Transcriber’s Note:
Spelling and punctuation are non-standard. Occasional sentences
end without punctuation or begin with a lower case letter.
Quotation marks appear randomly through the text. A double close
quote is frequently used to indicate an abbreviated word. A lower
case "s" was substituted for ſ throughout the book. The letter
‘c’ with a cedilla above it is transcribed as [‘c]. The letter
‘o’ with an umlaut below is transcribed as [o:].
Words and phrases in italics are surrounded by underscores, _like
this_. Superscripts are contained within braces and preceded by a
carat, e.g. III^{ter}. Footnotes were renumbered sequentially and
moved to the end of the book. Footnotes [10], [11], [12], and [15]
have multiple anchors. Page headers were converted to sidenotes.
In the Account of Belem Port Charges, a mid-dot was substituted for a
handwritten non-number non-letter character. Illegible handwriting is
identified [TN illegible handwriting].
_Elijah Cobb_
PUBLISHED ON THE FOUNDATION
ESTABLISHED IN MEMORY OF
PHILIP HAMILTON McMILLAN
OF THE CLASS OF 1894, YALE COLLEGE
[Illustration: [From a French pastel, 1794.]
“_He was tall and straight, of fine figure, his face
very pleasant to look upon. He loved children &
was loved by them, Distinguished for his sturdy
integrity, as well as talent, loved and respected
by all who knew him, he died at the age of 80._”]
_Elijah Cobb_
1768-1848
_A Cape Cod Skipper_
_WITH A FOREWORD BY
RALPH D. PAINE_
[Illustration: colophon]
_New Haven: Yale University Press_
London: Humphrey Milford: Oxford University Press
1925
Copyright 1925 by Yale University Press
Printed in the United States of America
_THE
PHILIP HAMILTON McMILLAN
MEMORIAL PUBLICATION
FUND_
The present volume is the fourth work published by the Yale University
Press on the Philip Hamilton McMillan Memorial Publication Fund. This
Foundation was established December 12, 1922, by a gift to Yale
University in pursuance of a pledge announced on Alumni University Day
in February, 1922, of a fund of $100,000 bequeathed to James Thayer
McMillan and Alexis Caswell Angell as Trustees, by Mrs. Elizabeth
Anderson McMillan, of Detroit, to be devoted by them to the
establishment of a Memorial in honor of her husband.
He was born in Detroit, Michigan, December 28th, 1872, prepared for
college at Phillips Academy, Andover, and was graduated from Yale in
the Class of 1894. As an undergraduate he was a leader in many of the
college activities of his day, and within a brief period of his
graduation was called upon to assume heavy responsibilities in the
management and direction of numerous business enterprises in Detroit;
where he was also a Trustee of the Young Men’s Christian Association
and of Grace Hospital. His untimely death, from heart disease, on
October 4th, 1919, deprived his city of one of its leading citizens
and his University of one of its most loyal sons.
_Table of Contents_
Page
Foreword 1
Biographical Sketch 17
Letters 85
_Illustrations_
Elijah Cobb _Frontispiece_
Ship _Ten Brothers_ _facing page_ 56
Port Charges in 1811 88
Ivory, Coffee and Palm Oil: a Typical
Bill of Lading 96
[Illustration: decorative line]
_FOREWORD_
Such memoirs as were left to posterity by Captain Elijah Cobb are
fragmentary, a few letters and a narrative of certain voyages, yet
they serve to portray with singular fidelity the figure of a New
England shipmaster of a century and more ago against the backgrounds
of his time. Seafaring has long since ceased to be interwoven with the
lives and interests of the American people as a whole. No fact is more
difficult to realize than that we were once a maritime nation which,
from father to son, earned its bread upon the face of the waters. The
abandoned farm with the grassy cellar-hole and the lilac bush
surviving by the stone doorstep is the accepted symbol of the Puritan
and Pilgrim pioneers. Just as eloquent and significant are the sloping
shores of a hundred bays and inlets where the little brigs, sloops,
and ketches were built to trade with Virginia, with the West Indies,
with the ports of Europe.
At the beginning of the Revolution, in fact, there were more sailors
than farmers in the coastwise settlements of Maine and New Hampshire.
Shipping was the chief industry of Boston. On Cape Cod, where Elijah
Cobb was born and raised, the boys followed the sea instead of the
plow, and the dry land was merely a roosting place until they were old
enough to sign on in a forecastle. The proverbial Yankee traits of
canny business dealings, handiness, and resourceful hardihood were
bred in those clumsy, home-made vessels. The skipper was also a
merchant who bought and sold and bartered the cargoes that filled his
holds. His crew risked their own “adventures” in cash or merchandise,
while his neighbors ashore owned shares in the vessel and her
enterprises. And every voyage was a hazard that might make or break
them.
Elijah Cobb is well worth bringing to light because he was so
completely typical, from his piety and his eccentric spelling to his
mastery of difficulties. The romance of the sea meant nothing to him,
although he sailed in continual peril of pirate and privateer and of
foundering in a gale of wind. Navigation was mostly by guesswork and
to us it seems miraculous that he and his kind were able to fetch
anywhere at all. What he called a good ship was not much larger than a
canal boat, with a few men and boys to handle it. Such was the
training school of the shipbuilders and seamen who, in succeeding
generations, were to win for the Stars and Stripes on the high seas a
commercial prestige that challenged the ancient supremacy of Great
Britain and achieved its superb climax in the clipper ship era.
