Tag Archives: Charles W. Morgan

Turtles, Turtle Soup and Class at Sea

August 15, 2014UncategorizedBlack Mariners, Charles W. Morgan, Class, Cooks, Early American History, Food History, Maritime History, Turtle Soup, Turtles, Whalingcharlesfoy1

As a young boy turtles played only a small role in my life. While weeding my mother’s garden or playing in the back yard I came across the occasional boxer turtle. Bemused by the slow moving animals I loved watching their halting movements through the underbrush. It never occurred to me turtles could be a source of food or reinforce social status. How unaware I was! A recent review of whaling journals at the San Francisco Public Library has made clear how little I still know about the central role of turtles and turtle soup on whaling voyages in the Age of Sail. It is Americans’, particularly whaling seamen’s, fascination with sea turtles during the Age of Sail and how turtles and turtle soup helped shape identities that I want to discuss in this post.

With the exception of New Orleans restaurants and some cruise ships, there are not many American public dining spaces that today serve turtle soup. Most contemporary Americans have never eaten turtle soup. The same could hardly be said for early settlers of the Americas or their European cousins. Englishmen sailing to Virginia who found themselves shipwrecked on Bermuda in 1609 subsequently set out for Virginia on the Sea Venture with supplies that included green turtles. Despite early seventeenth century attempts to limit harvesting of turtles the Bermudian turtle population was quickly depleted. As a result, Europeans spread out over the western Atlantic to Florida, the Cayman Islands and elsewhere in search of turtles. Turtlers, i.e. small vessels harvesting turtles, became an important component of the Western Atlantic maritime economy. These small vessels were critical to the development of a web of commercial connections whereby turtles were captured and then shipped to North American and European consumers.

In the ensuing centuries overhunting resulted in turtle canneries, such as A. Granday’s of Key West, having to limit their production of turtle soup, and eventually lead to strict regulation of turtle harvesting. With the passage in 1971 of the Endangered Species Act, killing of sea turtles in United States waters was prohibited and Granday’s and other turtle canneries went out of business.

But in the 18th and 18th centuries turtles were an important food staple in the Atlantic. A market for turtles and turtle soup was well developed in England as early as 1753 when Gentleman’s Magazine contained several notices of large sea turtles being dressed in London public houses. Demand for turtles grew so significantly that ships from the West Indies constructed wooden tanks in which live turtles could be transported. And an association between turtle soup and upper class pretensions developed fairly quickly. Even before the American Revolution turtle soup was associated with fops or dandies, wearers of macaroni wigs.

“The Drowsy Contrast or Turtle & Bone Soup Macaronies” http://www.britishmuseum.org/research/collection_online/collection_object_details/collection_image_gallery.aspx?assetId=124832&objectId=1619123&partId=1

Residents of North American were not far behind their British cousins in both developing a taste for turtle soup and associating its consumption with refinement. It appears that Charleston was the first major North American city which developed a market for the consumption of turtle soup in public dining spaces. Given the city’s proximity to West Indian and Floridian sources of sea turtles this is hardly surprising. In 1784 the Charleston Coffee Shop offered “Turtle Soup every Monday, Wednesday and Friday.” Soon competitors such as Moore’s Exchange Coffee-House and Tavern and Browne’s Eating-House placed similar notices in local papers. By the 1790s advertisements regularly appeared in New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore and Boston newspapers offering the public “Real Green Turtle Soup!” that was “of the best quantity,” while “gentlemen of the city” were urged to partake in dinners in which turtles would be “dressed in the finest style” before heading to the theater.

The popularity of turtle soup during the 18th century is also apparent from the1798 country dance called “Turtle Soup.” (Those of us of a certain age might remember the Turtles‘ last album was called “Turtle Soup.” I doubt that Flo and Eddie were inspired by the eighteenth century dance, but stranger things have happened).

In the first three decades of the nineteenth century, whether dancing to the sounds of “Turtle Soup” or not, many Americans and Europeans who were or aspired to be among the leisure classes ate turtle soup. Dining proprietors in Newburyport, Salem, Hartford, Newport, Providence, and Albany all advertised that turtle soup was on their menus and sought “gentlemen” to feast on the delicacy. Turtle soup came to be seen as a symbol of Victorian opulence, associated with lavish Lord Mayor’s and aldermen’s banquets. At most such galas, as well club dinners at hotels such as Young’s, the Parker House and the Albion Hotel, turtle soup was almost “invariably offered” as the first course of a extensive menu. Well off families were urged to have their servants pick up soup so the “families can be supplied.” In contrast workers who crowded into noisy crowded nineteenth century sixpenny restaurants where rapid fire meals were consumed in less than thirty minutes did not expect to be served turtle soup.

