In the early part of the novel, set in London, other members of the expedition are featured. They appear in more detail in The Golden Ocean, another O'Brian novel about the Anson expedition.

The expedition is beset by storms while rounding of Cape Horn, the Wager is shipwrecked off the coast of Chile as their position could not be determined. The crew rejected the authority of their officers, once the ship was wrecked and left the captain, some officers, and some other crew on the island when they sailed away in a boat built from the wreck. The marooned officers make their way to a Spanish settlement with the help of the native people. The novel is based on the accounts of the survivors. Survivors from the lower deck made their way back to Britain long before the officers. The novel describes the crew members asserting that the officers had no authority over them, once their ship was wrecked.

• Jack Byron – protagonist
• Tobias Barrow – "Jack's" friend

The Wager's crew did reject the authority of their officers, once the ship was wrecked.^[1] The lesson of the wreck of the Wager played a role in revising naval discipline, so that officers did retain formal authority over crew members, even when their ships were lost or captured.

John "Jack" Byron was a historical person and the basic facts of the story are true. He went on to a distinguished naval career, rising to the rank of vice-admiral. There is an "easter egg" that O'Brian includes in the novel: his Jack Byron secretly writes poetry. He wants Tobias to refrain from mentioning it to any of his peers. The famous poet Lord Byron was one of John Byron's grandsons.

• The Golden Ocean - another work by Patrick O'Brian, whose two protagonists are young men aboard one of the other vessels on the same expedition as the Wager.