EARLY GROWTH
Although geographical conditions were in most respects against them, it is
manifest from any study of the New Englanders that their chief mercantile
interests, during the earliest years, were concentrated in the fur trade.
The Pilgrims devoted their first surplus crop to that trade, and the first
voyage of Winthrop's _Blessing of the Bay_ was to "eastward." According
to the contracts, they had come to make fishing stations; yet the large
profits made on such furs as they were able to secure kept their minds
fixed on the Indian trade. But, happily, at an opportune moment a man came
to Salem who was able to see that enduring prosperity could be found by
the colonists only in the fisheries; and by example as well as precept he
speedily led them to accept his view. Curiously enough, as it must seem
in our modern view of the profession, this man was a clergyman, the Rev.
Hugh Peter (written also Peters).
Few more stirring stories are to be found in the history of New England
than the biography of Hugh Peter. He was born in England, of wealthy
parents, in 1599, graduated at Cambridge in 1622, and immediately took
holy orders. Very soon, however, he had (or made) such trouble with the
church authorities that he had to flee from the country. Then he served an
English congregation in Rotterdam until 1634, when he came to New England
and was made pastor of the Puritans at Salem.
In 1641 Peter was sent as ambassador to treat with the Dutch of New
Amsterdam for a settlement of the disputes over the territory of
Connecticut, and the records of his work, especially the proposals
which he submitted (N. Y. C. docs. I, 567), show that he was a master of
diplomacy. His work with the Dutch led the colonists to send him as their
ambassador to England, when the civil war began there. Being a Puritan,
he naturally joined the hosts of Cromwell and with such energy and zeal
as were characteristic of the man.
In June, 1645, he was made "Chaplain of the Train," and a little later
private secretary to Cromwell. He was with his chief at the storming of
the castle at Winchester and when the dour hosts swept over the works
at Basing. As a special honor, and because of his eloquence, Cromwell
sent him on each occasion to tell Parliament how the battles were won;
and the reader who would like to learn what a preacher had to say about
such fighting as was done in those battles can find one of the addresses
in Carlyle's _Cromwell_. Having been sent on a mission to Holland, he
delivered a sermon which stirred the audience until "crowds of women"
stripped the wedding rings from their fingers to aid in providing funds
for the work of the great Commoner.
For his zeal he was arrested soon after the Restoration. "His trial was a
scene of flagrant injustice," and he was condemned, hanged, and quartered.
But he faced his accusers and death as he had faced all else in life.
He was placed on the gallows while one of his friends was yet hanging
there, and was compelled to look on while the corpse was lowered and cut
to pieces. When this had been done, one of the executioners turned, and
rubbing his bloody hands together, said to Peter:--
"How like you this?"
But Peter, in a voice of unconcern, replied--
"I thank God I am not terrified at it; you may do your worst."
When Hugh Peter came to Salem, he found the people of the colony, with few
exceptions, living in log houses that had thatched roofs and dirt floors.
They were frontiersmen, a thin line of population stretched along the
beach. Although there were masters and servants, there was less division
of labor than that fact would now seem to imply. Owners and servants
worked together. They cut timber in the forest for lumber and fuel; they
built houses of all needed kinds; they cultivated the soil and they cared
for their cattle. The New World was almost without form and void, but the
divine power of labor was moving upon the wastes. A natural-born leader
was needed, however, and Hugh Peter was the man for the hour. He saw
that the fur trade was slipping away and that some other resource must be
provided. Better yet, he saw that the fisheries would provide a permanent
prosperity, and he began to preach the gospel of good fish markets in far
countries. No record of his arguments remains, but we may easily learn
what he said by reading the contemporary writings of John Smith, who used
the facts vigorously, as Peter did beyond a doubt.
In 1619 "there went" to America, said Smith, a ship "of 200 tuns ... which
with eight and thirty men and boys had her freight, which she sold for
£2100 ... so that every poor sailor that had but a single share had his
charges and sixteen pounds ten shillings for his seven months work." In
1620 three different ships "made so good a voyage that every sailor that
had a single share had twenty pounds for his seven months work, which is
more than in twenty months he should have gotten had he gone for wages
anywhere."
If a statement of the gains of a foremast hand would serve as an effective
argument in England, it would be much more effective in New England,
where many men low in the social scale were finding opportunities to
rise--where, indeed, men who had come over as indentured servants had
already become capitalists able to join in a venture afloat. The profits
of the merchants were also known and printed, however, even though
not considered a matter of first importance by Smith. Thus there was a
statement that "the charge of setting forth a ship of 100 tuns with 40
persons to make a fishing voyage" was £420 11_s._ The average take of
fish on the American coast would sell for £2100, of which £700 would be
the share of the merchant supplying the outfit costing £420 11_s._ His
profit on the voyage would therefore be near 100 per cent, even though
the prevailing rate of interest on borrowed money were 40 per cent. The
ship-owner took a third of the income from the voyage, and made a still
larger profit, for a hundred-ton ship could be built in New England, as
Randolph noted, for £4 per ton.
With these facts in hand Hugh Peter went among his people preaching the
gospel of enterprise with as much enthusiasm no doubt as he felt and
displayed later in preaching religious doctrines before Cromwell's men.
As a result of his work he "procured a good sum of money to be raised to
set on foot the fishing business, and wrote into England to raise as much
more." Further than that, the General Court, as the governing body of the
colony was called, appointed six men to fish "for general account."
The Salem people made money from the first. The business spread to near-by
Marblehead, and the people there became so much interested that when a
minister in the pulpit told them that they ought to seek the "kingdom
of heaven to the _exclusion_ of all earthly blessings," one of the
congregation interrupted him by saying, "You think you are preaching to
the people at the Bay. Our _main_ end is to catch fish."
By 1640 the Salem people had made such progress and profits in their
fishery that they were able to launch a ship of 300 tons, a monster of a
vessel for the day and place. Moreover, Boston people were so wrought up
by Peter's enterprise in this matter that they also built a ship at the
same time, the _Trial_, of 160 (or 200) tons.
Unhappily for Salem, her people had no leader after Peter sailed for
England, and Boston soon gained the ascendancy in commerce as in politics.
But for many years Salem was a port of vast importance in the story of
our merchant marine.
In the meantime (1636), the _Desire_, a ship of 120 tons, was built at
Marblehead for the fishing business. It is likely that Peter inspired
the people there to build her. She was engaged in fishing for two years
and then made a voyage in the slave trade, and thus acquired enduring
notoriety.
Of much more importance than these large vessels in promoting the shipping
interests of the colonists were the small vessels, smacks, and shallops,
which men of limited means built and used. A seven-ton shallop could
be built for £25, and in the hands of her owners she was well able to
go fishing. Friends and neighbors united their labor as well as their
accumulations of capital in sending the small boats to sea. Even the
dugout canoe which a man could make for himself was used in the bay
fisheries, and the whole world was within the reach and grasp of a man
who had the courage and enterprise to launch forth in a dugout canoe of
his own making. It was in and through such men that the American colonists
_were gaining the sea habit_.
The cod was the fish of chief importance, though other varieties were sent
abroad, and used at home in enormous quantities. Mackerel, though some
were eaten and some exported, were used chiefly for bait. Sturgeon eggs
were made into caviare then, as now, while the flesh of the sturgeon was
smoked and sold--perhaps as the flesh of some more delicate fish. Hake,
halibut, and haddock were of some importance, but the one fish that ranked
next after the cod was the alewife.
It is said that alewives were so called because their well-rounded
abdomens reminded the fishermen of such of their wives as were too fond
of malt drinks! Millions of alewives came to the coast and swarmed up the
streams until the channels seemed to be filled solid with the struggling
bodies. Seines, scoop-nets, and even the naked hands were used in taking
them, but the weir was in common use from the first. Indeed, the Indians
used weirs before the white men came.
The people naturally looked upon these swarming fish as common property,
and when weirs were built by private enterprise and the owners were thus
able to "control the market" to a certain extent, laws were promptly
enacted to regulate these primitive "trusts." One John Clark was
allowed to build a weir at Cambridge on condition that he sell to no
one not an inhabitant of the town "except for bait." The interests of
the commonwealth were placed ahead of those of the small community when
there was a need of "bait." The price of alewives was fixed at "IIIs 6d
per thousand." Another monopolist was to "fetch home the alewives from
the weir; and he is to have XVId a thousand and load them himself for
carriage; and _to have the power to take any man to help him_, he paying
of him for his work."
The importance of alewives to the people is thus shown clearly. The
notable uses of alewives were as food, as fertilizers, and as bait, but
a few were smoked for export.
The early laws governing the fisheries may well have still further
consideration here. After Hugh Peter began arousing an interest in the
fisheries, the General Court exempted fishing vessels from all charges for
a period of seven years, beginning in 1639. Fishermen and ship carpenters
were excused from serving the public on training days. When alewives were
taken at the weirs, the fishermen were to be served at statute-made prices
before any were to be offered to the public. This was provided for, of
course, after the farmers had learned their art well enough to prevent
the fear of starvation. Land was set aside for fish-curing stages, and
pasture was provided for the cattle which fishermen owned but could not
attend to while at sea.
Until 1648 the fishermen, on coming ashore to "make" their catch,
were allowed to land, cut timber, and erect their stages for the work
regardless of the ownership of the ground where they landed. After that
date they were still allowed to do the same things, but they were then
required to pay the owner of the land for the use of land and timber. In
1652, to preserve the reputation of the colony product of fish, the law
provided for "fish viewers" at "every fishing place," whose duty it was
to separate cured fish into grades according to quality.
Some details of the early methods of taking fish on the Banks were
recorded. Neither the dory nor the trawl had then been developed.
Hand-lines thrown from the deck of the fishing ship were used exclusively.
The hooks and lines were imported from England, and Smith records the
price: "12 dozen of fishing lines, £6; 24 dozen of fishing hooks, £2."
The Indians made fairly good hooks of bones and shells. They spun lines
from the fibres of Indian hemp, which they saturated with grease and the
wax of the bayberry bush, but the white men would not use any such gear.
Cod lines for use on the Grand Banks were from 50 to 75 fathoms long; the
lines now used on the Georges Bank are often as much as 150 fathoms long.
Sinkers (conical plummets of lead), were from 3 to 8 pounds in weight
according to the strength of the tidal current where the fishing vessel
anchored. The enthusiastic John Smith said: "Is it not pretty sport to
pull up two pence, six pence and twelve pence as fast as you can haul
and veer a line?" But the fishermen who stood at the rail, in freezing
weather, hauling a wet line that was 75 fathoms or more in length, and
weighted with 8 pounds of lead and a 100-pound codfish, did not find it
exactly "pretty sport." Moreover, hauling and veering did not end their
work, for when the school of fish was lost, the catch had to be cleaned
and salted, even though the men had been at the rail day and night for 48
hours. But the work afforded better opportunities for "getting on," and
so they found in it the "pleasing content" of which Smith also speaks.
As the reader knows, stoves were not invented until many years later, but
the fishermen made shift by carrying a half hogshead nearly filled with
sand. In the centre of the sand they scooped a hole in which the fire was
built. By means of such a fire, built on deck, they cooked their food,
warmed themselves, and dried their wet clothing. The scene where a fleet
of fishermen anchored together on the banks by night, and all together
cooked their suppers by the flaring fires, was memorable. One sees how
easy it was for the imaginative sailor to name such a tub of fire a
"galley," the name applied to the modern ship's kitchen.
In food supplies the New Englanders naturally fared better than their
old-country competitors. Being nearer home, they had fresh vegetables for
a greater proportion of the time afloat. Food was cheaper, too, and the
circumstances or conditions under which the food was produced made them
more lavish in using it. They raised their own peas and had barrels of
them at home; why should they stint themselves on the Banks? To this day
American ships are noted for superior food and hard work. Of course they
ate plenty of fish, as all fishermen did, and they caught many sea-birds,
of which they made savory dishes.
John Smith emphasizes the fact that in the English ships the catch
was divided into three parts, of which the crew received only a third,
the two-thirds going to the owner and the merchant who fitted out the
expedition. Where one man owned and outfitted the ship, he took the
two-thirds, of course. But as Weeden, in his _Economic History of New
England_ (quoting Bourne's _Wells and Kennebunk_), shows, in 1682-1685,
if not earlier, "the capitalist fitting out the expedition with boat,
provisions, seines, &c., took one-half the value of the catch, and the
other part went to the crew." In the eighteenth century the share of the
capitalist was reduced to one-fifth.