The expense of turtle soup and what Miss Corson’s Practical Cookery’s calls the “inconvenience” for families in killing large turtles did not stop those of limited means from aspiring to eat turtle soup. Price may have deterred workers from purchasing turtle soup but inventive cooks soon came up with an alternative – mock turtle soup. Mock turtle soup was popular in both England and North America and recipes for it can be found cook books of the late 18th and early nineteenth centuries. Typically , as did Mrs. Raffald’s 1807 Experienced Housekeeper recipe for “artificial” turtle soup, calf’s head was used to provide the gelatinous texture found in traditional turtle soup. But whether the mock turtle soup utilized calf’s head or fried ham it offered workers a means to experience the pleasure and associations of turtle soup without the expense or fuss involved in killing a large turtle.

For seamen whose diets were, to be charitable, dull and unvarying, sea turtles offered both an opportunity to ‘spice up’ their diet and partake in an activity that on land was generally limited to those of greater means than the typical Jack Tar.

Baltimore Patriot, July 1, 1821

Sailors, particularly whaling seamen, had a good deal of experience capturing and eating turtles. This resulted in mariners expressing preferences concerning the types of turtles they ate as well as how the turtles were prepared. New Bedford men often considered the green turtle “somewhat coarse food” causing them to leave the “flat-shelled fellows on the beaches behind us.” However, Massachusetts whalers did like terrapin turtles that they toasted, claiming that toasted terrapin was “sweeter than almond.” Other seaman, such as William Whitecar, expressed a preference for Madagascar terrapins. Whitcar and his mess mates found that despite some turtles having lived in the ship’s hold for a year they were “quite fat, and [provided] a delicious meal.”

When whaling crews captured large numbers of turtles ships’ cooks were said to create dinners “surpassing a civic banquet in the quality and quantity.” Given the immense size of some sea turtles, which could weight as much as two hundred pounds, the killing and cooking of these animals in the tight confines of a whaling ship was no easy feat. Sailors appreciated the efforts of ship cooks in preparing turtle meals. The mariners described their dinners of turtle meat and/or turtle soup as “feast[s] fit for a prince.” In describing turtle dinners on board a whaling ship the American seaman Thomas Beale remarked that “our black cook” had presented a feast that was “aldermanic.” Clearly Beale and other whalers enjoyed the fact that despite their physically demanding and often isolated lifestyle they were able to partake in eating high end food and engaging in a dining experience that on land was generally only experienced by more wealthy individuals such as aldermen. Whether the turtles they ate were green turtles from Florida, Madagascar terrapins or Pacific sea turtles, seamen’s dining on turtles constituted an inversion of usual class roles. Whaling seamen engaging in turtle fests at sea was the maritime equivalent of Election Day or Pinkster Day, where a black slave was elected Governor for a day. While neither turtle-fests at sea nor Election or Pinskter Days undid existing class structures, they did provide the underclass – sailors and slaves – a brief respite in which roles were reversed.

Wealth typically translates to greater health, meaning wealthier individuals who can afford better quality and diversity of food on average live longer. It is likely that eating turtle meat and soup allowed some unknown number of whaling seamen to reap benefits of a more diverse diet typically limited to those of greater means, and perhaps live longer lives than seamen who had less diverse diets.

What might be most interesting about the class implications of turtle soup is how long it retained its character as a dish for society’s elites. When John Lusty, chairman of the English firm which imported turtles, died in 1947, his obituary noted Lusty’s turtles had “graced the table of many a prince and society hostess,” as well as three monarchs. And yet, as the below image of Worthman’s Mock Turtle Soup indicates, even today there are still some who cannot afford turtle soup who seek to enjoy the luxurious experience associated with eating the soup without paying its cost.

