USA > Massachusetts > Commonwealth history of Massachusetts, colony, province and state, volume 4 > Part 42
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People stopped building clipper ships in the United States simply because they no longer paid. California freights by 1855 had dropped off to a sum which was barely remunera- tive; and the clippers were too expensive to maintain in pro- portion to their carrying capacity. The panic of 1857 made matters worse. British builders evolved an excellent type of medium clipper for their purpose, so that no more orders came from that side to Boston shipyards. Indeed, most of the American clipper ships that survived 1857, whether under the American or foreign flags, had their spars and sail plan drasti- cally reduced, so that they were mere shadows of the beautiful creatures that were launched in the early 'fifties. The Civil War and the depredations of Confederate raiders merely com- pleted a process that had begun five years before.
Although the memory of these noble vessels is peculiarly precious to Massachusetts, we must remember that her clip- pers were not the only ones. The New York and Connecticut and Baltimore builders produced some splendid examples, such as the Young America, the Andrew Jackson, and Neptune's Car; although the claim that the Andrew Jackson equalled the Flying Cloud's record run to San Francisco, is unfounded. Nova Scotia built the "Blue-nose" clippers; notably the Marco Polo, whose record of 79 days to Australia was broken by the Red Jacket. The British builders, once they got the hang of the new construction, turned out their famous tea clippers and wool clippers, such as the Cutty Sark and the Thermopy- lae, more slender and dainty perhaps than ours, and faster in the light and baffling winds of far-eastern waters, but lacking the majesty, power, and speed in heavy weather of the Mckay creations.
The supremacy of the Massachusetts clippers in the Cali- fornia trade is striking. Only 21 passages from an Atlantic
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THE CLIPPER SHIPS
port around the Horn to San Francisco in less than 100 days are on record. Of these 10 were made by Massachusetts- built vessels : six by Mckay's clippers, the Flying Cloud, Fly- ing Fish, Great Republic, Romance of the Seas, and Glory of the Seas; three by Pook's Surprise, Witchcraft, and Herald of the Morning; and one by Hall's John Gilpin. Taking all the passages recorded by Captain Clark in 110 days or better, we have 41 by Boston-built ships (including 19 by Mckay's), 17 by Medford-built ships, 7 by other Massachusetts builders, and 38 by New York builders. Yet Mckay built only ten clippers that made California voyages, and the New York Yards turned out two for our one.
Foreign vessels were not allowed to compete in the Cali- fornia trade, and did not seriously compete in the transatlantic trade; but, conversely, American clippers competed for only a few years in the China-England trade, and very few of them tried the England-Australian route. Yet note these records :
TRANSATLANTIC
Sovereign of the Seas, 13 d. 22 h. 50 m. New York dock to Liverpool anchorage, 1853.
James Baines, 12 d. 6 h. Boston Light to Rock Light, Liver- pool, 1854.
Red Jacket (Rockland, Me.), 13 d. 1 h. Sandy Hook to Rock Light, 1854.
Andrew Jackson (Mystic, Conn.), 15 days. Rock Light to Sandy Hook, 1860.
CHINA-ENGLAND
Witch of the Wave ( Portsmouth, N. H.), 90 d. Whampoa to London, 1852.
Comet (New York), 84 d. Liverpool to Hong Kong, 1854. Ariel (British), 83 d. Gravesend to Hong Kong, 1866-67. Sir Launcelot (British), 89 d. Foochow to London, 1869. Hallowe'en (British), 89 d. Shanghai to Tongue Lightship, 1873-1874.
469
RECORDS
ENGLAND-AUSTRALIA
James Baines, 63 d. 18 h. Rock Light, Liverpool to Hobson's
Bay, 65 d. 512 h. to Melbourne, 1854-1855.
Lightning, 64 d. 3 h. Port Philip to Liverpool, 1854.
Thermopylae (British), 63 d. 14 h. Gravesend to Port Philip, 1868-69.
AROUND THE WORLD
James Baines, 134 d. Liverpool-Melbourne-Liverpool, 1854- 1855.
Donald McKay's supremacy is even more evident when we look over the records of day's runs. Basil Lubbock, the chief English authority on sailing ship history, gives in his Colonial Clippers the following list of all runs by sailing ships of 400 miles and over which he has been able to verify:
RUN
SHIP
413
Red Jacket
DATE Jan. 19, 1854
400
July 6, 1854
430
Lightning
March 19, 1857
407
James Baines
Jan. 27, 1855
423
Feb. 6, 1855
420
June 18, 1856
436
Lightning
March 1, 1854
66
To this list I can add the following, from other sources :
RUN
SHIP
DATE
402 Flying Cloud
1856
411
Sovereign of the March 18, 1853
Seas
412 Lightning
Sept. 1854
404 James Baines
May 28, 1856
PLACE Cape Horn voyage, westward.
