General Whaling chat - Gam here

[AvastMH]

WOW!!!

It beats the first baseball game in the Philippines which was played by the crew of the Concord vs the Army. I suspect the army won because the log keeper didn't record the score. I did find a photo taken of the game.

I hope your whalers painted the baseballs red or orange. It would be hard to see a white ball against the ice and snow.

[AvastMH]

WOW!!!

It beats the first baseball game in the Philippines which was played by the crew of the Concord vs the Army. I suspect the army won because the log keeper didn't record the score. I did find a photo taken of the game.

Creative scoring eh?

I hope your whalers painted the baseballs red or orange. It would be hard to see a white ball against the ice and snow. ;D

It would be a hoot if some archaeologists suddenly strayed into a 'pool' of white baseballs in the middle of nowhere on the north coast of Canada.

[AvastMH]

During 1897 to 1898 265 Whalemen got caught in severe ice and had to be rescued by the great Overland Expedition which walked over a thousand miles to bring food to the men and families (yes - families!).
One problem that added to their woes was the lack of NE wind to blow away the ice as it broke up into the late Spring and early Summer. Here's a nice record of what they hoped would happen. This is from the Lucretia voyage of 1882-1883, May 20th

'Strong Breeses from NE and vearing to the N Evry thing furled Ends with a Gale of wind from N.E to E Ice breaking up fast Ship lays back'



She's close to Lat 61deg 10mins N Long 177deg 37mins E ('1' on the map below) a few miles off shore from Cape Lingholm on the coast of Kamchatka (Russia). Numbers 2 & 3 are the sites of the trapped whalers in 1897/8.

[AvastMH]

The Mary and Helen - January 10th, 1880



I've been scouting around for a few comments that pop up regularly, and for superlatives like "Worst ever gale", "Never doing this again". If anyone finds one of these please do record it in your remarks column, and post it here

The one I wanted was 'whales going quick to windward, could not follow' - and the Mary and Helen has obliged. ;D Steam made a great difference because the ships could take down their sails, get up steam and pursue those whales to windward. In fact the next day the whales apparently ran out of steam, they stopped, and one was killed. :'(

[AvastMH]

Steam on the brain! The Helen and Mary, the first purpose built steam whaler and who became the USS Rodgers, is enjoying a trip through the Magellan Straits on Thursday, February 12th 1880. However, the weather and sea are not helping much so she's bounced between two harbours in the hope of anchoring without too much trouble. Not so lucky though, but in reporting the problems the logkeeper has steam on the brain and 'at 10 a.m. broke the flue off from the Starboard Anchor'

[AvastMH]

[AvastMH]

Hey all! I've mentioned elsewhere that I got ahold of a copy of Forty Years Master: a life in sail and steam a memoir by Daniel O. Killman and I thought I'd check in with some details. Now, Killman was not a whaler himself. He sailed on a lot of different types of ships moving different goods around the world. But when I went looking for more information about Grampus this book came up because for a time Killman was the master on a bark called John & Winthrop delivering supplies to the whalers up in the Arctic Sea. Things like coal, cattle, mail, and apparently liquor for the captains! The chapter I just finished takes place during 1889 and these are the ships and captains he interacts with or hears about while on the trip:

Robert L. Belknap - Captain Horace Staples
America - Captain Gibson
Thrasher - Captain Charles E. Weeks
Grampus is mentioned but too far in the ice for him to get to (however there is a great description of its history in the endnotes)
Jesse H. Freeman - Captain M. A. Baker
Thetis - Lieutenant Charles H. Stockton
Captain Josiah N. Knowles of the Pacific Steam Whaling Company
Captain Millen Griffith of the Pacific Steam Whaling Company
Leroy S. Lewis of the Mars
Thomas Scullan of the Cape Horn Pigeon

On his way back in he picks up two survivors of the wrecked Little Ohio - not to be confused with the Ohio. A newspaper article from the Los Angeles Daily Herald about the wreck is included in the endnotes. The survivors had been stranded for a long, long time and were not doing well mentally. He talks about coming back into land and trying to get someone to take responsibility for them.

Earlier in the chapter, Killman also mentions an altercation he has with the captain of a small schooner, but the editors of the book hadn't been able to determine which schooner it was. If anyone recalls a logbook mentioning a Captain Killman getting into a fight with a schooner captain in 1889, it'd been interesting to know who it was.

[AvastMH]

The logs for Thetis, 1889, are here:

http://research.archives.gov/description/7284501

We were archiving mainly ice reports and location, but you could skim through and see if anything is mentioned.

[AvastMH]

Thanks, Michael, I'll give this a look!

[AvastMH]

I checked the OW Classic Thetis discussion, and there is no mention there.