With unconscious art Elijah Cobb suggests to us the beginnings of his
own career. It could not be better done by the practised hand of a
novelist. His father, the master of a brig, dying at sea, left a young
widow with six small children in poverty on a forlorn Cape Cod farm.
The family could not be kept together. “Some of us, must leave the
perternal dwelling & seek subsistance among strangers--my Bro^{r.},
being the elder, was tried first, but wou’d not stay, & came home
crying--I was then, in my 6^{th} year, & altho” too young to earn my
living, a place was offered me, & I left my dear Mother, for that
subsistance among strangers which she could not procure for me.”
For seven years this brave little codger toiled away from home and
then disabled himself by lifting beyond his strength. His dear mother
nursed him back to health and, in 1783, when he was in his fourteenth
year, he went to Boston to look for a voyage, with his “whole wardrobe
packed in a gin case, for a trunk.”
You can imagine him wandering down to the long wharf and admiring the
“monstrous size” of a new vessel, her great cables and anchors, when
the marvelous gentleman steps from her deck, and signs him on for the
voyage at $3.50 a month.
And so as a cook he sailed away for fever-stricken Surinam, or Dutch
Guiana. His wages, together with some presents from the officers,
enabled him to bring back a private “adventure” of a barrel of
molasses and some dried fruit. The trade with the West Indies had
flourished a full century before the Revolution. There was always a
market for salted codfish to feed the slaves of the sugar plantations.
The return cargoes were largely molasses for distilling New England
rum. These voyages had been extended to the mainland of South America;
to Surinam, where fish and lumber were exchanged for the products of
the Dutch East Indies; to Honduras, whose logwood and mahogany were
cut for export to England.
Young Elijah Cobb escaped the swamp fever and returned with twenty
silver dollars to put into his mother’s hands, “probably, the largest
sum of money she had possess^{d.} since she had been a widow--& that,
from her poor little sick Boy.” No wonder her tears flowed freely,
upon the occasion. For some time thereafter he was sailing coastwise
and working his way up to a mate’s berth. Then he crossed the stormy
Western Ocean and felt qualified for command. He must have been
twenty-three years old when he became master of a brig. This was not
unusually youthful. Nathaniel Silsbee of Salem, a captain in the East
India trade at nineteen, could say of his own family:
“Connected with the seafaring life of myself and my brothers, there
were some circumstances which do not usually occur in one family. In
the first place each of us commenced that occupation in the capacity
of clerk, or supercargo, myself at the age of fourteen years; my
brother William at about fifteen; and my brother Zachariah at about
sixteen and a half years. Each and all of us obtained the command of
vessels and the consignment of their cargoes before attaining the age
of twenty years, viz., myself at the age of eighteen and a half, my
brother William at nineteen and a half, and my brother Zachariah
before he was twenty years old.”
It was during his first voyage to Europe as a shipmaster that Captain
Elijah Cobb showed himself to be a young man of exceptional courage
and contrivance. Steering for Cadiz, he learned that it was unsafe to
venture too close to Gibraltar and so he changed his course to Coruna
in the Bay of Biscay. The swift corsairs of the Dey of Algiers were
cruising like wolves to snap up merchantmen and enslave their
Christian crews. In his journal Captain Cobb states that “the
Algerines were at war with America.” This is not quite accurate, for
the United States delayed declaring war on the Barbary pirates until
1801, several years after this.
The infant republic, left without any naval force at the close of the
Revolution, was compelled to submit to the most humiliating insults
and depredations at the hands of these lawless sea rovers. It seems
incredible to recall the gifts and bribes that were abjectly paid the
Dey of Algiers as tribute, including a handsome new frigate, nor can
one read the newspaper account without a blush.
Portsmouth, N. H., Jan 20, 1798. On Thursday morning, about
sunrise, a gun was discharged from the frigate _Crescent_,
as a signal for getting under way. May she arrive in safety
at the place of her destination, as a present to the Dey of
Algiers of one of the finest specimens of elegant naval
architecture which was ever borne on the Piscataqua’s
waters. Richard O’Brien, who was ten years a prisoner at
Algiers, took passage in the frigate and is to reside at
Algiers as Consul-General of the United States to all the
Barbary States. The _Crescent_ has many valuable presents
for the Dey, including twenty-six barrels of dollars. It is
worthy of remark that the captain, the chief officers and
many of the privates of the _Crescent_ frigate have been
prisoners at Algiers.
When Captain Cobb prudently went wide of the Strait of Gibraltar, in
1794, the Dey was running amuck among American merchant vessels. As
many as ten of these luckless ships had been taken in one cruise of a
brig and three xebecks out of Algiers, and more than a hundred Yankee
seamen thrown into dungeons to toil under the lash of Arab slave
drivers. And honest seamen were begging from door to door in Boston
and Salem to collect funds for the ransom of this fellow mariner or
that, with whom they had been shipmates. The tourist who visits the
Algiers of today, an ornate French metropolis with the ancient Arab
town climbing the hill behind it, can behold strongholds whose stones
were laid by tortured, perishing sailormen from the land of the brave
and the free.