Seamen “Love Their Bellies”: How Blacks Became Ship Cooks

August 10, 2014UncategorizedBlack Mariners, Charles W. Morgan, Cooks, Disabled Seamen, Early American History, Maritime History, Old Seamen, Whalingcharlesfoy1

City Gazette and Daily Advertiser (Charleston), Aug. 1, 1791

During orientation at Mystic Seaport in April Voyagers were told that hot cooked meals would not be provided when we sailed on the Charles W. Morgan. Being polite well-behaved academics, artists and writers, we did not harrumph about the cold provisions we were to be provided. Why complain when we were being given an opportunity few others would ever have, to sail on America’s oldest whaling ship. This would not, however, have been the reaction of seamen in the Age of Sail to such news.

As Samuel Pepys, Secretary to the Admiralty, observed in 1677, “Englishmen, and more especially seamen, love their bellies above everything else.” The importance of food in seamen’s lives was no less important in the eighteenth century. Which raises the question, who were 18th century ship cooks?

As the above slave sale notice implies, black men such as the “Negro Fellow” being sold, worked both as sailors and cooks. Many of these men could regularly be found working as ship cooks in the Age of Sail. But if so, which blacks became ship cooks, and why were there numerous black ship cooks, and what was the role of black cooks at sea?

To understand the place of black cooks it is important to consider who became ship cooks and why. Throughout the Anglo-American maritime world disabled and elderly men were employed as cooks. (The vessels of Scarborough, England in the mid-eighteenth century are a good example of this practice. See”Sewing a Safety Net,” http://thekeep.eiu.edu/history_fac/13). A primary reason for disabled and elderly men being employed as cooks was the job being far less physically demanding than the hauling of lines and unfurling sails that most seamen did.

Men missing a limb or having impaired vision were believed capable of being cooks and frequently were so employed. Thus, in 1753 when the cook of HMS Jason deserted in Boston, the ship’s captain saw little reason not to hire as the deserter’s replacement, William Hallbrook, a seaman who had lost a leg in the naval service. Musters of naval ships throughout the Atlantic contained entries for scores of other naval seamen who having lost limbs in action were kept in service as cooks. As one sailor so aptly observed, many seaman had a bullet “shot away one of his limbs, and so cut him out for a Sea-Cook.” While one would think having sight would be a bona fide occupational qualification as a cook, one-eyed men and even those who were blind, such as men on HMS Sovereign in 1741 and HMS Flora in 1771, were employed as cooks. The prevalence of disabled cooks is made apparent by the Navy Board’s 1746 pronouncement that there were no vacancies for cooks “because so many crippled sailors have been helped this way” and its 1776 order directing “cripples and maimed persons as are pensioners” be given preference for appointment as ship cooks.

Another group of men regularly employed as cooks were older men. In the eighteenth-century men over the age of forty generally only went to sea as non-officers if impoverished or without other opportunities. However, ‘old’ men (forty or older), frequently served as cooks on all types of ships. Most of these old cooks were not quite as elderly as Nicholas Dougherty, the eighty year old cook on HMS Eagle. But forty and fifty year old cooks were commonplace on ships in the Age of Sail. The Charles W. Morgan itself is a good example; at least two of the six cooks whose age were noted in the ship’s crew lists –John Branscombe of England and Felix Morris of Chile — were forty years of age and older. Each of these men made multiple voyages with Branscombe serving on five consecutive year long voyages.

As my last blog post discussed, ship captains were often willing to hire runaways with or without maritime experience. Often these fugitive slaves found work on ships as cooks. For example, when the 17 year old South Carolinian waiting boy Tom fled in 1797 the young bondsman was believed to have sought a berth as he had previously “shipped himself as a Cook.” John Giff and other fugitives “offered [themselves] as Cook[s] on board some Ship” or “affect[ed] [themselves] in the capacity of a cook.”

Claypoole’s American Daily Advertiser (Philadelphia), Apr. 22, 1796

Although not all runaways seeking freedom at sea had prior cooking experience, many did. The prevalence of enslaved cooks in British American colonies is made evident by the scores of slave sale notices such as the one below. Having spent much time cooking for white masters fugitives found that those same skills could serve as the key to finding freedom at sea.

