Docklands History Group meeting July 2005 Jonas Poole and the Ratcliffe Highway By Robert Baldwin

JONAS POOLE (1565-1612), master mariner, was born in the parish of St Botolph, Aldgate, London where the baptismal register for 8th January 1565-6 records his unusual name but not his parents. They were William Poole and Katherine Fullett who had married at St Dunstan's in the East, London, 28th April 1560. They brought up five sons to nautical careers; Richard, born in February 1561 later recorded in Admiralty Court business in 1630 as a pilot of about sixty and a Younger Brother of Trinity House); plus Randolph and Jonas, and two younger brothers who were practising as boatbuilders at Mortlake by 1612, plus a daughter, Katherine. Jonas's father was the naval "Captain William Poole" whom Captain William Fenner of the Aide records in a letter to Anthony Bacon* as among those seriously injured assaulting on the groyne at Corunna on 24th April 1589. Although well placed within London’s sailortown in a similar career, Jonas was keener to learn about the initial English experience of commercial whaling with the Grace of Bristol! on the Newfoundland grounds from 1596 to 1598 under Stephen Bennett and Stephen Burkhall. So on 10th April 1603 Jonas took ship in the Grace (30 tons) under Stephen Bennett after she had been refitted at the expense of Sir Thomas Cherry, Governor of the Muscovy' Company, to sail for Archangel [Murmansk], Jonas wrote that their plan was to use the return voyage to check Dutch claims to have found islands to the north west of the Kola River at about 80 degrees North. Poole and Bennett returned to London with confirmation on 10th September 1603. Through winning the trust of Stephen Bennett, who came to live at Tower Wharf Jonas returned to Svalbad five more times before 1609. Jonas's navigational and descriptive skills thus became known to the Governor of the Muscovy Company and to Sir Thomas Smythe-, well before he took sail for Sir Thomas and the Virginia Company with the first colonists hound for Jamestown in 1607.

That year Smythe displaced Sir Thomas Cherry as Governor of the Muscovy Company, amidst recriminations — over Cherry's private trade, assuring Jonas Poole of annual commercial commissions to return to Arctic waters. Jonas's own "Relations" (later published by Purchas) reveal that he sailed from Blackwall every year from 1603 to 12 ~ except in 1607, to exploit new walrus and whaling grounds. Jonas also located exploitable lead deposits bringing home samples to the Muscovy Company from Bjomoa in Svalbad. He records laying formal claim to and naming his discovery "Cherrie Island" after Sir Francis Cherry, who had been advocating that the company add whaling to its trading interests since T 593. Jonas's summary' of all his exploratory voyages prior to 1610 was given to Richard Hakluyt* late in 1610, probably with a lost account of the Jamestown colony. [This lost text may be the anonymous PRO text COI/1 fols 46-55 where Jonas Poole is No I in a list of "14 Saviours"].

Jonas Poole's accounts of all these exploratory voyages later appeared in Samuel Purchas*, His Pilgrimes, (London, 1625) Vol 11 l,pp.556-567. They reveal he was made master of a pinnace in 1606 and of then of the ship, Lioness, in 1609. Another shorter account appears in Purchas op. cit, Vol 111, pp 464-466. Although 31 tons of whale oil was gleaned on the 1608 voyage a loss of £1,000 was later declared. Poole details the abundance of "morses" or walruses and a steady increase in the numbers killed and rendered into saleable products. In 1609 he even brought hack two Polar Bear cubs which he reports as living in the Paris Garden in London. The detailed timings and observations printed by Purchas from the stormy voyage of 1609 which made a 40% profit were subsequently questioned by Albert Markham in 1879, but have since been vindicated by Sybren van der Werf and Louis Sicking who identified the natural atmospheric phenomenon which had facilitated Poole's astronomical observations. Although Purchas follows Henry Hudson and Thomas Edge in renaming some of Jonas Poole's earlier landfalls, and Nordenskiold took the re-naming further in 1889, Poole's dramatic accounts of the fauna of those shores concur exactly with a detailed map showing these discoveries and vignettes of the onshore tryworks updated to incorporate findings up to 1616 by Thomas Edge. That map first appears amidst the whaling scenes between pp.472 473 of Purchas's text showing Svalbad (not Greenland as it states) with "Hakluyt Headland" [on Amsterdam island) and waters up to 80 degrees N by "Purchas Plus Ultra" and "Purchas Point" [in Zealand Bayl. Tn March 1610 Poole took command of the Amitie (70 tons) on behalf of the Muscovy Company, writing a lively account of the walrus caught and rendered into oil and of the narwhal horn taken there which appears in Purchas, His Pilgrimes pp.699-707. The Muscovy Company's Commissions given on 31st March 1611 (pp.707-708) envisaged further exploration in the wake of Henry Hudson's exploration of 1607 to Spitsbergen and reveal Jonas Poole sailed as "Grand Pilot of the expedition" and took charge of the Elizabeth of Dover (60 tons) with Mr Stephen Bennett as his Master with six experienced Biscayan harpooners in his crew in 1611. Concurrently Thomas Edge would take overall charge of the fleet of four ships from the ill-fated Lady Margaret of London. To Poole's consternation, the Master of another ship in his fleet of 1609, Mr Woodcock, was seen off Svalbard in 1611 in command of a whaler from San Sebastian. At Edge's instance Purchas adds that on his return to London in 1612 Woodcock was gaoled in the Gatehouse and the Tower for sixteen months. Jonas Poole's account, "My Voyage of Discovery to Greenland and towards the west of it,” was supplemented on publication with a passage written by his brother Randolph at pp 712 -7J3 In 1611 Jonas Poole had sailed as far as an icefield just beyond 80 degrees N, noting the presence there of polar bears, deer and white arctic foxes as well as the habitats of many species of birds, whales, belugas, as well as grampuses (sea lions) and morses (walruses), many of which are featured distinctively on the map. After returning to Foul Sound from the walrus grounds on Cherry7 Island. Jonas Poole suffered a broken skull and collar bones while transhipping his own cargo of fat hides and Walrus ivory' out of the Elizabeth’s hold prior to loading the higher value whale oil tried out on beaches from the catches of the abandoned week. Mary' Margaret onto Edge’s command. Edge later contracted with the Master of a rival whaleship, the Hopewell of Hull to bring home the injured Jonas Poole plus his cargo of 20 tons of whale oil, 5 hogsheads of walrus ivory and 106 bundles of baleens. Poole was back in London by early August and recovered his health quickly having new whale chasing boats built during that winter. In 1612 Poole sailed again for the Muscovy Company as Master of the Sea Horse alongside a newer and bigger ship, the Whale, commanded by Thomas Edge while Mr Arthington and a talented surveyor and explorer John Mason were employed as the other fleet Masters. Poole’s last, unfinished “relation” of the voyage of 1612 describes a successful voyage until they encountered ice floes north of Svalbad 7th July 1612. An East India Source shows that the voyage of 1612 earned the Muscovy Company a 90% profit from the 17 whales caught and “tried out” at Svalbad into 180 tons of oil. Poole’s text reproduced in Purchas’s Pilgrimes (11 l,pp713-715) reveals a Dutch presence and the return of the John Woodcock with a Basque crew from San Sebastian, plus the- Diana of London, skippered by Thomas Bustian of Wapping.

