Historic Nantucket Winter 2007

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Historic Nantucket

Winter 2007 Volume 56, No.1

A Publication of the Nantucket Historical Association

Milford Haven,Wales The Cruise of Asia and Alliance Hawaiian Whalers in Nantucket

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Board of Trustees

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Historic Nantucket A Publication of the Nantucket Historical Association

Winter 2007

|

Vol. 56, No. 1

E. Geoffrey Verney, President Bruce Percelay, Vice President Melissa Philbrick, Vice President

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Patricia M. Bridier, Clerk

Nantucket Whalers in Milford Haven, Wales

Thomas Anathan

BY JANE CLAYTON , P H . D .

John W. Atherton Jr., Treasurer

Rebecca Bartlett C. Marshall Beale Kenneth L. Beaugrand Heidi Berry, Friends of the NHA Robert Brust Nancy Chase

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William R. Congdon Richard L. Duncan Polly Espy

The Cruise of the Nantucket Ships Asia and Alliance: In Consort to the Indian Ocean and the Coast of New Holland, Australia, 1791–94

Nan A. Geschke, Friends of the NHA Nina Hellman Julius Jensen III

BY ROD DICKSON

Christopher L. Maury Sarah B. Newton Anne S. Obrecht Christopher Quick

14 Native Hawaiian Whalers in Nantucket, 1820–60

Melanie Sabelhaus Janet L. Sherlund Nancy Soderberg

BY SUSAN A . LEBO , P H . D .

Bette M. Spriggs Isabel C. Stewart Jay Wilson William J. Tramposch executive director

editorial committee

From the Executive Director WILLIAM J. TRAMPOSCH

Mary H. Beman Thomas B. Congdon Jr. Richard L. Duncan

Scrapbasket | LESLIE

Peter J. Greenhalgh Cecil Barron Jensen

By the Way | HELEN

Robert F. Mooney

Monument Square

Elizabeth Oldham

David H. Wood Ben Simons Editor

SEAGER

NHA News

Nathaniel Philbrick James Sulzer

Copy Editor Eileen Powers/Javatime Design Design & Art Direction

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Cover: A detail from Milford Haven (1776)

by J. R.Attwood (fl. 1770–80), oil on canvas, courtesy of the National Museum of Wales.

Historic Nantucket welcomes articles on any aspect of Nantucket history. Original research; first-hand accounts; reminiscences of island experiences; historic logs, letters, and photographs are examples of materials of interest to our readers. ©2007 by Nantucket Historical Association

Elizabeth Oldham

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Sheep Shearing

Amy Jenness

Bette M. Spriggs

W. OTTINGER

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Historic Nantucket (ISSN 0439-2248) is published quarterly by the Nantucket Historical Association, 15 Broad Street, Nantucket, Massachusetts.

Periodical postage paid at Nantucket, MA, and additional entry offices.

POSTMASTER: Send address changes to Historic Nantucket, P.O. Box 1016, Nantucket, MA 02554 –1016 (508) 228–1894; fax: (508) 228–5618, nhainfo@nha.org For information about our historic sites: www.nha.org

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FROM THE EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR

Human Kin Across the Ages

S

everal months ago, the new Whaling Museum hosted its first sleep-over for youngsters. Jammy Gams, we call them, and they offer wonderful opportunities for sleeping in the halflight of Gosnell Hall amidst the treasures of the museum. To be sure, there is giggling and a lot of settling-in to do before the sleeping slips in, but, in time, the children are lulled to sleep by silent images of majestic sperm whales moving on the large video screen above. Our technique is a variation on Melville’s description of their valiant forebears in Moby-Dick: With the landless gull, that at sunset folds her wings and is rocked to sleep between billows; so at nightfall, the Nantucketer, out of sight of land, furls his sails, and lays him to his rest, while under his very pillow rush herds of walruses and whales. (Chapter 14) Before bedtime, though, there are plenty of activities for these young Nantucketers: music, stories, and a scavenger hunt, to name a few. During the latter, I overheard a seven-year-old say to himself, “I love this place.” He stood alone on the stairs of the Candle Factory and looked all about to the walls bedecked with South Sea treasures, to the huge arm of the spermaceti press, and then to the whaleboat beyond.

“To whom was the child speaking?” I wondered. It takes two people to make a conversation.

Given the interpretive power of the Whaling Museum, especially in the halflight of an evening, I believe that this young person actually felt he had an audience: It consisted of those seemingly departed island personalities represented in our collections. You would have had to be there, but I think he felt such a connection with the past that he felt comfortable (compelled in fact) to talk to his human kin across the ages. Madness, you say? Perhaps. But look at others who, in their own ways, have believed the same:

• When restoring the city of Williamsburg, Virginia, John D. Rockefeller Jr. preferred most to visit in the twilight, “when the ghosts were alive.”

• Henry Wadsworth Longfellow once said that old houses wherein men have lived and died, / Are haunted houses. Through the open doors, / The harmless phantoms on their errands glide /With feet that make no noise upon the floor.

• The Maori of New Zealand insist that their history, taonga, or treasures (when on tour) be “warmed” by the presence of living Maori, believing firmly that the spirits of their ancestors are alive in the objects they have left behind; thus, it would be rude to leave them alone in a museum overnight absent the company of their descendants.

Nantucket, more than most places in our nation’s cultural landscape, offers a presence of past personalities that is almost tactile. The halls of the Whaling Museum and each of the NHA’s other sites are replete with remarkable and vivid stories. All we need to add is a little historical imagination. Just listen to interpreter Doug Burch tell the story of the whaleship Essex, and you may find yourself standing in line to buy Nat Philbrick’s In the Heart of the Sea (the most popular book in our Museum Shop).

Effective museums awaken curiosity through storytelling. They are forums (agoras, if you will) in which we are introduced and connected to our “human kin across the ages.” Imagine: On Nantucket today it is possible to shake the hand of one who has shaken the hand of golden-age whaling captains. Such is the presence of the past here, even more so in many of the otherthan-whaling topics we interpret throughout our collections.

For example, we have been offering a series of community gams that have included war veterans, Whaler footballers, and survivors of the Andrea Doria disaster. In

BILL TRAMPOSCH addition, we are launching an oral-history effort that will enable us to collect the images and words of aging islanders who have remarkable tales to tell of their experiences here, tales that combine to define this place and enrich our appreciation of this island’s uniqueness. Soon we will be engaging sixth-, seventh-, and eighth-graders in a program we call “Landmarks of Nantucket,” an initiative that will capture photographically their most valued island “landmarks”; these images will be on display in the Candle Factory later this year and will be covered in a future issue of Historic Nantucket.

Furthermore, our twenty-one-part weekly “Food for Thought” series attracts locals to listen to the perspectives of island historians and cultural leaders. And, finally, with this issue we are launching a column that illuminates those historic places we pass almost every day on our travels around this “little elbow of sand.” We call it “By the Way,” and we know it will increase appreciation for Nantucket’s distinctive past.

The Jammygammer seemed to be speaking to the air, but I believe he was actually acknowledging a presence of the past that is nearly ubiquitous on this island. He felt very much at home in our halls, especially on that evening. We at the NHA encourage such conversations, especially if they speak across the ages.

William J. Tramposch Executive Director Winter 2007 | 3

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NANTUCKET WHALERS in Milford Haven, Wales

BY JANE CLAYTON ,

4 | Historic Nantucket

P H .D.

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The small town of Milford in southwest Wales played a significant role in the Southern Whale Fishery from Britain around the turn of the nineteenth century. Political and financial incentives offered by the British government and the business expertise of the colony of New England whaling families who settled there all contributed to the beginnings of the town, despite opposition to the success of the venture from a group of London whaling merchants. The development of a “flourishing whale fishery” in the southern oceans of the world was deemed to be of great importance by the British government. It was seen as a source of support for Britain’s navy, a venture that would lead to the acquisition of new territories, and, most important, a profitable commercial enterprise that would open up new trade routes.

Information about the beginnings of Milford as a whaling town is limited. In Whales and Destiny, Edouard Stackpole points out that “only meagre accounts remain of the American colony in Wales and these are tantalizing in what they could present as a fascinating story.”

However, from new sources, and a further analysis of existing evidence, it has been possible to reconstruct a more detailed picture of the beginnings of the town as a port actively engaged in the Southern Whale Fishery when that business was gaining in prosperity in Britain. That activity must be attributed to the determination of the town’s patron, Sir Charles Greville, and the industry of the Nantucketers who settled there.

At the end of the American Revolutionary War in 1783, Nantucket whalemen began searching for ways to restore their business. Many of their ships had been captured or destroyed; there was a glut of oil in the American markets as whales had become plentiful offshore during the hostilities; and whale oil was now subject to a foreign import duty in Britain, their main market, which almost equaled its selling price.

Three leading Nantucket whaling merchants—William Rotch, Samuel Starbuck Sr., and Timothy Folger— decided to relocate. It was as the result of discussions with these men that Greville made his proposals to the British government to build a town at Milford. The government’s response was extremely slow, and, by 1785, Benjamin Rotch was managing his father’s business out of Dunkirk, France, and the Starbuck–Folger group had transferred its whaling activities to Dartmouth, Nova Scotia. Nevertheless, Greville persisted, and by 1791 had secured promises of relocation to Milford from the leaders of the Dartmouth colony, though it would be eight more years before Ben Rotch followed suit.

links with New England, and Nantucket in particular. The houses built for the settlers reflected the “substantial, if somewhat austere, houses staring boldly out to sea, in keeping with the style and location of their [original] homes.” These grey, shingle-clad houses, often with tall ridgeend chimneys, while lacking the “roofwalk” evident in many Nantucket houses, often had ornate balconies at first- or second-floor level from which to view the harbor. Similarly, the stone surrounds of the front doors of many of the original dwellings, from the grand mansion at Priory Lodge to the artisans’ houses on Back Street, are reminiscent of buildings on Nantucket Island. Many of the original houses, along with the Quaker Meeting House, survive today with these features still intact. The Customs Bondage Store, now a museum, was in use by 1797. Some of the street names reflect Nantucket connections: Daniel and Samuel Starbuck Jr. built houses on Front Street on either side of what is now known as Dartmouth Street; the family name was acknowledged in Starbuck Road near the Quaker Meeting House; and the large house built by Uriel Bunker near Steynton is now known as Bunkers Hill Hotel. Other shingle-clad houses were built along Front Street, where it is thought Timothy and Abiel Folger lived at number 30.

