Monsters of the Deep and Men Who Go Down to the Sea in Ships
Whaling and
Whalers at RGSSA Library
“...with
louely dart,
Dinting his brest, had bred
his restlesse paine,
Like as the wounded Whale to shore flies fro the maine.”
—Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queene,
Book VI, Canto X
A little while ago I was watching a
marvellous documentary about the history of American whaling on SBS, Into the Deep: Whaling and the World,
which inspired me to see what works on whaling the Royal Geographical Society
of South Australia Library holds. Turns out we have something of a
higgledy-piggledy selection, presumably acquired over the years without any
firm collection development policy in mind (serious librarians won’t approve!)—but
to a picker up of unconsidered trifles like me, this makes it more interesting.
Most of the whaling books do, however, sit
quite well with our huge collection of works on travel and exploration: never
mind the official version of history, it was in fact the whalers who first
ventured into large tracts of the oceans hitherto unexplored by Westerners.
When I was a kid growing up in New Zealand there was the most cursory mention
of “whalers and sealers” when we were being taught basic NZ history. These
“whalers and sealers” had had small settlements here and there on the coast,
evidently. But they obviously didn’t count. We all just absorbed this intel
automatically, like little goldfish in a tank opening their mouths as the manna
floats down from above—and I dare say most of us forgot it five minutes later,
too! But looking back the attitude strikes as really weird. Was it because the
whalers and sealers weren’t Permanent Settlers, come to Open Up New Lands, and didn’t
fit in with our perception of ourselves as the descendants of serious, determined,
hardworking, and far-sighted people out to hack a better life out of the bush for
themselves and their families? Certainly they weren’t Sent by the King to Open
Up New Lands, maybe that let them out. And they weren’t Missionaries come with the
serious purpose of Converting the Heathen, like “the Reverend Samuel Marsden.”—I
got so as I never wanted to hear that name again: it cropped up every year from
about age 9 to 15. (The funny thing was, no-one ever told us what denomination
he was.)—No, well, the whalers and sealers were just hard-working stiffs, doing
a dirty, difficult, at times very boring and at other times very dangerous job.
Working-class blokes like all our ancestors, in fact! It’s a funny old world,
isn’t it?
One of the things I really liked
about the documentary was the way it examined Herman Melville’s attitude to the
men he worked with when he shipped aboard a whaler (or several—he jumped ship a
couple of times and was thrown in clink once, too). He was a true egalitarian
and found there was real solidarity amongst the men, and in most of them an innate
sense of decency. No doubt they were as dirty, ugly and contumacious as the
rest of humanity, but Melville’s great virtue for his times was that he saw
them as real people.
“The City that Lit
The World”*
 |
| Historic Buildings of New Bedford |
Whaling is of course an horrific trade, but
in the 18th and 19th centuries it was an extremely important aspect of world
commerce and, I was fascinated to learn from the aforesaid dokko, a major
factor in turning the United States into a global economic power—at one point
in the earlier 19th century New Bedford in Massachusetts, which had become a
centre for the Nantucket whalers, was the wealthiest city in the world! The
Civil War destroyed many ships of the great American whaling fleet, and by that
time oil had been discovered in Pennsylvania and the heyday of the whale-oil
lamp was over. The whaling industry began to decline, and though it was to
continue into the 20th century, killing even greater numbers of whales with the
development of the mechanized harpoon, it was no longer a dominant factor in
the global economy.
You can read more about the whalers from
New England in:
Verrill, A. Hyatt (Alpheus Hyatt), 1871-1954. The real
story of the whaler / by A. Hyatt Verrill. New York: Appleton, 1916.
xv, 248 p.
* See the description of New Bedford, in “Localities”, History of Whaling, Wikipedia, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_whaling
Spermaceti?
Really?
“What spermacetti is, men might justly doubt, since the learned
Hosmannus in his work of thirty years, saith plainly, Nescio quid sit.”
—Sir Thomas
Browne, Pseudodoxia Epidemica (1646) (or Vulgar Errors), quoted by Hermann Melville, Moby Dick,
Chapter 135, “Epilogue”.
I found out why the name “spermaceti”: inside the sperm whale’s head, which is where the poor creature stores the fluid, it is a clear liquid, but on exposure to the air it becomes opaque, resembling sperm! The whales were so huge that, having stripped them of their blubber, peeling off great slabs which could weigh a ton, and hoisted the hacked-off giant heads alongside (as Melville vividly describes, they were often too heavy to haul aboard), the whalers would sometimes actually get inside the head to release the prized oil. It was a double whammy for the poor sperm whales, as they are the ones with ambergris in their gut, still used today by many perfume manufacturers, although there are synthetic alternatives. (Unfortunately there don’t seem to be any regulations about listing this on the bottles, so if you’re thinking of buying an expensive and I must admit delicious French perfume, you might like to think again.) The American Cetacean Society provides a nice Fact Sheet on the sperm whale, which was the species in Melville’s Moby Dick. It’s suitable for teaching purposes and may be downloaded: http://www.acsonline.org/factpack/spermwhl.htm
“lump of tissue in sperm whale, containing spermaceti.”
The Wonderful Whalers From Whitby: William Scoresby x 2
I thought I was going nuts when I started
checking our bibliographic records for William Scoresby (1789-1857), because
although the dates were the same, there seemed to be two different men
involved: one was a whaler and one was a clergyman! Could the entries on the
Libraries Australia database possibly be wrong? Well, in this instance, no.
I’ve now found out that there were
two whalers called William Scoresby, and they were father and son—but our
William, who is the younger, was in fact both a whaler and a clergyman.
Extraordinary, isn’t it? He was an
extraordinary man, and so was his father.
 |
| William Scoresby, Snr., (L.) & Jnr. (R.) |
They came of farming stock near Whitby in
Yorkshire, England. (Yep, if you’re thinking of Captain Cook you’re not wrong!)
William Scoresby, the father (1760-1829), was the first to break with tradition
and go to sea. Maybe the family wasn’t badly off, by the standards of the day,
but William didn’t have much formal education: he left school when he was
only 9. He was working for another farmer and it was this man’s treatment of
him that drove him to run away to sea, round 1779-80. By 1785 he had joined a whaling ship and
thereafter whaling became his trade. By 1790, when he was only 30, he had
become captain of the ship and in the course of his 30 trips until his
retirement in 1822 racked up a score—he was well named, yes—of 533 whales,
making him Whitby’s most successful whaling captain.* And a very rich
man—whaling captains weren’t in it for fun—or for revenge, à la Melville.
It sounds as if he was both an energetic and
an intelligent man, as well as an adventurous one. Whitby-ites claim him as the
man who invented the ship’s “crow’s-nest”. (It seems obvious after the event to
stick a railed platform up the mast, but it was one of those things that nobody
else had thought of. His design was a wooden-framed box covered with canvas and
leather, and it afforded the best possible view of the whales. There was a
hatch at its base, so as you didn’t have to risk your life by climbing over its
side, and Scoresby put in a telescope and a speaking trumpet—very cluey!)
He wasn’t a posh Royal Navy captain with an
influential family, and he didn’t get a “sir” like the Rosses, uncle and
nephew, to name but two of the polar captains with gongs, but his voyage of
1806 sailed to 520 miles from the North Pole (Lat. 81º 30'), which was a record
for a ship. The record stood for 21 years, and even then that expedition went
part of the way over the ice, not by ship. Incidentally, Scoresby taught
himself navigation, determinedly reading up on the topic from the age of 19,
while he was waiting out the winter to ship aboard, and carrying on studying as
a common seaman, regardless of the jeers of his peers. He was a big man, very
strong, and could have clobbered them easily, but held back until the time two
of the cowards attacked him together, when he routed both of them, in fact
laying one out cold. After that he was not only left only, he was respected. **
The online newsletter, The Whitby Seagull, describes him as “a
forward thinker ... [who] became involved in Whitby public life in 1816.” He
was a member of the Whitby Literary & Philosophical Society, a churchgoer, and
quite a philanthropist, paying for a public pump to help the poor who were
short of water. “Some of his ideas were considered too radical for the day but
ironically since 1828 many of his far-sighted schemes have been carried out in
modern times just as he had laid down originally. He believed that the
unemployed could be paid to deepen the harbour, build quays and construct a new
bridge.” *** It’s amazing to think that this was the boy who left school at 9
years of age. Everything he knew he taught himself. No wonder that his son was
so proud of him that he wrote a book about him! **
William Scoresby (1789-1857)
was equally adventurous and even brighter. The title page of his memoir of his
father refers to him as: “The Rev. William Scoresby, D.D., Fellow of the Royal
Societies of London and Edinburgh; Member of the Institute of France; of the American
Institute, Philadelphia, etc. etc.” Well done, William, Jnr.! And let’s not
forget that you had an intelligent father who obviously encouraged you to work
hard and study hard.
Scoresby, William, 1789-1857. The Arctic whaling journals of
William Scoresby the younger / edited by C. Ian Jackson London :
Hakluyt Society, 1811-1820. (Works issued by the Hakluyt Society. 3rd ser. ; v.
12, 20, 21) 3 v.
Scoresby, William, 1789-1857. An account of the Arctic regions
with a history and description of the northern whale-fishery / by W.
Scoresby. Illustrated with twenty-four engravings. Edinburgh : Printed for A.
Constable & Co.; [etc.] 1820. 2 v.
The picture shows an episode at Spitsbergen
in 1816 when the ship’s hull was stove
in by an underwater projection from an iceberg. William’s attempt to turn it
upside-down for proper repairs didn’t work, they only got it on its side (you
can see the men hauling at it), so he had to stuff the hole instead.
Scoresby, William, 1789-1857. Journal of a voyage to the
northern whale-fishery : including researches and discoveries on the eastern
coast of west Greenland, made in the summer of 1822, in the ship Baffin of
Liverpool / by William Scoresby Junior. London : Hurst, Robinson and Co
1823. xliii, 472 p.
Young William started off as a
bad little boy who stowed away on his dad’s ship at the age of 11. You can
imagine the scene! Not to mention what his poor mum must have felt when she
found he’d disappeared! They were headed north via the Shetlands and his father tried to leave him there rather
than take him on the risky trip to arctic waters, but he found a boatman to
take him out to the ship again just as she was leaving. His father gave in and
let him come. By 1803 he’d taken young William on as a proper apprentice. They
went whaling together, the younger William eventually captaining his own ship, until the father retired.
Whalers in the northern
hemisphere had to lay off for the winter, and during several of these periods
young Scoresby attended classes in natural philosophy and chemistry at
Edinburgh University. I wonder how he got on there, amongst the sons of the proper
upper-middle class? However difficult it might have been socially,
intellectually he was obviously very, very bright. Whaling life consists of
long periods of boredom alternated with short bursts of frantic activity—not
only chasing and catching the whales but stripping them (“flenching” or
flensing”), boiling the blubber, and extracting the spermaceti oil or the
whalebone. (Different species. Sperm whales are toothed whales. Baleen
whales—blue, grey and right whales—have the whalebone.) William kept up his
studies at sea during the slow times. There’s quite a full article on him in
Wikipedia**** which tells us that in 1807 he “began the study of the
meteorology and natural history of the polar regions. Earlier results included
his original observations on snow and crystals; and in 1809 Robert Jameson
brought certain Arctic papers of his before the Wernerian Society of Edinburgh,
which at once elected him to its membership.” 1809? He’d only have been 20! Imagine how proud and thrilled he and
his dad must both have been!
His studies continued along with his whaling.
By the mid-1810’s he was married, captaining a ship, and researching the
temperature of the polar ocean: he was the first to establish that it’s warmer
at a great depth than on the surface. If you’ve read anything about the search
for the Northwest Passage you’ll know that it loomed large in the naval and
scientific minds of the time, but you may not know that it was William Scoresby
who gave the whole thing its initial impetus by pointing out to Sir Joseph
Banks, with whom he was now corresponding, that as ice levels in the Greenland
region were relatively low in 1817, now would be the time. Sir John Barrow’s
sending out the first of the Royal Naval Northwest Passage expeditions in 1818
was in direct response to Banks’s intel.
William’s book of 1820, An account of the Arctic regions with a
history and description of the northern whale-fishery, includes not
only descriptions of his adventures during his voyages, but a lot of scientific
detail on ice forms and arctic zoology. He provides pictures of narwhals, polar
bears and the beluga whale or white whale, a smaller toothed whale found in
arctic waters.
By the time the book came out William had been elected a fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh and was contributing a paper to the Royal Society: On the Anomaly in the Variation of the Magnetic Needle—an interest which was to continue for some time.
His whaling trip to Greenland in 1822 was to
be his last. Like Captain Cook (they had a lot more than Whitby in common) he
was an excellent cartographer: the charts he made during this trip were the
first accurate ones of the eastern coast of Greenland. It’s this trip which is
described in his second whaling book, also held by the RGSSA Library: Journal of a voyage to the northern
whale-fishery : including researches and discoveries on the eastern coast of
west Greenland, made in the summer of 1822, in the ship Baffin of Liverpool.
When he got back he found that
his wife (his first wife) had died. Presumably this was an influence which prompted
him to take Holy Orders. He was, in any case, a religious man, and his
biography of his father stresses throughout the influence of a benevolent Providence.
William had posts as a vicar in
various parts of England, eventually settling in Torquay with his third wife.
He kept up his scientific studies and his religious ones, gaining his D.D. in 1839.
He had been a Fellow of the Royal Society since 1824, and in 1827 became an honorary
corresponding member of the Académie des sciences. He was an active member of the British Association for the
Advancement of Science (founded in 1831). He
had a wide-ranging mind, and researched the topic of optics as well as keeping
up his interest in terrestrial magnetism, producing many papers on it.
Although his days as a whaler were over, he was
still interested in arctic exploration. One of the big topics of the period was
the fate of Sir John Franklin’s arctic expedition, an incredible number of
other expeditions being despatched in search of its remains, and in 1850
William published a work urging that the search be continued, with his conclusions
about arctic navigation from his own
experience. His days at sea weren’t over, either: he went to America in 1844
and 1848. Being William Scoresby, he didn’t just sit back aboard, but made
scientific observations on the height of the Atlantic waves. In 1856 the
terrestrial magnetism thing still beckoned and he sailed to Australia in quest
of more data. (The visit is commemorated by the name of the Melbourne suburb, Scoresby.)
His scientific report was published posthumously; RGSSA Library also holds this
work:
Scoresby, William,
1789-1857. Journal of a voyage to Australia and round the world, for magnetical
research / by the Rev. W. Scoresby ; edited by Archibald Smith. London
: Longman, Green, Longman, & Roberts, 1859. xlviii, 96, 315, 24 p.
William took after his father in taking an
active interest in social problems. He must have been one of those people with
relentless energy. His picture certainly looks as if he was: a wiry, keen, yet
thoughtful man. He published on religious topics as well as all his other
interests, so if you look him up in a very big catalogue you may well find such
works as Zoistic Magnetism and Jehovah Glorified in His Works
listed together with the whaling books under Scoresby, William, 1789-1857!
* Some of the
information about the senior William Scoresby
is from The Scoresby Page, which
also gives the family’s genealogy and mentions a link, curiously enough, to
South Australia: http://www.users.on.net/~rdblair/scoresby.htm
** This story is
recounted by William Jnr. in Memorials of
the Sea : My Father : Being Records of the Adventurous Life of the Late William
Scoresby, Esq. of Whitby / by his son. London : Longman, Brown, Green, and
Longmans, 1851. The other references quoted take most of their material from
this biography. It is available to download free from Gutenberg Books: http://www.gutenberg.org/3/5/1/8/35183
*** The Whitby
Seagull, http://www.thewhitbyseagull.co.uk/famous_people_and_whitby_william_scoresby_senior.html
**** William Scoresby, Wikipedia
SOME MORE OF THE
BOOKS
Here are some more of the RGSSA’s interesting
titles in the order in which, more or less, they were written (not necessarily
the date of publication, as you’ll see).
The Very Early
Days
17th Century
Edge, Thomas, d. 1624. A brief discouerie of the northerne
discoueries of seas, coasts, and counties, deliuered in order as they were
hopefully begunne, and haue euer since happily beene continued by the singular
industrie and charge of the worshipfull society of Muscouia merchants of
London, with the ten seuerall voyages of Captaine Thomas Edge the author. In:
Purchas, Samuel, 1577?-1626. Purchas his
Pilgrimes. London : Printed by William Stansby for Henrie Fetherstone, 1625,
vol.. 3, book 3, p. 462-473.
The work by Purchas is variously known as
“Purchas his Pilgrimes” or more often “Purchas his Pilgrimage.” RGSSA holds
several editions with variations of the title. Edge’s description of whaling,
quoted by Melville in the Epilogue,
gives an idea of the size of the whale’s head:
“While the whale is floating at the stern of the ship,
they cut off his head, and tow it with a boat as near the shore as it will
come; but it will be aground in twelve or thirteen feet [of] water.”
Thomas Edge (1587 or 88 - 1624) was an English whaler
and sealer working for the London-based Muscovy Company in the earlier 17th
century (which at that period claimed Spitsbergen for Britain.) His work
published in Purchas’s collection of early voyages and discoveries recounts
several of his whaling expeditions in the decade 1610-1620. He was a leading
captain, being in command of more than one ship and from 1613 commander or
co-commander of the English fleet: by that time, therefore, he must already
have been a successful and experienced sailor and trader. During the voyages
his ships encountered all the hazards of arctic waters, including unstable ice,
groundings, a boat’s getting separated from the fleet, a ship’s capsizing, and
unfriendly encounters with rival Danish and Dutch ships. They hunted walrus as
well as whales. Edge did extremely well out of his adventures and was able to
buy two properties and to retire comfortably. As a measure of his success, he
reports that on his 1611 trip their first catch of a Bowhead whale, “yielded
twelve Tuns of oil, being the first Oil that ever was made in Greenland.”* He
is remembered by the naming of Edgeøya or Edge Island, which the English
whalers rediscovered in 1616.
* Wikipedia http://en.wuikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Edge
Gerritsz, Hessel, 1581?-1632 and Brugge, Jacob Segersz
van der, fl. 1634. Early Dutch and English voyages to Spitsbergen in the seventeenth
century / edited with introduction and notes by Sir W. Martin Conway.
London : Printed for the Hakluyt Society 1904. (Works issued by the Hakluyt
Society ; no. 11) xvi, 191 p.
Contents: Histoire du Pays nommé
Spitsberghe / Hessel Gerritszoon van Assum ; translated into English by Basil
H. Soulsby -- Journael of Dach-register gehouden by seben Matroosen in haer
Overwinteren op Spitsbergen in Maurits-Bay / Jacob Segersz. van der Brugge ;
translated into English by J.A.J. de Villiers.
Spitsbergen, which
is the largest island of the Svalbard archipelago, now belonging to Norway, borders
the Arctic Ocean, the Norwegian Sea and the Greenland Sea. It was a great
whaling base for centuries: the picture shown under Scoresby’s An account of the Arctic regions with a
history and description of the northern whale-fishery is a scene there.
Edge’s whaling ventures were based there.
Here Be
Whales: The Growth of an Industry,
18th-early
19th centuries
Personal
Accounts:
1839
Beale, Thomas, 1807-1849. The natural history of the sperm
whale : its anatomy and physiology, food, spermaceti, ambergris, rise and
progress of the fishery, chase and capture, “cutting in” and “trying out”,
description of the ships, boats, men, and instruments used in the attack; with
an account of its favourite places of resort, to which is added a Sketch of a
South-Sea whaling voyage, embracing a description of the extent, as well as the
adventures and accidents that occurred during the voyage, in which the author
was personally engaged / by Thomas Beale. [2nd ed.] London : John van
Voorst 1839. [12], 393 p.
 |
| Beale’s illustration “Boats attacking whales”: it reappears in different forms in the literature |
This second, very much enlarged edition of
Beale’s book was immensely popular with the reading public, and provided
Melville with some of his background for Moby
Dick. Beale was not a scientist but a medical man; nevertheless his
scientific data was a valuable contribution to the knowledge of the time.
The
graphic story below of one of the whaling boats being attacked by a sperm whale
is typical of the exciting content of the less scientific sections of the work.
It also describes exactly how a whale is first harpooned, then chased, then
lanced. Because the lance is aimed at the lungs, the poor thing in effect
chokes to death on its own blood. It is horrific, yes. What the whalers call
its “flurry” is in fact its death throes.
 |
| “Lancing the whale” – another picture which was reprinted many times |
“Captain Swain, with twelve men in one
boat, therefore made another attack upon the whale with the lance which caused
it to throw up blood from the blow-hole in increased quantities. ... Soon after
the arrival of the third boat, the whale went into its flurry and soon died,
when, to the dismay of the boats’ crews, who had endured so much danger and
hardship in its capture, it sunk, and never rose again...”
1840
Bennett, Frederick Debell. Narrative of a whaling voyage
round the globe, from the year 1833-1836 : comprising sketches of Polynesia,
California, the Indian Archipelago, etc. with an account of southern whales,
the sperm whale fishery, and the natural history of the climates visited. London
: Richard Bentley, 1840. 2 v.
Bennett was another source used by Melville
in Moby Dick. Here is the quotation
he gives in his “Epilogue” (Chapter 135): “The Cachalot (Sperm Whale) is not
only better armed than the True Whale (Greenland or Right Whale) in possessing
a formidable weapon at either extremity of its body, but also more frequently
displays a disposition to employ these weapons offensively and in manner at
once so artful, bold, and mischievous, as to lead to its being regarded as the
most dangerous to attack of all the known species of the whale tribe.” –The interpolations
in brackets are Melville’s.
Historical Study of the Period:
1913
McNab, Robert,
1864-1917. The old whaling days : a history of Southern New Zealand from 1830 to
1840. Christchurch, N.Z. : Whitcombe and Tombs, 1913. 508 p.
Good for McNab! At least someone recognised that there
were Europeans in NZ before those famous “Early Settlers”! Pity no-one took
much notice of the fact.
Floreat Physeter:
The Whaling Industry as a Global Powerhouse, mid-19th century
Science and Economics:
1849
Enderby, Charles, 1798?-1876. The Auckland Islands : a short
account of their climate, soil, & productions : and the advantages of
establishing there a settlement at Port Ross for carrying on the southern whale
fisheries / by Charles Enderby. London : Pelham Richardson, 1849. iv, [vi] 57 p.
1851
Wall, William S. (William Sheridan). History
and description of the skeleton of a new sperm whale lately set up in the Australian Museum
;
together with some account of a new genus of sperm whale called Euphysetes.
Sydney : W.R. Piddington, 1851. 66 p.
Personal Accounts:
There was a great fashion in the 19th
century for writing the “journal” or “diary” of one’s adventures. Not all of
these got published at the time, true, as we can see from the examples below.
However, in the later part of the century true-life accounts of whaling
adventures, non-fiction or fictionalized, remained as popular as they had been
when Melville’s novels Typee (1846), Omoo (1847), and Mardi
(1849) first came out. The romanticized aura of such stories of derring-do in
the South Seas had great appeal. But Melville’s Moby Dick, a much more serious and wide-ranging book, which
includes a lot of references to the non-fiction works he consulted in his
research, was panned by the critics of the day and sank like a stone. It was
not to be until the anniversary of his birth in 1919 that the book would be
rediscovered and its author recognised as one of America’s greatest writers.
1860s-1870s
Hempleman, George, d. 1880, and Anson, F. A. (Frederick
Arthur). The Piraki log (e Pirangi ahau koe), or, Diary of Captain Hempleman :
with introduction, glossary, illustrations and map / by the present
owner. London : H. Frowde, Oxford University Press, [1910?]
Markham, Albert Hastings, Sir, 1841-1918. A
whaling cruise to Baffin’s Bay and the Gulf of Boothia, and an account of the
rescue of the crew of the Polaris. London : S. Low, Marston, Low and
Searle, 1874. xxiv, 319 p.
Smith, Charles Edward, 1838-1879. From the deep of the sea : being
the diary of the late Charles Edward Smith, M.R.C.S., surgeon of the whale-ship
Diana, of Hull / edited by his son, Charles Edward Smith Harris. London
: A. & C. Black, 1922. xi, 288 p.
20TH
CENTURY: FROM SCIENCE TO WHALE-WATCHING
 |
| Sperm whale (foreground) and bottle-nosed whale |
Serious Stuff: 20th-Century
Science
1912
Waite, Edgar R. (Edgar Ravenswood), 1866-1928. Guide
to the whales and dolphins of New Zealand : with special reference to the skeletons
of the Okarito Whale and the cast of the Allandale Whale in the Canterbury
Museum. Christchurch, N.Z. : Canterbury College (University of New Zealand), 1912. 21 p.
1998
Lawrence, Susan and Staniforth, Mark, 1957- (eds.) The
archaeology of whaling in Southern Australia and New Zealand. Gundaroo,
N.S.W. : Brolga Press for the Australasian Society for Historical Archaeology
and the Australian Institute for Maritime Archaeology, 1998. (Special
publication (Australian Institute for
Maritime Archaeology) ; no. 10). 115 p.
Personal Accounts:
1939
Gottgens, Tommy. Dad's diary : the chronicle of an insurance salesman who went whaling. Claremont,
South Africa : Pretext 1998. 99 p.
One of the most unusual items in the collection. It is held only in South Australia and I couldn't find it listed online elsewhere, not even by the National Library of South Africa. The author is the “Dad” of the title, Tommy Gottgens. He was a Dutchman who settled in South Africa. In 1939 the South African economy was at a low ebb and he took a job on board a Danish whaling ship so as to support his family. The diary simply recounts the day-to-day details of his whaling life—with quite an emphasis on the meals, which were clearly the highlights of each day! The food was surprisingly good and would doubtless have astounded the whalers of the 19th century. Tommy was obviously a very bright man: he’d travelled quite widely and spoke 7 languages including several Asian languages. And he was very capable and conscientious: they had a wait before leaving South Africa and he stayed aboard and put in some hard yacker, so the captain made him a foreman. This meant he didn’t get some of the dirtier jobs once they started whaling, like cleaning out the barrels, which were so smelly that they made several of the men feel faint. Tommy doesn’t complain but he mentions his aching muscles: the works seems to have been as hard and dirty as it was 100 years before. The Danish ship was designed in Germany and as World War II had broken out, in order to protect her the captain had her decked out as a German warship—extraordinary!. It must have worked, though. The diary wasn’t published until 1998 because Tommy wouldn’t let the family read it, although it had been written with them in mind. But it recounts nothing shocking—perhaps, as he was a modest man, he just felt shy about letting the kids reads his literary effort. It’s an easy read—very different from Melville’s overblown style!
Telling the Tale: Stories for
Big & Little People:
1928
Bootes, Henry H. (Henry Hedger) Deep-sea bubbles, or, The cruise
of the Anna Lombard. London : Ernest Benn, 1928. 261 p.
A fictitious account of a
voyage in a 19th-century whaling-ship.
1985
Nesdale, Iris. The bay whalers / Ira Nesdale ;
illustrated by Joan Saint. Kenthurst, [N.S.W.] : Kangaroo Press, 1985. 112 p.
An exciting story for children
of whaling in small boats off the South Australian coast in the mid-19th
century.
History of Whaling At Home & Abroad:
1924
Hawes, Charles Boardman, 1889-1923. Whaling. London :
Heinemann, 1924. 358 p.
1926
Cook, John Atkins. Pursuing the whale : a quarter century of
whaling in the Arctic. London : Murray, 1926. 344 p.
1969
Colwell, Max. Whaling around Australia. Adelaide :
Rigby [1969] 168, [10] p.
1980
Kerr, Margaret and
Kerr, Colin, 1912-1982. Australia's early whalemen. Adelaide
: Rigby 1980. (Pageant of Australia) 64
p.
Looking Back: Local History, South Australia
1947
Borrow, K. T. (Keith Travers). Whaling at Encounter Bay.
Adelaide : Pioneers' Association of S.A, [1947] [16] p.
1981
Parsons, Ronald, 1923-
Port Lincoln shipping : whalers, disasters, and the sea link with Adelaide. Magill [S. Aust.]
: R.H. Parsons 1981. iii, 73 p.
Whale Watching in South
Australia:
1999
Royal Geographical Society of South Australia. To
the whales and back, 12 to 18 September, 1999. [Adelaide] : Royal
Geographical Society of South Australia Inc., [1999]
41 leaves.
Notes to accompany a coach tour to Eyre Peninsula and
the head of the Great Australian Bight to watch whales.
~~~~~~~
Have I bored on
too long about the whalers and their books? Mm. Call me Ishmael.
--
This post was researched and created by Kathy Boyes
No comments:
Post a Comment