Bearing safely away from those ticklish waters, Captain Elijah Cobb
found himself out of the frying-pan and into the fire. England had
gone to war with France in 1793 when most of Europe was allied in the
effort to stamp out the flames of the Revolution. The rights of
neutrals were tossed aside. American shipping was ground between two
millstones. All was fair in war. British and French cruisers seized
our ships for engaging in trade which our own interpretation of
international law held to be perfectly legitimate. More than a hundred
American vessels were taken by France in 1793 on pretext of trading
with England or her colonies.
Captain Cobb could find no reason why his voyage to Spain should be
molested and he was too stiff-necked to submit without protest. His
papers were stolen by the prize master and there seemed to be no means
of redress whatever. He had no friends in France, official or
otherwise, and his ship was tied up in the port of Brest while a
starving populace looted her cargo of foodstuffs. The Reign of Terror
was at its height. Chaos and bloodshed ruled in place of government.
The guillotine was a law unto itself. In a period of fifteen months,
17,000 persons had been formally executed in France. The number of
those who were shot, drowned, or otherwise massacred without pretense
of a trial can never be known, but must be reckoned far greater.
All of which may have harrowed the soul of Captain Elijah Cobb, but he
kept his eye firmly fixed on his own predicament. His ship had to be
released and indemnity paid him for detention and loss of cargo. After
six weeks of wrangling with minor officials, he resolved to go to
Paris and seek satisfaction. A stubborn mariner who shoved obstacles
aside, behold him making this dangerous journey with an official
courier, for armament loaded pistols and a blunderbuss, in a carriage
that was “musquet shot proof” and driving like Jehu night and day,
without a wink of sleep all the way from Brest, more than six hundred
miles.
Undismayed, persistent, Captain Elijah Cobb pursued his way through
the weltering horrors of Paris, merely noting that he saw one thousand
persons beheaded by “that infernal machine,” the guillotine. Thwarted
at every turn, he carried his case to none other than Robespierre
himself. The audacity of this Yankee seafarer was amazing. He made
dollars seem heroic. His motive was really better than this--the
compulsion of duty toward the owners who had entrusted him with the
ship and her lading. Citizen Robespierre, Carlyle’s sea-green monster,
spoke the word that swiftly untangled the affair.
Shortly after this, Robespierre was overthrown and outlawed by the
Convention. Trying to commit suicide with a pistol, the bullet did no
more than shatter his jaw. And now for the final scene in the Place de
la Concorde. Captain Cobb stood there and beheld it with his own eyes,
on the 9th Thermidor (July 28, 1794). Robespierre rides on a tumbril,
the mangled jaw bound in dirty linen. The Gendarmes point their swords
at him to show the people who he is. A woman leaps upon the tumbril
and screams: “Thy death rejoices my very heart. _Scélérat_, go down to
Hell with the curses of all wives and mothers!” At the scaffold they
stretch him on the ground. Then Samson, the burly executioner, lifts
him aloft, wrenches off his coat, tears the dirty linen from his jaw.
A hideous cry and the head of Robespierre is shorn from his shoulders.
And how does Captain Cobb describe this gigantic episode? As if he
were making an entry in a ship’s log. “Before I left the country; I
saw Robertspeirs head taken off, by the same Machine--But to return to
my induvidual, and embarised affairs….” This was characteristic of the
New England breed of seafarers. They are exasperating at times. They
saw so much and told so little. The wonders of the world left them
unmoved. The pen was an awkward tool to handle and they were as
thrifty with words as with pence.
You will find Captain Cobb waxing loquacious, however, when it comes
to the intricate and difficult business of due bills and foreign
exchange or smuggling gold out of France. All this is of value to the
modern reader as showing how extremely competent were these master
mariners as bankers and merchants. It helps to explain why they became
the leaders in their communities when they retired from the
quarter-deck, and why they were so successful, as a class, in
commercial pursuits ashore. They were literally the first American
captains of industry, men accustomed to large responsibilities and the
tests of critical emergencies.
It throws a curious slant on the moral code of the time to find Elijah
Cobb so profoundly pious and yet so ready to bribe and smuggle with a
clear conscience. In a way, this point of view was inherited from the
American Revolution. The harsh restrictions laid by the mother country
on the commerce of her colonies had led to smuggling as an easy road
to wealth. In almost every town prominent characters were named who,
under British rule, had stowed in their attics and cellars goods that
were not for the officers of the King’s Customs to see. To these
harbors came vessels built for speed and laden with contraband wares
gathered in the colonies of France and Spain. And reputable merchants
were always ready to run the stuff ashore. Thus, on the very day when
the farmers of Middlesex drove the British out of Lexington, John
Hancock was to have stood trial for defrauding the Customs.
And so Elijah Cobb, pillar of the Universalist church in his later
years, is not in the least ashamed to admit that he did a very pretty
job of running rum to a crew of skilled smugglers between the Cove of
Cork and the Scilly Islands.
It was adroit intelligence and knowledge of the world that enabled him
to escape from the trap of the British Orders in Council that ruined
hundreds of American shipmasters and owners. These high-handed
measures aimed against Napoleon, together with his Milan Decree
launched in retaliation, made American vessels liable to confiscation
in almost every foreign port to which they traded. It was not a proud
era in our national history. The time was not far distant when the cry
of “Free Trade and Sailors’ Rights” was to sound the note of the
Second War with England.
Elijah Cobb, loading a return cargo of wines and dried fruit at
Malaga, in 1806, learned that England forbade such a voyage. He
decided to take a sporting chance of slipping by the English cruisers
in the “Gut of Gibralter.” The wind failing him at the wrong time, he
obtained his clearance papers by bribing an official. In the opinion
of Elijah Cobb there was more than one way to skin a cat.