Number 25, a house originally designed for Ben Rotch and his family, eventually became a bank run by Ben’s son Francis, Samuel Starbuck Jr., and a Mr. Phillips. According to Abiel Folger’s diary for 25th August 1810 “the bank opened in Samlls front room,” so this was not a new venture for him. The carved stone balustrade along the roof of number 25 is reminiscent of the wooden structures gracing the Three Bricks on Main Street in Nantucket.

The First Settlers

It seems certain that at least fifteen Nantucket whalemen and their families came to Milford in 1792, led by the Starbucks and the Folgers.

Samuel Starbuck Sr. came with his wife, Abigail, and their two sons, Samuel Jr. and Daniel, along with their families. Timothy Folger brought his wife, Abiel; one daughter, Peggy, with her husband David Grieve; and their son, Timothy Jr., along with his family. Others who came to settle included several ship captains: Zacchary Bunker and his wife, Judith, with some of their children; Elisha Clarke and his wife, Elizabeth, with their children; Barnabus Swain; James Gwinn; Peter Macy; Benjamin Folger; David Coleman; Jonathan Paddock; Nathaniel Macy; Uriel Bunker; and Frederick Coffin—with or without their famiThe Building of the Town The Dartmouth settlers presented an outline of the conditions they lies. Several returned to New England, while others remained in Britain would require which included the building of docks and quays, a site for the rest of their lives.

In 1795, an Act of Parliament was passed under which Ben Rotch was for a Quaker meeting house and burial ground, and assurance that they would not need to “embarrass themselves with agricultural activ- encouraged to bring his ships to Milford from London (where he had ity” as they intended to focus their energies in the whale fishery. relocated from France in 1794 after the outbreak of the Revolution). He However, when they arrived, the building of the town had not been did not, however, take advantage of this until 1800, in the meantime started. Milford was a “proprietary” town built with permission grant- carrying on “an extensive trade in tobacco and salt as a London mered by an Act of Parliament and monies provided by the landowner, Sir chant.” When he eventually moved to Milford, he took along a number William Hamilton. It developed into a hub of the international whaling of whaling ships, and remained there until 1814, when his business suftrade. With ships arriving from and departing to whaling grounds fered a financial setback, and he returned to London with his older around the world, Milford provided an early example of a globalized children. In 1813, three of his ships were lost; two, the Montezuma and industry. The design of some of Milford’s buildings reflects it strong the New Zealander, ironically were captured by the American frigate USS Essex during the war between Britain and America, and, the folfacing page top: Timothy Folger (1764) by John Singleton Copley lowing year, his London business venture also suffered a serious blow.

(1738–1815), oil on canvas, NHA Purchase with anonomous gifts, 2003.18.1.

Three valuable cargoes of oil that he had stored in London were devalfacing page bottom: A detail from Milford Haven (1776) by J. R.Attwood ued when the Napoleonic Wars ended and the market was flooded with (fl. 1770–80), oil on canvas, courtesy of the National Museum of Wales. oil. Ben Rotch appears to have traveled back and forth to Milford for Winter 2007 | 5

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nantucket whalers in milford haven, wales

top: Milford (1812) by J.Warwick Smith (1749–1831), watercolor on paper, courtesy of the National Museum of Wales. middle: The Customs Bondage Store. .bottom: The artisans’ house on Back Street, one of the earliest structures built in Milford Haven by the Nantucket settlers. some time, because the minutes of a Milford Meeting held in 1817 refer to his transfer to the Westminster Meeting in London despite his having resigned from the Society of Friends in 1813. His wife and younger children followed him there in 1819, their home at Castle Hall being sold to pay Ben’s bankruptcy debts.

The Whaling Business Several whaleships initially transferred from Dartmouth, Nova Scotia, to Milford. Samuel Starbuck Jr. wrote in his journal that his brother Daniel “Outfitted six valuable ships from 200 tons upwards of 350 tons to the South Atlantic, North and South Pacific and Southern Oceans on whale voyages. Some of his ships were worth about £12,000 at sea.” It has been possible to identify five of these vessels (Sierra Leone, Aurora, Maitland, Adonis, and Duke of Kent) and trace their involvement in the fishery from Milford. The sixth was either Jefferson, originally from Halifax, Nova Scotia, and later referred to as a Rotch ship, or one of six other vessels (Nancy, Harriet, Hibernia, Resource, Romulus, and Prince William) that went to Milford from Nova Scotia and made only token whaling voyages from there before being transferred to owners in London or returned to New England. The number of vessels increased with the arrival of the Rotch whaling business in 1800, which meant that at least five and up to eight more ships sailed to the Southern Fishery from Milford. (Ann, Hannah and Eliza,Wareham, Grand Sachem, Charles, Volunteer, New Zealander, and Montezuma). There is some question of transfer of ownership of certain vessels from members of the original settlers to Ben Rotch; as the Starbucks and Rotches were cousins, it would not be surprising. There is clear evidence that ships owned by the original settlers and led by the Starbuck and Folger families sailed regularly on whaling voyages from Milford to the Southern Fishery from 1792 until at least 1809 and that the ships belonging to Ben Rotch were whaling out of Milford from 1800 until at least 1813.

Two Welsh authors have written about the beginnings of Milford, one being a descendant of the Starbuck family. Both suggest that the whaling industry was short lived. However, the twenty ships mentioned were not only directly engaged in voyages to and from the Southern Fishery out of Milford, but part of a considerable threeway trade that involved the transhipment of whale products—particularly oil, bone, and candles—from New England to London via Milford. There is no conclusive evidence that the first settlers were transhipping whale products from New England, but this was clearly an important aspect of the Rotch business from Milford. Ben’s daughter, Eliza Farrar Rotch, wrote: My father began immediately to build a stores, and ships began arriving from America full freighted with sperm oil. The business now attracted artisans necessary for carrying it on [and] my father now received larger vessels loaded with sperm oil from his father and brothers settled lately at New Bedford and these he refitted at Milford and dispatched to the South Seas. His vessels were far more successful than those employed in the same fishery from London, the merchants there were very jealous of him.

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This success, along with Rotch’s personal difficulties, was to lead to loss of support for the venture by the British government, which favored its own whaling merchants in London. It would seem that most aspects of the whaling business in Milford declined once Rotch returned to London in 1814. However, the church register for June 14, 1824, records the baptism of Samuel Starbuck Phillips, describing his father as “master of a vessel in the South Sea Whale Fishery.”

The business of provisioning and fitting out whaleships with supplies sent from Nantucket and New Bedford was also an important part of Milford’s whaling activity because, as Stackpole suggests, “supplies could be obtained more cheaply and readily in America.” Timothy Folger supervised a large storehouse for maize, rye, barley, and wheat, chiefly imported from America. In some early paintings and photographs it may be possible to identify this building, which is easily confused with the customs house. Samuel Starbuck Jr. and his father set up and ran the bakery, producing ships biscuits and bread for the whalers as well as for the people living in and around Milford. It is described as “probably the first building erected—the white house with the tremendous chimney at the end of the houses below Hamilton Terrace (originally known as Front Street)—reputedly the oldest building.”

But it is also said that “the house with the large Flemish chimney below Hamilton Terrace was one of the original four buildings on the site before the town was begun.” Samuel Jr.’s journal has been traced to a private collection, but it has not been possible to date to establish whether he made comment on this role. In 1793, having visited London where he met several New England captains considering returning to America, he wrote of Milford, “The advantage there is in provisions which I have contrasted with this town.” In February 1800, Greville wrote to Samuel, saying, “If by chance any Indian meal is in the Ann, or maize, you might send me a loaf by the mail.” Evidence of those activities is readily available in the diary of Abiel Coleman Folger (a transcription of which is in the collection of the NHA Research Library) and in the manifests of some of the ships involved. In 1800, Hannah and Eliza, Captain Micajah Gardner, arrived in Milford from New Bedford carrying not only 325 casks of oil worth $29,650 (£7,400) but also white oak staves for making barrels, eight tubs of tar, and ten whale lines—all for direct use in the whaling trade—as well as coffee, sugar, pork, beef, flour, molasses, apples, beer, rum, and tobacco as provisions.

One of the difficulties in reconstructing a complete and accurate picture of the shipping activity connected with all three aspects of the settlers’ enterprise is the absence of records. Some of the voyages are recorded in Lloyds Register and the Society of Merchants in London, and also in the “Returns” of the London whaling merchants to the Board of Trade, but it has not been possible to locate any Customs Returns for Milford before 1827. Clearly, several vessels were registered in New England or had dual registry, and Lloyds Lists

below: Daniel Starbuck’s grave in the Quaker burial ground in Milford Haven. Other Nantucketers buried there include Timothy and Abiel Folger and Abigail and Samuel Starbuck Sr. have only been searched for voyages to the Southern Seas or Fisheries. A more detailed picture of the transhipping of oil from America and round the coast from Milford to London would need a further trawl of these records—a mammoth task. However, the absence of customs returns is more difficult to explain. The Customs Bondage Store was functioning from 1797 and extended by 1806, suggesting an increase in shipping activity. Timothy Folger is described as “a surveyor of ships,” and Samuel Starbuck Jr. was appointed “supervisor of wrecks,” as such having control of their cargoes, which makes this lack of information all the more puzzling.

Abiel Folger’s diary, written between December 1806 and March 1811, has provided the most illuminating record of whaling activities in Milford to date. She often comments on the sailing or arrival of ships, whether from the fishery or America: “27th June 1807 Baxter sailed, got all on board” and “9th June 1809 the ship Arora [Aurora] got to the kay.” Abiel and Timothy Folger regularly invited the ships’ masters to dine: “14th October 1810 we have had Gwinn [captain of the Ann] and Dunamon [captain of the New Zealander] to dine.”

Timothy was an expert candlemaker, and he either continued this business from Milford or imported Nantucket candles to sell in London. His wife wrote: “18th April 1810 I have cleand and wipd three boxes candles.” He was also directly involved in the industry as well as the provisioning; Abiel writes “my H cutting bone but makes a poor ham.”

Clearly the whaling town of Milford did not, as Greville had hoped, contribute to the success of the British Southern Fishery to any great extent, but became a prosperous branch of the New England Fishery, which by the early 1800s had begun to recover. New Englanders, and Nantucketers in particular, who were used to crossing the oceans of the world to carry on this trade, saw the whaling vessels as links to keep their scattered community in touch with one another and their island home. Although the majority of the Nantucket settlers were either Loyalists or had Loyalist sympathies, their allegiance in their new home was less to “king or country” than to their Quaker faith and to the whaling trade from Nantucket.

Jane Clayton, Ph.D.: Jane Clayton’s whaling interest stems from her early studies in geography and beginning doctoral studies in 1968. In 1970, she visited Nantucket to work with Edouard Stackpole, who was to become a good friend and mentor. After a career in nursing—both as a practitioner and researcher—she was prompted to resume her whaling studies in 1997 upon the rediscovery of her early data, which led to the completion of her Ph. D. thesis in 2002. She hopes to retire in July of 2007 and devote more time to writing. She lives near Chania in Crete.

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T HE C RUISE

OF THE

NANTUCKET S HIPS

Asia and Alliance: In Consort to the Indian Ocean and the Coast of New Holland, Australia, 1791–94

BY ROD DICKSON

While researching the history of whaling on the coasts of New Holland, now Western Australia, in the days of the sailing whalers, I came across the microfilmed logbook of the Nantucket whaler/sealer Asia. Initially, I put it to one side, as I was concentrating my research on the south coast and Asia had touched the western shores. When I began to read and study the log in depth, however, I was amazed to find the amount of detail written by the logbook’s keeper, Sylvanus Crosby, second mate of the ship, and realized that this was indeed a journal of great importance to our maritime history.

As I transcribed the log, I kept wondering about the consort ship, Alliance, and her captain, Bartlett Coffin. Then, by chance, I discovered that the logbook of this ship was also extant, listed in the collection of the Cincinnati Public Library.

On contacting the library and inquiring about the whereabouts of the log and if it could be copied, I was informed that 8 | Historic Nantucket

it was not there and could not be located. I then found out that in the Nantucket Historical Association Research Library collection there was a microfilm version and that I could have a copy made and flown airmail across to me, here in Perth. So then I had copies of both logs at my disposal. Two logbooks and two keepers: Sylvanus Crosby, of Asia, and Andrew Pinkham, of Alliance, describing the voyage from two different perspectives on the same days.

Subsequent to my initial inquiry, the logbook of Alliance was rediscovered in Cincinnati, and is now on the International Register.

I must pay special thanks to Sylvia V. Metzinger, former Manager of Rare Books and Special Collections at the Public Library of Cincinnati and Hamilton County, Ohio; and to Elizabeth Oldham, Research Associate at the Nantucket Historical Association Research Library.

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On the morning of Thursday, September 29, 1791, the good ship Alliance lay alongside North Wharf at Sherburne, Nantucket Island, preparing for sea. At eleven o’clock the pilot came on board, and, with the wind at SW, Captain Bartlett Coffin gave the order to get under way.

As the ship drew away from the wharf, the captain and his twenty-man crew waved their farewells, knowing that they would not see their homes or loved ones for a very long time. At noon the ship crossed the bar and came to anchor off Great Point, where lighters came alongside and discharged their cargoes of wood, water, and provisions into the holds of the ship, enough to last the men for a three-year cruise.

On the following day, Friday, September 30, the ship Asia, commanded by Elijah Coffin, Bartlett’s cousin, took on a pilot and sailed from North Wharf, crossed the bar, and anchored to take on provisions, wood, and water.

The two ships sailed in consort to the southeast, making their first landfall at the Canary Islands; from there, they sailed south to recruit at Cape de Verde, where they met up with cousins Jonathan Coffin and Brown Coffin, each commanding his own ship. Departing Boa Vista on November 10, Asia and Alliance crossed the Equator and made for their next waypoint, the island of Trinidada (Trinity) at latitude 20º south.

Taking their departure, both ships sailed southeast for the Cape of Good Hope, which they reached on January 20, 1792. After a week of taking on wood, water, and more livestock, the ships departed, bound for the Indian Ocean. Captain Bartlett Coffin soon discovered that the mainmast of Alliance was rotten in the cheeks and, after further inspection, decided to run into Saldanha Bay for repairs. [Cheeks are pieces of timber bolted to the masthead to help support the top mast.—Ed.] The mast was stripped of standing and running rigging; the yards were lowered to the deck; the topgallant mast and topmast were lowered down; sheer legs were erected; and, with some extra hands from Asia, the mast was removed and repaired. In two days the operation was completed and the ships were ready for sea again. Sailing ESE, they reached St. Paul’s Island in the southern Indian Ocean only to find sealing gangs already at work, clubbing the animals to death for skins for the China market.

The captains conferred and decided to sail for the coast of New Holland, where, in and about Shark Bay, they hoped for better whaling than they had so far had. Thus far, the cruise had been very poor in the pocket and hardly a barrel of oil in the holds.

Reaching Shark Bay, they were disappointed to find a barren and desolate country, with no wood and no water, for both of which the ships were badly in need. On the second day of their stay, the cabin boy, while helping to furl the mizzen topsail, missed his hand-hold and fell from the top, breaking his arm badly and cracking his skull. “He was 16 years of age and his name was Uriah Bunker, son of Sylvanus Bunker of Nantucket.” [Uriah survived the fall.—Ed.] After a five-day stay in which they caught fish and birds and made a general exploration, they sailed for the Island of Java, which they reached on June 2, 1792, coming to anchor at Princes Island on June 10.

Filling the barrels with good fresh water, taking on boatloads of wood, and purchasing turtles and fruit from the natives, the crews rested up until called upon to sail again.

This part of the cruise led them southwest to the Cocos-Keeling Islands, where the boats went ashore and collected a full load of

opposite: “Map of the World” from Smith’s Atlas (1839), courtesy of the New Bedford Whaling Museum. below: Crew list from the ship Asia.

Photo is actual size of booklet NHARL MS 335, Folder 976. coconuts. Without anchoring, the ships carried on southwest bound for the Isle of France (Mauritius), arriving there on the 29th of July. After making inquiries of the local merchants as to the best whaling grounds in the area, they were advised to make for St. Mary’s Island on the northeast coast of Madagascar. It was here, while out after humpback whales, that the ships were attacked by natives in five large war canoes, the natives announcing their intentions by sounding their shell trumpets and landing on the beach directly opposite the ships with their muskets, one of which discharged.

The ships just managed to get their anchors to the bows, and with a most fortunate fair wind got clear of the land and away. Thwarted again in whaling, the ships returned to the Isle of France, where they anchored on October 4, 1792. It was here that two occurrences of some importance took place: the first concerns the smallpox epidemic that was ravaging the island.

Following are excerpts from the daily logbook entries transcribed day by day, ship by ship.

Crosby, keeper on the Asia, frequently writes phonetically, while Pinkham, on Alliance, is obviously well read and more educated.

[Some spelling and punctuation have been edited for clarity; unfamiliar nautical terms are described as in the Oxford Companion to Ships and the Sea. —Ed.]

Alliance Thursday, October 4th, 1792.

First part fresh gales at ESE. We stood WbyN. At 2 pm we saw the Isle of France, bearing West and 7 leagues distance. At night we were within 3 leagues of the SE part of the Island. We lay by under a close reeft main topsail, headed to the northward and drift along shore. The weather looked moderate.We lay till one oclock then set in easey sail and stood along shore to the NW. At 9 am the Pilot come on board. At 10 am we come to anchor in 12 fathoms with the best anchor. Sent down the topgallant yards and masts. Our Captain went on shore to report the ship lying out here by the buoys. In the afternoon the Pilot come off with a large boat and several negroes to help warp the ship in.

Alliance Friday, October 5th, 1792.

At 4 this morning we called all hands and streamed the hausers [hawsers], and went to work to warping in. The weather moderate. At night we were a third of the way up.We let go the best bower under foot and had a hauser out to a ship outside it. So ends. [Streaming is letting the aft anchor buoy drop into the sea to prevent the anchor cable from being fouled as it runs out. The “best bower” is the starboard bow anchor,one of the two largest anchors on a sailing vessel.—Ed.]

Asia Remarks on Fryday, October the 5 day, 1792 First part of this 24 hours begins with fine weather and a fresh breeze at ESE ... At 6 am a boat came on board and brought off our Poilote [Pilot] off and the Captain. Latter part, at 6 am gut under way in order to warp up the harbor.

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Alliance Saturday, October 6th, 1792.

Alliance Tuesday, October 9th, 1792

The fore part light gales. Got the ship up to her moorings, which was to two anchors which were berried [buried] ashore and were hard aground with the end of a cable out of each to our bow, and a hauser for our stern. For we were fast to our Consort, her being moored alongside of us.

The fore part of this day we took 25 casks of oil on deck and got it ready to go on shore. All of us who were under an inoculation took a potion of physic to work down which it did for certain. Mr Starbuck and myself went on shore and spoke for some cloths [purchased clothes for the coming voyage].

We hauld the ships together so as to pass from one to the other without a boat. We carryed all our boats on shore except one. The Small Pox is so bad here on shore that we knew we should unavoidably take it the natural way for we were not Inoculated.

Asia Remarks on Tuesday October the 9 Day 1792

We concluded to all take by Inoculation, which we did. This day we had a Doctor from the shore and he put it into 20 of us, belonging half to our ship and half to the other This day ends with fine weather.

Asia Remarks on Saturday October the 6 Day 1792 First part of this 24 hours Begins with fine weather and still warping up. At 8 pm gut our ship up to the Landing Place and made fast to the Anker on Shore and git a little supper and then turned in. Latter part, fine weather, gut our cabells on shore and Mored our Ship solled [got our cables on shore and moored our ship solid]. At 10 am the Doctor came of and Nockolated Both our Cruese for the Small Pox. Is so breef that it is Emposable to Keep Clear from it. [The Oxford English Dictionary has breef as a variant spelling of brief, meaning “common, or prevalent, often used of epidemic diseases.” The OED remarks that the word is “much used by the uneducated in the interior of New England...when speaking of epidemic diseases.”—Ed.] It is so Breef that 129 died in one Day. There is one ship A Long Side of us that has got 2 or 3 down with it. There is a great many of our crue that has not had it, 10 of them and 10 of Alliance’s Crues, 20 in all. So ends this 24 hours and all well as yet on board.

A smallpox epidemic was raging on the island, and, as Sylvanus states, “129 died in one day.” It is so prevalent that no one is spared except those who have already had the disease. Twenty members of the crews of Asia and Alliance, approximately half their complement, were in danger of becoming infected, so the captains got the doctor to come on board and inoculate them.

First part of this Day Begins with fine weather. Our people took a Potion of fisick. Employed in giting up 20 Cask of Oil out of the Alliance. Last part our Mate went on Shore. So ends this day all well on board.

Alliance Wednesday, October 10th, 1792 We landed 25 casks of oil the fore part of this day.The latter part of this day we had little or nothing to do. Had a turn of the wind to westward and some rain. So ends.

Asia Remarks on Wednesday October the 10 Day 1792 First part of this Day Begins with fine weather.Sent 23 Cask of oil from the Alliance.Went on Shore then went on Board of the Robert Morris, Captain Hay let us have 10 Bushels of Corn. Latter part thick weather. So ends this Day 1792.

Alliance Thursday, October 11th, 1792 First part, fine weather, we loosed all our sails and dryed them. All of us who were under an inoculation took a dose of cooling powders.We unbent our sails and stowed them away, all excepting the mizen and main topmast staysail. So ends.

Asia Remarks on Thursday October the 11 Day 1792 First part of this Day begins with fine weather. Got a Boat and Sent 26 Cask of oil on Shore. Latter part all well.

Alliance Friday, October 12th, 1792.

First part, those of us who were under an inoculation began to complain of the head aches and all other pains. The well people employed in fitting the rigging. So ends.

Alliance Sunday, October 7th, 1792

Asia Remarks on Fryday October the 12 Day

First part moderate trade winds. All of us who is under Inoculation took a Vomit. The Doctor payed us a visit to see how we fared. The weather inclines to be sultry. So ends.

First part of this 24 hours begins with fine weather. Our Small Pox people Begins to Cumplain. The well ones Employed them selves about fiting riging.Latter part,thare is great Cumplaint from the Sick.

So ends.

Asia Remarks on Sunday October the 7 Day 1792 First part of this 24 hours Begins with a Lite Wind and Warm. Riged Awrnings over our Decks to make it Cool. The doctor Came on board to See the Small Pox folks and they took a Puke. So ends this 24 hours.

Alliance Saturday, October 13th, 1792 The first part fine weather. The Simptoms are verry hard upon some of us, so as to cause us to faint. The well people had full employ to attend the sick. So ends. The Doctor visited us today.

Alliance Monday, October 8th, 1792 Begins with a moderate trade wind all these 24 hours. Captain Mick in the ship Award sailed for Bengal. Little or nothing to do except take on board a 12 inch cable of 120 fathoms. So ends this day.

Asia Remarks on Monday October the 8 Day 1792 First part of this Day Begins with fine weather. The Doctor Came on Board. Latter part, went on shore.We went on shore and Brought off a Cabell for the Alliance. At 2 oclock Captain Mick sailed for Bangall. So ends this Day. 10 | Historic Nantucket

Asia Remarks on Saturday October the 27 Day 1792 First part of this day begins with fine weather.We healed [heeled, or tipped] our ship and cleaned one Side. The Doctor come on board to See the Small Pox people and give them a fisick to take in the morning. So ends this day.

Asia Remarks on Sunday October the 28 Day 1792 First part of this day begins with fine weather. Our people taking fisick. This day received of Captain Elijah Coffin, Six Paper Dollars. All

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hands going on Shore. Spending there Money to git things for the Voyage. We are Bound to the Disolations [Kerguélen Islands]. So ends.

Alliance Sunday, October 28th, 1792.

This day all our people went on shore to buy what things they stood in need of and they all returned at night excepting James Robinson.

When we came to examine his chest we found no cloths and how he got them on shore there is no one can give any account. So ends.

Asia Remarks on Monday October the 29 Day 1792.

The first part of this day begins with fine weather.We heald our Ship to Bootop her But the weather Being thick and Hazy the Botom did not Drye. And we let Her Lay all night upon a Heal. So ends this day. [Boot-topping: Covering the bottom of a vessel with a mixture of tallow, sulphur or lime, and rosin— partly as a deterrent against weed and barnacles and partly to give the bottom a smooth surface to reduce friction through the water when sailing.—Ed.]

Alliance Monday, October 29th, 1792.

All hands employed breaking up the fore hold.

Asia Remarks on Tuesday October the 30 Day 1792.

First part of this day begins with fine weather.

We finished our Bootoping and begin to stow our Hole [fill the hold].We took 168 Bushels of Salt on to salt Skins. Gut up a Cask of Bread. So ends this 24 hours and all well except one.

Departing from Port Louis, the three vessels sailed south for the Desolation [Kerguélen] Islands, chosen after consulting with the merchants of Port Louis, who knew of the seals abounding in this island group. Captain Bartlett Coffin had a copy of the chart made

by Captain Cook during his 1777 voyage, showing Christmas Harbor, the ship’s destination.

The ships arrived on December 17, 1792, but found Christmas Harbor a terrible anchorage and shifted to Port Washington, which they named. A tragedy occurred on the 9th of February 1793 when Captain Bartlett Coffin died on board Alliance after a serious illness.

His body was carried ashore the next day and “at 4 oclock in the afternoon the body of our Honoured Captain was Committed to the Earth with all the Solemnity due on such a Melancholy Operation.”

He was buried on the south shore of Port Washington. The logbook keeper and first mate, Andrew Pinkham, then took command of the vessel for the rest of the cruise. After killing and skinning more than a thousand elephant seals for their blubber, a quantity of fur seals for their skins, and some leopard seals for their meat, during a threemonth period, in which they were buffeted by heavy gales and squalls of sleet and snow and heavy rain, the ships sailed again for the Isle of France.

above: “Kerguélen Land” from Narrative of the Wreck of the Favorite on the Island of Desolation (1850) by John Nunn, courtesy of the New Bedford Whaling Museum.

In early April 1793, Asia and Alliance warped into Port Louis, followed a week later by the schooner Hunter, which had called at the Island of Bourbon (today Reunion). The schooner they had picked up was sold for 21,000 livres ($2,100) along with most of their oil to the local merchants, and the captains purchased sugar and coffee for the American markets. Departing from the Isle of France, the two ships prepared for whaling again, and, with further information gleaned from other captains at Port Louis, headed for Delgoa Bay on the southeast coast of Africa, where they arrived and anchored on June 30, 1793, joining twelve other ships already there, most from Nantucket. As soon as the ships were moored, the crews began putting off with the boats and lancing whales.

When the time came to depart, Captain Elijah Coffin and Captain Andrew Pinkham decided to part ways and sail home to Nantucket independently; Alliance sailed directly and without calling at any port, arriving home on January 15, 1794. Asia, on the other hand, had a much more exciting voyage before arriving at her home port.

She also bypassed the Cape of Good Hope and turned north up the Atlantic, passing St. Helena on October 29, 1793. Her next landfall was Ascension Island, reached on November 6. The log keeper aboard Asia, Sylvanus Crosby, has the habit of ending every day’s Winter 2007 | 11

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entry: “So ends this 24 hours and all well as to helth.” However, on this particular day, he notes:

Asia Remarks on Thursday November the 7 Day 1793 The first part of this 24 hours begins with fine weather and a fresh wind. Loard [lowered] down our boat and went on Shore A gunning. One boats crew employed Hoging the vessel. [The “hog” is a large brushlike device used to clean the ship’s bottom; it is made of twigs held between pieces of timber, attached to ropes and dragged along the hull.—Ed.] At 6 pm came on board with sum fowls and hoisted up our boat.

Middle part, fine weather and a small traide [trade wind]. Latter part, fine weather and a fresh traide. One boats crew went on shore a gunning, the other employed on board a hoging. Sent down the topgallant yard and mended the sail. At 11 am Carryed the COOK on Shore and Buryed Him for the Scurvy, then come on board. So ends this 24 hours.

It is strange that Sylvanus Crosby reports day after day that “all are well on board as to helth,” and then, without feeling, states that the cook has died from the scurvy. This is a most debilitating disease and the sufferer can take days or weeks to finally succumb. It would have been impossible for the crew not to have known of the sickness on board.

