THE LAST OF THE

ICE HUNTERS

AN ORAL HISTORY OF

THE NEWFOUNDLAND SEAL HUNT

Edited and with an Introduction

and Commentary by Shannon Ryan

FLANKER PRESS LIMITED

ST. JOHN’S

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication

The last of the ice hunters : an oral history of the Newfoundland seal

hunt / edited and with an introduction and commentary by Shannon Ryan.

A compilation of interviews conducted by students who trained under

Memorial University of Newfoundland professor Shannon Ryan.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Issued in print and electronic formats.

ISBN 978-1-77117-316-2 (pbk.).--ISBN 978-1-77117-317-9 (epub).--

ISBN 978-1-77117-318-6 (kindle).--ISBN 978-1-77117-319-3 (pdf)

1. Sealers (Persons)--Newfoundland and Labrador--Interviews.

2. Sealing--Newfoundland and Labrador--History. 3. Sealing industry--

Newfoundland and Labrador--History. 4. Oral history--Newfoundland

and Labrador. I. Ryan, Shannon, 1941-, writer of added commentary,

editor of compilation II. Title: Ice hunters.

SH362.L38 2014 338.3’7297909718 C2013-908426-6

C2013-908427-4

———————————————————————

© 2014 by Shannon Ryan

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. No part of the work covered by the copyright hereon may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means—graphic, electronic or mechanical—without the written permission of the publisher. Any request for photocopying, recording, taping, or information storage and retrieval systems of any part of this book shall be directed to Access Copyright, The Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency, 1 Yonge Street, Suite 800, Toronto, ON M5E 1E5. This applies to classroom use as well.

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We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program (BPIDP) for our publishing activities and the Government of Newfoundland and Labrador, Department of Tourism, Culture and Recreation. We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts, which last year invested $157 million to bring the arts to Canadians throughout the country. Nous remercions le Conseil des arts du Canada de son soutien. L’an dernier, le Conseil a investi 157 millions de dollars pour mettre de l’art dans la vie des Canadiennes et des Canadiens de tout le pays.

For Margaret

and in honour of the last traditional Newfoundland

ice hunters

and their dependants

Contents

Preface

Introduction

Part 1 Long Interviews: Setting the Stage

Part 2 Interview Extracts with Selected Topics

Conclusion

Acknowledgements

Appendix 1 Informants

Appendix 2 Oral History Project Team Members, 1986 and 1987

Appendix 3 Chafe’s “Notes of the Voyages,” 1924-1941

Bibliography

Preface

This effort has its own history. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, in order to understand the technologies of the cod fisheries—as my father and his family were railway workers, I had little knowledge of fishing technologies—I began to interview older retired fishermen, especially Uncle Andy (Andrew) Short (1900-1989) and Ned (Edward) Russell (1883-1985), both living in Riverhead, Harbour Grace, my home community. My MA at Memorial University of Newfoundland (MUN) (1969-1972) on the cod fishery, under the supervision of Dr. Keith Matthews (since deceased), was followed by a Ph.D. dissertation on the Newfoundland saltfish trade (1814-1914) at the University of London, under the direction of Professor Glyn Williams.

The publication of my dissertation/monograph in 1986 coincided with an invitation by three prominent academics of MUN—Professors Leslie Harris, George Story, and Fred Aldrich (all now deceased)—to focus on the history of the seal fishery (or hunt). As literary executors of a large collection of seal fishery material gathered by the late Professor Cater W. Andrews, Biology Department, MUN, they suggested that a study of the Newfoundland seal fishery to 1914 would complement my study of the saltfish trade for the same period. I agreed.

I created a two-year research/writing period by teaching for two extra semesters and applying for a year’s sabbatical. In September 1985 I began a two-year leave of absence from teaching. As I had already collected some useful information from retired sealers and others in the sealing industry through my research on the cod fishery, I decided to engage in further research in the oral history of the seal fishery. Coincidently, in the fall of 1985 the Canadian federal government, through its Canada Employment and Immigration Commission (CEIC), announced a program to provide unemployed people with training that could lead to regular employment. An old friend, employed by the provincial government’s Department of Labour, Edward McCann, reminded me of the CEIC program, in which Newfoundland was also participating at the time, and I decided to check it out. CEIC’s Job Development Program allowed not-for-profit organizations to train unemployed people. These trainees would not only learn skills that would increase their chances of employment but they would also be paid $225 per week, and the weeks so worked would be insurable, thus qualifying them for employment insurance at a later point in their training.

As president of the Newfoundland Historical Society (NHS) I proposed to its executive that NHS sponsor a grant application under this program whereby I would train people to interview older retired sealers about their experiences at the ice. Mary Devine, vice-president, and Dr. George Story, a past NHS president, supported this application, which was approved by the NHS executive. A grant was received in December 1985, and the project begun the following January. Further grants were applied for and received periodically up to and through the fall of 1987. The provincial government participated in the first stage of the program, but it quickly became exclusively a federal responsibility. This Oral History Project delayed my planned monograph on a history of the Newfoundland seal fishery up to 1914—The Ice Hunters (Breakwater, 1994)—but oral history research must always take precedence over documentary research because the latter, unlike the former, can be delayed.

As director of this Oral History Project aimed at the Newfoundland seal hunt during the 20th century, especially c.1914-1949, I concentrated on those former sealers who had worked on the coal-burning sealing steamers out of St. John’s (several female informants were also interviewed). (The two Harbour Grace firms that had also participated in this hunt, Ridley’s and Munn’s, went out of business in the late 1800s and therefore had no role in this study.) My earlier monograph, Fish out of Water: The Newfoundland Saltfish Trade, 1814-1914 (1986), covered the history of the Newfoundland cod fishery up to 1914, leaving a substantial background for this further study.

The sealers on the coal-burning steamers were the focus of the study but we (including the researchers in the field) also interviewed elderly fishermen who had hunted from land (landsmen), and our study picked up references from prior to 1914 and from post-1949. However, 1950 became our official termination date because in that year the SS Eagle, the last of the wooden-wall coal-burning sealing ships, was sunk by its owners, Bowring’s. My reasoning for this project was that those men who had been involved in sealing, an activity which barely made it into the 1940s, would soon pass away. I was convinced we needed to collect their personal narratives, histories, and memories. I was, and am, fully cognizant of the fact that this was the end of sealing as a Newfoundland industry because the old British colony had become a Canadian province in 1949, which meant that any future sealing activities would be controlled by Ottawa (with rather disappointing results). In addition, confederation with Canada provided an outlet for Newfoundland labour, which was able to take advantage of job opportunities in mainland Canada, principally, as I recall, Toronto, during the 1950s. To satisfy the terms of the grant, the project was designed to teach the trainees how to interview sealers, record these interviews, and transcribe and type them.

In the fall/winter of 1985/86, we began the Project with computers which could handle only short files on WordPerfect 4.0. But soon the capacity of the computer programs expanded considerably while the newly employed interviewers learned typing and computer skills. Since I was close to the senior students in MUN’s History Department, many of the first people hired had strong backgrounds in Newfoundland history and were known to me personally. Other students were attracted by word of mouth. All expenditures were regularly audited by CEIC accountants. We sought out individual sealers by local inquiries, starting with people we knew and extending our research into senior citizens’ residences in St. John’s at first and then in the major bays from Conception Bay to Notre Dame Bay. Some interviewers travelled and, in the case of Conception Bay, we hired local people who met our criteria. Naturally, as we progressed, informants gave us the names of others to contact for interviews.

Some of the longer interviews, included in Part 1, present an overview of the sealing industry and are representative of the major areas of study, beginning with three individuals who worked at and/or operated Bowring Brothers, the principal firm in the seal hunt during this period. This is followed by interviews with former sealers, chosen from various coastal sites involved in sealing, and concluded with an interview with Martha (Mrs. Cater) Andrews.

The project soon settled into a routine. Although all personnel in our small but ever-changing group underwent the same training, they each gravitated to work with which they felt most comfortable: interviewing, transcribing, typing, and general office administration. The project developed a scattergun approach: finding as many informants as possible. There were times that I thought we should do follow-up interviews, and I sometimes regret not doing this, but time did not permit: we progressed from grant to grant, never knowing when our project would be terminated by running out of money. Transcribing the oral interviews was usually undertaken by a member of the team, other than the interviewer, but in every case the handwritten transcript was proofread by the interviewer before it was typed. Nevertheless, some editing occurred during the process, with false starts, repetitions, etc. being edited out. For those interested in conducting more in-depth research into the seal hunt, the tapes of the original interviews are held in the Shannon Ryan Oral History Collection in Memorial University’s Folklore and Language Archives (MUNFLA).

The interviews in Part 1 have been divided into paragraphs for ease of reading. Part 2, arranged alphabetically by topic, contains extracts from the interviews; this section presents problems of overlapping and repetition: it was difficult to be consistent in finding the correct heading for each piece of information, and, secondly, the informants were so generous with their time and attention that they deserved, for their own sake and that of their families, to be included, even at the risk of repetition. The numbers following the informants’ names in Part 2 refer to the pagination of the original typescript. The tapes include my initials followed by those of the interviewer in square brackets; for example, [SRBH] at the end of an extract denotes that Brent Howell did the interview. I assigned a number beginning with “1” for the first interviewer, “2” for the second, etc. Each interviewer began with a digit from 1 to 9. This information is included at the end of each extract, directing researchers to the specific tapes from which the information was extracted. A tape can also be accessed by an informant’s name (see Appendix 1).

I also examined the MUNFLA interviews, most of which were collected by John Widdowson and Herbert Halpert in the 1960s, sometimes assisted by others. Extracts from these interviews have been incorporated into those from the Project. The names of MUNFLA’s informants are also listed in Appendix 1. There is usually less information about the sealing industry in the MUNFLA interviews because the interviewers’ primary focus was language and folklore.

A third source of interviews was the tapes of interviews I had conducted in the 1970s, prior to the Project’s beginning. These are denoted as Reel to Reel and are sometimes accompanied by a number.

I also realized that the statistics collected by Levi Chafe, which I had earlier published (Chafe’s Sealing Book, 1989), also contained information on the sealing voyages during 1924 to 1941 (inclusive). Since Chafe’s reports on these annual voyages had been printed as broadsheets during his lifetime, and never collected and republished, I decided that they should be included as an appendix in this present study (see Appendix 3). For 1924-1941, the main period covered by the Project’s interviews, Chafe’s documentary evidence corresponds with the oral sources. However, the Project’s interviews, not Chafe’s statistics, are the primary sources for this study.

This is the study of an old industry in decline and one which provided the few opportunities for employment during the 1930s. This study will begin with a chapter on the introduction, background, and overall development of the hunt up to c.1950. The major theme will be the social and economic impact on the men who were actively involved and their working conditions and their families who benefited from the financial rewards or suffered from death and injury at the icefields. One development that will become obvious is the expansion of the sealing industry in the early 1800s and, later, the role played by the introduction of larger and more powerful ships and the decline in the number of men and ships involved in the hunt. This had a major negative impact on the cod fishery, particularly that prosecuted on the coast of Labrador by fishermen from the east and northeast coasts of the island of Newfoundland. Finally, the impact of petroleum products on the value of seal (and whale, fish, and other traditional oils) on the markets will become obvious.

The majority of the interviews concerned sealers during the Great Depression and Newfoundland sealing during the Commission of Government period (1934-1949). Thus, one will notice the absence of any influence by politicians, unlike the period before the Great War (World War I), when, for example, Captain Arthur Jackman always gave “tickets” to his old friend Cabinet Minister Mike Cashin. However, one will also note the role played by clergymen and merchants in the distribution of these “tickets” which guaranteed the recipient a “berth” on a sealing ship. The experience of Bowring’s in their apparent difficulties with the Commission was connected by a thread extending back through the Dominions Office in London, through the Colonial Office, and back to the Naval Commodores of the 1570s. This thread can be traced forward to Judge Reeves in the 1790s as well, and it was firmly believed in British government circles that the established merchants were not supporters of the various government offices in London that had always tried to oversee Newfoundland’s development. Consequently, in the discussions leading up to the votes on confederation, many in the old mercantile establishment on Water Street, St. John’s, were disappointed that Newfoundland was not simply given back Responsible Government status instead of having to defend it in referenda—which they lost.

The interviews show the lives of the men, young and old, who worked hard, under harsh conditions, to provide “a bite to eat and a roof over their heads” (an old Newfoundland expression) for themselves and their families. This manuscript also recognizes and commemorates the end of Newfoundland’s traditional seal hunt. (The end of Newfoundland’s traditional saltfish industry was slower to arrive.) Therefore, 1949 marks the end of the annual ice hunt as a truly Newfoundland activity.

The Last of the Ice Hunters is not the end of the discussion of the Newfoundland seal hunt. Further work on the subject and the period will be continued by other researchers and writers. This effort is intended to provide a resource for others to use in their pursuits of information of our sealers, their dependants, and the social and economic circumstances of the first half of the twentieth century.

Introduction

Old and Young Ahead, the title of Abram Kean’s autobiography—Kean was probably the greatest sealing steamer captain, or at least the most well-known, in the history of the Newfoundland seal fishery—was taken from the shout often heard from the barrelman in the crow’s nest on top of the main mast of a sealing steamer announcing that a patch of old and young seals lay ahead. The bridgemaster would relay this information to the wheelman, who, with his crew, would adjust the wheel appropriately. On most occasions, the scunner, standing in a barrel high up on the foremast, would continue directing the steamer around and through growlers (pieces of semi-sunken ice) and ice pans that could damage the hull. The second hand (first mate) would order the men to assemble on deck. They would gather in watches (groups) around their master watches, of whom there were generally four by the early 1900s. The master watches were responsible for their complement of men, but they were often assisted by ice masters whom they had appointed to look after six or seven men each. Each ice master was responsible for his small contingent of sealers, who were expected to remain close to him while on the ice—and each small group carried a flag, which was used to indicate a pile of pelts (two flags flying close together informed sealers where to meet or signalled an emergency). The gunners would be prepared with their guns and dogs (men who carried the cartridges) in case old seals could not escape through the ice. The men, batsmen as they were known, would have their killing gaffs in hand, along with knives and steels, and ropes for hauling the pelts (or sculps) to their flag after the bloody slaughter was over.

