William C. Hammond – Författare

The first volume in a series of maritime novels set in the early years of the United States, A MATTER OF HONOR is a dramatic account of a young man's coming of age during the American Revolution. Introducing Richard Cutler, a Massachusetts teenager with strong family ties to England, the novel tells his story as he ships out with John Paul Jones to avenge the death of his beloved brother Will, impressed by the Royal Navy and flogged to death for striking an officer. On the high seas, in England and in France, on the sugar islands of the Caribbean, and on the battlefield of Yorktown, Cutler proves his mettle and wins the love--and allegiance to the infant republic--of a beautiful English aristocrat from the arms of Horatio Nelson himself.

Credited with vividly recreating an early chapter in American history with his first novel, A Matter of Honor, William C. Hammond continues the seafaring adventures of the prominent Massachusetts family in this second novel. Set in the years following the American Revolution, it offers an exciting look at the young republic at a time when America remained a weak nation with no Navy to protect its prosperous merchant fleet from Barbary pirates or nations intent on crippling its shipping. The novel opens with the capture of the Cutler merchant brig Eagle by Barbary pirates. Young Caleb Cutler and his shipmates are taken as prisoners to Algiers, and his brother Richard, the novel's main protagonist, is sent to North Africa to pay ransoms demanded by the Dey of Algiers. But Richard learns of the Dey's intent to reject the ransom, as well as threats from the British and French, and fights a fierce battle in the Mediterranean with two Arab xebecs. Victorious at sea, Richard travels to Paris to report to John Paul Jones, his former naval commander who now serves as American emissary to the Barbary States. The author's careful historical research and thorough knowledge of sailing and the ways of the sea bring an authenticity to the novel without detracting from the entertaining storyline. The book includes a romantic interest involving a desperate race to save the beautiful Anne Marie Helvétian and her two daughters from the guillotine. Hammond's focus on the American perspective of the Age of Fighting Sail in the years following the American Revolution adds a fresh dimension to historical novels of the period.

The Power and the Glory is the third novel in the historical, nautical fiction series from William C. Hammond. It follows in the wake of A Matter of Honor and For Love of Country, and features the adventures of the seafaring Cutler family of Hingham, Massachusetts and an ever expanding cast of characters. Set during the Quasi-War against the French Republic during the late 1790's, The Power and the Glory offers the reader a stirring and authentic look at the birth of the modern United States Navy during the Age of Fighting Sail. Whether confronting French pirates off the coast of Nantucket or heavily armed French frigates in the Caribbean, Capt. Thomas Truxtun, Capt. Silas Talbot, Lt. Richard Cutler and other early naval heroes --most real, some fictional -- personify the best of American honor and courage. Beyond electrifying sea battles and the challenge to French colonial rule in Haiti and in the French West Indies, The Power and the Glory provides intriguing glimpses into everyday life of the era, be they in the bedroom of the Cutler clapboard home in Hingham, on the island of Barbados where the Cutlers' own a sugar cane plantation and run a far-reaching commercial enterprise, or aboard Adm. Sir Hyde Parker's flagship in Port Royal, Jamaica. And at the center of all the excitement, passion and intrigue are two of the finest "super frigates" ever constructed: USS Constellation and her sister ship, USS Constitution. As with all books in the series, the author's careful research and attention to detail, coupled with his thorough knowledge of sailing and the ways of the sea, bring history alive in a refreshing and entertaining fashio

The sixth volume in the award-winning series profiling the
American perspective in the Age of Sail, No Sacrifice Too Great, chronicles the swashbuckling adventures of 
the Cutler family as the United States takes on Great Britain 
in the War of 1812. Richard Cutler and his two 
sons, William and James, serve in the US Navy, weak in 
number of ships but strong in experience and fighting
spirit. Battles in which the family participates include high 
seas drama between Constitution and HMS Guerriere, fleet 
engagements on Lake Erie and Lake Champlain, the siege 
of Baltimore, and the epic Battle of New Orleans.

A Return to Duty, the eighth volume in the award-winning Cutler Family Chronicles series, is set in Massachusetts and the Orient in the early 1850s during the aftermath of the First Opium War fought between China and Great Britain. The subsequent flood of opium into North America and Europe, from Turkey and the eastern provinces of India through China, threatens the very fabric of America. As a premier carrier of goods along Far Eastern trade routes, Cutler & Sons, in league with the U.S. Navy and the Royal Navy, plays a key role in the struggle to eliminate the scourge of narcotics. Family loyalties, core values, and passions are woven into a plot that takes the reader from Boston to Washington, and from Java to Hong Kong and the Gulf of Tonkin, in a savage conflict with cutthroats and brigands who defy their emperor to amass huge fortunes by ransoming sailors and smuggling opium. The fate of Cutler & Sons and the future of Western civilization hang in the balance.