Captain Coffin has now decided to sail home via the West Indies and makes his landfall at the island of Dominica on the 4th of December. By the 6th of December the ship was passing the Leeward Island group, where they saw a British frigate making for them. The frigate fired two shots across Asia’s bows, and, after arresting her, took her in tow into the port of Basse-Terre, St. Christopher (now St. Kitts). The Royal Navy frigate has been identified as HMS Favourite.

While Asia was at anchor at Basse-Terre, the succeeding ship’s cook also died of the dreaded scurvy and was taken ashore on 10

top right: Log of Asia, October 6, 1792. NHARL MS 220, Log 335 below: Graves on Kerguélen Island. Michel Champon, French High Commissioner of the Southern and Antarctic Territories, provided these images, writing:“There is a quiet cemetery in the Island of Kerguélen.

We take care of all these poor graves with dignity and compassion.”

12 | Historic Nantucket

A BRIEF HISTORY OF SMALLPOX When I read these log entries and noted the word “nockolated,” I went to the medical journals to find out the origin of smallpox and the origins of inoculations, as it seemed to me to be very early in history to have needles and inoculations, especially in a small island such as Mauritius, in spite of its being the crossroads of the Indian Ocean and a French possession.

Smallpox: acute, highly contagious disease causing a high fever and successive stages of skin eruptions.The disease dates from the time of ancient Egypt or earlier. It has occurred worldwide in epidemics throughout history, killing up to forty percent of those infected, and accounting for more deaths over time than any other infectious disease. It spread to the New World with colonization, killing huge numbers of indigenous people, who had no immunity. A crude vaccination method began with Emmanuel Timoni, a Greek physician, in the early eighteenth century.This procedure came from the Chinese, and consisted of collecting scabs from the smallpox lesions, then drying and powdering them.The resultant powder was then “blown” with a straw up the noses of the healthy.They, in turn, caught a mild dose, and, when recovered, became immune.The firstrecorded Westerner to attempt this remedy was Lady Mary Montague, wife of the British Ambassador to Turkey. Smallpox was rife in the community, worried about her two children, she went to see Doctor Timoni and had them inoculated.They initially became ill but recovered quickly.This became the standard form of inoculation throughout the world until Doctor Edward Jenner modified the procedure in 1796 by using the related cowpox virus.

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above: Christmas Harbor, Kerguélen Island, from Cook’s Voyages and Life (1880) by A. Kippis.

December and buried in a “deascent manner.” However, it was determined that this cook was not going to be left ashore in a strange place, so the crew went ashore the next evening, dug him up, and returned him to the ship!

12 December: We carryed the Cook on shore and buryed him for the Scurvy. Left one Man to Wate upon him.

13 December: At 5 pm finished [bending sails] and went on shore and Fetched off the old Cook.

14 December: Little or Nothing to do. Went on shore and Carryed the Old Cook and Buryed Him for the Scurvy and come on board. So ends.

15th December 1793 Went on shore and carryed a Pass to the Fort. At 6 pm Went and Fetched the Old Cook that was Buryed for the Scurvey and Hoisted up our boat.

Presumably, the poor old cook was finally buried at sea as the ship sailed, and there is no further mention of burying or exhuming. Crosby also provides no explanation for the number of burials.

After a number of incidents, the ship arrived at Le Mole St. Nicholas on the island of Haiti, and that is where Sylvanus Crosby ends his logbook entries. The ship and crew arrived at Nantucket in late February 1794.

Rod Dickson: Born in Melbourne, Australia, the author went to sea in the Merchant Navy in late 1955 and served on almost every type of vessel afloat, including a stint as mate on a motorized whale-chaser working out of Carnarvon on the northwest coast of Western Australia during the early 1960s.

AUTHOR ’ S N OTE As a young lad growing up, little did I think as I lay there reading Moby-Dick and Typee that I would one day be whaling myself. I soon discovered that there was no glory in the job, only long hours and very dirty and smelly.

I moved on to other jobs, some interesting, some just boring, but all at sea, on that great blue desert!

About twenty or so years ago, I was doing some volunteer work at the Fremantle Maritime Museum, and was asked to do a simple piece of research—and I was hooked. I have always loved sailing ships and everything to do with them, and have read all that I could get my hands on, and now I was being asked to research and write about them.

For a number of years I carried my notes and typewriter, and/or laptop, up the gangway of the ship I was about to join, and having done the research at home while on leave, I would write the book or paper while in my off-watch hours on board.

The last eight years of my seagoing career were spent on board 128,000-ton Liquid Natural Gas carriers running between the northwest coast of Western Australia and Japan; three years ago I decided that enough was enough, and I retired.

When I walked down the gangway for the last time, I felt no emotion at all, because the industry has changed so radically in the last few years and there are so few seamen left.There is not a young man at sea today who can make a bell rope or do any other sort of fancy ropework, nor do they have to or want to.

And now I spend my days working in the libraries and archives and on the computer, hoping to educate the populace about the importance of seafarers and their ships, and their relevance to history.

Rod Dickson, Perth,Western Australia

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PHOTO BY JEFF ALLEN

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A Shoal of Sperm Whales off the Island of Hawaii (1833), engraved by J. Hill from a sketch by C. B. Hulsart, gift of the Friends of the Nantucket Historical Association, 1994.32.1.

T

Native Hawaiian

Whalers in Nantucket, 1820~60

BY SUSAN LEBO , P H . D .

14 | Historic Nantucket

he manuscript collections in the Nantucket Historical Association Research Library contain a rich history of the more than three hundred Nantucket whaling voyages to Hawaii and the Native Hawaiian crewmen aboard. An examination of census records, property deeds, death and cemetery documents, and the journals and business accounts of local citizens provides a rare glimpse of native, or Kanaka, seamen in Nantucket in the mid-nineteenth century. Records of their employment aboard Nantucket whaleships appear in ship logs; consulate, shipping, and discharge papers; and in ship disbursement records and crew accounts.

These details indicate that Native mariners left an enduring record of their ties to Nantucket and to the island’s whaling history, and provide a wealth of information about Nantucket’s perspectives on Pacific people and their cultures, and about their lives as native whalers.

Many of the Native Hawaiian seamen who arrived in Nantucket were named George, Jack, Joe, or Tom Canacker, Kanaka, Mowee, or Woahoo.

Their given names remain lost to us because of the common practice among whaling captains of giving them English nicknames and surnames denoting their origins in the Sandwich Islands, an early name for the Hawaiian Islands. An 1834 editorial in the New Bedford Mercury defined “Canackers” for New England readers. “The term Canacker bears the same meaning as our English word man and is used by the natives to signify man, in general, and a man as distinguished from a woman or female. The present established mode of writing it is Kanaka, pronounced Kah nah kah, with the accent on the second syllable.”

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For the Kanaka seamen, whose traditions did not include hunting whales, whaling life presented both challenges and benefits. On the one hand, their voyages exposed them to deleterious diseases, climates, working and living conditions, and to possible abandonment in a foreign port. On the other hand, the voyages gave them unparalleled opportunity to pursue adventure; to engage in cultural exchange with people from islands or shoreline communities of the Atlantic, Pacific, and Arctic oceans; and to acquire foreign goods and money.

Native Hawaiians brought their own traditions to the Nantucket whaling voyages, including ancient chants, stories, sayings, and proverbs describing their cultural connection to whales. In native oral traditions, whales sometimes carried boys and men on spiritual journeys to become religious leaders or priests.

Their chiefs claimed the rights to all whales that beached on their land, while taboos allowed only men to eat whale meat. Artisans fashioned ornaments, weapons, tools, and containers from the niho palaoa (whale teeth) and iwi (bones) of beached whales. The palaoa, or whale, is a body form of the god Kanaloa, one of the four major gods (Käne, Kü, Kanaloa, Lono) of ancient Hawaii. It brought the mana (spiritual power and knowledge) of Kanaloa to the artisan, the ornament, and the wearer. The palaoa gave the wearer authority to speak. Only high chiefs and chieftesses wore the sacred lei niho palaoa (whale-tooth necklace).

By the early 1820s, records show that whaling had linked the citizens of Nantucket with the citizens of the Sandwich Islands, where Nantucket whalers stopped to rest, to take on provisions, and to hire native seamen.

As the number of whalers from New England increased, some even proposed to establish a consul at Owhyhee (island of Hawaii) to preserve American interests and influences and to aid and protect Native Hawaiians in their perceived advances in civilization and Christian teachings.

Local newspapers, including the Nantucket Inquirer, Nantucket Journal, and the Nantucket Mirror, routinely carried stories about Native Hawaiian traditions and current events of social, economic, or political interest to Nantucket citizens. News stories about Pacific whaling activities often detailed the cultural and natural environs of the region. These narratives frequently mentioned the heathen behavior, dress, and manners of particular island inhabitants; deaths, desertions, drunken and unsavory behav-

at left: Kanaka seaman John Jack, courtesy of the New Bedford Whaling Museum. below left: Mill Hill Cemetery contains the graves of Pacific Islanders who died on Nantucket.

iors and mutinies by whalers in foreign ports; and cannibalism and massacres in Fiji, Palau, the Marquesas, and elsewhere in southern Polynesia.

Many Nantucket captains, returning home from their Pacific whaling voyages, also recounted their Hawaiian adventures. Some brought back objects of Hawaiian manufacture as well as Native Hawaiian seamen. Captains Edmund Gardner, of the New Bedford ship Balaena, and Elisha Folger, of the Nantucket ship Equator, wrote the earliest stories of whaling in Hawaii.

Gardner’s published journal gives us an interesting insight into the ships’ crews hunting a whale in Kealakekua Bay, off the island of Hawaii.

According to Gardner, they arrived in September 1819, and found the islanders friendly and eager to trade. Among them was a young Native Hawaiian who spoke English, which he had learned while attending school in Boston.

