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Richard Hughes was brought up in the West Indies in Jamaica and only wrote only four novels, the most famous of which is The Innocent Voyage (1929), or A High Wind in Jamaica, as Hughes renamed it soon after its initial publication.  

Set in the 19th century, it explores the events which follow the accidental capture of a group of English children by pirates: the children are revealed as considerably more amoral than the pirates (it was in this novel that Hughes first described the cocktail Hangman's Blood, recipe below). 


During 1938, he wrote an allegorical novel In Hazard based on the true story of the S.S. Phemius that was caught in the 1932 Cuba hurricane for 4 days during its maximum intensity. He also wrote volumes of children's stories, including The Spider's Palace, plays and poetry.

A High Wind in Jamaica was made into a film of the same name in 1965. The book was initially titled The Innocent Voyage and published by Harper & Brothers in the spring of that year.

Directed by Alexander Mackendrick for the 20th Century-Fox studio. It stars Anthony Quinn and James Coburn as the pirates who capture five children.

The film is regarded highly today because of Mackendrick's direction and Quinn's lead performance as the pirate captain whose relationship with the children betokens a subtle change in his character, finally leading to his downfall and the pirates' end.

The material in A High Wind in Jamaica afforded the director an opportunity to combine a light touch with serious drama.

Essentially, what makes the film fascinating is the theme of children growing up and their contact with a world of adults (the pirates) who act as if they are grown-up children.

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