• Preface
• Chapter One: Owen Chase
• Chapter two: Narrative of the Most Extraordinary and Distressing Shipwreck of a Whale-ship Essex, of Nantucket, by Owen Chase
• Chapter Three: Ne Cede Malis
• Chapter four: Next Lowering: Owen Chase after the Essex, George Pollard, Jr., The Other Survivors
• Chapter Five: Telling the Story: The Authorship and Publication of Owen Chase’s Narrative, Herman Melville, Accounts and Borrowings
• Appendices: Her man Melville’s Annotations and Markings in His Copy of Owen Chase’s Narrative, The Story of the Essex Shipwreck Presented in Captain Pollard’s Interrview with George Bennet, Thomas Chapple’s Account of the Loss of the Essex, March 7, 1821, Letter of Commodore Ridgely to the Secretary of the Navy, The “Paddack Letter” on the Rescue of Captain Pollard and Charles Ramsdell, Report of the Essex Shipwreck and rescue in the Sydney Gazette, June 9, 1821, Table of Islands from Bowditch’s Navigator, Chase Genealogy
• Notes
• Index