Robert Drury (1687 – c. 1743–1750) was an English sailor whose life became defined by a catastrophic shipwreck during his youth. At just seventeen years old, while serving aboard the vessel Degrave, Drury was shipwrecked on the coast of Madagascar. He remained trapped on the island for fifteen years, living among the local population before finally securing passage back to England.
Following his return to his homeland, Drury's extraordinary experiences were compiled into a memoir published under his name in 1729, titled Madagascar: or, Robert Drury's Journal. The book became an immediate commercial success, captivating the public with its vivid descriptions of survival, local conflicts, and the daily customs of the Malagasy people. It offered European readers a rare, detailed glimpse into a region that was largely uncharted by Westerners at the time.
Although the book's absolute authenticity was heavily debated by later historians—with some suspecting it was a work of fiction or a collaboration with a prominent ghostwriter—modern scholarship has vindicated much of Drury's narrative. Researchers have verified numerous cultural, linguistic, and geographical details within the text. Today, the journal is recognized not only as a classic survival story but also as one of the oldest and most valuable written historical records of life in southern Madagascar during the early eighteenth century.