The intolerable aggressions aimed at American commerce, including the
impressment of seamen, had caused President Thomas Jefferson to use
the embargo as a weapon in reprisal. If he could not protect American
ships and sailors on the high seas, he could, at least, he thought,
save them by keeping them at home. Maritime New England had been
reluctant to accept an embargo policy. Josiah Quincy had begged
Congress to remember that the ocean could not be abandoned by his
people “of whom thousands would rather see a boat-hook than all the
sheep-crooks in the world.” However, the first Embargo Bill was passed
in December of 1807, forbidding the departure of American vessels for
any foreign port. The results were futile and disastrous. Ports filled
with dismantled ships, counting-houses deserted, grass growing in the
waterside streets failed to affect perfidious Albion. Nevertheless,
the embargo was tried again in the spring of 1812.
Captain Cobb was loading flour at Alexandria, Virginia, for a European
voyage when the news of another embargo came like a blow from a clear
sky. Hard-bitten New Englander, he had refused to heed the warnings.
His own Massachusetts Legislature had denounced such Acts of Congress
as unconstitutional, and a hundred towns had adopted resolutions of
protest. However, Mr. Madison’s latest embargo was a condition and not
a theory, so Elijah Cobb made haste to get to sea before the officials
could lawfully stop him. He had twenty-four hours of grace. A gale of
wind was blowing, so violent that the ship was almost torn away from
the wharf. Here was the efficient shipmaster in action--a hundred tons
of stone ballast to be landed, three thousand barrels of flour to be
stowed in the hold and secured, provisions, wood, and water to be
taken aboard, a crew to be found and signed on, and the vessel cleared
at the custom house.
Elijah Cobb turned the trick without bluster or confusion. It was the
kind of thing he could do extremely well. His portrait is that of a
man very resolute and composed, not much humor in the straight mouth
and steadfast eye, a good deal of the Puritan afloat. In his sedate
way he must have enjoyed what he called “running away from the
Embargo.”
England and the United States were on the brink of war. This final
embargo was frankly intended as a preparation for war. It held
American ships in our own ports and saved them from capture while a
swift pilot schooner was sent to warn American merchantmen in northern
Europe that hostilities impended and they must hasten home or lie up
abroad in some neutral harbor. These signs and portents seemed to have
escaped the notice of Captain Elijah Cobb. He was oddly unaware of it
all, busied with selling his flour in Cadiz at a profit and buying
British bills of exchange to reap more dollars. Congress had formally
declared war, on June 18, while Captain Cobb was in the midst of his
transactions. And when he sailed from Cadiz for Boston, on July 5, “he
never felt himself saffer, on account of enemies on the high seas.”
Peacefully he jogged across the Atlantic, as far as the Grand Bank,
when he was overhauled by a British armed schooner. The subsequent
proceedings must upset the conventional notions of the sea warfare of
bygone days. All British seamen are presumed to have been ruffianly
and outrageous persons. It will be noted that the interviews between
Captain Cobb and his captors were conducted with courtesy and
friendliness.
The merchant skipper was pained and surprised to find that he had
fallen into the enemy’s hands. The enemy endeavored to make it as
comfortable as possible, trusting that Captain Cobb would “excuse
their inquisitiveness.”
You will find the dialogue vastly entertaining and not at all as the
fictionist would fancy it. Mutual regrets and esteem, the prize
politely ordered to St. Johns, the prisoners to be made as comfortable
as possible under the circumstances! And then it is your pleasure to
meet that fine old Port Admiral of St. Johns, Sir John Thomas
Duckworth, who tried to make these unwilling visitors feel at home.
“Supercargoes and Gentlemen passengers” were set at liberty.
The display of gentlemanly feeling between sailor foemen was not
unique in the annals of the War of 1812. England was well aware that
the maritime interests of the New England coast were out of sympathy
with the war and it was policy to avoid provoking them more than
possible. “Organize a peace party throughout your Country,” resolved
the Massachusetts House of Representatives, after war had been
declared, “and let the sound of your disapprobation be loud and deep.”
The climax came with the secretly seditious Hartford Convention. The
Federalist opposition was stupidly blind to the fact that the war was
a defensive struggle against the massed resources of the British
Empire. The seafaring population, forgetting the national interests
and suffering destruction and blockade, allowed the politicians to
lead it by the nose.
Captain Elijah Cobb stayed at home on the farm until the end of the
war. Then he resumed his voyages to Europe, uneventfully, and engaged
in the African trade in 1818, commanding the ship _Ten Brothers_.
There was no worse pest hole on earth than the West Coast and its
slave ports, no area so indelibly stained with man’s inhumanity to
man. A land of treacherous surf and steaming jungle, of tawny beaches
and sluggish rivers, the infamies of centuries cursed the names of
Goree and Gambia, the Bight of Benin and the Bight of Biafra, Calabar,
Anamaboe, and the Congo. In 1819 the slave trade had been outlawed by
England and the United States, but many thousands of the poor wretches
were annually smuggled into the West Indies and the southern ports of
this country.