In most cases, the captain would drop off part of his crew, a watch for example, depending on the size of the patch and the weather. If one watch or two could kill the entire patch, and the weather was reasonably good, the steamer would seek another patch. The watch on the ice, under the supervision of the master watch and his ice masters, killed and pelted the whitecoats (pups, so called because of their fur colour), and the pelts were dragged to flagged central points. The few gunners in the watch would shoot any old seals in the vicinity; these would be paunched—stomach split open—and the penis, in demand by the Chinese (usually laundrymen), who sent them back to China or used them locally as an aphrodisiac (although many sealers believed they were used to make starch!), cut off. These old seals were also pelted by the batsmen.

Toward the end of the day the steamer would return, the pelts winched on board, and the men picked up. If the pelts were still warm, they were left on deck for a while, but if they had come from an early kill, they would have chilled and be ready to be stowed below in the holds with a man assigned to keep tally as they were stowed. An extra pelt was generally thrown in after each 20 was tallied. Stowing the pelts was started by the early shift—two of the four watches (for example), with the men working from 8 p.m. to 12 midnight. The other shift, two watches, would eat and sleep and take over at 12 and work until 4 a.m. On-board work during these two shifts included dumping the ashes overboard and transferring coal from the forward holds to the engine room. The engineer would oversee the reduction of steam power and “burn ’er down” (reduce the fires) for the night. Firemen and coal trimmers (labourers who kept the coal to the firemen) would take a well-deserved rest. The steam engine would slow down until it produced only enough power for lighting and the steamer’s whistle.

Before the designated watches went to their bunks for three or four hours, or tackled the work which confronted them, all the men ate their evening meal of salt beef/pork and duff, usually covered with molasses (vegetables were added by the 1920s). The night work of stowing pelts, dumping ashes, and moving coal was supervised by deck routers or assistant master watches. It was a cold miserable affair, especially for those trying to sleep in the crudely built, temporary bunks between decks. The hatches would be open while men, before or after their watch on deck, tried to sleep mere yards from the swaying winch and its hook of pelts descending and coal or ashes ascending. It was not unusual for lumps of coal or pieces of seal fat to land on their sleeping forms. All men were up before dawn to breakfast on hard bread, butter, and tea. Hard bread (also called hardtack or sea biscuit) was available to all the men in any quantity and was always carried by them on the ice; often eaten with raw seal hearts, it provided sustenance throughout the day. The story of the sealing steamers, their captains and men, and their contribution to the Newfoundland colony during the early 1900s (c.1914-1950) is the subject of this study.

Before I examine the steamer industry, I will discuss the early developments in the seal fishery during the period leading up to 1863—the year wooden-wall steamers were introduced to the Newfoundland seal fishery—and then the 1860s and 1870s, when both sailers and steamers were employed, followed by a study of the wooden-walls and the expansion of this fleet. The addition of steel steamers to the wooden fleet in the early 1900s will also be considered. Finally, I will examine the war period and its impact and the depressions in the seal oil industry, the Great Depression, and World War II. The history of this industry since the beginning of the 20th century is heavily dependent on oral sources, which were recorded by me or under my direction from 1986 to 1988.

Britain’s recognition of Newfoundland, unlike its other colonies, was granted comparatively late despite a series of proprietary colonial charters granted by the Crown in the 1600s. The English colonies of present-day Canada and the United States of America (USA) were founded on economic hopes primarily, into which fitted the social and religious objectives of Puritans, Quakers, Roman Catholics, and others, with an additional interest in a route to Asia. (I am leaving aside French Canada/Quebec for the present.) Initially the English colonies were disappointments, yielding neither mineral wealth nor a shortcut to Asia. However, the Atlantic coast could produce and export fish to Europe, and gradually it was discovered that it could produce tobacco, cotton, and rice as well—products in demand in England. More importantly, the Atlantic coast locations (excluding Newfoundland) could produce grain, vegetables, fruit, herbs, and livestock for their own consumption—and later for export. The native inhabitants, referred to as Indians, introduced the colonists to corn, squash, and beans, with potatoes arriving from Peru via Europe. The English-controlled area, from Maine in the north to the Carolinas in the south, became self-sufficient in food. Newfoundland was the exception: it had neither the soil nor the climate to support agriculture, and the short seasonal nature of its bountiful cod fishery did not provide the time that migratory fishermen needed to experiment with farming.

French Canada on the St. Lawrence River became an important fur-trading settlement beginning in the early 1600s, expanding throughout that century and the early 1700s. The fur-trading enterprise between Quebec and France was accompanied by a large migratory French cod fishery prosecuted both on the coast of Newfoundland and on the Newfoundland Grand Banks as well as the coast of Labrador. The English migratory cod fishery on the east and northeast coasts of Newfoundland flourished, amidst many vicissitudes, throughout the three centuries up to c.1800.

In the early 1700s, the scattered English inhabitants (settlers) along the northeast coast began to shoot, net, and club seals in the waters near their habitations. Because seals are warm-blooded sea mammals, their thick coats of subcutaneous blubber maintain their body temperature. (Whales, seals, and other sea mammals require the protection of blubber for the same reason.) The blubber was easily rendered into oil, which provided lighting fuel, the meat consumed, and the skins used for footwear and harness leather. The oil later found a ready market in Britain for lighting, lubrication, and other purposes, and the skins were also in demand. As England was industrialized, the oil market grew and expanded dramatically in the latter 1700s, primarily due to advances in lighting technology (the Argand lamp—the first invention since the classical period), which created a demand for indoor lighting—shops, houses, taverns, theatres, churches, etc.

As I have pointed out in other publications, especially The Ice Hunters (1994), this small sea mammal, the harp seal (Phoca groenlandica), revolutionized the settlement and governance of Newfoundland (which, from 1809, included the coast of Labrador). A mature male harp seal weighs 100-130 kilograms (220-300 lbs.) and measures 1.5-2 metres (4.6-6.6 ft.); females are smaller. The name harp comes from the large dark harp-shaped pattern on its back; the rest of the body is usually grey. The female gives birth to pups (whitecoats), weighing about 11 kilograms (24 lbs.), and nurses them for about two weeks, during which time the pups become very fat. The mothers then desert their pups on the ice and seek a breeding partner; the young, without food, spend another week or two before going into the water out of desperation for food. When they enter the water, the pups begin to moult, and are referred to as ragged or raggedy jackets. When the pups are capable of swimming and fishing, the main seal herd resumes its migration north, and the young become known as beaters, and, by year two, bedlamers. After year four, approximately, they have acquired the adult colouration of the harp seal, and their life span is about 35 years.

Harp seals live in the Arctic during summer but migrate south in the fall and spend several months gorging themselves on fish and available food on the Grand Banks and other closer banks. (They are always accompanied by hood seals that travel in family groups, not in herds, yet always farther seaward from the harps.) In February harps and hoods return north and begin the long swim to Arctic Nunavut waters. Meanwhile, Arctic ice drifts south in large fields of pans. The seals meet the ice and females (harp and hood) climb on it and give birth (this ice is known as whelping ice) within several days at the end of February and the beginning of March and, within a month, the raggedy jackets join the migration to northwestern waters.

Although commercial European sealing had begun in Newfoundland at least as early as the 1720s, when seal oil exports to England were first recorded, the industry remained small throughout the 1700s. For example, seal oil valued at £6,025 was exported in 1723; by the five-year period ending in 1792, annual average exports were still less than £8,000 (Ice Hunters, 49-54). During that century sealing was carried on north of Trinity, where nets were used to capture those occasional seals that swam close to shore. People in those northern settlements also used their small fishing boats to seek out seals on loose ice, shooting them with flintlock muskets. Occasionally, whelping ice bearing whitecoats would drift into harbours, giving the inhabitants an excellent opportunity to procure a large kill in a short period—with men, women, and children participating. St. John’s and the principal cod-fishing ports in Conception Bay, however, were not in a position to take advantage of this resource as the seals rarely journeyed or floated so far south. As the seals did not come to them, fishermen in Conception Bay and St. John’s had to go to the seals and by the late 1700s England provided a ready market for the oil produced.