Running easting down, South Pacific. 7
In other words, the twelve greatest recorded day's runs by sailing ships of all time, were made by five ships of Donald Mckay and one designed by Pook and built at Rockland, Maine !
The fastest recorded day's run by a British sailing ship is 374 miles. This was made by the clipper ship Melbourne; and
North Atlantic
421 Donald McKay
Feb. 27, 1855
PLACE North Atlantic.
Running her easting down, Cape of Good Hope to Melbourne.
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THE CLIPPER SHIPS
it has been attained, I believe, by a few others. The Cutty Sark's best was 363 miles.
This extraordinary series of day's runs presents several interesting features. Eight were made running the easting down in the forties or fifties, south latitude. Three were made between New York or Boston and Ireland in mid- winter. All but that of the Flying Cloud were made going east ; consequently the actual sailing day was about 2312 in- stead of 24 hours. Further, these runs were not reckoned by a patent log, which is liable to error, but by measuring the distance on a chart between the points observed at two suc- cessive noons; consequently no account is taken of minor variations from a straight course. If we corrected them to allow for the loss of the half hour or so by easting, or trans- lated the nautical miles or "knots" of 6,080 feet into statute miles of 5,280 feet, we could lengthen them out considerably ; and it is safe to say that most "400-mile day's runs" attributed to other vessels were obtained by some such generous methods of computation.
FATE OF THE CLIPPERS
Many, if not most, of the Massachusetts clippers met tragic ends. The Romance of the Seas sailed from San Francisco, December 31, 1862, and was never heard from again. The great South Sea still holds the mystery of her fate. The Reporter, dismasted and swept fore-and-aft by a terrible sea off Cape Horn in 1862, was lost with all but four of her crew. The Stag Hound was burned to the water's edge on a voyage to San Francisco in 1861. The Witchcraft was a total loss on Cape Hatteras. The Sovereign of the Seas was lost on a shoal in the Straits of Malacca. And so I might go on, page after page. After all, these were more fitting ends than that of being degraded to a lumber drogher like the Flying Cloud, or turned into a salmon cannery like the Glory of the Seas, or made a landing hulk at Liverpool like the James Baines. A few were still limping about as aged tramps at the opening of this century; but now all are gone. To realize what a Yankee clipper was like in her glory, you must study
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SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
prints and models, such as the splendid full-rigged model of the Flying Cloud in the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston; or view the grand old British clipper Cutty Sark, restored and preserved in Falmouth Harbor as the property of the British nation. It is just as well that we have not preserved one of ours. She would have had to stay immobile at some dock or harbor, for the men can no longer be found to accept the in- evitable hardships of the sea on sailing ships; to go aloft and shorten sail on lofty spars, in blinding snow and scream- ing gale.
And so we may apply to our clippers what John Masefield wrote of those of his own nation :
"They mark our passage as a race of men, Earth will not see such ships as those again."
NOTE .- All the tonnage statistics in this article are "old measurement," superseded in 1865, by which registered tonnage equals length minus three- fifths beam, multiplied by beam multiplied by depth, divided by 95. The ton was supposed to be forty cubic feet, and had no reference to weight.
SELECT BIBLIOGRAPHY
CLARK, ARTHUR HAMILTON .- The Clipper Ship Era (N. Y., Putnam's, 1911)-The classic work on the subject and one of the best bits of marine literature in the English language, by an old officer on clipper ships. Freely illustrated.
Dow, GEORGE FRANCIS and ROBINSON, JOHN .- The Sailing Ships of New England. (3 vols., Salem, Marine Research Society, 1922, 1924, 1928) -Comprises reproductions of pictures of vessels, including many of clipper ships.
DANIEL, HAWTHORNE .- The Clipper Ship (N. Y., Dodd, Mead, 1928).
HOWE, OCTAVIUS THORNDIKE, and MATTHEWS, FREDERICK C .- American Clipper Ships, 1833-1858 (2 vols., Salem, Marine Research Society, 1926-1927)-Data concerning each individual ship, gathered from newspaper files and arranged alphabetically. Well illustrated.
