Sea History 150- Spring 2015

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prone to minor p ro blem s requiring the constant attention of a specialist. The task of oiling, adjusting, mending, fo rging, and rebuilding the engines and auxiliary systems fell to the machinist's mate. In the spring of 188 1, when word passed through the navy seeking volumeers fo r the hazardous duty going after J eannette, a young m achinist's mate, Patrick Cahill, answered the call. The n avy purchased a new steam whaler n amed Mary and Helen and sent her to M are Island, where, like USS Jeannette, her hull would be reinforced before heading into the polar ice. Renamed USS Rodgers, the 155-foot vessel was steam powe red but carried "a great spread of sail " across three m asts. H er crew was going to need that canvas; though only two yea rs old, h er boilers and steam engines were always on the verge of breakdown and in constant need of repai r. Before departing for the Arctic, Patrick Cahill co ntacted the San Francisco Chron icle and offered to act as its correspondent during the voyage. "I explained that I had never tried this kind of work, but agreed to do so if anything wo rth reco rding happened," he later w rote. A lthough Cahill kept daily notes about the expedition, he makes no mention of sending them home via telegraph or passing ship. Evidently, they didn't make it to the States before he did, and remained instead in rough manuscript form. Patrick Cahill 's log, like the formal ship's log, recounts the days' events in succession, without fa il, whether they were tumultuous- like the day the ship burned to the waterline-or mundane. In either case, he is never short on detail, and it is in those derails, in his wry commentaries and acerbic observa tions on the fo ibles of his companions, that the true charm of his narrative comes th rough . USS Rodgers departed Mare Island Navy Yard on 16 June, headed fo r Petropavlovsk in Russia, their first port of call. The men on USS I ndep endence cheered as we sailed by and must have been very much surp rised to hear the crew of the "Rodgers" singing a "Shantee," as it is not allowed by the US navy offi cers, but everything goes to-day, even the ride is

SEA HISTORY 150, SPRING 20 15

(a bove) San Francisco, 1880. View is to the northeast, toward San Pablo Bay. (below) 1he former steam whaler Mary and H elen, renamed USS Rodgers, preparing to depart the California Coast, bound for the Arctic in 1881.

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with us. After starting m ain shaft, box heated and we stopped about ten minutes to cool it off, then started again. I h ad charge of the engine room. No one could h ave known that their venture, and the Jeanette-the obj ect of their search-were already doomed . The missing ship had been trapped in the sea ice in the Arctic O cean since 6 September 1879. She was damaged but still afloat in May of 188 1, carried by the drift and current to a new "fa rrhes t north ." It was an honor most of her men would not survive long enough to claim; a few days before

USS Rodgers departed , the sea ice crushed Jeannette and she sank in the East Siberian Sea. H er crew took to the ice, taking three ship's boars for when they would reach open water. Of the thirty-three men who embarked on the expedition, twenty would perish, including their captain . [16 June 188 1] Several vessels, the Sausalito, Hartley, Gov. Irwin, and Holyoke, with friends and music accompanied us as far as Fort Point, and flags were dipped and whistles blown as we sailed by, and hundreds of people lined the wh arves, cheering us as we sailed by.

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Sea History 150- Spring 2015 by National Maritime Historical Society & Sea History Magazine - Issuu