Most sources claim that the first vessels to go seal hunting were two small “fore-and-afters” (schooners) of about 45 tons each that sailed from St. John’s in 1793 and brought back a total of about 1,600 seal pelts (CO/194/129, fol.147). Another source points out that in 1796 four vessels went from St. John’s and several from Conception Bay, some of which met with good success. W. A. Munn, a local historian writing in the early 1920s, described these early vessels as “shallops, decked in fore and aft with movable deck boards in the centre of the boat . . . [while] the shelter cuddies at each end gave the crews some protection when they remained out over night” in his Introduction to Chafe’s Sealing Book (20).

In 1804, 35 shallops from Conception Bay sailed to the icefields, and, of these, 25 were lost in northeast gales; by 1806, all shallops had been replaced by decked schooners (Chafe’s Sealing Book, 15). Although John Bland, Bonavista, doubted that this new spring seal fishery would survive, because of shipping losses experienced in the early years, the industry thrived and expanded rapidly due largely to the increasing market for oil in Britain. The fleet from St. John’s expanded from 19 ships carrying 188 men in 1803 to 32 ships carrying 545 men in 1819, and the Conception Bay fleet from 35 “vessels and shallops” carrying 369 men to 140 vessels carrying 2,203 men during this period (Ice Hunters, 121). By 1820, Conception Bay had become the dominant region participating in the seal fishery. This was largely because of the capital accumulated by its merchants and by the manner in which these merchants and fishermen could combine so successfully the seal fishery with the new migratory cod fishery that they prosecuted on the Labrador coast during the summer months—employing the same ships and men. St. John’s, on the other hand, had become the major commercial centre of the English-Newfoundland shore during the Napoleonic War (1803-1815) and it was slower than Conception Bay to take advantage of the seal resources.

The Labrador coast cod fishery had evolved from the fishery by Conception Bay merchants and others that had developed on the North Shore (i.e., the east side of the Great Northern Peninsula)—Petit Nord to the French. The North Shore fishery had been established by English fishermen, especially from Conception Bay, during the French Revolutionary War and the Napoleonic War, when there was a tremendous demand for Newfoundland saltfish and the French fishermen were unable to use their traditional fishing grounds in Newfoundland. Consequently, after peace was restored between Britain and France in 1815, Conception Bay merchants directed their fishing captains to continue north across the Straits of Belle Isle and to prosecute the cod fishery on the Labrador coast. As the Labrador cod-fishing season was even shorter than that of the inshore fishery in Conception Bay, it could not support the men employed (and their families) for 12 months. In other words, the migratory Labrador cod fishery that operated from Newfoundland suffered the same disadvantage as the earlier English-Newfoundland migratory fishery had. This is where the seal fishery entered the picture: It provided employment from early February, when the vessels were outfitted, to May, when the seals had been harvested, the pelts skinned of their fat, and the fat rendered into oil. Combined with the necessary work of building and repairing the sealing/fishing vessels and the maintenance of their homesteads, these fishermen/sealers had year-round employment.

Munn reports that Conception Bay fishermen began building stronger craft circa 1810 because of their investment in both the seal and Labrador cod fisheries; he credits Richard Taylor of Carbonear with protecting bows with iron sheathing and installing false beams in his schooner to strengthen the hull during the sealing voyage (Chafe’s Sealing Book, 16, 20). Not surprisingly, shipbuilding became the third most important industry in this area and remained a major Newfoundland industry throughout the first half of the 1800s.

As shallops gave way to decked schooners, the latter increased in size. At first the burthen of sealing vessels ranged from 30 to 60 tons and carried 10 to 16 men (Ice Hunters, 124). In 1819, William Munden of Brigus launched the first vessel of over 100 tons built for the seal fishery: Four Brothers, 104 tons. Munn quotes a contemporary of Munden’s: “Even Robert Brown, who afterwards founded the ‘Commercial Bank’ [1858] said, ‘he always thought William Munden a level headed man till he built the Four Brothers, of 104 tons, for the ice in 1819’” (Chafe’s Sealing Book, 22). This example soon led others to build larger vessels for sealing. Between 1814 and 1862 the average burthen of sealing ships departing St. John’s increased from 53 to 129 tons and the average crew from 17 to 52 men; the respective figures for Conception Bay during this period were 54-127 tons and 16-51 men (Ice Hunters, 453-6). The industry found that larger ships could make voyages of “a longer distance and stand the weather better” (Chafe’s Sealing Book, 20).

One contemporary writer in Newfoundland observed the changing nature of the shipping technology employed in the seal fishery. Joseph B. Jukes had been hired by the government in 1839 to engage in a geological survey of the island’s resources. He pursued his objective with great enthusiasm and engaged in exploratory activities beyond his terms of reference. In late February, accompanied by Dr. Stuvitz, a Norwegian professor of Natural History from the University of Christiania (Oslo), he ventured to the icefields to observe the seal hunt. They had some difficulty in finding a ship that would or could take them. Jukes described the sealing ships and their search for berths:

The generality of vessels going to the ice are schooners and brigs [brigantines] from 80 to 150 tons, manned by a stout crew of rough fishermen, with a skipper at their head of their own stamp. These ships are inconceivably filthy, being often saturated with oil; and crew and skipper all live and lie together in a narrow dark cabin of the smallest possible dimensions, and the fewest possible conveniences, everything being in common. In such a vessel as this it was evidently impossible for us to be accommodated, nor would either crew or skipper have consented to take us. There are, however, one or two masters of ships of a superior description who reserve the after-cabin to themselves and keep the crew in the forecastle. Among these, one of the most respectable was Mr. Furneaux . . . [who] had just built a new vessel called the Topaz, a brigantine of 120 tons, in which he was going out for the first time. She had a comfortable little after-cabin, with small staterooms, containing altogether five berths. This cabin he agreed to share with us . . . (112-3)

Jukes and Stuvitz witnessed the changing technology used in the shipping employed in the annual seal fishery. The separation between officers and men, both physically and socially, would increase throughout the following decades until, by the latter part of the century, it had become completely established and acceptable.

In the early years of sealing, sailing ships left port about March 17—St. Patrick’s Day—and generally shot older seals on loose ice or in the water (Anspach, 422). Soon, however, the men became aware that female seals gave birth around the end of February and that helpless whitecoats could be killed on the ice with a gaff—a heavy and sturdy adaptation of the fishing gaff—with a combination iron spike and hook at one end. Because the fat (or blubber) of the whitecoats produced a finer and higher quality oil than that from older seals and because these pups could be killed in large numbers relatively quickly, the search for whelping patches became the aim of every sealing captain. Later in the season men continued to shoot adult seals among the ice floes, but this was usually a last resort for crews that had failed to reach the whitecoats, although occasionally ships came upon adult seals basking on ice that had “tightened” or gone together and prevented their escape into the water.