The whale fishery of the first half of the seventeenth century was of
small importance in comparison with that of later years, but it is still
worth mention. The chief source of oil and bone seems to have been found
in the whales that died from natural causes and drifted to the beach. But
men did go afloat in chase when the spouting spray and vapor were seen
from the shore, and laws were provided at an early day to regulate the
catch. The General Court, under these laws, took a share of all drift
whales--from two barrels to a third of the whole product. In the chase
the first harpoon that held its place claimed the whale. It was provided
"5ly, that no whael shall be needlessly or fouellishly lansed behind ye
vitall." The most important fact here is that at first the men who killed
a whale shared equally. Later, when the men of superior skill claimed
shares in proportion to the work they did, the "lay" system was evolved.
The captain of a ship received from 1 barrel in 17 to 1 in 25; in recent
years still more. Mates had from 1 in 30 to 1 in 50. The men who threw the
harpoon had 1 in 75, say, while foremast men had still less, even down to
1 in 200 for a green hand. No better system for encouraging men to do as
well as they could has ever been devised.
Of similar importance was the custom then prevailing of allowing the crews
of merchant ships to carry a "private venture." When Skipper Cornell's
Ewoutsen, in a Dutch cruiser, captured four New England ketches "in the
neighborhood of Blocx Island," Captain Richard Hollingworth, commanding of
one of the four, declared that he was "freighted on account of Wharton and
Company, merchants of Boston, with 47 tubs of tobacco; _Item_, 6 tubs of
tobacco for Mathew Cartwright and 13 tubs for himself and crew ... in all
66 tubs, with eight hides." The crew owned nearly a fifth of the cargo.
(N. Y. C. docs. II, 662.) Seamen before the mast as well as officers took
from port, in stated quantities, any commodities which they supposed they
could sell to advantage in any of the ports to which the ship was bound.
Here or there these goods were exchanged for others, which were again
traded at other ports, or carried home to be sold. Wages were not so very
low for common sailors, even by modern standards. They received on an
average £2 10_s._ per month. Mates had, say, £3 10_s._, and captains £4
10_s._, and, rarely, £6 a month. On top of this the private venture was
carried free, and the shrewd sailormen often made much more on the private
venture than from wages. It is a matter of much importance.
The sailor, having a direct interest in the voyage, made haste to shorten
sail when a squall threatened to carry away the masts; he worked with
all his might whenever any danger threatened, because she carried his
merchandise. More important still is the fact that the custom made
merchants of the men, and that is to say, it made them self-respecting and
ambitious. There were instances where the crew received no wages whatever;
the owner, master, and men were all adventurers together.
There is no more instructive comparison in the history of the nation than
that between these early-day merchants of the forecastle and the driven
brutes before the mast in the clippers of a later day.
Consider now the influence of the poverty of the builder upon the
character of the ship. Capital was so scarce that a man worth £4000 was
called wealthy. Ships were built where scarcely a shilling in currency
changed hands. The workmen were paid with goods. Where neighbors united
to build a vessel, they traded produce of fishery field, or forest to
the merchant for such iron, sails, and cordage as they needed, or they
gave him a share in the vessel. The merchant traded the produce of the
fisheries or forest in Europe for the outfit he gave to the builders. By
hard labor and severe economy only were these vessels sent afloat. It was
the European fashion of the day to build ships with enormous cabins piled
high at the stern end, and to ornament the superstructures with carvings
and paints. The New Englanders, having no capital to spare, had to forego
the pleasure of ornamenting their ships with decorated superstructures;
they were obliged to consider efficiency only. They did not know it at the
time, but the fact was that this enforced economy led to an advance in the
art of ship-building. On navigating the ships without superstructures, it
was seen that the tall cabins had made the ships top-heavy, and had served
to strain instead of strengthen the hulls. Moreover, the huge pile of
timber had held the ship back in any winds but the fairest. Ships without
superstructures were stronger, of greater capacity, swifter and handier.
Then there were the geographical influences which affected the model and
rigs of ships. Whether in fishing or coasting voyages, the American ship
must be prepared to meet winds from any point of the compass on every
day she was out of port. The prevailing winds were westerly, but there
was neither trade wind nor monsoon. The ship must therefore be rigged to
force her way ahead against adverse winds. For such winds the spritsails,
lugs, and others, where the cloth was stretched fore and aft, rather than
to yards hung square across the masts, were more convenient. The schooner
was a natural evolution of the coasting conditions.