The barracoons and factories were flourishing when Captain Cobb sailed
on his lawful trading voyages to Prince’s Island in the Gulf of
Guinea. Like many another American shipmaster he risked the deadly
fever in order to sell his goods to the natives and carry home palm
oil, ivory, coffee, and gold dust. The most lucrative traffic was in
New England rum, muskets, and gunpowder, but Captain Cobb makes no
mention of these as in his invoice, and it is fair to give him the
benefit of the doubt. Not that it would have discredited him in the
reputable circles of Boston or Brewster. A man could be a deacon and
still peddle Medford rum to the benighted Africans.
Captain Cobb stocked his ship with the customary trade goods, gaudy
cotton prints, tobacco, beads and brass pots, bandana hankerchiefs,
flour and meal, salt beef, pork, and fish, candles, tinware, and
crockery. His letters are pretty doleful reading. Several other
American vessels were with him at Prince’s Island, their captains ill
or dead of fever, his own ship rotten with it. What they called
fumigation was crude and ineffectual. They suffered grimly. It was all
in the day’s work, and they could only commit themselves “to a
mercifull just God who always acts for the good of his Creaturs, &
happy would it be for us; if we could always bow with humble
submission to His righteous dispensations.”
Even this consolation was not enough to make Captain Cobb endure more
than two voyages to the Guinea Coast. His ship had to be scuttled at a
Boston wharf, so foul she was with deadly fever, and there was fear
that the contagion might spread ashore. This was the end of his
seafaring career of nearly forty years. To a ripe old age he dwelt in
Brewster, a distinguished citizen and active farmer, “tall & straight
of fine figure his face very pleasant to look upon.” The imperious
traits of the quarter-deck were carried into his religious activities.
As a Universalist he played a lone hand for some years, and “met with
violent opposition to his views, yet waxing only the more valiant in
the fight, he came off conquerer.”
It is the wistful desire of every true sailorman to quit the restless
sea and own a farm. This boon was vouchsafed Elijah Cobb and it is
fitting to bid him farewell when “the wind has got around to the
south” and he is just returning from a visit to the young orchard--a
mellowed old gentleman who had lived through the most stirring era of
American ships and sailors and had survived hazards innumerable to
find a quiet harbor! Not a flamboyant career, but splendidly competent
as one reads between the lines. He was one of the pioneers, blood
brother of the men who turned landward to tame the wilderness.
Ralph D. Paine.
_Durham, New Hampshire
April, 1925._
[Illustration: decorative line]
_BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH_
_The following Biographical sketch; with a few of the incidents of
my life, are committed to paper, for the gratification, and
amusement of my beloved Grand-children. Considering the
advanced age of the writer, on the brink of 75, it must be
expected, there will be imperfections, of various kinds--the
old mans trembling hand is conspicuous at first sight--but even
that, may interest, when the reader reflect, that the hand
which pen’d these lines, is now mouldering in Dust._
In the year 1802, I was in Yarmouth, a sea port, in the East of
England; and by one of those casual events of life, was favoured with
an interview with an aged Gentleman, a Port admiral, by the name of
Isaac Cobb--lea[r]ning, that I was an American, and my name Cobb, he
expressed a desire to know the names of my ancestors, as far back as I
could recolect; I could only give him, to my great G^{r.} Father
Jonathan Cobb--he then told me, that it was clear to him, that my
ancestor originated from Harwich in England, that he had been at the
seat, where he was born, many times,--that Silvanus Cobb, had 4 sons.
viz Jonathan, Eleazer, Silvanus, & Benjamin, that the two first named
embarked for America in the May Flower[1] that Silvanus followed them
some 2 or 3 years after; & that Benjamin remained with his Father
untill he died, & then followed his Brothers to America.
He then produced a very lengthy Biography of several generations, &
read many particulars of the Cobb families, and among them--that
Jonathan, son of Silvanus, setled upon Cape Cod--Eleazer, somewhat
further westward--& Silvanus, some distance north of Boston--and that
I was, no doubt, a decendant from Jonathan.
The old gentlemen ordered his secretary, to make a copy, of such parts
of the biography, as related to my ancestry, but circomstances obliged
me leave, before I received it.
So much for Admiral Cobb.
[Sidenote: Ancestry]
I remember, perfectly well, when I had five Grand Parents alive, 4 on
my Fathers side, & one, on my Mothers--viz. my Great G’d Father & g’d
Mother Cobb--my Grand Father & g’d Mother Cobb, & my G’d Mother
Freeman, my Mothers Mother, I cannot trace my ancestry beyond my Great
g’d Father Cobb--there were three, of his family, which I perfecty
remember--viz. Jonathan, Eleazer, & Benjamin--the female part, I have
no knowledge of--my G’d Fathers family consisted of 10 children, 6
sons, & 4 daughters, viz Elijah, Scottow, Isaac, John, Seth, Elkanah,
Mary, Sally, Hannah, Betsey--my Grandmother Freemans name was Mary,
she was Sister to Rev^{d.} Nath^{l.} Stone the first ordained Minister
in this Town, then Harwich--she married Barnabus Freeman, of eastham,
he was a sea Captain, & died at about 40 years of age--my mother, was
their only child, & was only 12 years old when her Father died--at 17
she marreid my Father, Scottow Cobb, their family consisted of 6
children, viz. Huldah, Barna, Elijah, Reliance, Judith, &
Sally--three, have already paid the debt of nature; & the united ages
of the three alive, is 224 years.