The Royal Gazette (New York), Feb. 6, 1779

George Prince, Jack Rogers and scores of other blacks served as cooks on African slaving ships. Other blacks, such as the itinerant preacher John Jea, worked as cooks on New England coasting vessels, trans-Atlantic merchant ships, Continental naval vessels, whaling ships, privateers, pirate ships, Lord Nelson’s naval ships and West Indies sloops. The narrative of the most famous 18th century black mariner, Olaudah Equiano, makes evident black cooks’ presence at sea. A quick perusal of Equiano’s Interesting Narrative (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/15399/15399-h/15399-h.htm) not only offers readers a description of a black ship cook spilling hot fat, but also tells of his friend John Amis, a cook on a West Indies ship, having been kidnapped in England and forcibly re-enslaved on the island of St. Kitts. In short, black cooks were ubiquitous in the 18th century Atlantic.

Mystic Seaport’s listing of The Charles W. Morgan‘s thirty-seven crews contains no identifiable blacks among the sixteen cooks in the ship’s crew lists serving between 1841 and 1921. However, as the Boston Globe recently reported, on the ship’s 37th voyage in 1921 the black Julian Grace served as the ship’s cook (the crew list does not indicate a cook for this voyage) http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2014/07/20/charles-morgan-brings-history-life-for-family-whose-roots-america-began-ship/oqPs97CwWWUjjbmVPKNTjI/story.html. Like a considerable number of other seamen on the Charles W. Morgan, Grace was from the Cape Verde Islands. Leaving Cape Verde at the age of nineteen Julian Grace settled in Massachusetts. His recipes for codfish cakes and beans with salted pork are still used by Grace family. Beans with salted pork would have been a meal Julian would have likely made for the Morgan‘s crew. But was he able to make them cachupa, the famous Cape Verde stew of slow cooked stew of corn, beans, and fish or meat ? Given that the ships of this era generally carried meat and often fished the basic elements of the stew would have been available to Grace (see http://library.mysticseaport.org/initiative/PageImage.cfm?PageNum=21&BibID=36681 for an example of the crew fishing). Was he able to bring on board the yams and plantains traditionally included in the stew? And did the ship’s provisions include the garlic and bay leaves that gives the dish its flavor? This is unlikely as few captains put much priority in spending monies to add variety to the crew’s meals. But other than an entry regarding making bread on board, the ship’s journal contains no reference to the ship’s cook (http://library.mysticseaport.org/initiative/PageImage.cfm?PageNum=38&BibID=36682) Thus what is unknown is how Julian’s, and for that matter, most Age of Sail cooks, cooking was received by his crewmates.

So eighteenth century cooks tended to be disabled, old and/or black. In short, they were often from the margins of society. It is therefore hardly surprising that in the eighteenth century black cooks often were ridiculed. Thomas McLean’s “Naval Scenes – or sketches afloat – No. 3 Cooking” is a good example such ridicule. Unlike the typical image of a black seaman during the Age of Sail that depicted sable sailors as heroic (see, e.g., http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/68/Fall_of_Nelson.jpg depicting a black gunner on the deck of HMS Victory at the moment of Lord Nelson’s death), McLean shows the black cook and steward on the slaver Sandown as foolish. The cook’s low status is made clear by his being bare foot; while many plantation slaves in the Americas worked barefoot, seamen generally did not. On the other hand the steward is shown as perhaps slow or inefficient in his work, asking the cook “Tommy am I to make the Pies” to which the cook replies, “Pies no look Al you nasty d– Black.”

Naval Scenes, Steward and Cook copy

Naval Scenes – or sketches afloat – No. 3 Cooking, http://collections.rmg.co.uk/collections/objects/127866.html

Black cooks were also often made subjects of entertainment. For example, on a 1792 voyage to Cadiz the black cook of the brig Minerva was awoken and ordered to prepare breakfast for the crew. However, when he could not be found a half hour later it was assumed he had fallen overboard. However, two days later the cook was discovered “crawling out of a hole, he had secured to sleep in,” and “from which he was only roused by hunger.” The crew was said to have “had a fine laugh on the occasion, and the cook was afforded them much entertainment since that time.”