Samuel Purchas, acting at Randolph Poole’s instance, added a marginal note (op.cit. Vol 111 p.707) to the text of 1611 voyage that Jonas Poole was, unusually, “entertained by a certayne stipend” before he “was, as I have heard, miserably and basely murthered betwixt Ratcliffe and London after his return from this voyage”. Jonas’s murder in Wapping after the 1612 voyage left his widow Joanne, as his sole heir but with no will to administer. The Bishop’s admonition, given in 1612 (Guildhall Ms 9168, fol 158) records that Joanne Poole, widow of the Parish of Stepney, was due after his death on September 8th, just £I4.8sh.4d. On 1st and 2nd December 1612 John Brumbridge was acquitted of the murder of Jonas Poole before the Middlesex Sessions, but the judge set him back to prison without bail pending good conduct Joanne Poole had at least two sons, Robert who married in St. Dunstan’s in 1611; and Jonas Pole junior, who married Mary'' Wild at St. Dunstan’s Stepney on 23rd June 1635. Joanne lived to see a grandson, Jonas, christened there on 17lh March 1636.

Jonas Poole Jnr. (d 1666) naval captain followed an apprenticeship before the mast with naval service under the Protectorate, rising to the Master of the Mary Rose (32 guns) in the first Dutch War and sailing as far as Venice in 1652. Having patched up Captain Whetstone’s notorious quarrels during the Mediterranean deployments of 1657-59, his promotion to Lieutenant followed during the Protectorate’s Anglo-French war in 1659 whereupon he assumed command of the Leopard. In 1660 the Duke of York confirmed this command, before assigning him the Anne during 1661. In 1662 he was gazetted as Captain of the Newcastle by the Earl of Sandwich at Lisbon, just before the Earl returned with Catherine of Aragon who was to be married to King Charles 11 at Portsmouth on 22nd May 1662. In 1664 he was appointed Captain of the Devon by the Duke of York, but was soon transferred to the 64 gun London (also known as Loyal London) with a warrant to impress 300 men to top up her complement of 390 men. In 1665 he was transferred to the smaller Vanguard, 56 guns just before the battle of Lowestoft. However, Samuel Pepys Diary for 15tn June 1665 reports that he had conducted himself there “so basely” that he was soon to be deprived of his command.

Robert showed us maps of some of the voyages which are mentioned in his notes, and enlarged on the anecdotes mentioned. He made a particular point of mentioning the use to which whalebone and baleens were used. Most of the ladies present were glad that the era of boned corsetry is mostly a thing of the past, although basques still play a part for younger women. It seems that the sailors liked to think of their sweethearts being encased in a baleen, which they had brought home for them!

He also commented on the fact that preparing whale oil on a beach is one thing, but preparing the same product in a London area was not appreciated at all.

Harry' thanked Robert for a very interesting and enlightening talk, and John Jupp took the opportunity to tell us all that our speaker had been very involved with the original group of enthusiasts who had done much of the groundwork for the setting up of the Museum in Docklands - which brought additional thanks from all present.

Robert Baldwin