My Father persued a seafaring life for subsistance; was Master of a
Brig, & died on his passage from Cadiz to Quebec, in the 33^{d} year of
his age--leaving my Mother with 6 infant children, the oldest but 10
years of age, and the youngest, born after Father left home, the last
time,--For the support of this helpless flock; was a small cape cod
farm, a small house & barn, and one cow--I have heard my Mother say,
that she never received 100$ for my Fathers effects--
Under such circomstances; it was not posible to keep the family
together--to support & educate them, with the means in her power, was
out of the question--some of us, must leave the perternal dwelling &
seek subsistance among strangers--my Bro^{r.}, being the Elder, was
tried first, but wou’d not stay, & came home crying--I was then, in my
6^{th} year, & altho” too young to earn my living, a place was offered
me, & I left my dear mother for that subsistance among strangers which
she could not procure for me.
I continued from my Mother, except at times visiting her, untill in my
13^{th.} year, when by an imprudent attempt, to lift beyond my
strength, I broke a vessell in my stomack, which entirely disenabled
me; and I was sent home to my Mother, incapable of labour of any kind.
I remained with her; under the care of a skilfull Docter, about a
year, when he advised me, to be sent to sea, as the best method to
regain my health.
[Sidenote: Seeks a Voyage]
Accordingly, in the fall of 1783, I was fitted out for Boston, to look
for a voyage--My whole wardrobe, was packed in a gin case, for a
trunk; a tow bedsack, filled with rye straw, & a pair of, home-made,
blankets, for sleeping appuratis, with two bushels of corn, to pay my
passage to Boston--and acquipted thus, I left the family circle, with
buoyant sperits and in full confidence that I should work myself thro”
life, with honour & credit--I embarked, at Skaket, in a small Schooner
of only 25 Tons, called the _Creture_; & after going into Provinctown,
& laying there during a gale of wind, we reached Boston, in about
three days.
At the time, I am speaking of, there were more men, than could readily
find employ, & frequently, the best of seamen, were distitute of
voyages--several of our neighbouring young men, had been to Boston,
that fall, previous to my leaving home, & had returned without giting
employ, they told my Mother, that I would only spend the two bushels
of corn, & return to her without giting a voyage--but their
predictions were set at naught; for the first time I went down the
long wharf, & stood gazeing at a new vessell, wondering, & admiring
her monstrous size, her great cables & anchors &c--a gentleman stept
from her deck & thus accosted me! My lad, do you want a voyage--. Yes
Sir--will you go with me in this vessell--where are you bound Sir--to
Siranam--I am told Sir, that all flesh die, that go there--well my
boy, to prove, that you have not been told the truth, I have been
there 13 voyages, & you see I’m alive yet--well Sir, I should like to
go, what wages will you allow me--do you know how to cook--not much
Sir, but I can soon learn--well my boy, if you think so, I presume you
will, I like your candour & will take you, & give you the customary
wages of a boy; half of Seamens wages $3.50 p^{r} month, but you must
go immediately on board, & git dinner for the men at work--& thus I
commenced my duty as cook & cabin Boy.
When the men broke off work, at night, they all went away; the
Cap^{t.} then asked me, where my bed & cloaths were--I told him, on
board the creture, in town dock--well, you must go & git them, & I’ll
keep ship untill you return, you must sleep on board to night--who
else will sleep on board--nobody, there is no one belongs to the
vessell, except you & myself--not liking the idea of sleeping on board
alone, I took the liberty of asking him, where his mate was--he said,
he had not got one yet--I told him, I _gessed_, I knew a good man,
that would like to go--who is he--I said, My Uncle, who came up, in
the creture to look for a voyage--has he ever been mate--Yes Sir, &
prise mastre too, in the war--well, you go after your things, & if you
see your Uncle, ask him to come down & see me, in the morning when I
got on board the creture, my Uncle was there, and by way of a
reprimand, asked, where I had been all day--why Uncle, said I, I have
shipped myself, & I beleive I have got a voyage for you also.
[Sidenote: Voyage to Surinam]
To make a short story, my Uncle went down in the morning, & shipped &
went the voyage.--I then wrote to my Mother, that I had got a voyage
for myself & Uncle, & if those young men would come to Boston before I
sailed, I would ship them off, rather than have them stay at home
Idle, & upon expense all winter.
The vessell was soon loaded, & we went to sea--my inexperienc, & being
very sea-sick, for a while, rendered my situation very unpleasant, but
I soon surmounted those deficulties; & began to injoy my new mode of
life; after the opperation of David Jones’s medecine (sea-sickness) I
felt my health improved, & by the time we arrived in Surinam, I felt
quite well, and I found I was able to give pritty good satisfaction in
my line of duty.
My perticular attention to the officers, procured me some presents, by
wh I was enabled to purchase a Barrel of molasses, & some fruit, for
an adventure back to Boston.
Nothing meterial took place, during the remainder of the voyage, worth
noting; we returned to Boston in the spring of 1784, discharged our
cargo, mollases, was paid our wages & seperated, each to home. My
wages amouted to 21$, & by the sale of my bbl of Molases, & some my
fruit, I was enabled to git myself a new suit of sailors cloaths, from
the Slopshop, & carried home, & put into my Mothers hands, 20 silver
Dollars--probably, the largest sum of money she had posses^{d.} since
she had been a widow--& that, from her poor little sick Boy--her tears
flowed freely, upon the occasion, but they were tears of gratitude to
our heavenly Father, for his mercies to her child, in permitting his
return home, in the injoyment of so much better health, than he left
it--my own feelings, upon the occasion, can be better imagined than
discribed.