LUBBOCK, BASIL .- The Colonial Clippers (Glasgow, Brown, 1921)-This work, by the principal British authority on clipper ships, contains many details not found elsewhere on the American clippers in the Australian trade.
LUBBOCK, BASIL .- The Western Ocean Packets (Glasgow, Brown, 1925).
MCKAY, RICHARD CORNELIUS .- Some Famous Sailing Ships and their Builder, Donald McKay (N. Y., Putnam's, 1928)-By a grandson of the famous shipbuilder.
472
THE CLIPPER SHIPS
MORISON, SAMUEL ELIOT .- The Maritime History of Massachusetts (Bos- ton, Houghton Mifflin, 1921)-A survey of the maritime activities of Massachusetts from the Revolution to the Civil War, with a useful bibliography.
SAMUELS, SAMUEL .- From the Forecastle to the Cabin (Boston, Lauriat, 1924)-The best personal narrative by a clipper ship commander.
SPEARS, JOHN RANDOLPH .- The Story of the American Merchant Marine (N. Y., Macmillan, 1918)-The standard work.
CHAPTER XVI
PRELIMINARIES OF CIVIL WAR (1850-1860)
BY HENRY GREENLEAF PEARSON Professor of English, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
MASSACHUSETTS AND THE COMPROMISE OF 1850
During the year 1850 the forces that were tending to divide the existing great national parties-Whigs and Democrats- along the lines of the sectional issue created by the existence of slavery in the South increased in power. Nowhere was their effect more strikingly manifest than in Massachusetts. Here men of faith, men of prejudice, men with political repu- tations to be preserved or to be built up were acted upon by events and influences from outside. They reacted in turn. The resultant was a pattern of history brilliant and significant by reason of the major issues and strong personalities with which it was enriched.
A contest over the speakership in the national House of Representatives in 1849, ending with the defeat of Winthrop, made another element in the strife between the Massachusetts Free-soilers and the Massachusetts Whigs, and formed the prelude to the severer struggle which was to mark the year 1850. The Democrats and the Free-soilers in Massachusetts were both minority parties; in the preceding fall they polled 29 per cent and 22 per cent respectively of the total vote. They were flirting with each other, a handful of hopeful and greedy men in each camp trusting that the existing approxi- mation of the two parties in their antislavery views might result in a combination which would wrest control from the powerful Whigs. In each party, however, this plan of fusion -if it could then be called such-was frowned upon by men of character and influence.
For a proper understanding of the Free-soil leaders in
473
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PRELIMINARIES OF CIVIL WAR
these times and the course which they sought to steer for their party, they must be looked upon as having the merits and failings of any political group. Among them were men of courage and clear idealism; working with these were others whose political sense was, to say the least, as strong as their moral sense. Henry Wilson, for example, chairman of the State Free-soil Committee, believed that the party must grow in weight and in numbers as a political entity; to do this it must draw from the ranks of the Whigs; to this end it must discredit the Whig leaders-above all, Daniel Webster.
WEBSTER ON THE COMPROMISE
The story of Webster's part in the Compromise of 1850 and the effect in Massachusetts of his "Seventh of March Speech" has already been told in this volume. His course, besides provoking an outburst of moral indignation, divided the Whigs, and thus promised Wilson and his group the opportunity for which they had been longing.
Webster was taken out of their reach as a victim by his appointment as Secretary of State by Fillmore, following the sudden death of President Taylor ; and his successor in the Senate, Robert C. Winthrop, was a man of quite another stamp. Although accepting the terms of the compromise in principle, Winthrop could not stomach the Fugitive Slave Bill as drawn. As he put it himself, "After trying in vain for Trial by Jury, and Habeas Corpus, and Protection for Free Colored Seamen, I voted against it." By this courageous and patriotic course, he did everything possible to repair for the Massachusetts Whigs the damage caused by Webster's "Seventh of March Speech." The address to the people, issued by the Whigs after the State convention in September, adopted Winthrop's stand on the Fugitive Slave Law, declar- ing that without specified amendments it would not be satis- factory to the people of Massachusetts.
Nevertheless, these were eleventh hour efforts; they could not offset the indignation at the "cotton" influence in the party which had given it the reputation of representing exclu- sively conservatism, aristocracy, and the property interest. This indignation Wilson and his associates now planned to turn to their own political advantage.