Captain Peter Carter, commanding the SS Ungava, experienced this phenomenon in 1933 when he was returning to St. John’s from the hunt with a fair cargo of 26,100 whitecoats. Sighting a black mass ahead, he discovered that it was a herd of adult and bedlamer harps caught on tight ice. He sent his gunners forward, but when he realized that the seals could not escape, he shouted—using his loudhailer—for the gunners to hang back and let the batsmen go first with their gaffs. They killed over 18,000. Carter set the record for the heaviest cargo of seal pelts ever brought into a Newfoundland port in a single trip. (Andrew [Andy] Short, 1900-1989, who was on board that trip, described to me how the old seals congregated in one spot, piling on top of each other in an effort to break the ice and thus escape.) In any event, it was early in the 1800s when ships left port in time to concentrate their efforts on finding the whelping patches of the harp seals. (Hood seals whelped on scattered ice pans.)

The adoption of larger vessels increased productivity and profits for the merchants. At the same time, overall seal production increased as merchants expanded their fleets and as more captains and firms entered this new industry. For example, average annual exports of about 100,000 seal skins in the latter 1810s peaked at nearly 700,000 in 1844 (Ice Hunters, 445). The increased production encouraged the growth of permanent population from about 40,000 to 100,000 people over this same period (Ryan, “Cod Fishery,” 202). This growth resulted from a small but continuing flow of immigrants from the United Kingdom and fewer than usual Newfoundland residents emigrating to the United States.

Merchants, then, were forced to introduce changes in their method of calculating the value of seal pelt cargoes. It had always been customary to pay a sealing ship for the number of pelts brought into port—a set price for whitecoats, another for old harps—regardless of weight or size. This custom encouraged captains to harvest whitecoats as soon as their ships could reach the whelping grounds, and cargoes began to consist of pelts from ever younger whitecoats instead of older, much larger, ones that had ceased, or were about to cease, nursing. Consequently, captains were leaving port earlier and, with their larger ships, penetrating the whelping grounds soon after the seals had whelped. In 1835, this practice was fully exposed when a cargo of whitecoats was bought from a Captain John Henley, sight unseen, by the firm of Tobin and Bland, St. John’s, for five shillings and three pence per pelt. The firm discovered that the pelts were those of very young whitecoats (called “cats,” and averaged about 20 pounds each). The firm felt cheated, and all firms then agreed that in future all pelts would be purchased by weight. This encouraged captains to practise a rudimentary form of conservation because fewer, heavier pelts were needed to load a ship, and it was not unusual, in later years, for ships to wait in a whelping patch (if there were no other ships in the neighbourhood) for whitecoats to fatten.

As the ships became larger, the rigging also underwent adaptations. The common schooner rig was first used, but the masts were lengthened to better catch the wind. The fore and aft rig was impractical within ice floes, where watery leads had to be followed. Sails were supplemented by manpower. Long poles were lashed horizontally to the sides of the schooners and tied together at the tips well out beyond the stem. The men walked along on the ice pans, pushing them aside, and dragged the schooner along. This was a cold, wet job, and many sealers literally hauled their schooners for days. It soon became a common practice to rig a square topsail on the foremast of a schooner to catch more wind, when possible. This created what the locals called the “Beaver Hat Man” because of the image the vessels presented when seen at a distance among the ice floes. As the vessels reached 100 tons burthen, the “Jack Ass Brig” was adopted: a square rig on the foremast, one square topsail, and one topgallant on the main mast for temporary use. According to contemporary reports, the standard brigantine with square sails on both masts gradually became the favourite sealing vessel. Apparently only two barquentines (three masts with square rigging on the foremast and fore and aft on the others) were used at sealing—and apparently not successfully (Chafe’s Sealing Book, 17). William Munden (b.1776) of Brigus was the most successful of the earlier sealing captains in his little schooner Active, making two trips each spring (Chafe’s Sealing Book, 22). He supported the idea of bigger vessels. Although he was ridiculed by other skippers, he built the brig Four Brothers, 104 tons, for the sealing season of 1819; this introduced bigger vessels, actually brigs, and larger crews.

The increased production of seals, however, had a detrimental impact on the resource, and in spite of increased investment, production levelled off, and began to decline. Equally serious was the decline of local shipbuilding, as it became cheaper and more practical to import the necessary shipping from the nearby British colonies on the continent. According to Munn,

Prior to 1840, nearly every vessel prosecuting the Seal Fishery was native-built. Every Harbor of importance on the Eastern Front of our Island built its own vessels; Twillingate, Fogo, Greenspond, Bonavista, King’s Cove, Trinity and Hants Harbor as well as every Harbor in Conception Bay and several ports South of St. John’s . . . (Chafe’s Sealing Book, 16)

Nicholas Smith, a sealer and fisherman, describes how his father came from Dartmouth in 1839 to work as a shipbuilder in St. John’s. Soon afterwards he was persuaded by Brigus sealing captains to move to their town and carry out his trade there, which he did until his premature death (Smith, 10-1). It seems that by the 1840s and 1850s, Newfoundland shipbuilders were unable, because of the lack of timber, to build the ever-larger brigantines that were becoming increasingly popular in this industry.

The brigantine became the dominant, and practically only type of, vessel to prosecute the seal fishery during its peak in the 1840s and 1850s. It generally carried square sails on the foremast and the main mast, and by the 1850s most of these vessels were imported. This is illustrated in shipping records. From 1820 to 1840 locally built vessels owned by Conception Bay residents and registered in St. John’s numbered 422, while foreign-built or imported vessels numbered 221. Later these numbers became reversed: smaller vessels were locally built and the larger vessels were imported. Thus, ironically, the demand for increasingly larger vessels resulted in the decline of local shipbuilding, an important industry.

Nevertheless, some larger ships were being built in both Conception Bay and St. John’s and larger crews employed. The average burthen of the Conception Bay fleet reached 104 tons in 1853, 112 tons in 1857, and 125 tons in 1862 (Ice Hunters, 141). When the Thomas Ridley was built by Michael Kearney in Carbonear for John Rorke’s firm, and launched on February 25, 1852, it was reported to be the largest sealing vessel in the island, with a burthen (according to the custom office) of 164 tons (Express, 6 March 1862). What made this launching newsworthy was the fact that so few large vessels were being built locally. On the whole, St. John’s ships were slightly larger than Conception Bay ships, averaging 129 tons each in 1862. Meanwhile, the number of crew members increased from 31 men per ship in 1846 to over 50 in 1862.

The early 1860s was a major turning point in the history of Newfoundland sealing. The sealing fleet had already experienced major losses as well as numerous individual disasters since the beginning of this industry. For example, 25 ships were lost in 1804; 15 in 1829; an undetermined number in 1836; 20 in 1843, the “‘Bonavista Bay Spring’ and another cat year”; considerable damage to shipping during the “Spring of the Growlers,” 1844; serious losses in 1845; great losses in 1846, followed by a decline in the St. John’s fleet from 141 ships in 1846 to 96 in 1847 and a decline in the Conception Bay fleet from 186 to 156; and a loss of 50 to 60 vessels during the “Spring of the Wadhams” in 1852 (Chafe’s Sealing Book, 39-41). No total figures are available for the “Green Bay Spring” of 1862, but it was disastrous in terms of shipping losses, with the St. John’s fleet declining from 99 to 39 vessels between 1859 and 1863, and the Conception Bay fleet from 152 to 113 between 1861 and 1863. About 30 vessels were lost in 1864 (Ice Hunters, 298). The early 1860s was the beginning of the end for the sailing fleet, and the losses were not replaced, as steam power was introduced into the sealing industry.