I tarried at home but a short time, before I returned to Boston, in
persuit of employ; & spent the summer, with a Cap^{t.} Lombard, in the
coasting business. In the fall I shipped, as a common sailor, & made
several voyages to the W. Idies--returning from a voyage, in Dec^{r.}
1786, I was informed that my Brother, had fallen from mast-head, in
the Delaware Bay, had Broken both his legs, one thigh, & put out of
joint, one shoulder--and was then, in the Pensalvinia hospital, with
one leg amputated.
The Season was then so far advanced, that the navigation, was about
closing with Ice, consequently, I was compelled to relinquish my
visit, to my unfortunate Brother, untill the spring opened the
navigation.
Prehaps you will ask! why, G’d Father did not go on by land--but, my
dear G. children, the mode of traveling then, was quite different from
now, we had no railroads, no, steam conveyance, and scarcly, a
carriage--even the mail, was carried upon horses--a stage coach was
not known--
[Sidenote: Brotherly Love]
I consequently, engaged a birth, for the spring, with my uncle John
Cobb, in the employ of Benj^{a} Cobb & Sons, of Boston, in the
Philadelphia trade, went home, & attended School, about 2 months, when
I was call’d upon, to go on to Boston by land to join the vessell. I
accordingly started, in company with 3 others, for the same object, &
walked to Boston. We there joined the vessell, loaded her, & saild for
Philadelphia--on our arrival, I procured a permit, as soon as posible,
& visited my poor Brother in the hospital--affectionate Brothers &
Sisters, can better imagine, our feelings at meeting, than I can
discribe it--suffice it to say, he was not well anough, to leave the
hospital then, but t’was thought he wou’d be, by our next trip--our
trips, only took up about a month, & according the next time, he came
on with us to Boston, & I sent him home to our Mother.
I continued in the employ of B. C. & Sons, about a year, when they
premoted me to the office of mate--and in that capacity I served them,
under many different captains, between 6 & 7 years, untill I felt
myself qualifi^{d.} to command a vessel, & seeing no disposition on
their part to indulge me, I left the employ; went to Baltimore, & made
two voyages to Europe, in the capacity of 1^{st.} mate of a
ship--after which, I returned to Boston; and got the command of a
Brig, in the employ of Edw^{d.} & Will^{m.} Reynolds--
[Sidenote: Captured by the French]
After making several voyages, to Virginia, & one to the West Idies; in
April 1793, I went to the cape, & got married; I was then in my
25^{th.} year--. I continued in the employ of the Mess^{rs.}
Reynolds’s; principally in the virginia trade, about two years longer,
when they concluded to send me, on a voyage to Europe--their object
was, to cadiz; but at that time, the algerines were at war with
America; & it was reported, that their crusiers were outside of the
streights of Gibaralter--in consequence, it was recommended that I
should clear my vessell for Curruna, a northern port in spain, and
there essertain, whether it would be safe, to proceed to Cadiz--I was
however, spared the trouble of enquirry, by falling in, with a French
Frigate, who captur^{d}, & sent me to France. x x x x & here commences
my first trouble & anxiety, as a ship Master--having under my charge,
a valuable vessell & cargo, inexperienced in business--carried into a
foreign port, unacquainted with the language, no American consel, or
merchant to advise with--and my reputation, as a ship master,
depending upon the measures I persued &c &c.
The time, that I arrived in France, was during the french Revolution,
and in the _bloody_ reign of Robertspeire--all was arnachy &
confusion--the galliotine, in continual opperation, & their streets &
publick squars, drenched with human blood--I minuted down, 1000
persons, that I saw beheaded, by that _infernal_ machine; and probably
saw, as many more, that I did not note down, men, women, preists &
laymen, of all ages--and finally, before I left the country; I saw
Robertspeirs head taken off, by the same Machine--But, to return to my
induvidual, and embarised affairs--all my papers, relative to my ship
& voyage, had been taken from me, on board the Frigate, at sea; I
concluded they were put in possession of the prise Master, who brought
me in, but he, was not to be found; neither could I find any clue to
my papers, and without them, I could not prove, any demand for redress
upon the government, for their violation of our neutrality--it was
true, my vessel was there; but her cargo, Flour & Rice, was taken out,
& was daily made into bread, soups, &c &c, for the half starved,
populace--and without papers, I could not, even substanciate my claim
to an empty ship--they meerly condecended, to send me to a Hotell, to
board; & those of my ships crew, that were sent in with me, were also,
provided for.
In this very unpleasant perdicerment I remained about six weeks--I
had, however, in that time, written to the american charge des affairs
at Paris, & received an answer, but it contained nothing definite, he
regreted my situation, & that of my countrymen generally, in France, &
that it was owing to the disorganized state of affairs in the country;
and that, I must exercise patiance, & the government w^{d.} do what
was right in time.
In about six weeks, as before observed, I was called upon, at my
lodgings, by an officer, of the tribunal of commerce, bringing, a copy
of the judgment, of said tribunal, upon my vessel and cargo, & a
linguister to explain it to me.
Thus, had they tried me, & passed sentance without my hearing, or even
knowing that I was on trial--but, in that way, all business was
managed in France at that time.
The decision of the tribunal, was, however, so favourable, that it
gave a spring to my feelings, & a sensation that gave new life.