The waters of the harbors were shallow. In England deep-water ports had
favored deep hulls, but the American designer who wished to increase the
capacity of a hull had to make it wider instead of deeper. Wide beam gave
greater stability; a wide ship could carry wide sails and yet "stand up
like a church" in a heavy wind. Of course stout masts were needed for
wide sails, but the forests were full of enormous pines that could be
had, at first, for the cutting. Wide hulls of shoal draft, with wide
sails spread upon stout spars, made speedy ships, a fact that even now
is not as well understood as it should be. The speedy ships invited their
masters to "carry on"--to keep their sails spread full breadth while the
gale increased to a weight that would "take the sticks out of" vessels of
inferior design. The swift ship, well driven, soon brought fame as well
as additional profit to crew and owners, and the pride in the ship which
was thus developed led all who were in any way connected with her to look
for still further improvements.
The short distances between harbors also had some influence upon the
forms of ships. For one thing, short passages favored small vessels with
small crews. The greater the number of vessels, the greater the number of
captains accustomed to responsibility, a matter of no small importance in
its effect upon the formation of the sea habit among a people. Then the
short passage naturally led the crew into taking chances; they would risk
a growing gale in a short run. Once out of port in "dirty weather," the
manifest dangers set all hands thinking of improved ways of shortening
sail in an emergency, and of improved shapes of hull and cut of canvas
to help a vessel to "claw off" a lee shore. The men who worked in the
shipyard building for themselves, and then went afloat, were particularly
observant at such times. One of the most common statements to be found in
the stories of perils at sea, as related by American shipmasters of other
days, is this: "Every dollar I owned in the world was in that ship, and"
for that reason every hardship was endured and every effort made to bring
her to port.
In 1624 the Pilgrims exported their first cargo of fish. Boston sent its
first cargo away in 1633. The owners of these fish had to pay three or
four pounds a ton freight; and an agent in England, who charged a good
commission for doing so, found a customer to buy them. The New Englanders
saw that the vessel carrying the cargo made a profit for her owner. They
saw, too, that an agent in a foreign country across the water would never
have quite the interest in selling to advantage that they themselves would
have if they were there to sell. In short, if the fish business were to be
handled in the most profitable way possible, they must carry the cargo in
their own ship direct to the consumer. Hugh Peter preached this doctrine
with emphasis, beyond doubt, for it was he who led in building the 300-ton
ship at Salem. From catching fish to carrying them to the oversea market
was a short passage quickly made. With this in mind, consider the brief
story of the voyage of the good ship _Trial_, Captain Thomas Coytemore,
made after the fishing business was well in hand.
The _Trial_, as noted, was the ship built in Boston when the people there
were stirred to emulation by the work of Hugh Peter in Salem. Loaded with
fish and pipe-staves, she sailed away to Fayal (1642). Fayal was chosen
because the people there had religious views leading them to eat fish
instead of flesh on many days of the year, and they were wine-makers
who used many casks every year. The _Trial_ found the market at Fayal
"extraordinary good," and Captain Coytemore exchanged the fish and staves
for wine, sugar, etc., which he carried to St. Christopher's, in the West
Indies. There he traded wine for cotton, tobacco, and some iron which the
people had taken from a ship that had been wrecked on the coast, and was
then visible, though so far under water that the wreckers had abandoned
all work upon it. As the New Englanders were exceedingly anxious to get
all kinds of iron things used about a ship, Captain Coytemore must needs
have a look at the wreck, and after due examination, he determined to try
to recover more of the wreckage. Slinging a "diving tub" (doubtless a good
stout cask, well weighted, and with the open end down), above the hulk,
he got into it, and having been lowered to the sunken deck, made shift to
hook good stout grapnels to the valuable things lying within reach.
[Illustration: An Early View of Charleston Harbor
From a print in the possession of the Lenox Library]
Comparisons, though sometimes odious, may be excused when instructive. The
conditions of life in Canada led the French to devote themselves to furs
only. The Dutch at Manhattan Island were absorbed in furs and the trade
of the West India Company. The Virginians and the English West Indians
devoted themselves almost exclusively to producing tobacco and sugar by
means of slave labor.
Under the conditions of life in New England, the people became perforce
farmers, growing their own food; loggers, cutting timber in the near-by
forest for use in building houses, fishing smacks, and ships; fishermen,
going afloat in the smacks and then curing the catch on the beach; seamen,
who, blow high or blow low, carried the catch in their own ships direct to
the consumer; traders, meeting the competition of the keenest merchants in
the world; inventors, who, when unable to do their work by methods already
in use, promptly improvised something new that would serve the purpose.