Given the importance seamen placed upon food cooks were often the focus of their colleagues’ attention, for better and worse. With limited authority to alter what was generally a dull and repetitive diet (which will be the focus on my next blog), cooks stood responsible for a crucial element in crews’ lives and therefore the anger of the crew when food did not meet expectations. For example, when a black cook dropped a plate on a slave ship the cook was flogged and had salt water and cayenne rubbed on his back. In contrast, in 1724 when the free black cook on Francis Spriggs’ pirate ship divided provisions equally, the crew responded “very merrily.” In sum, when combined with not being viewed by most sailors as skilled maritime workers, cooks occupied an ambiguous and difficult place on most 18th century ships.

So simply stated being a ship cook offered both freedom from enslavement and economic independence for many blacks, while at times the position also often served to reinforce blacks’ inferior status within the Anglo-America Atlantic.

If blacks regularly worked as ship cooks what foods did they cook? My next two posts will consider the foods typically cooked on ships and the outsized place turtles and turtle soup had in the diet of whaling seamen.

‘Walks Very Much Upright’: Black Men in Confined Maritime Spaces

July 29, 2014UncategorizedBlack Mariners, Charles W. Morgan, Early American, Maritime History, Whalingcharlesfoy1

Morgan Forecastle

The Charles W. Morgan forecastle On Thursday October 4, 1764 a South Carolinian slave named Saundy ran away. His flight by itself was hardly remarkable; in the eighteenth century hundreds of enslaved individuals in British North America, the West Indies, Central and South America fled their masters. This six-foot tall African-born man walked “very upright.” Saundy was believed likely to seek a berth on a ship causing his master to place an advertisement warning ship masters not to “carry off the said fellow.” During the 18th century black men such as Saundy could be found hauling lines and at the helms of Boston coasters, New London pinnaces, New Jersey oyster boats, New York ferries, Carolinian shallops, Bermudian blue sea sloops, Jamaican droghers, as well as a variety of other vessels in the Western Atlantic. Considerable numbers of blacks, such as the Philadelphia dockyard worker depicted below, outfitted, loaded and unloaded these vessels. For example, Jingo Negro, Quam and Newport were but three of the more than 125 black men employed by a single Rhode Island merchant to prepare his ships for sea between 1760 and 1782. In sum, Saundy would not have appeared out of place when on dockside seeking a possible berth.

William Russell Birch, “Arch Street Ferry, Philadelphia,” Library Company of Philadelphia

Maritime work experiences, along with the use of sailors’ clothing, often enabled runaways to convince ship masters to hire them, particularly during wars when seamen were in great demand. As the historian Jeffrey Bolster has noted, ship captains often hired with ‘more of an eye to muscle than complexion’. But in coming aboard what type of life did Saundy and other fugitives find? This is a complicated question for in seeking freedom through maritime employment these runaways choose a regimented and highly controlled environment. In this post I’d like to address one aspect of this question: how did Saundy and other tall black men fit — physically and socially — into the tight cramped spaces of 18th century ships?

In eighteenth century Americans were considerably shorter than today’s Americans. While the average American male now stands 5′ 9 1/2″, studies have shown that the average height of 18th century native-born South Carolinian, Trinidad and British sugar islands male slaves was 5′ 6″. Seamen were similarly shorter than today’s Americans. Among the more than nine hundred 18th century black mariners and maritime fugitives in my Black Mariner Database (BMD) for whom there is height data the average height was 5′ 5 2/3.” Given the average height of 18th century men I define eighteenth century seamen 5′ 10″ or taller as “tall”.

