“A Very Good Sailer” Merchant Ship Technology and The
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“A VERY GOOD SAILER” MERCHANT SHIP TECHNOLOGY AND THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE BRITISH ATLANTIC EMPIRE 1600—1800 by © Phillip Frank Reid A thesis submitted to the School of Graduate Studies in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of History Memorial University of Newfoundland February 2017 St. John’s Newfoundland and Labrador ABSTRACT To understand the technology that helped create the British Atlantic in the early 1600s and expand it to the end of the next century, this study investigates Atlantic World history, maritime economic history, nautical archaeology, material culture studies, the history of technology, and the technical history of the ship. In addition to archival research in merchants’ and shipbuilders’ papers, the study relies on the technical analysis and modeling of extant vessel remains by ship archaeologists, and incorporates the study of replica vessels and the experiences of those who operate them, with an experimental- archaeology approach. The insights gained make it difficult to remain comfortable with inherited assumptions without further investigation, while making it easier to understand how a technology traditionally considered static served a new and rapidly expanding colonial-imperial enterprise so well. Experiments suggested by the processing and analysis of the source material present opportunities for the study of the period merchant ship to make a more significant contribution to Atlantic, maritime, and technological history. The approach presented here can help free Atlantic World historians with no technical background from having to take the received wisdom of ship history at face value, and offer new avenues of inquiry into problems in maritime economic history going back to Ralph Davis’s work in the 1960s. It demonstrates that strong elements of continuity and important changes were both responses to the evolving needs and high risks of the British Atlantic. Understanding those needs and risks is the goal; asking questions about ships is asking questions about people, and how they were similar to and ii different from us, and in what ways, and why, so that we can better understand ourselves and our own world. iii ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS It is cliché to say something to the effect that no project like this would have been possible without the assistance of a rather large number of people. Now I know why: because it is literally true. It is especially true for this project. As the person whose name is on it, I take responsibility for the interpretations and conclusions contained herein— with no small amount of pride and satisfaction, despite my assumption that those interpretations and conclusions need further investigation, and may well be superseded by my own or others’ work. (In fact, I hope that happens, at least to some extent.) It will be clear to the reader, though, how much this study owes to the experts who volunteered their contributions to it. For much of the time I spent researching this, I felt like a curator, following a collection strategy to acquire information, rather than objects, out of which I could assemble as comprehensive an interpretive effort as possible, with the solemn responsibility to treat that information with the greatest care. So I have much sincere thanks to offer many people here. I will start with my adviser, Neil Kennedy, not so much because of his position but because he has been a true friend in every way for the past five years, and even before that he was encouraging to me as I began taking tentative steps toward such a prodigious undertaking. That is not to discount his capacity as adviser, to which he has been committed without lapse since he agreed to serve in it and began recommending good books. He has always taken an interest in the project, and in me, beyond what was obligatory. Long may we continue to share thoughts, drink recipes, and inappropriate remarks on appropriate subjects. iv Among my host of debts to him is his selection of scholars to approach for a committee; we were fortunate that both of them accepted. I first heard of “Skip” Fischer about 16 years before I ever met him. His long friendship with Carl Swanson was instrumental in my winding up at MUN, and while I was a bit intimidated to approach him at first, I needn’t have been. I would do well to offer anyone who ever asks it of me the kindness and counsel he has offered me over the past four years. I know (because he told me so) that I can count on that indefinitely. Knowing we had a project in mind that would dance back and forth over whatever the line is between history and related disciplines—especially those concerned with objects in historical and cultural contexts—Neil asked Jerry Pocius to bring his expertise in such matters to bear; the body of literature Jerry provided for me, and the conversations we had about that, gave me something much bigger than a contribution to this project (though they certainly gave me that too). The reader will discover how important the material-culture perspective is to a study such as this. Like Skip, Jerry is a busy man, but also like Skip, he never gave me the feeling that he didn’t quite have time for me. I appreciate that. I thank the Department of History for more than just being there and doing what it is supposed to do. Even when I’m in a bad mood, I can’t think of a way in which the Department as a whole (and as individuals) could have been more supportive of me. I particularly want to thank former Graduate Coordinators John Sandlos, Jeff Webb, and Dominique Brégent-Heald. Thanks also to former Department Head Sean Cadigan for good conversation, and to Fran Warren, Renee Clowe, Colleen Banfield, and current v Head Terry Bishop Stirling for making necessary things happen. The Department has consistently provided me with the most financial support it could, including a research travel grant for the summer of 2015 that helped make my archival research possible, and has awarded me a Teaching Assistantship whose benefits, I am lucky to say, have been most rewarding intellectually and pedagogically. I must also express gratitude for the Department’s immediate and complete support when I suddenly had to defer my enrollment for a year for family medical reasons. Everything was taken care of and I was able to spend that year doing good work with good advice. The School of Graduate Studies has provided me with a Graduate Fellowship for four years, making this entire enterprise possible; and this year also awarded me an A.G. Hatcher Memorial Scholarship, an honor and a substantial validation of my work. I am grateful to Anne Thareau, Head of French and Spanish, for noticing the presence of a doctoral student from the History Department on her corridor, and connecting me with Scott Jamieson, with whom I had twice-weekly one-on-one French translation sessions for an entire semester, which I consider outrageous fortune. We produced translations of two subject-relevant journal articles together, which I will always treasure—as I will his kindness and deep insight into language and culture. I wish Professor Jamieson the happiest of retirements. Examiners Barry Gaulton, Olaf Janzen, and Warren Riess made helpful suggestions and offered encouraging comments. I thank them for taking the time to examine the thesis so carefully and for conducting a stimulating defense. vi Before I leave St. John’s here, I have finally to thank Professor Dan Walker of the Department of Ocean and Naval Architectural Engineering for serving as a technical adviser to this project. Discussing technical matters with a naval architect who understands sailing craft contributed much to the analysis in Chapter Five, and thus for the final interpretations, conclusions, and direction of further work. The other major research approach that took us outside the library and the archives was the attempt to gather and analyze the insights of people who actually sail these things (or, to be precise, reproductions of these things) rather than just read books and talk about them. Without the cooperation of the remarkable people who design and sail replica ships, this study would be up a creek. Jim Graczyk, former crew member of HM Armed Sloop Welcome on the Great Lakes, shared so much information and experience with me to start that phase of research. His former crewmate Theresa O’Byrne shared videos and experience too. William T. “Chip” Reynolds, master of the replica Half Moon in New York, sat down for a lengthy telephone interview about his experiences, as did masters Sharon Dounce of the Kalmar Nyckel in Wilmington, Delaware, Drew McMullen of the Sultana Education Foundation in Maryland, Walter Rybka of the U.S. Brig Niagara in Pennsylvania, and Eric Speth of the Jamestown ships Susan Constant, Godspeed, and Discovery. Joakim Severinson, Master Shipwright of the Swedish Ship Götheborg, answered my questionnaire in writing, and David Thorpe, crew member on Mayflower II’s 1957 transatlantic, helped me get my hands on articles he had published over the years in Mayflower Quarterly—as did Walt Powell, Executive Director of the Mayflower Society, who was so kind as to box up a collection of his own materials, vii including an original 1957 National Geographic featuring the cover story on the transatlantic, and a chip from a shipwright’s adze from the hull of the Mayflower II herself. When a lonely scholar gets something like that in the mail, it lifts the spirits. The third major research approach for this project was a more traditional archival one, and involved two months of travel—which is expensive.