Between the 1790s and early 1860s several developments in the Newfoundland sealing industry were evident. The ever-larger vessels could and did prosecute sealing more efficiently by going farther afield and by bringing in ever larger cargoes. From just over 100,000 pelts annually in the post–Napoleonic War years, production peaked at nearly 700,000 pelts, as mentioned, in 1844 (Ice Hunters, 282-99). Seal oil exports increased from fewer than 2,000 tuns (1 tun equals 4 hogsheads or 256 gallons) worth £40,000-£60,000 to over 10,000 tuns worth over £300,000 during this same period. This boom led to an increase in population from about 40,000 to 100,000 people (statistics from Ice Hunters, Appendix, unless otherwise stated). However, efficient harvesting had seriously reduced the seal herds, and a plateau in production was reached by the mid-1840s despite continuing investment. Furthermore, as pointed out, Newfoundland lost a substantial part of its shipbuilding industry.

Meanwhile, a new form of propulsion had been developed using steam power, the practical application of which was first developed in Britain in the early 1700s. Although he built on earlier experiments, Thomas Newcomen (1664-1729, Dartmouth, Devon) can be considered the father of the steam engine. His engine was (to us) a simple affair of heated water and a steam-driven piston attached to a reciprocating rod, and it was used to pump water from mines—originally tin mines in the southwest counties of England, and soon coal mines in the midlands. It used coal or wood as a fuel and, because the steam was expelled externally as the piston retreated, it needed a constant flow of water. It wasted fuel and water but it could be used cheaply where these were readily available, and it could pump water from mines up to 150 feet (47.5 m) deep.

James Watt (1736-1819, Greenock, Scotland) improved the Newcomen engine considerably, adding a wheel. The Watt engine could drive more complicated machines. This improvement allowed the steam engine to be used in factories and mills, turning the machinery necessary to their operations such as power spindles and, later, power looms in the cotton industry, and hammers and rollers in the iron industry. Because England possessed major coal resources, fuel was readily available and could be shipped by water to centres away from streams and water wheels, and established towns and seaports became industrial centres. The early steam engines derived their power from the vacuum created by cooling the steam in the piston chamber. But by 1800, steam power itself produced the force to push the pistons and turn the wheels to which they were connected.

It did not take long for aficionados of steam to appreciate the possibilities of using steam power for propulsion on land and sea. A steamship using a simply designed rear paddlewheel or two side paddlewheels came into use early in the 1800s. In tandem, steam locomotion was applied to land transport. The English mining and freighting industry had used horse-drawn carts on rails since an earlier age. They had also begun to cover the rails with strips of iron plating. Some observers and inventors concluded that steam power could replace horses. In 1825, after several experiments, George Stephenson built a steam-powered locomotive for the Stockton-Darlington Railway. His first public railway for passengers and freight was opened in 1830 between Liverpool and Manchester—the beginning of massive railway building in Britain.

To return to the sea: the paddlewheel steamer with its stern wheel or side wheels became common in British water traffic particularly in harbours and on rivers. It was also used in transatlantic traffic and adopted in the USA and Canada for extensive river transportation. On the open seas, however, where schedules were not precise, sail propulsion remained the dominant system. Despite its advantages, the paddlewheel steamer was not well suited for ocean travel. Its wheels often could not withstand the pounding of the seas and certainly not the presence of ice or other surface obstructions. As a result, an alternative to the paddlewheel was explored.

The Archimedes screw, named after its Greek inventor, became the object of investigation and experimentation. Since this screw was used originally to lift water, it was believed by some that it could be used to push a ship forward. In one experiment using a fairly long screw attached to a steam engine, when part of the screw broke off, it was discovered that the short stump pushed the vessel faster. Experiments with various screws resulted, but the principle was always the same. Fishermen and boatmen recognized its similarity to the sculling oar. By the early 1840s, both the USA and Royal Navies were using screw propellers experimentally and soon adopted the new technology. Although the screw propeller was successful, steamers could not carry enough coal to make this technology worthwhile to transport passengers and freight long distances. Consequently, maritime nations, particularly Britain, used sailing ships to transport loads of coal to designated coaling stations on their freight, passenger, and naval routes. Britain established many coaling stations around the British Isles, on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean, and the Mediterranean (including British Gibraltar), Indian, Pacific, and Arctic oceans. Other maritime nations followed this practice, but up to 1914 none could match Britain.

Meanwhile, Newfoundland sealing and British Arctic whaling ships, to name two obvious industries, needed power to track through icefields, regardless of the wind direction. As we have seen, paddlewheel steamers would not be viable in these industries because the wheels would be crushed by the ice. Therefore, these fleets eagerly awaited information on the perfection of the screw steamer. By the late 1850s, faith in the screw steamers was growing, and, according to Munn, the first attempt to prosecute a seal fishery with steamers took place in 1862, when the SS Camperdown and SS Polynia were sent to the ice by Scottish interests. Their success, or lack of, was not noted by Munn, although he reported that the Polynia “had to put into St. John’s for repairs” (Chafe’s Sealing Book, 13).

As a follow-up to the Scottish experiment, a new era of sealing began in 1863. In that year two St. John’s firms introduced steamers into the Newfoundland seal fishery: Walter Grieve & Co. sent out the SS Wolf, 210 tons, and Baine Johnston & Co. sent out the SS Bloodhound I, 153 tons. The steam engines of these ships produced only 30 and 40 horsepower respectively (nominal horsepower—nhp); therefore, sails were also needed. These steamers had been built for the British Arctic whale fishery, where they had proved themselves, and were purchased from their owners. Although these low-powered steamers needed to supplement steam power with sails, and were unsuccessful at first, they soon proved their superiority over the sailing vessels. The obvious advantage from the beginning was that steamers, no matter how inefficient the early engines, could follow the open leads through the icefields, regardless of wind direction.

The advance in technology was countered by a decline in the price of seal oil as petroleum entered the marketplace. During the 10-year period ending in 1864, seal oil was sold on the London market for an average of £43 per tun (about $215); during the 10-year period ending in 1880, it averaged £30 ($150) per tun (Mark Lane Express, 1880)—a drop of one-third. According to Newfoundland records, the value of seal oil exports during 1865-1870 averaged $175 per tun, while the value of exports during 1891-1896 averaged only $75 per tun (HAJ). Production continued to decline due to over-harvesting—from 527,000 seals annually during 1841-1845 to an average of 233,000 annually during 1896-1900 (Ice Hunters, 104-5)—and even lower in the 20th century.

The adoption of steamers changed the sealing industry. As the outports could not finance these relatively expensive ships, St. John’s merchants soon monopolized the industry. This led to a decline in the migratory Labrador cod fishery as prosecuted by the outports because their shipping was no longer viable for sealing, and to provide shipping for the Labrador cod fishery alone was not economical. Thus the economies of the outports declined. Similarly, the number of men needed to operate the sealing steamers declined: from a peak of 14,000 men in sailing craft in the 1850s to 3,500-4,000 in steamers by the end of the century.