After being at Kealakekua Bay for a week, and learning that Native Hawaiian traders had spotted a large sperm whale, Captains Gardner and Folger each sent two whaleboats in pursuit. Hours later, Native Hawaiians in more than fifty canoes helped tow the dead whale to the ships. The next day, hundreds of Native Hawaiians watched as the whalers stripped the blubber. They “commenced (with our leave) to tear off the lean from the carcass and fill their canoes as fast as they could tear it off,” Gardner wrote.

“They had a great festival from what they got from the whale.”

While at Maui, two Native Hawaiians joined the ship Balaena: Joe Bal and Jack Ena, named by Gardner after the ship, disembarked in New Bedford in 1820. Six months later, returning home in the Baleana with clothing “sufficient for three years,” Joe and Jack left the ship once they reached Maui. With the desertion of another seaman, Captain Gardner chose four Native Hawaiian replacements—“two natives from Mowee, one from Woahoo and one from Onehow.” The names he “gave them were Henry Harmony, George Germaine, John Jovel, and Sam How.”

L EI N IHO PALAOA

Walrus-ivory hook, human hair, olonä cordage, ca. 1850 This Native Hawaiian lei niho palaoa (whale-tooth necklace), on display at the Whaling Museum, exhibits the traditional tongue-shaped pendant, necklace of twisted or braided human hair, and olonä cordage.The use of a walrus hook instead of the tooth of a beached whale reflects the trade introduction of walrus ivory to Hawaii during the China Trade period.The olonä cordage binds the braiding and forms the necklace clasp.

Dr. Benjamin Sharp acquired this lei niho palaoa in Hawaii in 1893, while on a scientific expedition for the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences.

Gift of Benjamin S. Richmond 1983.79.1

PHOTO BY JEFF ALLEN

PHOTO BY JEFF ALLEN

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native hawaiian whalers

Other Native Hawaiians landed in Nantucket, New Bedford, and nearby ports almost immediately after Joe and Jack. They came as whalers or as students who attended the island’s Sabbath school. Within a few years, over fifty “natives of the South Sea Islands” reportedly served aboard Nantucket whaleships. By the 1830s, Nantucket whalers employed about fourteen hundred seamen, including Native Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders. Four or five hundred men arrived or departed annually.

An unknown number of the Hawaiians attended local schools or temporarily resided in town with local families. Some ill or destitute mariners found support in the asylum at Quaise, while the majority stayed in boarding houses run by single, married, and widowed women and men. Rooming exposed foreign seamen to Nantucket family life while providing residents with supplemental income.

According to the records, in 1822, three of the “Heathen Youth” aboard an outbound whaler formerly attended the Sabbath School at the First Congregational Church.

That year, the Nantucket Inquirer reported “7 natives of the Sandwich Islands” at the school, while the Boston Recorder indicated “twenty Society or Sandwich Islanders” in attendance. Two years later, Henry Attvoi (or Attooi) left for a whaling cruise aboard the Nantucket ship Oeno; he probably lived in the largely nonwhite section of town called New Guinea before his Oeno voyage began.

In 1830, Jack and Harry lived in Newtown in the household of John and Elizabeth Gordon (or Gorden). Their “alien” status and ages, 18 and 19, respectively, appear in several versions of the local 1830 Nantucket census, while their Sandwich Island birthplace appears in only one version. The 1830 U. S. census for Nantucket confirms them as residing in the John Gordon household and their status of alien, black males, between the ages of 10 and 23.

At least six sailor boarding houses operated during the 1820 to 1860 period when Native Hawaiian seamen frequented Nantucket. Among the proprietors of those establishments were Absalom Boston, Mrs. Elkins, Alexander Wheeler, Wesley Berry, and James W. Denison [Dennison]. At least one house, near Pleasant Street in Nantucket’s New Guinea section, primarily or exclusively boarded Hawaiians and Pacific Islanders, and a sign identified William Whippy’s establishment as the “WILLIAM WHIPPY CANACKA BOARDING-HOUSE.” As early as 1838, several citizens had espoused the need for erecting a “seamen’s bethel” [A designated place of worship for seamen.—Ed.] in Nantucket. They expressed particular concern about the deplorable number of “grog-shops of the worst description” and their detrimental effects on the morals of sailors and of whaling voyages. They reported that a woman operating a sailor’s boarding house “where a sailor finds no temptation” may soon “abandon her commendable enterprise” because “she was so severely tired” her seamen boarders find liquor elsewhere. Although possibly taking in a few sailors, other boarding houses primarily catered to “gentlemen” travelers. Proprietors of those lodgings included Betsey Swain 16 | Historic Nantucket

at left: Kanaka sailors illustrated in Ballou’s Universalist Magazine (1855), courtesy of the New Bedford Whaling Museum. below left: William Whippy’s boarding house was in the New Guinea (Five Corners) neighborhood of Nantucket, although the exact location has proved difficult to identify.

Gift of Mary E. Long, 1992.212.1.

Cary, Samuel Cary, Anna Smith, Susan Gardner, and Mrs. Barney.

Of the several Kanaka mariners known to have resided at Quaise Asylum, at least two died there of unknown causes. John Canaka died on October 24, 1836, and John President “Canacker” on August 4, 1840.

Several who probably boarded in the New Guinea section of town also died far from home. On February 26, 1832, the body of a Kanaka whaler who had “sailed around Cape Horn” was found on the North Shore “beneath Coffin’s barn.” Another died on November 24, 1836, and was buried in Newtown. A notice of his death described him as a 21-year old “Sandwich Island Canackar.” Consumption killed four Hawaii-born men—Joseph Dix (age 26) on June 26, 1843; James Swain, a 27-year old from a “S. Sea Island,” on July 17, 1844; and Thomas Clay (age 31) on February 25, 1848.

John Smith died of typhus (also called “prison fever” or “ship fever”), transmitted by vermin, at the age of 30 on March 20, 1848.

Census records, crew lists, and crew accounts supplement this anecdotal evidence of Native Hawaiian seamen in Nantucket or aboard Nantucket whaleships. The enumeration of 793 nonresident mariners or seamen in the 1840 census and another 593 in that of 1850 suggests that the Nantucket community viewed these men as extended family. This familial status could reflect the community’s significant socioeconomic ties to these mariners in sustaining their whaling livelihood.

The 1840 census identified young “Free White” and “Free Black” men by age groupings but omitted information about their birthplaces, ethnicity, given (native) names, or the name of their whaleships. Without those vital data, surnames assigned by whaling captains indicated reliably only five men as native seamen: Harry Mowee, Ned Kannacker, Peter Kannacker, Joe Hannacker [Kannacker], and Jack Spunyarn.

These whalers, on countless other Nantucket voyages with Hawaiian crews, contributed to the economic and social history of this small island community. They shared their cultural traditions, languages, skills, and knowledge with Nantucket’s citizens and with each other aboard the island’s whaleships.

Susan A. Lebo, Ph.D., received her doctorate in Anthropology from the University of Washington, Seattle, in 1992, and was the recipient of the NHA’s Verney Fellowship in 2004. She is an adjunct faculty member at the University of Hawaii-West O‘ahu, and an independent researcher studying native Hawaiian and Polynesian whalers in the nineteenth-century New England fleets. note: Restrictions of space prevented the printing of some statistical materials and documentation. Dr. Lebo’s full text is available as Research Paper No. 124 in the NHA Research Library.

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SCRAPBASKET

b y L e s l i e W. O t t i n g e r

O

n June 25, 1833, in the journal that he kept for the voyage of the whaling ship Maria to the Pacific grounds, Charles Murphey penned a poem of fortyeight lines about “Shearing Day on Nantucket.” The Maria, under Captain Alexander Macy, had left Nantucket six months before, sailed around Cape Horn, and was at the time off the west coast of South America.

Murphey, a mate on the Maria and the veteran of several whaling voyages, had an active interest in writing poetry. His long poem, describing in detail a previous voyage on the ship Dauphin, was subsequently published in book form. The Maria journal also contains a similar poem of some 220 lines along with about a dozen others, one of which is Shearing Day. In 1833, the shearing pens were located just east of Miacomet Pond. Each spring, free-ranging sheep were brought there from various areas over the island, washed in the pond, separated as to owner, sheared, and the lambs marked. Two quotes from material in the NHA Research Library add a contemporary context to the poem.

In a letter to his brother Thomas dated July 12, 1835, G. Andrews wrote: It is much more pleasant living here than I at first imagined it would be; the inhabitants are a steady, staid set; and engage in but little recreation or amusement. The 4th passed over with little notice of its return and reminiscences connected with it. There were a few guns fired, and flags hoisted on the shipping, which were the only things that distinguished it from ordinary days. Sheep shearing days are the most noticed of their holidays. Three days are set aside yearly for the purpose.

They commence about the 20th of June. The first day they wash their sheep and the other days they shear.

There are rising of 12,000 sheep on the island. Formerly this event was celebrated to a great extent, but is now on the decline, although great numbers, both belonging to the island, and many from the main, still flock to witness the operation.

In the Inquirer, dated June 28, 1828, in an article headed “Shearing,” there is a description of the celebration itself:

Shearing Day

P17996 In addition to the ceremonies, cheer and hospitality, connected with those immediately engaged in shearing, there is a large number of tents pitched a little to the northward of the sheepfold, for the special purpose of making pockets lighter and heads and stomachs heavier. In these tents is fancifully arranged a great variety of eatables and drinkables, so that the most fastidious palates and undistinguishing guzzles may be accommodated at a moment’s warning. And as a kind of pageant to add higher relish to the whole entertainment, the fiddle bow is drawn merrily for the amusement of the jolly sons of Neptune, and such lasses as may feel disposed to join the “mazy dance.” This is performed on a temporary floor, some ten or twelve feet in length and five or six in width.

On this, different feats of activity are performed and various steps taken, which we are wholly unqualified to name, save the double shuffle and the Narragansett back-step.

