This book describes the wrecking of the schooner Grafton which sunk off the coast of Auckland Island, an uninhabited island south of New Zealand, in 1864. The crew managed to reach the shore and waited a year for rescue, but it soon became apparent that none was coming. After a further six months, the party launched a dinghy and its three-man crew managed to reach New Zealand and arranged for the return of the rest of the men. After eighteen months stranded on the island, all members of the shipwrecked crew were rescued. The account of the remarkable survival of the crew was very popular on its publication and was soon translated into English under the title Wrecked on a Reef.