THE CRUISE OF THE NANTUCKET SHIPS ASIA CAPTAIN ELIJAH COFFIN AND HIS CREW. & ALLIANCE CAPTAIN BARTLETT COFFIN AND HIS CREW TO THE INDIAN OCEAN AND THE COAST OF NEW HOLLAND IN SEARCH OF WHALES AND SEALS. DURING THE YEARS OF OUR LORD 1791 - 1792 - 1793 - 1794 By Rod Dickson, Maritime Historian, 2007. The voyage of the ASIA and ALLIANCE. Previous books and papers by Rod Dickson. MARINE ACCIDENTS AND INCIDENTS IN W.A. WA TERS Fremantle Maritime Museum Report, No. 56. STEAM WHISTLES ON THE SWAN The advent of steam transport on the Swan River. Maritime Museum Report No. 70. SHIP REGISTERED IN WESTERN AUSTRALIA; 1856 -1969. Fremantle Maritime Museum Report; No. 80. THEY KEPT THIS STA TE AFLOA T Shipbuilders, Boatbuilders and Shipwrights of W.A. Hesperian Press; Perth; W.A. 1998. THE PRICE OF A PEARL. 22 Short Stories of the Pearling Industry. Hesperian Press; Perth, 2002. A VOYAGE OF NO IMPORTANCE. Disaster and Heroism on the Kimberly Coast. Hesperian Press; Perth; 2003. TO KING GEORGE THE THIRD SOUND FOR WHALES The log book oftheEngUsh Whaler, ^/A^G^TOTV. Hesperian Press; Perth; 2006 THE HISTORY OF WHALING ON THE SOUTH COAST OF NEW HOLLAND. Details of more than 700 American, French and Colonial whaling voyages. Hesperian Press; Perth; W.A. 2007. UNDER THE WINGS OF AN ALBATROSS A Maritime History of the French Sub-Antarctic Islands. Self Published; 2007. MUM'S GREY HAIR; or; The Life of a Merchant Seaman. Autobiography. Self Published; 2008. MARITIME RESEARCH RESOURCES in WESTERN AUSTRALIA. Where and How to find. Self Published; 2008. MARITIME MATTERS of the SOUTH COAST of W.A. Every known maritime incident from the Leeuwin to Eucla. Published by the Maritime Heritage Association of W.A. 2008. THE CRUISE OF THE ASIA & ALLIANCE. To the Indian Ocean & New Holland. Unpublished Manuscript. H.M.S GUARDIAN & The ISLAND OF ICK An amazing story of Survival at sea in 1790. Unpublished Manuscript. page 2 The voyage of the ASIA and ALLIANCE. Introduction, While researching the history of whaling on the Coast of New Holland, now known as Western Australia, I began reading the Pacific Maritime Bureau series of microfilmed ships log books, mainly whalers. In one of those films, P.M.B. 228, I read that two ships, the ASIA, Captain Elijah Coffin and the ALLIANCE, Captain Bartlett Coffin from the Island of Nantucket, had sailed in September 1791, bound on a cruise for whales and seals in distant waters. They sailed south through the Atlantics, passing the Canary Islands, the Cape de Verdes, where the Captains purchased livestock, further south to the solitary Island of Trinidade, (also known as Trinity Island), from where they took their departure for the Cape of Good Hope, which they reached on the 20th day of January, 1792. The Captains allowed the crews a days shore leave where they walked about the town and viewed "the folks and fashions" and admired the neat layout of the squared streets and colonial buildings. At 6 pm on January 31 both Captains and their 1st officers along with another 5 American Captains attended "the burying place" for the funeral of a lady from Baltimore, Maryland, who had passed away on board a ship that was bound for the Isle of France. Departing Cape Town the ships sailed in consort for St. Pauls Island, where, it was reported, there were literally thousands of fur seals. This report was correct and there were thousands of seals, however, other ships and crews had beaten them to the prize and were busy at the killing and skinning. Their sealing prospects dashed the ASIA and ALLIANCE sailed on eastwards towards the coast of New Holland, ( Western Australia ). The ships went to anchor on April 28 in Sharks Bay, under the cliffs of Dirk Hartog Island, where the famous Hartog and Vlaming plates had been left many years before as a relic of their having been visitors to this hostile land. Both the ASIA and ALLIANCE required wood and water for themselves and water and fodder for their livestock. Unfortunately for them this barren coast provided nothing of which they were in want, however they caught fish and shot shags and other seabirds for the table. With nothing to keep them the Captains consulted their charts and decided to sail for Java and the Straits of Sunda. After avoiding the legendary, but, non-existant, Cloates Island the ships arrived off the southern coast of Java and proceeded west until they arrived at Princes Island at the mouth of the Sunda Strait. Here they obtained as much wood, water and provisions as they wanted and after a week at anchor sailed