The steamers were more efficient as they could reach the whelping patches, which were frequently beyond the reach of the old sailing ships, although this would eventually have an adverse effect on the resource. Successful captains bringing to port tens of thousands of seals earned more in a voyage lasting several weeks than cabinet ministers earned annually. The fishermen’s shares declined drastically, however, as charges were levied on them, and their share of the voyage was reduced from the traditional one-half on sailing ships to one-third on steamers. In the 1830s and 1840s men regularly earned the equivalent of $150-$200; by the 1860s and 1870s the average share of a man had declined by about 50 per cent.

The steamers showed little promise at first. In 1863, the Bloodhound, with 100 men, brought in 3,000 seals; the Wolf, with 110 men, brought in 1,340. Despite these poor results Baine Johnston’s added the Ospray (also called Osprey, 176 tons) in 1864 and that year the three steamers, with their 300-plus men, brought in only 1,059 seals. In 1865, these steamers brought in a total of 19,086 seals, with the Bloodhound and Wolf taking 700 on their second trips. Bowring Brothers, another St. John’s firm, introduced the SS Hawk, 172 tons, and these four steamers brought in over 28,000 seals. In 1867, Grieve’s added the SS Lion, 292 tons; Job Brothers, another major St. John’s fishing firm, added the Nimrod, 226 tons, that same year; Baine Johnston’s (with Abram Bartlett as partner) added the Panther. In 1870, the steamers began to show their prowess: the Lion brought in 19,500 seals; Nimrod, 18,500; Panther, 16,400—for a total of 102,310 seals, including the other steamers and six second trips. Meanwhile, J & W Stewart had introduced the Walrus in 1870, while the other established firms continued to add to their fleets: Eagle owned by Bowring’s in 1871; Hector, Job’s, 1871; Montecello, Harvey’s, 1872; Iceland and Greenland, Nicholas Stabb, 1872; and Neptune, Job’s, 1873—Captain Edward White Sr. had supervised the construction of the Neptune in Scotland during the winter of 1872. In 1873, the Ranger, Hector, and Tigress were also added to the steamer fleet, by which time the Bloodhound had been lost at the ice, followed by the loss of the Wolf and Ospray in 1874, and the Hawk in 1876. Finally, in 1873, 18 steamers went to the ice; most cleared from St. John’s, with one each from Trinity, Bay Roberts, and Catalina.

Of all the outports and outport firms in Conception, Trinity, and Bonavista bays with their substantial sail sealing fleets, only Harbour Grace moved into steam sealing. In 1866, Ridley & Sons sent the SS Retriever to the ice. It made two trips and brought in 23,400 seals. Its captain was James Murphy and it sailed from Catalina on its first trip. I mention Catalina to point out that the steamers incorporated sealers from the northern bays—experienced men from the sailing ship era—into their crew. In 1867, Ridley introduced the Mastiff, also under Murphy, also clearing from Catalina. Meanwhile, the Retriever was also sent out and both steamers made reasonable voyages. Up to, and including, 1870, Ridley & Sons was the only firm to operate in steam sealing outside St. John’s and James Murphy was their principal captain. In 1871, John Munn & Co. ordered a steamer, the Commodore, to be built in Scotland; it was put under the command of Captain Azariah Munden (son of William, above), their principal sailing captain from Brigus. Munden, a successful sealing captain during the last days of sail, had his father’s brig the Four Brothers rebuilt, and rechristened the Three Sisters. He also had considerable success in the Commodore, christened in his honour, and in 1872 brought in 31,314 seals and his crew each made the considerable sum of $158.21. Even the Boston Traveller noted this, describing how the ship arrived with seals piled on the deck and being towed (Ryan & Drake, Seals and Sealers, 71).

After 1873, Ridley’s bankruptcy ended its participation in the seal fishery, leaving only John Munn & Co. to represent the outports. In 1873, Munn’s took possession of the Vanguard and put it under the command of Munden and, in fact, wanted to christen it the Admiral in respect for Munden, who declined the honour. Munn’s went bankrupt in 1894 along with other major fishing and sealing firms in St. John’s and the two major banks—Commercial Bank and Union Bank. One could point to the Bank Crash of 1894 as a firm indication of the end of the commercial northern outports (i.e., those north of St. John’s) as major semi-independent entities.

Within a few years of the introduction of steamers, the sailing fleet dwindled and, in 1874, 23 steamers and “few sailing vessels” went to the icefields (Royal Gazette, 10 March 1874). In 1882, the famous sailing vessel captain from Harbour Grace, Henry Thomey, reminded his contemporaries of the advantages of steam-powered sealing ships. In command of the large brig Isabella Ridley, he reported that he had seen thousands of seals but that the ice was too thick to penetrate. He was confident, however, that the steamers would be successful (Evening Telegram, 29 April 1882). (However, one wonders why Thomey did not send his men to kill seals and haul the pelts to his ship, as was a common practice.) The sailing ships, unable to reach the whelping patches before the steamers, were reduced to hunting the older seals among the loose ice, a practice that was not financially feasible. The St. John’s Evening Telegram summed up the situation:

The brig William, Capt. Stephen Whelan arrived at this port from the Northern icefield about noon yesterday with between six and seven hundred old seals. Capt. Whelan’s news seems to be in the main very similar to what we have received from the commanders of other sailing vessels. The steamers took the lead and kept it all spring, and as they passed through the different patches of hoods and harps everything in the shape of a seal was picked up. Verily, the days of our sailing fleet are numbered. (April 30, 1883)

By then the age of the sealing sailers had ended and the steamers had triumphed.

To maintain one’s perspective regarding the catch of seals since 1818, Chafe gives the following figures in 10-year totals, except for the first period:

The peak years of the seal hunt occurred between 1830 and 1859, with expansion up to the end of the 1840s and into the early 1850s. The 1860s were depressed years due to the depopulation of the herds by hundreds of sealing vessels and thousands of men. As noted in Ice Hunters (445-449), for example, in 1857 over 496,000 seals were harvested, nearly 508,000 in 1858, 329,000 in 1859, 344,000 in 1860, and 124,950 in 1864. Production never recovered to its 1830s, 1840s, and 1850s levels. To add to the problems of depopulation, the value of seal oil declined as mineral oil (petroleum) began to take its place.

Although statistics regarding the ages of seals harvested were not kept before 1895, the net weight of the ships’ cargo of seal pelts was sometimes recorded. By dividing the net weight of pelts by the number brought into port, one can calculate the average weight of pelts in certain instances and draw tentative conclusions about the success of the steamers in reaching the whelping patches. In 1869, for example, the four steamers for which figures are available brought into port pelts averaging 52, 64, 68, and 50 pounds each (2.2 lbs. per kilogram). Since 50-52 pounds was considered a good quality whitecoat pelt, these steamers undoubtedly were killing on whelping patches. Similarly, in 1871 five steamers harvested pelts averaging 49, 49, 49, 42, and 48 pounds; in 1878, 48, 47, 57, 47, 68, and 55 pounds; in 1879, 44 pounds; and in 1888, 58 pounds. Strictly from the point of view of productivity, the introduction of wooden-wall steamers was quite successful in that these ships were reaching the valuable whitecoats. The seals, however, were being overharvested, resulting in declining stocks and adverse social and economic impacts on the outports. Beginning in 1895 the statistics become more specific and one can differentiate the number of young harps (whitecoats), old harps, bedlamers (yearlings in livestock parlance), young hoods (blue backs), and old hoods. Whitecoats made up the vast proportion of pelts brought into St. John’s by the sealing steamers during the period 1895-1940—thereby demonstrating their efficiency.