Here is Charles Murphey’s poem dated June 25 (1833):

Now this is Shearing day Alack And we are round Cape-Horn And we shall surely miss of this As sure as we are born Now half the town and all Bull lanes Drive up their Sheep together And in the Sheep-fold shorn are they Each Ram & Ewe & Wether And some with lads about the town On foot to town must tag on And John-like away they drive With Girls to Siasconsett While others to the Shear-pen go And round the tents do caper And dance & cut all kinds of Quams Before a Cat-gut scraper The tents all filled with Cakes & Wine And Liquors in galore Of Beef & Port & Pigs & Fowls They have abundant store All nicely cook’d and all serv’d up As rich as Milk & Honey Where you can sit & eat your fill As long as you have Money

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continued

Sheep shearing, ca. 1870s. GPN4311 But as the Sun keeps going down The Steam begins to rise And ’tis quite common there to see Red Noses and bunged eyes Now Sable night her curtain spreads And rather cool the weather And Beaus & Girls begin to think Of Jogging home together And he whose purse is fairly out On foot to town must tag on But he can ride who’s flush with cash In Coach or Cart or Wagon Now all the Siasconsett folks Drive into town like thunder And rattling o’re the pavements they Make Gawky’s stare in wonder Some with broken Chaise tied up Some’s kill’d their horse a racing But all such things on Shearing day Sure there is no disgrace in Now sing long celebrate the day We’ll ride and dance and spose it And next when the day comes round May I be there to see it I was not able to find the meaning of “Bull lanes” and I know no more about 18 | Historic Nantucket

“Quams” than of “the double shuffle and the Narragansett back-step.” “And Johnlike away they drive” refers to the ride of John Gilpin and to the comic poem titled The Diverting History of John Gilpin, written

by William Cowper and published in 1782.

Certainly, Charles Murphey would have had little use for the somewhat dire final conclusion of the Inquirer article: Thus if . . . the annual shearing of the sheep upon this Island could be performed like the ordinary pursuits of life, that is without the appendages which are always attached to such ceremonies, the moral character of many would be less tarnished; and he who will be at the trouble to investigate the subject, will find that the fair promise of many hopeful lads is first sullied, and the charming buds of female delicacy are often first blighted, on days of public festivity and amusement; and he will also find that the wisdom of riper years, and even gray hairs, are not at all times exempted from the contagion of “great days” Leslie W. Ottinger, a physician, retired to Nantucket in 1996. He contributed “ ‘Saw a comet star ablazing…’: Log of the New Bedford Whaling Ship Washington, March 6, 1843” to the Winter 2004 issue of Historic Nantucket.

Sources NHARL MS 220, Log 321.

A Journal of a Whaling Voyage on Board Ship Dauphin of Nantucket Composed by Charles Murphey,Third Mate on the Voyage: Mattapoisett, Mass.; Atlantic Publishing Company, 1877. G. Andrews to Thomas Andrews, July 12, 1835, NHARL MS 92, Folder 3.

Les Ottinger has been a volunteer in the Research Library since 1999, and is to date the most devoted and reliable transcriber of the logs in the collection (MS 220). He takes a genuine interest in shipboard life and appreciates the quirky, sometimes melancholy, comments entered by the keepers. He relishes the discovery of arcane words and customs and delights in the random sketches entered by keepers—a line drawing of the hog that would shortly be sacrificed to feed the crew, a particularly beautiful example of calligraphy. And when I am busy with library clients, Les doesn’t mind interrupting his reading to descend to the vault to retrieve manuscript materials.

Volunteer nonpareil, that’s Les.Thank you.

— Libby Oldham NHA Research Associate & Copy Editor

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by Helen Seager

Such is the presence of the by-gone and the old on Nantucket that we who live here, and those who visit, cannot help but pass by daily reminders of the island’s remarkable past.With this issue, Historic Nantucket launches a new column “By the Way.” It will endeavor to illuminate the places in our cultural landscape that make our travels on this “little elbow of sand” more ghostly and meaningful.We are grateful to Helen Seager for her assistance with the inaugural feature on the neighborhood of Monument Square, and we invite readers to submit ideas of their own. —Ed.

Monument Square far left: The Soldiers and Sailors Monument at Monument Square, ca. 1880. GPN574 left: Monument Square Grocery at 106 Main Street, ca. 1890. P15631

T

he neighborhood known as Monument Square—around the intersection of Main, Upper Main, Milk, and Gardner Streets—was at one time the thriving civic hub of Nantucket Town. The island’s original rural settlement had been gradually shifting closer to Nantucket Harbor throughout the eighteenth century, assuming the characteristics of a village.

In 1798, the town had changed its name from Sherborn/Sherburne to Nantucket. In the midst of this resettlement, Monument Square became the site of civic buildings, a meetinghouse, an early school, and the dwellings of some of Nantucket’s most prominent citizens.

Beginning where a Quaker Meeting House had been built in 1790 at State Street (as Main Street was known before 1825), Pleasant Street ran south and then southeast to the Newtown Gate. The meetinghouse was taken down in 1834. Pleasant Street would not be paved until 1864. The new meetinghouse was only part of the residential, civic, and commercial development in the area in the postRevolutionary period.

In 1799, a federal tax policy necessitated naming the streets in every town. A new village center for Sherburne had long since evolved on the extreme end of West Chester Extension, as it is now called; a 1716 Town Building from that area was moved in 1783 to the southwest corner of Milk and Main Streets to serve as a courthouse for at least fifty years.

In the early nineteenth century, court held only two sessions a year. The sheriff took responsibility for the jails [gaols]. One stood on High Street near Pine, with an adjacent workhouse built in 1770; they were taken down

soon after 1800. The still-standing “Old Gaol” was built in 1805.

The Town Building housed a schoolroom on its upper level, where William Mitchell, who lived around the corner at 1 Vestal Street, taught the first public school classes (1829) on the island, serving 202 students. The building sported a belfry for the town’s largest bell, which served as a fire alarm. A faded sign on its façade announced “State Street”; “Main Street” was painted over it. In 1849, the island’s first Roman Catholic community held its first Mass in the Town Building, and its rectory was housed on Pleasant Street.

The building was used even after the town offices were moved to Union Street in the 1880s and schools were established elsewhere. The square was still considered important enough in 1874 to be the location of the Civil War monument. The developing civic center at the intersection of Main and Milk, behind the backyards of the Pleasant Street dwellings, had on its northeast corner Christopher Starbuck’s dwelling, which had been moved into town from Sherburne and expanded. Joseph Starbuck would build his house close by on New Dollar Lane in 1809. Starbuck ran his tryworks and candle factory behind his house and to the west of Macy’s backyard. The tryworks building was reached by a still-existing way from Pleasant Street called Starbuck Court. The building, remodeled as a residence, still stands, visible from New Dollar Lane.

A long gully ran from Main to Mill Street, parallel to the western side of Pleasant Street behind the houses. A number of whale-oil factories and warehouses were situated there. A candle facto-

ry, cooper shop, and well were on the south side of Mill Street on land owned by Isaiah Coffin.

Although the wharves soon pulled the business center toward the harbor, retail shops still operated until well after World War II; several different businesses occupied 106 Main, one after another. A hose-cart house and retail businesses, including a grocery store, were opened later on Gardner Street. A cooper shop, now a residence, once stood at Pleasant and Summer Streets.

At one time, Monument Square was named “Old White Bone,” after a bleached jawbone of a whale that had been placed at the corner of Main and Gardner Streets. That name faded when a “Liberty Pole” was erected during the Revolution. Important meetings then and during the War of 1812 occurred there, and a soup kitchen was set up at Main and Gardner to feed poor families during the bitter winter of 1814–15.

The building was taken down in 1865. The Liberty Pole was replaced in 1874 by the Soldiers and Sailors Monument, in memory of the seventy-three Nantucket men who died in the Civil War. Its foundation is a millstone from the Round Top Mill, demolished the year before.

A large Victorian-era house now stands on the site of the old courthouse. Despite the illadvised demolition in 2001 of the unoccupied but sound commercial structure at 106 Main Street (the original Monument Square Grocery, subsequently a branch of the A&P, and then a dry-cleaning establishment), and the destruction in 2006 of most of the historic interior of the Christopher Starbuck residence at 105, the intersection still displays small features of its former importance as a civic center: a postal box, a bike rack, and a bulletin board for the Maria Mitchell Association, now the area’s most active organization.

Helen Seager, a founder of the Friends of the African Meeting House on Nantucket, is a lifelong advocate of historic preservation.

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News Notes & Highlights Exhibitions CURRENT:

Nantucket Nightmare and Recent Acquisitions

Grieder and Robinson family members with their donated Tuckernuck school items.

Two winter exhibitions added to the NHA’s year-round offerings. Nantucket Nightmare (Whitney Gallery, February–April) features a series of original drawings by Nantucket artist and teacher Richard C. Maloney. The cartoons, satirizing the issues of expansion and development on island, appeared originally in the Inquirer and Mirror in the 1970s. Recent Acquisitions: A Selection of Gifts to the Collection (Peter Foulger Gallery, February–April) marked the first winter exhibition in the museum’s premier display space, the Peter Foulger Gallery, showcasing donations to the NHA collection made in 2006. Highlights include a Benjamin Franklin-family rocking chair, an inlaid Nantucket candlestand, material from the Tuckernuck school, and four large C. Robert Perrin watercolors of The Seasons from Tonkin of Nantucket on Main Street.

UPCOMING:

The Art Colony and The Paintings of Elizabeth Rebecca Coffin The major summer exhibition in the Peter Foulger Gallery will be The Art Colony (Member Preview, May 25), presented in collaboration with the Artists Association of Nantucket. The exhibition will trace the development and expansion of Nantucket’s Art Colony from its roots in the early twentieth century up to the formation of the Kenneth Taylor Gallery in 1945. The works of major figures such as Frank Swift Chase, Anne Ramsdell Congdon, Ruth Haviland Sutton, Elizabeth Saltonstall, and their colleagues, will be on display throughout the summer.

