09/24/2025
In 1704, Scottish sailor Alexander Selkirk made a fateful choice. After bitter disputes with his captain about the seaworthiness of their ship, he demanded to be left ashore on the uninhabited Juan Fernández Islands, west of Chile. With only a musket, tools, clothes, and a Bible, he faced the terrifying prospect of survival alone.
What followed was a story that would echo through history. For more than four years, Selkirk hunted wild goats for meat and skins, built huts from branches, tamed feral cats to fend off rats, and read scripture for comfort. His body grew strong, his spirit hardened, and his instincts sharpened. When rescued by the privateer Duke in 1709, he astonished the crew with his speed, strength, and survival skills—so much so that his tale quickly spread across Europe.
Selkirk’s ordeal became the seed for Daniel Defoe’s Robinson Crusoe (1719), one of the most famous novels ever written. Yet behind the fiction stood a real man—a stubborn sailor whose quarrel with fate marooned him in isolation, but whose endurance made him immortal.