David Cheap, the Centurion’s first lieutenant, is introduced as an ambitious but indebted Scotsman who finds purpose and authority at sea. Under Commodore George Anson—newly elevated despite scant patronage—Cheap sees a path to captaincy and prize money, if they can seize a Spanish treasure galleon in a secret Pacific campaign.

War with Spain intensifies the rush to sea, but the squadron stalls in Portsmouth amid shipyard chaos. The Centurion and sister ships require extensive repairs for rot, worms, and decay; the Wager, a converted East Indiaman under Captain Dandy Kidd, proves sluggish and ill-omened, even trapped for months when the Thames freezes.

As Cheap frets about missing the safer austral summer for rounding Cape Horn, the Admiralty’s manning crisis worsens. Typhus ravages recruits, many die or desert, and press gangs seize unwilling sailors. Cheap processes pressed men, including young John Campbell, while scores flee; even invalid pensioners are forced aboard despite their unfitness.

Anson and Cheap struggle to keep crews intact by mooring offshore, but desertions and sickness continue. Reverend Richard Walter chronicles the mission’s secrecy and the lure of the galleon, while midshipman Augustus Keppel boasts of the Centurion’s strength, underscoring hopes of rich prizes against mounting logistical failure.

After nearly a year’s delay, the squadron repeatedly attempts departure, is driven back by contrary winds, then finally clears the Channel on September 18, 1740. With repairs incomplete in spirit and crews diminished in quality, Anson’s force heads for Cape Horn, its late start and fragile manpower foreshadowing peril.