again, this time south west and making for the Isle of France, also known as Mauritius. On this course they passed the Cocos-Keeling Islands, which they knew, from their charts, as Coconut Islands and they each sent a boat through the fringing reefs to the main island to collect as many coconuts as they could carry, which took only a couple of hours and the ships did not even have to anchor. Arriving at Port Louis, Mauritius, the Captains Coffin went ashore and conferred with the local merchants asking for local knowledge on areas where whales congregated. They received information that the whales were known to congregate in the waters about Atongil Bay on the north east coast of Madagascar. South of the mouth of the Bay is St. Marys Island, which the ships were to use as a base of operations. After a fortnight of whaling, taking cows and calves, cutting in and stowing oil, both ships were attacked by a horde of natives, armed with muskets, in five war canoes. page2 The voyage of the ASIA and ALLIANCE. By the greatest of good fortunes, the day the natives chose to attack was the first day where the winds were favourable for sailing straight out of the bay. It was a close run thing with both ships having to cut their cables and abandon their anchors as the natives closed within a musket shot of the ships. Returning to Mauritius, they found the Island in the grip of a smallpox epidemic, with 129 people dying in the night prior to their arrival. After mooring the ships on the 6th day of October 1792, bows to the shore, the local doctor boarded and, in the words of Sylvanus Crosby, the log keeper of the ASIA, "Gut our cabells on shore and mored our ship soiled. At 10 am the doctor came off and Nockerlated both our crues for the Small Pox. It is so breef that it is Emposable to Keep Cleer from it. It is so breef that 129 died in one day There is a ship a long side of us that has got 2 or 3 down with it. There is a Great many of our crue that has not had it, 10 of us and 10 of thQ ALLIANCE, e.g. Crues, 20 men in all." After 3 weeks most of the men had recovered from the small pox and the ships were being prepared for a further adventure. The Captains Coffin had visited the Merchants again and this time were preparing to sail to virtually uncharted waters. The Kerguelen Islands, also known as the Desolations. Only two previous visitors have been recorded in this area of the southern Indian Ocean, the French explorer Yves-Joseph de Kerguelen-Tremarec, ship FORTUNE and his Consort Francois Alesno, ship GROS VENTRE, who discovered the islands on February 12, 1772, (however Kerguelen himself never landed on them). Kerguelen returned to the islands in late 1773 and once again did not go ashore. The next visitors were Captain James Cook, in the ship H.M.S. RESOLUTION and his Consort, Charles Gierke, in the ship H.M.S. DISCOVERY, who, with his crew, explored and charted the north west and northern coast of the islands during his third voyage in 1776. From the merchants of Port Louis Captain Coffin obtained a copy of Cook's chart and description of the land, which at the time he was there he named The Desolations, due to the inhospitality and harshness of the land. Cook's writings included the information that the seas and beaches abounded in seals and seabirds and the deeper oceans were home to sperm whales. They then purchased, for 2000 paper dollars, a small 50 ton schooner to be used as a catcher boat, being nimble and shallow drafted. They were going after elephant seals, of which it was claimed, there were literally thousands and thousands lying on the beaches. With their thick fatty layers of blubber they were easy prey, easy to skin and profitable. As an added bonus there were supposedly a great number of fur seals in large colonies. After fitting out the schooner, which they named HUNTER, for a cruise in southern seas the three vessels departed Mauritius bound south. The ships arrived at Cook's Christmas Harbour, but found it an inhospitable anchorage, with fierce wind gusts coming off the mountains and squalls of snow, as described by Andrew Pinkham :- "Tuesday. December 25th, 1792: The first part of this day we had hard gales at WSW We streamed towlines and hauled the HUNTER alongside and began to caulk her decks but the snow fell so fast that it was difficult to get the oakum to stick. At 8 in the evening the snow flew verry thick and it is the most exceeding cold." "WeHnesdav. December 26th, 1792. The wind continues to blow a gale at WNW and brings plenty of snow and hail.