Native American Whalemen and the World: Indigenous Encounters and the Contingency of Race

316 Pages·2015·5.281 MB·English

by  Nancy Shoemaker

NATIVE AMERICAN
WHALEMEN AND THE
WORLD
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NATIVE AMERICAN
WHALEMEN AND THE
WORLD
Indigenous Encounters and the
Contingency of Race
NANCY SHOEMAKER
the university of north carolina press
Chapel Hill
© 2015 The University of North Carolina Press
All rights reserved
Set in Miller
by Westchester Publishing Services
Manufactured in the United States of America
The paper in this book meets the guidelines
for permanence and durability of the Committee on
Production Guidelines for Book Longevity
of the Council on Library Resources.
The University of North Carolina Press has been a
member of the Green Press Initiative since 2003.
Jacket illustration: Detail of harbor traffi c at Cape Horn; courtesy
of the New Bedford Whaling Museum. Whale image from the log of the
Abraham Barker; Nicholson Whaling Collection, Providence Public Library
Special Collections, Providence, RI.
Library of Congress Cataloging- in-Publication Data
Shoemaker, Nancy, 1958–
Native American whalemen and the world : indigenous encounters and the
contingency of race / Nancy Shoemaker. — First edition.
pages cm
Includes bibliographical references and index.
isbn 978-1-4696-2257-6 (cloth : alk. paper)
isbn 978-1-4696-2258-3 (ebook)
1. Indians of North America—New England—History—19th century.
2. Indian whalers—New England—History. 3. Whaling—New England—
History—19th century. 4. Indians of North America—Fishing—New England.
5. Indians of North America—New England—Ethnic identity. 6. Whaling—
Social aspects—New England—History. 7. Whites—New England—Relations
with Indians. 8. New England—Race relations. 9. New England—Ethnic
relations. I. Title.
E78.N5S48 2015
974.004'97—dc23
2014034897
Contents
Acknowledgments ix
Introduction 1
part i. the ship
Chapter 1. The Gay Head Harpooner 21
Chapter 2. Race, Nationality, and Gender 40
Chapter 3. The Primacy of Rank 58
part ii. the beach
Chapter 4. Cultural Encounters 79
Chapter 5. Cycles of Conquest 93
Chapter 6. New Heaven 110
part iii. islands
Chapter 7. Native American Beachcombers in the Pacifi c 129
Chapter 8. Race and Indigeneity in the Life of Elisha Apes 145
Chapter 9. Beachcombers in New En gland 162
part iv. the reservation
Chapter 10. Degradation and Respect 181
Conclusion 195
Appendix A. Native American Whalemen’s Database 199
Appendix B. Native American Logbooks and Journals 203
Notes 209
Bibliography 257
Index 289
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Tables, Maps, and Figures
tables
1. Earnings of James W. DeGrass of Christiantown 31
2. Sampling of Lays of Native Third Mates in the 1840s 60
3. New Bedford Area Whaling Voyages with
Native Americans Aboard, 1800–1889 201
4. Native American Logbooks and Journals 207
maps
1. Native Communities and Major Whaling Ports 11
2. Mashpee Wampanoag Whaling Voyages Ended by Disaster 33
3. Fiji Islands 135
figures
1. Page from Joel G. Jared’s Journal 2
2. Whaleman Samuel G. Mingo and His Wife Lucina (Jeff ers) 15
3. Amos Haskins, Captain of the Bark Massasoit 25
4. Page from William A. Vanderhoop’s Journal 35
5. The Sunbeam’s Forecastle 55
6. The Execution of William Humphries on the Globe, 1824 83
7. William Allen Wall, Gosnold at the Smoking Rocks (1842) 96
8. Figurehead of the Awashonks 101
9. Elisha Apes in New Zealand 155
10. Elisha Apes’s Son James (Tiemi Hipi) 156
11. William Allen Wall, Birth of the Whaling Industry (1853) 182
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Acknowledgments
I am very grateful for the support this project received from the National
Endowment for the Humanities, the American Antiquarian Society, the
University of Connecticut Humanities Institute, and the University of
Connecticut Research Foundation. I am hugely indebted to the University
of Connecticut Libraries’ interlibrary loan team for all they have done to
help me over the years. And I thank the staff of the many archives I visited
for their knowledge and patience. Especially gracious given the number of
questions and demands I placed on them were Michael Dyer, Laura
Pereira, and Mark Procknik at the New Bedford Whaling Museum; Paul
O’Pecko at the G. W. Blunt White Library, Mystic Seaport Museum; and
the many staff members who assisted me at the U.S. National Archives at
Boston and the National Archives of the Fiji Islands.
Many other individuals helped in a variety of ways. At the University of
Connecticut, I thank several who received their doctorates in history and
anthropology and have since moved on—P atrick Blythe, Elliotte Draegor,
Brian Carroll, Jason Mancini, Timothy Ives, Cedric Woods, Meredith
Vasta, and Blaire Gagnon; my colleagues in the History Department, es-
pecially Helen Rozwadowski, Cornelia Dayton, Altina Waller, Richard
Brown, Matthew McKenzie, Micki McElya, Janet Watson, and Shirley
Roe; and the community of fellows during my year at the UConn Hu-
manities Institute. Researchers affi liated with the Mashantucket Pequot
Museum and Research Center, a fantastic resource to have nearby, gener-
ously shared research fi ndings and responded to questions: Kevin McBride,
Paul Grant-Costa (now at the Yale Indian Papers Project), Jason Mancini,
and Russell Handsman. Jason and I, in par tic u lar, have had many conver-
sations, especially after he also developed an interest in New En gland
natives’ maritime world. During my year at the American Antiquarian
Society, I received much useful feedback and encouragement from Caroline
Sloat, Jim Moran, Robert Bonner, Seth Rockman, Jenny Anderson, Jeff rey
Sklansky, and others who belonged to the community of fellows that year.
Formal and informal conversations in response to my queries, while at
conferences or in discussions following pres ent at ions I gave, also had an
impact on this book, for which I thank David Silverman, Susan Lebo, Ed-
ward Gray, Judith Lund, Christina Snyder, Lisa Norling, Martha Hodes,
Daniel Mandell, Ann Fabian, and Joshua Reid. For my New Zealand re-
ix