[Sidenote: A Promise to Pay]
They declared, my vessell & cargo, to be new-trial property; & that,
as the cargo was at _my_ disposition, I should be paid for it, by the
government, at the prices that might be fixed upon, by myself & the
agent of the government, and an adequate endemnification, for my
capture, detention, expenditures &c &c
I was then waited upon, to the agent of marine, to sell my cargo; when
it is presumed, there was not a pound, of the flour, or rice in
existance--and after battleing, in words, three days in succession, we
fixed the prices, as follows, viz--Flour $16.50, & Rice $5.50--this,
was a good begining, being over 200 p^{r}cent on the invoice.
but a long altercation now insue’d, relative to the payment--money,
was out of the question, for if they had it, to pay, there was a law
against bringing it away from the country--goods, also, were out of
the question, as well as bills on England or America--finally, I
agreed to take, government Bills of exchange, on Hamburg, payable 60
days after date, and was promised, by the Agent; that I should have my
bills, in 12 or 14 days--I waited patiently a month, but no bills
came; & finding that no confidence could be placed in their promises,
& feeling doubtfull, as to obtaing any thing for my Cargo; I thought
it advisable to send my vessell home, under charge of the
mate--consequently, I ballased her, & sent her away; writing to my
owners, that I was determ^{d.} to persevere, untill I obtained
satisfaction.
My mind being releived, from seing my vessell laying Idle, & at great
expense; I came to the determination of going to head quarters,
Paris--but many deficulties were to be surmounted, in order to attain
this object--1^{st.} the road was dangerous to travail; the adherents
of royalty, were reduced to mere scurmaging parties, that committed
their depradations under cover of the night, in solitary places, upon
travellers, & the peaceble inhabitants--and as all horses were taken
into requisition by the government, except those that convey^{d.} the
national dispatches; there was no other mode of travelling; and it was
conterary to law, for them to take a passengers--but my mind was fixed
upon going, as the only chance of ever accomplishing my business with
the French government. I therefore called upon the Minister of Marine,
& got an official copy, of my demands on the government, and had them
recorded (a precautionary measure) as I had lea[r]ned, that loseing a
mans papers, was one of their methods of procrastination, to keep far
off a settlement.
After this, I procured an interpreter, & waited upon _Jean Con. S^{t.}
Andre_, a man, holding high offices under the Government, & reported
to be, favourably disposed to Americans--to him I made known my
situation--the treatment I had received, the praplexity I was in--&
the necessity of going to Paris--& praying him, not only to grant me a
pasport, but to grant a special permitt, to one of the Coureirs, to
carry me there--after a long demur, with himself, & repeatedly feeling
of his neck, to see how it would bear the knife; he returned a
favourable reply--viz. that I must call upon him the next day, when he
would make the necessary arrangments &c
[Sidenote: On to Paris]
Accordingly, in two days, I was underway for Paris, in one of the
national coureirs with government dispatches, the Master of which, did
not speak one word of English, & myself, but a few words of French, of
course, we were not _very_ sociable--we were furnished, each with a
pair of pistals, with a blunderbus, loaded, in front, our carraige,
was musquet shot proof, except in front; drove, by a postilion outside
with from 5, to 9 horses, according to the road, which at best, was
very indifferent.
And thus we drove on, Jehu like, without stoping, except to exchange
horses, & mail; taking occasionally, as we run, a mouthfull of bread,
and washing it down, with some low prised, red Burgendy wine--as to
sleep, I did not git one wink during the journey, of 684 miles. But
_la maitre de les despach_, would sleep, during the day, pitching
about the carriage, for the roads were very rough, to my very great
anoyance--but, during the night, his anxiety kept _him_ awake, through
fear, altho” we had a guard, of, from 12 to 24, mouted horsmen each
night, from sunset, to sunrise, to preceed, & follow--and as a
demonstration, that the precaution was necessary, on the 2^{d} morning,
after leaving Brewst, just before our gaurds left us, we witnessed a
scene, that filled us with horrow.--the remains, of a Coreir, laying
in the road, the Master, the Postilion, & 5 horses laying dead, &
mangled by it, & the mail mutalated & scatered in all directions. We
were informed, afterwards, that the Coureir, was without an gaurd,
that the evening previous; there was an alarm in the visinity, that
had called out, all their fources to supress, consequently, at the
last stage, there was none to supply; & it was death by law, for
national despatches to stop, therefore, the Master proceeded, without
a guard, and met the fate, as discribed.
The next night, at about sun-setting we came to a stage, where we
expected to receive our guard, & there was none for us, however, the
next stage, was only five miles, & not considered very dangerous; we
therefore proceeded on, atho” not without great anxiety; & preparation
of our fire arms, in case of an attact.
[Sidenote: A Word of English]
In the very neat village of Alan[‘c]on, in Normondy, I had the first,
& only, word of English, sporken to me, during the journey, we stopped
to exchange horses & mail, when the _Maitre_, as usual, was called to
an account for having a passenger, & a foreigner too, in the Coureir;
and while he was making his justification, shewing pasports &c; a man
in a tattered uniform, came up to the door of the Carraige, & reaching
out his hand, said in quite good english; for the love of God, my dear
Sir, do permitt me to shake hands, with one, who comes from that
country, where, the _great_, and beloved Washington resides--he only
had time to say, ‘that he went to America with, la Fayettee, and had
the honour of having served under the _best man God ever made_, even
the great Washington.