475
FREE-SOIL COALITION
DEMOCRATIC-FREE-SOIL COALITION (1850)
One of the immediate consequences of Webster's memorable speech had been a plan hatched by three leaders of the legislature, Wilson, Free-soiler, and Boutwell and Banks, Democrats. It was to put actively into effect for the fall elections the scheme already proposed of a combination of Democrats and Free-soilers. With three parties in the field, the Whigs had been able to poll only 49 per cent of the voters. Nevertheless, they controlled the State government by virtue of the solid delegation from Boston which they sent to the legislature. Since that body was empowered to choose the State officers whenever none of the candidates received a majority at the election, if the Free-soilers and Democrats could unite on candidates for the legislature in all the towns and cities of the State, they could accomplish their aim. As the plan took shape in the fall, its main difficulty concerned the division of the spoils. The Free-soilers, it seemed, would be content with the long-term senatorship; the Democrats might have all the State offices and (for good measure) the short-term senatorship. The point of this arrangement was that it would show Massachusetts to the nation as repudiat- ing Websterism, filling his place with a man (Charles Sumner, for example) who was outspoken against slavery. No scheme could be better devised to exasperate and humiliate the Whigs; it would be fitting revenge for all that Wilson and his associates had suffered at their hands.
Just as there were "conscience" Whigs, whose scruples kept them from the crude and practical methods of the Web- ster wing of the party, so there were "conscience" Free-soilers -men who in 1848 had fought for a principle with no hope of victory and plunder. Palfrey, Adams, Dana, Phillips, and Samuel Hoar all had good reasons for wishing to pull the Whigs down from their high place; but for this purpose they could not see their way to a combination with members of the Democratic party, to whose fundamental principles they had long been opposed. On the Democratic side, Caleb Cushing and Marcus Morton were against the fusion.
As a result of such objections, the conventions of the two parties in the fall of 1850 took no formal action towards coalition; it was understood, however, that on local tickets
476
PRELIMINARIES OF CIVIL WAR
men were free to vote as they pleased. This course was all that was necessary, and the small politicians of both parties lost no time in making arrangements throughout the State whereby coalition men should be elected to the Legislature.
EFFECT OF THE FUGITIVE SLAVE LAW (1850-1851)
In the campaign that followed, in which the three parties were competing for votes on the basis of a condemnation of Websterism, either mild or severe, the Fugitive Slave Law played an important part. Massachusetts had been aimed at by the Southerners when they framed it; and the events im- mediately following its passage showed that Winthrop was right in saying that the South had overreached itself. Slave catchers appeared in Boston seeking William and Ellen Craft, mulattoes who, after a romantic escape from slavery, had lived peaceably in the city, being respected members of Theo- dore Parker's congregation. In anticipation of this event, a vigilance committee had already been formed, which now did active service in protecting the couple and in frightening the slave catchers out of town. At once meetings in protest against the new law were held in various places in the State, as elsewhere in the North; the clergy and the press were aroused, and everywhere an animated debate was carried on over the law of the Constitution versus the law of God.
In truth, the Fugitive Slave Law had brought the slave question before the Northerner in a new light. He was forced to ask himself whether he would give aid in returning a runaway to his owner. Would he betray a hiding place? Would he assist at an arrest? Would he refuse help to a fugitive when the pursuers were close upon him? To put the case in general terms, was he bound to render obedience to what he regarded as an unjust law? The problem thus be- came the question of the hour-a personal question, which no one could ignore. The more it was discussed, the more was heat engendered.
The Free-soilers had their say at Faneuil Hall on October 14, when Charles Francis Adams presided and Richard Henry Dana, Jr., in presenting resolutions, called for a repeal of the law as unconstitutional and repugnant to the moral sense,
477
FUSION ACCOMPLISHED
Both men urged the colored people of Boston not to flee to Canada, and promised to defend them.
The Whigs rallied to the support of the government at the same place on November 26, when their chief constitutional authority, Benjamin R. Curtis, delivered a long and weighty argument in defense of the law. In his opinion, the aboli- tionists, who denounced the Constitution, stood on ground more tenable intellectually than those who, accepting it on the one hand, also professed allegiance to a "higher law." These men were not facing the issue manfully, and refused to see where their course was carrying them. The real
difficulty, he said, arose from the fact that two communities, with conflicting institutions, must perforce live side by side on the same continent. "You may break up the Constitution and the Union tomorrow ; you may do it by a civil war or by, what I could never understand, the method or the principles of -what is called a peaceable secession; you may do it in any conceivable or inconceivable way; you may draw the geo- graphical line between slave-holding and non-slave-holding anywhere; but when we shall have settled down, they will have their institutions and we shall have ours. One is as much a fact as the other. One engages the interests and feel- ings and passions of men as much as the other.
