Plot
The film tells the story of the crew aboard an English cargo ship named the SS Glencairn, during World War II, on the long voyage home from the West Indies to Baltimore and then to England. The ship carries a cargo of high-explosives.
On liberty, after a night of drinking in bars in the West Indies, the crew returns to the tramp steamer and set sail for Baltimore.
They're a motley group: a middle-aged Irishman Driscoll (Thomas Mitchell), a young Swedish ex-farmer Ole Olsen (John Wayne), the spiteful steward Cocky (Barry Fitzgerald); the brooding Lord Jim-like Englishman Smitty (Ian Hunter), and others.
After the ship picks up a load of dynamite in Baltimore, the rough seas they encounter become nerve-racking to the crew.
They're also concerned that Smitty might be a German spy because he's secretive. After they force Smitty to show them his letters from home it turns out that Smitty is an alcoholic who has run away from his family. When they near port a German plane attacks the ship, killing Smitty in a burst of machine gun fire. The rest of the crew members decide not to sign on for another voyage on the Glencairn and go ashore, determined to help Ole return to his family in Sweden who he has not seen in ten years. At a seedy bar Ole is tricked into taking a drugged drink and he is shanghaied aboard another ship, the Amindra. Driscoll and the rest of the crew rescue him from the ship, but Driscoll is accidentally left behind in the confusion. As the crew straggles back to the Glencairn the next morning to sign on for another voyage, they learn that the Amindra was sunk by German torpedoes, killing all on board.
Read more about this topic: The Long Voyage Home
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