Nautical Newburyport by Dyke Hendrickson

Author:Dyke Hendrickson [Hendrickson, Dyke]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: History, United States, State & Local, New England (CT; MA; ME; NH; RI; VT), Photography, Subjects & Themes, Regional, Travel, Pictorials
ISBN: 9781467135870
Google: xSYlDgAAQBAJ
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing
Published: 2017-01-15T15:55:30+00:00

The four-masted Harvester at the dock. Newburyport Archival Center of the Newburyport Public Library.

We went to Valparaiso. The captain wouldn’t give us boys any money, but the ship’s carpenter, a Norwegian, let us have a dollar apiece. We rowed ashore and started walking up through the town. The first thing I knew, the pavement commenced to roll up! We were in an earthquake! A very funny sensation. The captain got back to the ship before we did, and he was storming. “Put those boys to work,” he said to the mate, and for a good many hours we had to scrape paint and tar.

After discharging our cargo in Valparaiso, we went to Callao in the Chincha Islands. Each day we had a mug of coffee at daybreak, and climbed into a boat and rowed it under the chutes to load up; then we rowed back to the ship and discharged our load into the vessel. We kept doing this, back and forth, for 90 days, until we were loaded up and got under way.

Coming back around the Horn, we had one land blow after we got down to the Southward—quite dangerous, and we kept two men at the wheel every minute because of the strain. But after that we had good weather and the trip was much more pleasant. We were headed for St. Pierre in the West Indies. At St. Pierre, the old man had a change of heart; he gave us $10 and told us we could go ashore. The climate was very hot there. We went into a restaurant and had a good feed, and then wandered all over the hilly town. A man came along and said, “Boys, what ship do you belong to?” We told him, and he said, “Come up on the piazza.” He gave us dinner and iced cream, and cake. Later I found out who this man was; he was the American Consul.

We went across to Mobile, and there we were entitled to a discharge. We intended to go from Mobile to Boston by steam railroad. At the time in Mobile they had State money—“shin plasters”—worth only 25 cents on the dollar, and we didn’t know about this. The captain paid us off in State money. The mate, with whom we had gone ashore, said, “Boys, when you come out of the State that money isn’t worth anything.” He took us back to the captain and said, “You pay these boys in gold or I will make trouble.” The captain paid us. I have not mentioned the captain’s name or the name of the ship, because I do not want to step on any toes of some people now living in Newburyport.

The next morning, deciding not to go home by railroad, I signed on as a quartermaster for $100 in a ship loaded with cotton bound for Liverpool. From there I shipped on the Charles Endicott to St. John, receiving $50, and from St. John I came home by train.

On my next voyage, I shipped with Captain George Avery, a very fine gentleman.

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