought a house in a valley southwest of Penzance, and there continued to write. In 1930, however, at the age of 42, a boat he was rowing overturned, and Crosbie Garstin was lost, presumed dead.
With the success of his popular novels, Garstin bought a house in a valley southwest of Penzance, and there continued to write. In 1930, however, at the age of 42, a boat he was rowing overturned, and Crosbie Garstin was lost, presumed dead.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
September 14, 2025
I am bereft to have finished the Penhale trilogy. Loved the story, the humour, the characters, the familiar location but also the supporting cast of people Ortho meets along the way. The myriad intertwined or often entirely separate stories that interact with his. A truly wonderful tale of love, life, travel, home, adventure and friendships. I will sorely miss it and recommend it to anyone who will listen for a very long time
May 9, 2024
[2015] Everybody has heard of the 'Poldark' books by Winston Graham - the first written in the 1940s. They were read and enjoyed by a small loyal following until the 1970s when it was televised in two series by the BBC. After that Poldark became mainstream and interest in the story of a Cornish yeoman - back from the war and married to the servant girl - took off. An ITV version and in 2014 another hugely popular TV remake and the romanticised image of eighteenth century Cornwall produced a tourist surge - followed as in the 1970s and 80s by the upturn of inward migration - which, it could be argued, transformed the face of Cornwall.
The third book keeps up the pace and is generally a really good read and as it says on the blurb If you like Poldark you'll love Penhale.
The third book keeps up the pace and is generally a really good read and as it says on the blurb If you like Poldark you'll love Penhale.
July 23, 2018
This story of Ortho Penhale is fictional, but it is clearly deeply rooted in Crosbie Garstin’s own experiences, and it draws on both his love of travel and adventure and his love of his Cornish home.
‘High Noon’ - the second book of the trilogy - opens in the West Indies, late in the 18th century. Ortho had been press-ganged by the Royal Navy when he went down to see what was happening in a small cove not far from his home. At first he had been philosophical; delighted to be at sea again and earning good money, but chafing a little under the restriction and at having to take orders from younger and less experienced men.
When his ship reached St Lucia, Otho decided that he’d had enough, and that he would jump ship and find his own way back to Cornwall. He wondered if he had made a bad mistake when he was drawn into a trap laid by a seductive woman, who he slowly realised was terribly dangerous; and it was only by using all of his charm and experience that he managed to get away.
The atmosphere that Crosbie Garstin created was extraordinary. I loved the way that light suddenly turned to darkness and that he put me right there at Ortho’s side and had we wondering how on earth he could possibly escape this time.
When he got back to Cornwall, Ortho found that much had changed. His brother Eli told him that he couldn’t go on managing his farm as well as his own. The lovely girl he had planned to marry had married another man and was the mother of a young son. And his mother, Teresa, had died in strange circumstances.
Ortho understood his brother’s concerns, and he set to work straight away. He had always loved his home and the life he led there; and, though he and Eli were very different, they had a great deal in common and they understood each other well.
He realised why his lovely girl has married in haste as soon as he saw her young son.
And an encounter with a horse trader helped him to understand how and why his mother life had ended. John Penhale had rescued her, a gypsy girl, from a cruel master and she came to love him and to love the farm that she saw as a land of plenty. When he died she took comfort in rich food and drink, and in extravagant living. As she grew older that left her vulnerable, and one day her past caught up with her.
That completed a circle; there are a number of circles begun and completed over the course of this trilogy.
The story of Ortho’s return to Cornwall was wonderfully well told, firmly rooted in places I knew well; and I found it so easy to believe that the Penhale family lived and breathed and that the stories I read really happened.
He wanted a wife, and when he met Nicola, the daughter of a wealthy Penzance family he thought he had found her. She was bright and vivacious, she was brave and adventurous, and all of her family loved the tales that Ortho had to tell. They wouldn’t accept Ortho as a suitor though, and so they began to meet in secret and they ran away to get married.
Ortho realised too late that they should never have married, that Nicola would need to be cared for and protected for the rest of her life, and that her family had stood against their romance for the very best of reasons. He accepted that he had to accept the consequences of his actions, that he had to accept the responsibilities of a husband even though the woman he had married would never be a wife to him.
Though he didn’t always live within the law, Ortho had firm principles, he was a man of his word and he accepted that he had to deal with the consequences of his actions, for better and for worse.
He put arrangements in place, and then he went to sea because that was the only way he could earn enough money to pay for everything that was needed. Fate took him back to St Lucia, and a second encounter with the woman who might have been – who might still be – his nemesis.
This second volume of the trilogy built very well on the first volume and left interesting possibilities for the third.
‘High Noon’ - the second book of the trilogy - opens in the West Indies, late in the 18th century. Ortho had been press-ganged by the Royal Navy when he went down to see what was happening in a small cove not far from his home. At first he had been philosophical; delighted to be at sea again and earning good money, but chafing a little under the restriction and at having to take orders from younger and less experienced men.
When his ship reached St Lucia, Otho decided that he’d had enough, and that he would jump ship and find his own way back to Cornwall. He wondered if he had made a bad mistake when he was drawn into a trap laid by a seductive woman, who he slowly realised was terribly dangerous; and it was only by using all of his charm and experience that he managed to get away.
The atmosphere that Crosbie Garstin created was extraordinary. I loved the way that light suddenly turned to darkness and that he put me right there at Ortho’s side and had we wondering how on earth he could possibly escape this time.
When he got back to Cornwall, Ortho found that much had changed. His brother Eli told him that he couldn’t go on managing his farm as well as his own. The lovely girl he had planned to marry had married another man and was the mother of a young son. And his mother, Teresa, had died in strange circumstances.
Ortho understood his brother’s concerns, and he set to work straight away. He had always loved his home and the life he led there; and, though he and Eli were very different, they had a great deal in common and they understood each other well.
He realised why his lovely girl has married in haste as soon as he saw her young son.
And an encounter with a horse trader helped him to understand how and why his mother life had ended. John Penhale had rescued her, a gypsy girl, from a cruel master and she came to love him and to love the farm that she saw as a land of plenty. When he died she took comfort in rich food and drink, and in extravagant living. As she grew older that left her vulnerable, and one day her past caught up with her.
That completed a circle; there are a number of circles begun and completed over the course of this trilogy.
The story of Ortho’s return to Cornwall was wonderfully well told, firmly rooted in places I knew well; and I found it so easy to believe that the Penhale family lived and breathed and that the stories I read really happened.
He wanted a wife, and when he met Nicola, the daughter of a wealthy Penzance family he thought he had found her. She was bright and vivacious, she was brave and adventurous, and all of her family loved the tales that Ortho had to tell. They wouldn’t accept Ortho as a suitor though, and so they began to meet in secret and they ran away to get married.
Ortho realised too late that they should never have married, that Nicola would need to be cared for and protected for the rest of her life, and that her family had stood against their romance for the very best of reasons. He accepted that he had to accept the consequences of his actions, that he had to accept the responsibilities of a husband even though the woman he had married would never be a wife to him.
Though he didn’t always live within the law, Ortho had firm principles, he was a man of his word and he accepted that he had to deal with the consequences of his actions, for better and for worse.
He put arrangements in place, and then he went to sea because that was the only way he could earn enough money to pay for everything that was needed. Fate took him back to St Lucia, and a second encounter with the woman who might have been – who might still be – his nemesis.
This second volume of the trilogy built very well on the first volume and left interesting possibilities for the third.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews