Columbus Series: Grace Under Pressure This note is about Sea History's eightpart series on Columbus. I just finished the last in stallment, put it down , and took a deep breath to mark considerable admiration. In the latest three years it has been my fate , like th at of man y other editors , writers and museum folk , to wade throu g h a clutch of books about Columbus, to di sc uss 500th anniversary programs by a half dozen organizations, and , in my case , to write a long piece on 1492 for Smithsonian while commissioning and editing several others. In the process I ' ve become pretty well Columbused out. Even so, I read Peter Stanford on Columbus with pleasure. Graceful , hi storicall y informed in a time of galloping " presentism ," evenhanded in the midst of pernicious political correctness and accessible to the general reader, the seri es is a deli ght for anyone who cares about hi story or sailing. It is the best brief and popular accounting I've come across. Magazine iss ues get lost, however. Is there a way yo u guys could print it all up ' together and make it available at a reasonable price to the membership? TIMOTHY FOOTE Board of Editors Smithsonian Magazine I have read the latest work in the seri es on Columbus in the Autumn iss ue of Sea History. I want to te ll yo u what a splendid job has been done with thi s effort. The extremists have had entire ly too much to say about their own inte rests and biases, failing completely to take a bal anced view.By contrast, Peter Stanford's seri es has given the proper credit due to thi s remarkable man , at the same time acknowledging hi s flaw s. It is vital , of course, as yo u have pointed out, to realize that Columbus was a man of hi s times and made no real pretension of being anything other than a capable seaman , a good navigator, and one with a spirit of adventure. (It 's of interest to note that even our own President George Washington was not without weaknesses). I think these writings would be worth assembling into a publication of some kind before the era passes into hi story once more. ROBERT W. HUBNER Butler's Island Darien , Connecticut SEA HISTORY 64, WINTER 1992-93
From Sea-Foam By some intervention of Poseidon your editors create contents of Sea History from sea-foam-like Aphrodite. The Autumn issue attests to your prowess: li ghthou ses; Netherland waterways-hi story plu s vivid travel ; the Bo s ton-Li ve rpool race and the Kru zenshtern ' s tests of US hospitality. Finall y, but really first, Peter Stanford's statesmanlike and va lid retrospective of Christopher Columbus and his milieu! Congratulations. SID EYW.DEAN , JR . New York, New York Let's Hear It for Stan Hugill, the Shantyman In the Summer issue of Sea History , I was pleased to see John Townley 's appreciation of the life of my great friend Stan Hu gill. I would like to add a little more to thi s acco unt, in particular his life as a shantyman. Stan co ll ected shanties from all he met over 20 yea rs at sea; and in the Caribbean he met co lorful characters like Harding the Barbad ian Barbari an, a black singer from whom he learnt the vocal hitches which he used to great effect in folk c lubs, and which no singer has been able to successfull y copy. In the early 1950s, when a foundation was set up to put the 4-masted barks Pamir and Passat to sea again, he was involved in the training of the first crews and had connections with Kurt Hahn , the then-headmaster of Gordonstoun. It was Kurt who said he should write the shanties down before they were lost, and fate took a hand when he fell over a wa ll and broke a leg, which led to the eventual publication of Shanties from the Se ven Seas, published in l 961. Thi s book was to become the " bible" for a new breed of enthusiastic shanty singers . Following hi s discovery by the folk world , he was much in demand at clubs and festival s up and down the country and hi s fame was spreading abroad. He was in demand in Holland, France and latte rly Poland , where a whole new shanty culture grew up, with hi s Shantiesfr om the Seven Seas being translated into Poli sh and being sung by youngsters of 16 to 20 years of age. I stood on a stage in Cracow to hear chants of "S tachu , Stachu," the diminuti ve of Stanislaw (S tanley) from as man y as 2,500 adoring fans . It was a breathtaking moment. I would also offer these corrections to John Townley ' s account. Stan Hug ill
died on the 13th of May, not the 15th, and , unfortunately, hi s family was not with him when he died , but on their way to visit. Also, the Garthpool was not the last British commercial sq uare rigger, but the last deep waterman under the British flag. She sailed on the 23rd of October 1929 and was wrecked Armistice Day of that year, November 11 , at Ponta Reef, Cape Yerde- 1927 was not the year of her wrecking. "Fire Down Below" was indeed the last shanty sung aboard, but Stan told me man y times that it was sung a week or so before, and not on the day of the wrecking. CHRIS ROCHE Surrey, England
Dra wing by Sran Hugill
I enjoyed John Townley ' s article on Stan Hugill in yourSummeredition immensely. I'm doing research for a book on the yac ht Black Douglas, which was built for my father, Robert Roebling , by the Bath Iron Works and launched in June 1930. In November of that year, my parents departed on a trip aboard her around South America, which took them through the Straits of Magellan. On the way, they experienced both crew as well as engine difficulti es , and stopped in Trinidad. The engine was repaired and the crew replaced . One of the sailors making up the new crew was none other than Stan Hug ill! Stan remained with the ship through the Straits, did a beautiful pen and ink drawing of her there, and departed in Montevideo , when the call of the Argentine beckoned. He contacted my mother and father from pri son camp during WWII , through the Red Cross, and they sent relief packages, including art supplies, up until the time we entered the war and this avenue was shut off. For years we thought he had become a war casualty, but in June of 1991 , when I was gathering information at the Maine Maritime Museum , I di scovered that I had just mi ssed one of Stan ' s fa mous shanty programs at Bath, by abo ut two weeks! I called him immediately and in Au-
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