We are actively seeking loan material for inclusion in The Art Colony show. Please contact Ben Simons at bsimons@nha.org, or (508) 228-1894 x 303.

As part of the “summer of the arts” surrounding the Art Colony Exhibition, the Whitney Gallery will present an exhibition of The Paintings of Elizabeth Rebecca Coffin (April–November), in cooperation with the Egan Maritime Foundation, the Maria Mitchell Association, and the Nantucket Atheneum.

The Old Mill (1940)

by Anne Ramsdell Congdon

CPC Recommends Grant of $400,000 for Greater Light

The NHA’s Greater Light property

August Antiques Show Chair Connie Cigarran 20 | Historic Nantucket

Greater Light, the house on Howard Street converted in the 1920s from an old cow and pig barn into the home of Quaker sisters Hanna and Gertrude Monaghan, has been an NHA property since 1970. As a focus of the NHA initiative Four Properties: Four Centuries, Greater Light has been recommended for a matching grant of $400,000 from the Town of Nantucket’s Community Preservation Committee. The NHA will commence a broad community-based campaign to raise support for the restoration of Greater Light. The Monaghan sisters hosted regular theatrical and musical performances, staged readings, and painted in the gardens of Greater Light, greatly contributing to the spirit of the Art Colony. Gertrude was herself an accomplished painter who rented out wharf studios alongside other Nantucket Art Colony artists.

August Antiques Show Lights, camera, auction! Mark your calendars for the thirtieth annual August Antiques Show (August 3–5). Proceeds of the August Antiques Show benefit the preservation initiatives and educational programming within the organization.

Managed by the Antiques Council, this year’s show will be chaired by Connie Cigarran. The show begins with the Preview Party on August 2 on the grounds of the Nantucket New School, 15 Nobadeer Farm Road. The Antiques Show cocktail party will be held on August 4 at “Moors End,” the home of Mrs. John K.Whitney. The dinner and live auction will follow at the Eleanor Ham Pony Field, including dancing and music by a seven-piece band. The live auction will feature five specially selected lifestyle items, “What Money Can’t Buy,” to be auctioned off to benefit the NHA.

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hts Year-Round Community Programs Free Brown Bag Lunch Series

Nathaniel Philbrick speaks at the Brown Bag Lunch Series

Fall and winter programming blossomed at the NHA with the November kick-off of the new Brown Bag Lunch Series. Initiated by executive director William J. Tramposch, the series features twenty-one “Conversations with Notable Nantucketers,” free to the public Thursdays at noon in the Discovery Room of the Whaling Museum. Among the speakers who have appeared to date are such Nantucket luminaries as Robert Mooney, Nathaniel Philbrick, Frances Karttunen, and Reggie Levine, speaking on topics ranging from the Great Fire of Bill Tramposch and Bob Mooney 1846 to the Art Colony of the twentieth century.

Songs and Stories: An Evening of Remembrance for Veterans

Veterans Gam

On the anniversary of the United States involvement in WWII, Pearl Harbor Day set the stage for Nantucket’s own Greatest Generation to partake in a special Veterans Gam. All Nantucketers who served their country were invited to attend. Introduced by music chosen

by Nantucket Community Music Center executive director Dr. Gerry Mack, veterans shared some of their personal memories of WWII. The superb musical talents of Bob Lehman and Patty O’Connor Kepenash, with Diane Lehman accompanying on the piano, filled the museum with the music of the era. It was a step back in time, enjoyed by prominent members of the Nantucket community.

A Celebration of Cape Verdean Culture In late August, the NHA hosted an evening of traditional Cape Verdean music and food in conjunction with the Nantucket premiere of the critically acclaimed documentary film “Some Kind of Funny Porto Rican? A Cape Verdean-American Story,” by Dr. Claire Andrade-Watkins.

The reception featured Cape Verdean food; live music by renowned island guitarist Jimmie Duarte; and vocals by Charlene, Christine, and Melanie Andrade. The evening was very well received, and the guest list was a wonderful cross-section of Nantucketers and many visitors from off-island.

Jammy Gam Sleepover

Jammy Gam Held in Whaling Museum

Whalers Football Fever at the NHA

For the first time in its history, the Whaling Museum hosted a sleepover with twenty students from the Nantucket New School.

Bill Tramposch and interpretation coordinator Sarah Bishop worked closely with Dave Provost, Head of School of the Nantucket New School, to ensure that the first Jammy Gam was an enjoyable and educational experience. Future Jammy Gams have been planned for the 2007 season.

On Thursday, November 16, Gosnell Hall was filled to capacity with guests attending the first sporting event held within the new museum. A Whaler Football Gam, led by everybody’s favorite island coach Vito Capizzo and island historian Bob Mooney, included short recollections from a number of ex-Whaler football players, and even some former Whaler cheerleaders.

GO WHALERS!

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News Notes & Highlights Painted Barrel Staves by Sally Nolan at the Museum Shop Sally Nolan continues the traditional artistry of her mother, Elizabeth Dean, who began painting old barrel staves for the NHA Museum Shop in the 1980s. Sally recalls the beginning of this family tradition: “We were living in the lakes region of New Hampshire, and a friend of my father, who loved to find things at the dump, gave him some old barrel staves one day, and said, ‘Can your wife do anything with these?’” He took the staves home to his wife, who made them the canvases for her paintings.

For her daughter Sally, the subject matter of whaling is a natural: “Barrels are so connected with whaling that I think that’s the reason the scenes of the Whale Hunt and Nantucket Sleighride are so popular.”

Sally Nolan’s painted barrel staves are available in the NHA Museum Shop. For more information about these and other museum shop gifts, please contact Georgina Winton at gwinton@nha.org, or (508) 228–5758.

New NHA Hires In December, NHA executive director William J.Tramposch announced that Kimberly H. McCray had been hired as Manager of Interpretation and Education. Having worked for the past six years at the Smithsonian Institution as the Public Programs Coordinator of the National Postal Museum, “she will bring great leadership assistance to our broad schedule of programs, and has enormous promise to be a leader in the national museum field.”

Kimberly H. McCray Tramposch also announced that acting curator Ben Simons has been named the new Robyn and John Davis Curator of Collections.

Simons has been with the NHA since 2002 and succeeds Niles Parker, who moved to Searsport, Maine, last August. Simons became acting curator upon Parker’s departure and assumed Mark Wilson and Ben Simons the new position January 1. The position was redefined to eliminate supervision of the Education Department. As the new Robyn and John Davis Curator of Collections, Simons will oversee the Research Library, artifact collections, exhibitions, and assist in fundraising efforts. In addition, Simons has been named editor of Historic Nantucket, and will serve as the key liaison with the Friends of the Nantucket Historical Association.

Tramposch also announced that Mark Wilson has been named Manager of Historic Resources. Wilson has been the NHA Collections Registrar since 2003, and will begin his new position January 1. “Mark will continue what he’s already undertaken on an informal basis, with the exception that he will now direct the Maintenance and Grounds staff as well,” said Tramposch. “Mark will oversee all NHA properties, our emergency preparedness efforts, and serve as our liaison with community preservation efforts. He will also continue writing grant requests to garner much-needed funding for our many NHA properties.”

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Festival of Wreaths and Trees Celebrating its eighth year, the Festival of Wreaths included seventyfive handmade wreaths by local artists, artisans, schoolchildren, nonprofits, and merchants. The 13th annual Festival of Trees featured seventy brilliantly decorated trees. “A terrific festival committee, the distinguished list of past chairs, and the current volunteer list were a testament to the importance of this seasonal event,” said NHA executive director William J.Tramposch. “We are extremely grateful to our generous underwriters and all those who make this festival possible.”

Early American Arts and Crafts at the 1800 House Featuring over thirty courses, the Early American Arts and Crafts educational programs at the restored 1800 House are dedicated to celebrating and reviving Nantucket’s rich tradition in historic decorative arts and crafts. Many of the classes were filled to capacity, and the entire program met with very favorable results from all who participated. The current schedule for spring and summer classes may be viewed online at www.nha.org/1800house.

Celebrate Your Event at the New Nantucket Whaling Museum The Nantucket Whaling Museum is the perfect blend of traditional Nantucket and state-of-the-art convenience. Located in the heart of town, the museum offers a climate-controlled environment that can accommodate dinner parties, cocktail receptions, and corporate-meeting needs. The rooftop observation deck imparts breathtaking views of Nantucket harbor, town, and beyond.

Immerse your guests in history at the Nantucket Whaling Museum. Exceptional events begin with unforgettable venues.

Contact Susan Beaumont at sbeaumont@nha.org or (508) 2281894 x 131 for more information.

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New ad TK

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THE HERITAGE SOCIETY Planning today for the NHA’s Tomorrow

Make the Gift of a Lifetime in 2007 with a Tax-free Charitable IRA Recent legislation allows you to make a tax-free transfer of your excess retirement assets to the Nantucket Historical Association—only in 2007.

If you are age 70 1⁄2 or older, you can roll over up to $100,000 from a traditional or Roth IRA directly to the Nantucket Historical Association.

This amount would be excluded from your income and taxes and count toward your mandatory IRA withdrawals. In addition, your heirs

would not be burdened later by the substantial taxes associated with inheriting an IRA. Making a gift to the NHA during your lifetime lets you see the results of your philanthropy.

Gifts may be directed to the permanent endowment or to a specific area of interest, such as the historic properties, the Whaling Museum, Research Library, 1800 House, or educational programs.

For further information, consult your financial professional or contact Judith Wodynski.

508 228 1894, ext. 111 email: jwodynski@nha.org

Historic Nantucket P.O. Box 1016, Nantucket, MA 02554-1016

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