The Essex was an American whaleship from Nantucket, Massachusetts.
The Essex was an American whaleship from Nantucket, Massachusetts. She was 87 feet (27 m) long, measured 238 tons, and was captained by the 28-year-old George Pollard, Jr. She was attacked and sunk by a sperm whale in the Pacific Ocean in 1820, an inspiration for Herman Melville's (1819-1891) novel "Moby-Dick" (1851).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Essex_%28whaleship%29

The Essex left Nantucket on Aug, 1819 on a two-and-a-half-year voyage to the west coast of South America. Essex rounded Cape Horn in Jan 1820, beginning the long spring and summer hunt in the south Pacific, going up the western coast of South America. Finding the area nearly fished out [OZ: придурки almost make sperm whales extinct], they encountered other whalers, who told them of a newly-discovered hunting ground, located at 5–10 degrees south latitude and 105–125 degrees west longitude, in the South Pacific, roughly 2500 nautical miles (4,600 km) to the south and west, in the area with its many islands rumored to be populated by cannibals.

On Nov 20, 1820, Essex Chase's boat harpooned a whale, which then rammed it,  opening up a seam, resulting in their having to cut his line from the whale and put back to the ship for repairs.

Chase was repairing the damaged boat on board when the crew observed a whale, that was much larger than normal (85 ft = 26 m). It rammed the ship and then went under, battering it and causing it to tip from side to side. It then swam 500 yards ahead of the ship, turned around, accelerated to 2x his ordinary speed (24 kt), and it appeared with tenfold fury and vengeance in his aspect [OZ: У страха глаза велики -  actually fourfold]. The whale crushed the bow like an eggshell, driving the 238-ton vessel backwards. The whale finally disengaged its head from the shattered timbers and swam off, never to be seen again, leaving the Essex quickly going down by the bow.

The ship sank 2,000 nmi (=3,700 km) west of South America. 20 sailors set out in the three small whaleboats with wholly inadequate supplies of food and fresh water. The closest known islands, the Marquesas, were more than 1,200 mi (=1,900 km) to the west and Captain Pollard intended to make for them but the crew, led by Owen Chase, feared the islands may be inhabited by cannibals and voted to make for South America. Due to wind pattern, the trip would take 4000 mi (=5400 km).

Food and water was rationed from the beginning [...] the survivors were rinsing their mouths with seawater and drinking their own urine. Literally within hours of the crew beginning to die of thirst, the boats landed on uninhabited Henderson Island. Had they landed on Pitcairn, 104 miles (167 km) to the S/W, they would have received help: it was habitable and the survivors of the HMS Bounty still lived there. On Henderson Island they found a small freshwater spring and the men gorged on birds, eggs, crabs, and peppergrass. However, after one week, they had largely exhausted the island's food resources and on Dec 26 concluded that they would starve if they remained much longer. Three men opted to stay behind on Henderson. The remaining Essex crewmen resumed the journey on New Year's Eve hoping to reach Easter Island. Within three days they had exhausted the crabs and birds they had collected for the voyage, leaving only a small reserve of bread, salvaged from the Essex. On Jan 4, they estimated that they had drifted too far south of Easter Island to reach it and decided to make for Más a Tierra island, 1,818 mi (=2,926 km) to the east and 419 miles (674 km) west of South America. One by one, the men began to die.

On Jan 10, Matthew Joy died and on the following day the boat carrying Owen Chase, Richard Peterson, Isaac Cole, Benjamin Lawrence and Thomas Nickerson became separated from the others during a squall. Peterson died on Jan 18 and like Joy, was buried at sea. On Feb 8, Isaac Cole died and was eaten. By Feb 15 the three remaining men had again run out of food and on Feb 18, were spotted and rescued by the British whaleship Indian 90 days after the sinking of the Essex.

Obed Hendricks's boat exhausted their food supplies on Jan 14 with Pollard's men exhausting theirs on Jan 21. Lawson Thomas had died on Jan 20 and was eaten. Charles Shorter died on Jan 23, Isaiah Shepard on Jan 27 and Samuel Reed on Jan 28. Later that day the two boats separated with the one carrying Obed Hendricks, Joseph West and William Bond never to be seen again.

By Feb 1 the food had run out and the situation in Captain Pollard's boat became quite critical. The men drew lots to determine who would be sacrificed for the survival of the crew. A young man named Owen Coffin, Captain Pollard's 17 year old cousin, whom he had sworn to protect, drew the black spot. Pollard allegedly offered to protect his cousin but Coffin is said to have replied "No, I like my lot as well as any other." Lots were drawn again to determine who would be Coffin's executioner. His young friend, Charles Ramsdell, drew the black spot. Ramsdell shot Coffin, and his remains were consumed by Pollard, Barzillai Ray, and Charles Ramsdell. On Feb 11, Ray also died. For the remainder of their journey, Pollard and Ramsdell survived by gnawing on the bones of Coffin and Ray. They were rescued when almost within sight of the South American coast by the Nantucket whaleship Dauphin on Feb 23, 95 days after the Essex sank. Both men by that time were so completely dissociative that they did not even notice the Dauphin alongside them and became terrified by seeing their rescuers.

Pollard, Chase, Ramsdell, Lawrence, and Nickerson were reunited in the port of Valparaíso, where they informed officials there of their three shipmates stranded on Henderson Island. A ship destined on a trans-Pacific passage was ordered to look for the men on Henderson. Although close to death, the three men were eventually rescued.
By the time the last of the eight survivors were rescued on April 5, 1821 the corpses of seven fellow sailors had been consumed. All eight returned to the sea within months of their return to Nantucket.

First Mate Owen Chase [1] returned to Nantucket on Jun 11, 1821. Four months later he had completed an account of the disaster, the Narrative of the Most Extraordinary and Distressing Shipwreck of the Whale-Ship Essex; this was used by Herman Melville as one of the inspirations for his novel Moby-Dick. When he retired from whaling, in 1840, memories of the harrowing ordeal haunted Chase. He suffered terrible headaches and nightmares. Later in his life, Chase began hiding food in the attic of his Nantucket house on Orange Street and was eventually institutionalized.

The cabin boy, Thomas Nickerson, became a captain in the Merchant Service and later wrote another account of the sinking titled The Loss of the Ship "Essex" Sunk by a Whale and the Ordeal of the Crew in Open Boats which was not published until 1984 by the Nantucket Historical Association. Nickerson wrote his account late in his life and it was lost until 1960. It was not until 1980, when it came into the hands of Nantucket whaling expert Edouard Stackpole, that its significance was realized.

Most of the survivors at some time or another wrote accounts of the disaster, some of which differ considerably on details regarding the behavior of various survivors. A lot of those are on Amazon.

[1] A prototype of Starbuck, for whom Starbucks is named.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Essex_%28whaleship%29

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