[AvastMH]

I don't recall a Capt Killman - but I've seen so many names :-\ And I suspect we've mostly done the bigger ships.

I put out a list of OWW Phase 1 ships: https://forum.oldweather.org/index.php? ... #msg164582

I notice Grampus there. Sadly access to those logbooks seem to have failed.

On voyage from February 11, 1888 - November 5, 1888 to the Arctic Ocean and Chukchi Sea http://www.whalingmuseum.org/explore/li ... -odhs_948A
Ships spoken to.gammed
Abraham Barker of San Francisco
(Bark)
Andrew Hicks of San Francisco
(Bark)
Balaena of San Francisco (Steam
bark)
Beluga of San Francisco (Steam
bark)
Belvedere of San Francisco (Steam
bark)
Consuelo of Honolulu
(Brig)
Eliza of San Francisco
(Bark)
Hamilton (Schooner)
Helen Mar of San Francisco
(Bark)
James A. Hamilton of San Francisco
(Schooner)
Jesse H. Freeman of San Francisco
(Steam bark)
John Howland of San Francisco
(Bark)
John P. West of San Francisco
(Bark)
Lagoda of New Bedford
(Bark)
Lucretia of San Francisco (Steam
bark)
Mars of San Francisco
(Bark)
Mary and Susan of San Francisco
(Bark)
Narwhal of San Francisco (Steam
bark)
Orca of San Francisco (Steam
bark)
Strong(Bark)
Thrasher of San Francisco (Steam
bark)
Wanderer of San Francisco
(Bark)
William Baylies of San Francisco
(Bark)
Young Phoenix of San Francisco
(Bark)


On voyage from February 26, 1889 - November 12, 1889 to the Arctic Ocean and Chickchi Sea http://www.whalingmuseum.org/explore/li ... -odhs_948B
Ships spoken to/gammed
Abraham Barker of San Francisco
(Bark)
Alton of San Francisco
(Schooner)
Balaena of San Francisco (Steam
bark)
Beluga of San Francisco (Steam
bark)
Belvedere of San Francisco (Steam
bark)
Bounding Billow of San Francisco
(Bark)
Dora (unknown)
Eliza of San Francisco
(Bark)
Hunter of San Francisco
(Bark)
Jesse H. Freeman of San Francisco
(Steam bark)
La Ninfa of San Francisco
(Schooner)
Lucretia of San Francisco (Steam
barke)
Narwhal of San Francisco (Steam
bark)
Northern Light (Bark)
Ocean of San Francisco
(Bark)
Orca of San Francisco (Steam
bark)
Thrasher of San Francisco (Steam
bark)
Wanderer of San Francisco
(Bark)
William Baylies of San Francisco
(Bark)
William Lewis of San Francisco
(Steam bark)

[AvastMH]

Many thanks to Randi who unscrambled the problem of the access to the old OWW Scribe/Phase 1 logs.

Here's the logs for Grampus
https://archive.org/details/logbookofgr ... e/mode/2up (11 Feb. 1888-5 Nov. 1888)
and
https://archive.org/details/grampusstea ... m/mode/2up (22 Mar. 1890-31 Oct. 1891)

[AvastMH]

The Mary and Helen August 7th 1880
In the middle of a stretch of 7 days when she catches a whale a day the log records an amusing comment...

'plenty of whales and very shy'



If I were a whale in their bit of the Bering Sea I'd be feeling shy too!

[AvastMH]

Yes, shy could definitely be life saving! Love the picture in the log too ....

[AvastMH]

American Culture: Essays on the Familiar and Unfamiliar
Interesting section called Public Justice, Conflict and Violence: The Whalemen.
It mentions Beluga

[AvastMH]

American Culture: Essays on the Familiar and Unfamiliar
Interesting section called Public Justice, Conflict and Violence: The Whalemen.
It mentions Beluga

Oh that's cool! Thanks for posting this Randi I think that this was the event where Bodfish assisted Capt Tilton in the removal of frostbitten fingers. Frankly the whole of this section is very familiar both from having transcribed/read the entries themselves, and also from Bodfish's book which I'm currently working through. Getting all of these events together with some analysis is so informative.


Maureen - Page 16 onwards will be of interest to you I think https://books.google.co.uk/books?id=A2L ... ga&f=false

[AvastMH]

Worth re-posting here...how OWW began

https://www.opb.org/news/article/what-l ... te-change/

[AvastMH]

Many thanks to Randi for passing me this cartoon. It gave me a good chuckle

[Randi]

From The Sailor's Word-Book, by Admiral W. H. Smyth, 1867:

GRAMPUS, Blowing the. Sluicing a person with water, especially practised on him who skulks or sleeps on his watch.

[AvastMH]

We've got a whaler called the Grampus - towels all round then