Why the focus on tall black men at sea? Simply stated, they represent certain tensions in the 18th century maritime environment. On one hand tall slaves were highly valued. Slave traders often choose taller men “to increase their profits” and advertisements stressed that men to be sold were tall and strong. Ship captains also valued tall men’s strength and endurance. In 1762 Pompey, Harry, Sam and Prince each fled their New York masters. All were 6′ or taller and “used to the sea” and/or wearing sailors clothes. Each was believed likely to have been hired aboard a ship in New York harbor. Yet while they may have been highly valued Pompey and other tall men’s very size shaped their lives at sea as well as social relations on ships in distinct ways. Not only did these men need to fit within very confined spaces, but their size and maritime skills also represented a challenge to many whites’ expectation of blacks’ place in society. And life in confined space at sea raised negative associations for black seamen. Thus for tall blacks life on 18th century ships provided unique challenges. Lets consider the tensions that tall black seamen represent by first focusing on the confined nature of space in sailing ships. To go below deck on whaling ship The Charles W. Morgan one descends a very steep set of stairs. Although I am 5′ 8 1/2″ I found myself ducking to avoid bumping my head. The first time I did so I thought of my 6′ 9″ colleague Newton Key. How torturous it would have been for him to descend those steps! The image of him attempting to do so provided a vivid image of how uncomfortable life below deck could be for tall men. In the hold one needs to regularly hunch-over as beams provide less than 5′ 6″ clearance. The experience is a bit like walking through narrow passageways in caves where one has to duck down every few feet. Undoubtedly tall men on 18th century sailing ships spent a good deal of time crouched over and in some discomfort. Even the best contemporary literary and theatrical representations of life in the Age of Sail do not capture the hunched-over nature of life below deck. The recent Glyndebourne production of Benjamin Britten’s opera Billy Budd emphasized the claustrophobia of sailing ships by using a three-sided curved set that hemmed in HMS Indomitable‘s crew. And yet this moving production does not completely capture the low clearance in the ship’s hold; in the opera’s powerful scene when the seamen below deck sing to each other, not a single sailor crouches to fit under the ship’s beams. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5e1uvPCGsrM

http://glyndebourne.com/production/billy-budd

Americans such as Abigail Adams might observe that the confined spaces of sailing ships caused “sickness and fatigue” for passengers. But for blacks the confined spaces in holds of ships had a much darker connotation. For large numbers of 18th century African-Americans their initial connection to the Atlantic was being shackled to others in the hold of slave ships, such as the Brookes depicted below. Subsequently finding themselves in bunks on a whaling ship may have provided maritime fugitives with freedom. But it also represented a existence where once these men again lived in confined quarters and in a system where their movements and actions were under strict control of white men.

“Stowage of the British Slave Ship Brookes,” http://memory.loc.gov/

For some maritime fugitives, i.e., slaves who escaped via the sea, life on board 18th century ships would have also reminded them of the living quarters they had fled. Slaves in North American cities often slept in attics, garrets or small spaces behind kitchens. While not quite as small as ship bunks they also were cramped and confined places. Thus, although work at sea may have been the means for maritime fugitives to obtain freedom, forecastles would have had associations for these men of places where they were viewed as having limited humanity and thus provided painful echoes of the men’s enslaved pasts. Once on board tall men would have found sleeping on sailing ships a challenge. Small bunks, such as those on The Charles W. Morgan, provided limited headroom. Despite not being tall I found it hard to fall asleep in the ship. In my bunk a massive ship’s knee loomed over my head creating the sensation of lying in compressed space. Only by turning on my side was I able to not feel confined and fall asleep. Men such as Sambo, Golia, Abel and Fortune, who were not only 6′ tall but were stout men with large feet, would have found getting up into such tight spaces an awkward experience. And once in the bunks sleep would not have been very comfortable. However skilled a black sailor might be race was still often the determinative factor of one’s position on a sailing ship. In the eighteenth century it was unusual for a black to be an ship’s officer, be it on a man-of-war, a merchant ship, a privateer or a fishing vessel in the Anglo-American Atlantic. Despite being valued for their strength and maritime skills all black men found movement up the maritime hierarchy difficult. Men such as John Jenkins, a free black lieutenant commanding a Royal Navy schooner during the American Revolution, stood out as one of a handful of black sea officers. Thus, while the confined space of a ship’s hold may have caused physical discomfort for tall black seamen, racial attitudes also created a wooden ceiling in the 18th century maritime Anglo-American world that framed and limited black seamen’s opportunities. As the image below shows, blacks were far more likely to be serving officers than being officers. http://collections.rmg.co.uk/collections/objects/127865.html This is not to say that black men were socially ostracized on board ships. Black and white seamen relied upon each other while working. They hauled lines and stood watch together, they were mess mates and shared stories during meals. But white seamen were known to have “taken a Dislike to [a black] man’s Colour.” Such racial attitudes led some whites to resist being lead by black officers and in some cases to violence against black sailors. In the western Atlantic, in which blacks could be found enslaved in most ports and free blacks had limited rights, this is hardly surprising. Racial attitudes did not magically change upon men stepping aboard a ship. For whites who were uncomfortable with blacks working alongside a larger stronger black seamen would have been disconcerning, if not result in outright hostility towards his dark-skinned shipmate. Thus, while obtaining berths may have been how considerable numbers of maritime fugitives found freedom, the wide expanses of the Atlantic rarely resulted in absolute independence for these runaways. In considering how blacks fit within narrow confined maritime spaces my next blog will focus on the role of black cooks.