"If any one in this age expects to live in peace, side by side with the slaveholding States, without some effectual stipulation as to the restoration of fugitives, he must either be so wise as to foresee events in no wise connected with human experience, or so foolish as to reject experience and probabilities as guides of action."
FUSION ACCOMPLISHED (1850-1851)
Under these circumstances of excitement, the results of the State election in November, 1850, were naturally a subject for study and speculation. The results were as follows:
Whigs
57,000
Democrats
36,000
Free Soilers
27,000
Total
120,000
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PRELIMINARIES OF CIVIL WAR
It is true that, although ten thousand more votes were cast than in the preceding year, the Whigs lost only two per cent of their votes to the other two parties. But the significance of the result lay in the fact that the Free-soil and the Demo- cratic parties had effected their informal coalition, and the Legislature was placed in their joint control by a majority of ten in the Senate and fifty-four in the House, if they could be brought to act together. Here was the rebuke to Whigism and Websterism; in this peculiar and, politically speaking, not altogether wholesome manner did Massachusetts pronounce its condemnation of the Fugitive Slave Law.
As for the political managers who had taken advantage of the public indignation to engineer this triumph, they were eager to reap where they had sown. Their course meant the temporary if not the permanent sacrifice of many of the best men in both parties; but they needed the political crop for profit-even, in some cases, for sustenance-and so their hands would not be stayed. When the legislature assembled in January, 1851, they drew up their program and called upon their followers to put it into effect.
The first part of the bargain was carried out with no delay. There being no choice by popular vote, the State offices were filled by the legislature and were given to Democrats, George S. Boutwell becoming governor, and Robert Rantoul, Jr., Senator for the short term. The hitch came over the election of the Senator for the full period of six years. The Free-soilers insisted upon their most aggressive man, Charles Sumner; a choice which aroused dissent in many quarters. To Caleb Cushing it fell to lead in the opposition. Believing that it was the first duty of all to preserve the Union, he could not possibly consent to support a man whose position as to slavery he regarded as only a little less extreme than that of Garrison. Although the Democratic caucus voted down Cushing's resolution condemning the coalition bargain, he was able, on the first ballot for Senator, to control twenty-eight votes, and there was no choice. "Caleb Cushing," remarks his biographer, "had stirred up several violent political storms in his lifetime, but it may be doubted whether there had been any as turbulent as that which followed his action in voting against Sumner." For over three months the tempest raged,
479
SHADRACH FUGITIVE SLAVE CASE
a contest full of personalities and bitterness and one from which Sumner himself would gladly have escaped had his managers permitted. But their own political prestige was bound up in his success, and he found himself helpless.
SHADRACH FUGITIVE SLAVE CASE (1851)
While the muddy waters of politics were agitated by these blasts of Coalitionism and anti-Coalitionism, other events were supplying the influences which were to determine the outcome. Since the day when the Vigilance Committee, in- spired by Theodore Parker, paraded the corridors of the United States Hotel and frightened off the men who sought William and Ellen Craft, the negroes of Boston had been living in quiet, and their apprehensions on the score of the Fugitive Slave Law had somewhat subsided. But the South- erners had by no means given over their purpose of recovering a fugitive in the city of Garrison and the abolitionists. Sud- denly, on February 15, 1851, a slave catcher appeared, seized a negro known as Shadrach, and brought him before George T. Curtis, the United States commissioner. It was the moment for a lawyer, and one was at hand-Richard Henry Dana, Jr. Here was the occasion for which he had publicly pledged himself. Rushing from his office to the courthouse across the street, he found the commissioner on the bench, "actually in the judge's seat." A crowd gathered; the excite- ment grew intense. Hunting up Chief Justice Shaw, Dana presented the petition which he had hastily drawn up. The two men came to grips in an earnest argument; to Dana the judge's reasons seemed invalid, but his refusal was final.
Baffled, the lawyer returned to his office to consider the next move; he heard a hubbub in the street and beheld Shad- rach in the arms of men of his own race who had snatched him from the law and were hurrying him away to freedom. For the moment the antislavery men were triumphant; but the real significance of the incident was noted by Dana in the following words: "The conduct of the Chief Justice, his evident disinclination to act, the frivolous nature of his objec- tions, and his insulting manner to me, have troubled me more than any other manifestation. It shows me how deeply seated, so as to affect, unconsciously I doubt not, good men like him,
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