Men like Captain Hand, the only survivor of the loss of the sloop Henry at Ocracoke in 1819; and Ensign Lucian Young, hero of the wreck of the U.S. gunboat Huron at Nags Head in 1877; and Dunbar Davis of Southport, who devoted most of his life to saving mariners wrecked on the North Carolina coast, deserve the bulk of the credit for this book.