From Ozenbrig to Tarred Breeches

July 21, 2014UncategorizedBlack Mariners, Charles W. Morgan, Early American History, Maritime History, Whalingcharlesfoy1

Dana Mancinelli, Aaron Gralnik and Ryan Loftus, Deckhands on The Charles W. Morgan

In The Slave Ship Marcus Rediker demonstrates that slaving vessels were sites of transformation, where Ibos became Africans, ship captains became prison wardens and seamen became guards. These transformations were significant, both for the individuals on those ships as well as for the wider Atlantic world. But were all ships similarly places of transformation? Or was this a process unique to slave ships?

During the The Charles W. Morgan‘s recent voyage from Provincetown to Boston we sailed in fog for three hours. During this time only the sounds of the crew hauling line, officers barking orders, the fog horn and water lapping against the ship’s hull broke the silence. We could neither see land or much else. Each Voyager on the ship became largely disconnected from their lives on land. In a sense each became “maritime” in a way we were not before we had stepped aboard the ship. The experience made me think about the transformation 18th century runaway slaves underwent when they found berths on ships in order to flee their masters. How easy was it for fugitives to transform themselves into seamen and by what means did they do so?

The Charles Morgan sailing in fog, July 15, 2014

Five factors were crucial in runaways becoming mariners: prior maritime experience, use of boats or canoes to reach ships, change in clothing, war, and being able to convince ship captains they were capable of shipboard work.

Large numbers of fugitive slaves seeking berths, individuals I characterize as “maritime fugitives,” already had maritime experience, either refitting ships or working on a vessel. These men’s movement onto ships while difficult — after all masters sought to recapture them and offered rewards for their return — was far easier than for those runaways lacking maritime experience. They knew the language of a ship and easily affected the distinctive walk and talk of a Jack Tar. Thus, when Will Johnston fled Captain Lemuel Jenkins’ Providence whaling ship in 1775 his knowledge of the cooper’s trade and experience on Jenkins’ whaling ship made him a prime candidate for a berth in any of the nearby New England ports.

Unlike Will Johnston, many maritime fugitives did not live in ports. Fleeing countryside enslavement these runaways headed to waterside cities knowing ports offered them the opportunity to permanently disappear. To avoid being stopped on roads many fugitives such as Ceaser, the subject of the below fugitive slave advertisement, used small boats and canoes to flee their master. Local rivers, streams and bays served as watery networks by which inland slaves in places such as Bucks County, Pennsylvania or Westchester County, New York reached major ports. Thus, the experience of becoming “maritime” in fact started for many runaways far from the busy docks of Philadelphia and New York.

Dec. 1, 1737 American Mercury

In the 18^th century, a period before widespread use of identification papers, clothing was the means by which one’s status was conveyed to others, whether through the powdered wigs of a gentleman or the tarred breeches of a blue water seaman. Upon entering a Royal Navy ship, those who lacked proper clothing were provided slop cloths and bedding to both assist them in working on board but also indicated they were one of the crew. As Gabriel Bray’s “A Sailor Brining Up his Hammock to Pallas,” so vividly details, while 18th century Royal Navy seamen may not have had a standard uniform, naval seamen clearly denoted their status through personally identified bedding (note the “CD No. 4” on the hammock), short jackets, sailor’s caps and scarves. Bray, Waterman Bringing Up His Hammock to Pallas

The clothing that maritime fugitives wore often posed a practical obstacle to their finding berths on ships. Many masters in the 18th century required their slaves to wear ozenbrig, a fabric similar in texture to burlap. Few individuals would willingly choose to wear the fabric. Those who did were easily identified as enslaved or as indentured bondsmen. For slaves seeking to flee their masters via the sea, ridding themselves of the much disliked ozenbrig clothing was the first step to transforming themselves into mariners. For example, in 1745 Mingo was said to ‘‘make for some seaport, in order to enter on board a privateer.’’ His master, as did the masters of Adam Dobbs, Joseph Anthony and hundreds of other maritime fugitives, believed the runaway would shed his ozenbrig clothes. These men were often able to do so through selling or exchanging their clothing at portside taverns. As a result slave owners frequently felt compelled to place newspaper advertisements warning ship captains “to be careful in not carrying [the slave] away.”

