ntil I read the book Whaling Letters, I thought I was pretty well acquainted with the whaling era in this country and, in particular, of whaling out of N ew Bedford and southern N ew England. I remember going aboard Charles W Morgan at Round Hill in the mid-1930s and watching the replica of Lagoda bein g built at the Whaling Museum . Yes, I knew a lot of whaling history, but it was all the history of ships and whales, cargoes of oil, faraway places, shipwrecks, vessels frozen in ice, and yes, mutiny. What I had never realized was the love and anguish between those at sea for years on end and the wives and children left at home. These letters gave me an insight into the emotional stress and strains that these lengthy voyages placed upon hundreds of marriages. A short whaling voyage might last a little more than a year, but this was the exception. Most ran three years or more (one, the whaling ship James A llen, lasted five years and four months!). Letters
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Whaling Letters was compiled and edited by Genevieve D arden (1915-2003)
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or men who went ro sea in search of whales and fo r fam ilies they left behind, the co rrespo ndence between them created links in a precious chain that bound them rogether through long periods of separation. Som e fa milies saved these letters for generatio ns, and th e sro ries within them gradually worked their way into family folklore. So it was with the exchange of letters between Captain Francis Post of New Bedford and his wife, Ruth (Barker) Post over a twenty-year span in th e earl y 1800s. In a letter ro his mother and sisters, written aboard the ship Hydaspe in 1841 , Captain Post wrote: '1 stopped at home so long to enjoy the advantages ofa water-level, that I found the smell of bilge-water, and the eternal tossing about at first anything but agreeable; though I soon learnt to regard the ocean as an 'auld acquaintance' . .. but I shall never regret the year spent at home; it passed very quietly and pleasantly and, I might add, speedily away. ... And moreover I was pleased with the thought that Ruth's time must needs pass more pleasantly away with her poor babe, if God spare its life, than has been the case with her while I have been absent on my other voyages. " The following correspondence between my great-grandparents illustrates the diffulities a seafarin g life, and whaling in par ticular, imposed on marriage and fam ily. Studying these letters has given me a connection with both my family his-
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rory and the broader hisrory of American whaling itself. We share these with yo u in hopes that their personal experiences will add ro yo ur understanding of a valuable era in our nation's hisrory. - Irving R. Post, Sharon, Massachusetts
"Everyone is asleep and it is so still I can hear my heart beat, it seems as if I must hear yo u speak, as Frank said last sabbath Morning when we was all raking a look at yo ur likeness, he said now let me take it, he looked at it very earnest for a moment and then raised his eyes, Ma, sa id he, pa is going ro speak ro me, he has go t his lips open now, I will put it ro my ear I can hear him whisper if he don't speak loud." Ir was early September of 185 0 and the bark Eliza Thornton , perhaps the first command of Captain Francis Post which was not a whaler, was lade n with cargo and bound for San Francisco. Many New Bedford ships, so me of them co nverted whaling vessels, fo llowed the same path in that decade. The greater part of the lure, hisrorians say, was gold, but gold or whales-the effect on families was the same. Especially, perhaps, on wives like Ruth Barker Post, who was left in New Bedford with three children, what seems ro have been a slim pocketbook, and the prospect of having ro give up her home. "I expect every day ro hear the summons ro move our of this house, the house
is up at auction , so yo u must expect ro find a house upon the fruit tree lot when yo u return , and I hope you will return soon not ro leave us again." Captain Post's whaling career had begun twenty-seven years before, when he reached the age of fifteen. By the rime he was twenty-four he was master of the whaler Huntress, recently married ro Ruth Barker, and well into a way of life which was of course renowned for keeping m en away from home. As his wife expressed it in the first of those 1850 and 185 1 letters: "Do yo u ever think of the number of years that has passed away since we was married and not but a few months of that time have we spent rogerher, and ye t I do not wish ro complain, bur I do hope we shall soon be permitted ro sit down and enj oy a few ho urs rogerher from this wearring anxiety." The "wearring anxiety" may have been rooted in money worries-Captain Post was on his ninth voyage our of New Bedford and his fortunes, like those of man y mariners, rose and ebbed during those risky m id-century years-in the loneliness endemic among wives of that period, or perhaps in concern for the health of her yo unger son: " ... the children have come in they have been up ro see Tom Th umb, and such a confusion I have seldom heard, and little Willie oh you should see him oh he is so cute and so good and we all love him dearly, I fear we think so much of him, he is affiicted with that SEA HISTORY 109, WINTER 2004-2005