The Phillips encountered unsettled weather when it entered the Gulf Stream. The storm escalated into a raging hurricane, bur the battered Phillips was seaworthy and rhe equally bartered seamen proved themselves competent. The remainder of the voyage south to rhe Horn challenged them wirh inrermi ttent gales and occasional doldrums but did nor become frightening until they reached the Strait of Magellan. There, rhe crew struggled against fierce winds, strong currenrs, and towering waves to pass the stark Cape Virgin and Tierra de! Fuego to Punta Arenas, Chile, where they put in for rest, repairs, and provisions. In Winchester's Experience on a Voyagefrom Lynn, Punta Arenas, they found a buyer for their Mass. to San Francisco, Cal and to the Alaskan coal who was willing to purchase their balGold Fields, 1900). last at a good price. As rhe Phillips headed After a summer of preparations, the Hat- into rhe sou rhern Pacific, rhey encountered tie I. Phillips was ready to set sail to deliver a violenr squalls called williwaws, bur rhe group ofGloucestermen to join the roughly intrepid voyagers took these storms in stride 40,000 others bound for the Klondike. All and sailed relatively uneventfully to San rhe costs and profits of the expedition were Francisco. to be apportioned among the shareholders The voyage proved remarkably swift. of the mining company. Ifa member became The Phillips sailed from Gloucester to San ill, he would still receive an equal share. If Francisco in 129 days, which included the he died, the allotment would pass on to six-day layover in Punta Arenas. This was a his family. The Phillips was ballasted with respectable passage for any vessel, let alone bituminous coal, a relatively scarce resource a fishing schooner under the command of in South Atlantic pons that could be sold at a novice captain and crew. a profit or bartered for fresh supplies. The The San Francisco of 1898 was a chaotic schooner cast off in the afternoon on 18 place, but the Gloucester prospectors were October 1897. A crowd of spectators filled able to take some much-needed rest and the docks, the salr-fish stages, roofs, and enjoy what recreation was available. Three windows of harborside buildings to look days after his arrival, Blackburn wrote to on and wish rhe Gloucester Mining Com- his friend Dr. William Hale: "Things are a pany expedition well. Blackburn planned little differenr rhan I expected, but I believe to sail from Gloucester in the autumn so rhat we will come out on top. I see by rhe as to reach "the Horn" during rhe southern San Francisco papers rhat a large number of hemisphere's summer. To defray expenses, vessels are on their way here. It is an underrhe company hoped to rake on cargo bound taking rhar requires patience and perseverfor San Francisco and, once in California, ance. People here say that nor over one per take on paying passengers headed north for cent of rhe men who go to Alaska will ever Alaska, just as the Northern hemisphere sum- find gold. Ir looks like a slim chance, but mer was beginning. Most of the Alaskan ice we will take it." Since so many vessels from would have melted out of the meandering around the world were using San Francisco Yukon and Koyukuk River complexes. Once as a stopover before traveling north to the there, they hoped to sell their schooner to gold fields, Blackburn and his crew rho ugh t the highest bidder, assemble the Eclipse and, rhar they could profitably use the Phillips to wirh their dories in tow, make their way to freight heavy equipment up rhe coast and rhe gold fields and their fortunes. If they haul lumber from logging camps while rhey could not find a buyer for the Phillips in rhe waited for fair weather farther north. Alaskan port of St. Michael, they would sail When the Phillips sailed to Oregon the schooner as a coastal freighter between to pick up a load of building material for more southerly ports and Alaska while a transport to San Francisco, men in Astoria, portion of the company went on to the gold Oregon, tried to dissuade rhe New Engfields. landers from joining the gold rush. The A member of the Lynn Mining Company gave the flavor of the 1897 gold rush times: "It was in the month of August when mywife .. . [read]ofa woman in Klondike who took out with her dish-pan sixty dollars a pan after her husband's first washing, began to get the gold fever . ... Being a sea-faring man, I began to see my way to Alaska. After devising schemes of all kinds that failed to meet the requirements needed, I read in the papers [rhatacompanywas being organized] to go out to rhe gold-fields . . .. [There was opportunity] in Alaska, where a poor man could drive his stakes with no millionaire bosses to say that he should not." (Capt. JD.
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Gloucestermen were sailing along rhe coastal Pacific Ocean rhar was teeming with fish; the fortune rhey sought was likely as close as the waters beneath their keel. Of course, rhe Astoria men's argument was no remedy for that pernicious disease known as "Klondike gold fever." The Phillips crewmen loaded their cargo and returned to San Francisco. As time passed, patience started to wear rhin. The New Englanders soon realized rhey were in dire need of cash to survive in the inflated gold fever economy. Bitter financial disputes frequently arose among rhe shipmates of the Gloucester Mining Company. While the bickering continued, Blackburn wired east for the rest of the mining company to join them overland. Charles Swinson, a carpenter, and engineer John Wennerberg would help assemble and maintain the Eclipse; and contractor W N. Grant might help negotiate with the profiteers at St. Michael. In desperation, the Gloucestermen agreed to sell their schooner at a bargain price, but they found no buyers. Disgruntled party members called a meeting and voted to sell shares in their venture to local would-be prospectors for cash. That action split the integrity of the original company and led to a shift in its leadership. Blackburn was dismissed as the expedition's leader and ignominiously returned across the country by rail. The remainder of the splintered company sailed to St. Michael, assembled the Eclipse, and set out to make their fortunes. By then it was already autumn. The Phillips was finally sold and made its new owners a profit taking early returnees from the Klondike back to San Francisco. The Hattie I. Phillips eventually ended her days as a Mexican coaster. The increasingly cold Alaskan autumn days and onslaught of an early winter rook a physical toll on all of the members of the company. The Eclipse, which they had hauled all the way from New England, proved to be a poor icebreaker. The river, fraught with shoals and boulders, caused the vessel to break down constantly. It rook the expedition sixty days to push their way up rhe Koyukuk River about 400 miles to rhe junction of rhe Allenkakat (Alarna) River. Although Blackburn had rhe foresight to pack a spare propeller for the Eclipse, both propellers were irreparably damaged during rhe arduous trip upriver. The little steamer had to be abandoned to rake on a new role as their riverside supply base. The fishing
SEA HISTORY 131, SUMMER 20 l 0