Having escaped their master, obtained a boat, reached a port and gotten rid of their ozenbrig clothing maritime fugitives still faced two critical hurdles: the vagrancies of maritime labor markets and the ability to convince ship captains of their capability on board.

The critical role of war as effecting American maritime markets and the opportunities for maritime fugitives cannot be understated. There was a direct correlation between the size of maritime labor markets – which boomed during the many wars of the 18^th century – and the number of maritime fugitives. Likewise, during post-war recessions, the numbers of maritime fugitives plummeted. The result was that the overwhelming majority of 18^th century maritime fugitives fled during wartime.

Even after arriving dockside a fugitive seeking a berth who lacked sea experience needed to be an effective salesmen. Or as the master of Jack, a Maryland enslaved waiter who in 1784 fled seeking a berth at sea observed, fugitives needed to be “artful fellow(s)” to convince ship masters that they were capable of working aboard a ship. This meant that few runaways who did not speak English were able to obtain berths.

Maritime fugitives may be a particularly fitting topic as we only recently celebrated Solomon Northup Day. In Twelve Years a Slave when Northup was shown being enshackled on a ship about to be transported south he was bewildered and angry. Northup, like many enslaved individuals, experienced ships as the means by which they lost freedom. However, for hundreds of 18th century maritime fugitives, the white sails of ships, were not simply symbols of enslavement, but also held out the promise of more independent lives. As Philip D. Morgan has noted, blacks were not simply “objects being moved but also … subjects doing the moving.”

In future posts I will discuss the nature of black seamen’s lives in the 18^th century.

Going To Sea

July 14, 2014UncategorizedBlack Mariners, Charles W. Morgan, Early American History, Maritime History, Whalingcharlesfoy1

Standing in a room strewn with a backpack, notebook, Ipad and clothes I’m little more than a hour from driving to Provincetown to go sailing (yes, the first hint that your writer is a procrastinator). Why Provincetown and why to sail? It’s fair to say I am not, in the words of the Harvard historian Samuel Morrison, an “adventure-loving youth” seeking “an easy escape from the strict conventions and prying busybodies of New England towns.” Nor am I one of the pirates who, as Marcus Redicker so wonderfully describes, is seeking an alternative social order by going to sea. And I do not believe, as Henry Dana did, I will “cure, if possible … a weakness of the eyes” by hard work at sea. Actually, it is more likely I will get sea sick than cure any illness I have. Neither an adventurer, radical or cure-seeker am I. I am instead a quite ordinary academic, normally desk-bound and with a wife who probably has more than a few quibbles about her “old man” going to sea.

So if not for the romance, the desire or need to seek a new life or to find a cure for my physical ailments why is it that I leave the comfort of my Brooklyn home for the choppy waters of Boston Bay? In short, the opportunity of a lifetime; to sail on Mystic Seaport’s Charles W. Morgan, America’s oldest whaling ship.

The Charles W. Morgan is back at sea after a major retrofit. Sailing out into the Atlantic it has for the first time in more than seventy years unfurled its sails in open waters. As part of Mystic Seaport’s 38th Voyager Program (this is the 38th voyage of the Charles W. Morgan ) the Seaport has, with support from NEH and other funders, embarked on one of this nation’s largest public history projects; taking 79 artists, writers, historians, film makers, archeologists, literary scholars and scientists aboard the whaling ship for a series of voyages. And I am one of these fortunate few who will be sailing on the whaling ship.

Over the coming weeks and months I will regularly post blogs regarding my time, albeit short, on the Charles W. Morgan, with the intention of connecting my experiences to those of the men I write about; 18th century black mariners. I hope to create a conversation about the central role of black mariners in America’s Age of Sail and in doing so “uncover hidden lives.” In doing so, I will focus much of my attention to the lives of individual black mariners. My posts will utilize my Black Mariner Database , a dataset of more than 25,000 18th century black mariners and maritime fugitives, to provide individual case stories to bring alive some of the issues (race at sea, opportunities for freedom, how serving on different types of ships shaped the lives of black mariners, etc.) I’ll be discussing.

I look forward to your comments.