While wooden-wall sealing steamers drove the sailing fleet out of the industry, they, in turn, were soon confronted by steel steamers. In 1906 the St. John’s firm of Harvey & Co. introduced the Dundee-built SS Adventure, over 800 net tons, into the seal hunt. Besides having a sturdier steel hull, it was the largest sealing steamer to prosecute the hunt during the 1906-8 seasons. The Adventure set a style, not only as a new sealing ship but as a class of icebreaker. Its stem was designed to ride up on the ice and break it with its own weight instead of ramming it to crack open a lead. A contemporary report described this revolutionary sealer:

Yesterday a steamer was launched by the Dundee Shipbuilders Co., Ltd., which marks a distinct advance on any of these [earlier steamers], and built as it is for the sealing trade of St. John’s, Newfoundland, seems not unlikely to be destined to be the forerunner of many vessels of a similar type. The S.S. Adventure, which name has been given the boat, is especially constructed for ice navigation, but, unlike previous vessels for that trade, she is built completely of steel to Lloyd’s highest class, and far in excess of their requirements, her stem, stern post, rudder and steam steering gear being fully twice the weight and power required for vessels of her size. Her frames and beams are much above usual size and more closely placed, while her plating is correspondingly heavy, the plates at forward and along the side being up to one and one-half inches thick. She is also fitted for further strength during the sealing season with tiers of heavy portable wood beams, these being removed when the vessel is engaged during the rest of the year as an ordinary trading steamer. She is . . . 265 feet by 88 feet by 21 feet moulded depth, fitted with all the latest appliances for the rapid handling of cargo, and is lighted by electricity, including a powerful searchlight for use in the quest of seals. She will be fitted with engines . . . [and] three boilers of sufficient power to obtain a speed of twelve knots . . . (Evening Telegram, February 2, 1906)

The Adventure proved its worth on its first voyage. Its ability to cut a track through the icefields was noted by all, and several wooden-walls followed in its wake. At the end of the season this steamer brought in over 30,000 pelts, worth almost $50,000—the largest voyage in the fleet—and paid its men $81.65 each—$10 more than the nearest placed wooden steamer (Ice Hunters, 189). (Incidentally, the total catch this season, 341,836 pelts, was never to be equalled.) In 1906, when the Adventure first prosecuted the seal fishery, 24 sealing steamers operated from St. John’s. Five had been built in the 1860s, 12 in the 1870s, five in the 1880s, one in the 1890s, and one in 1902. Almost immediately, the wooden-walls suffered in comparison with the new steel steamer, as their captains tried in vain to keep up with the Adventure. The result was the loss of two wooden-walls in the ice in 1907 and three in 1908.

The three major sealing firms in St. John’s—Bowring’s, Job’s, and Harvey’s—adopted the new technology wholeheartedly in 1909. Bowring’s weighed in with the largest steamer to that point, the Florizel at 1,980 tons; Job’s, Beothic at 471 tons; and Harvey’s, Bellaventure at 466 tons and Bonaventure at 446 tons. Only the firm of Baine Johnston’s stayed exclusively with the wooden-walls. Meanwhile, Bowring’s installed a Marconi wireless set—the first on a sealing ship—on the Florizel. Two more wooden-walls went to the bottom that year, and a third narrowly escaped, and was towed into St. John’s.

The stars of the fleet did well and the top two voyages were almost identical. Bowring’s Florizel under Captain Abram Kean (a legend in his own right) was the highliner with 30,488 pelts (including over 10,000 young hoods or blue backs) with a total value of $54,000, of which the 203 men each received $88.33. Job’s Beothic under Captain George Barbour brought in 34,837 pelts worth $53,610 and paid its men $87.67 each. Harvey’s Bonaventure was third with 31,188 pelts and paid its men $75 per share. Bowring’s wooden-wall, the Eagle, was fifth and paid its men $59.10, and the Adventure paid $53.87 per man. All paid well above the overall average of $42.65 per man’s share that year (Ice Hunters, 190-2; Chafe’s Sealing Book, 76).

It was apparent that the wooden-walls could not keep up with the steel steamers, and in 1910 the owners of both types of steamers agreed that the former would be given a head start on their way to the icefields; they would leave after 8 a.m. on March 12, while the latter would not leave before 6 p.m. This was a fairly productive season, with Captain Abram Kean setting a record with over 49,000 pelts worth $90,800 and paying his men $148.36 each. Bowring’s installed wireless sets on both the Florizel and the wooden-wall Eagle under Captain Joseph Kean, which was probably instrumental in his bringing in 30,000 pelts and paying his men $89 each (Ice Hunters, 192-3). In 1909 the Florizel had demonstrated that wireless was useful in maintaining contact with their firm in St. John’s through contact with land-based Marconi stations. In 1910 it was discovered that wireless could be used between vessels while at sea, thereby making it convenient for captains employed by the same firm to notify each other (in code) when one of them had anything useful to report. Thereafter, wireless sets were installed on some of the other steel ships as well as on some of the wooden-walls.

The steel steamers continued to operate without any major incidents during the next several years. In 1912, Bowring’s added the Stephano, 2,144 tons, to its fleet; but 1912 was an unproductive year, with most of the 24 steamers doing poorly, although several did quite well (the highliner Beothic, for example, paid its men $73.82 each). Two years later, in 1914, there were two disasters: the Southern Cross sank, with its entire crew of 173, while returning from a successful hunt; and the Newfoundland lost 78 men to frost and drowning when most of its crew were left on the ice in a storm for about 53 hours. They were left on the ice because Captain Westbury Kean had no way of knowing that his men were not on his father’s (Captain Abram’s) steamer, Stephano. The Newfoundland’s owner, Harvey’s, had removed its wireless set that year as a cost-cutting measure. Furthermore, when Captain Abram carried the Newfoundland’s crew to a small patch of seals, and assumed (wrongly) that he had taken them closer to their own ship, he did not advise the neighbouring steamers that the Newfoundland’s crew was on the ice.

The two sealing disasters of 1914 resulted in an Enquiry held between November 30, 1914, and January 15, 1915. The Commissioners of the Enquiry were Honourable Sir William Horwood, Chief Justice of the Supreme Court; and Honourables George H. Emerson and George M. Johnson, both Supreme Court Justices. The Counsels were Honourable R. A. Squires, KC, Attorney General in E. P. Morris’s Peoples’ Party Government, on behalf of the Crown, and W. F. Lloyd, Liberal MHA, who represented the sealers. John H. Fenelon, a prominent St. John’s lawyer, was present on occasion, representing the owners of the Newfoundland (Harvey & Co. Ltd.). In his testimony Alick J. Harvey pointed out that the Newfoundland was owned by the Newfoundland Sealing Co. Ltd., of which he was the managing director (although by the time of the Enquiry the company had gone into liquidation). He testified that the wireless had been removed from the Newfoundland before the 1914 seal hunt because it had not increased the profits made at the hunt. He candidly stated that he had never considered the wireless apparatus from a safety perspective (although he was quick to state that his previous view had changed). Therefore, when the Newfoundland sailed from St. John’s to pick up part of its crew in Wesleyville, Bonavista North, it had no wireless, and the stage was set for the ensuing disaster.

The captain of the Newfoundland, Westbury Kean, 29 years old and lacking in most navigational skills, as the Enquiry would discover, was the son of Captain Abram Kean, the commodore of the sealing fleet. Abe (as he was known) was master of the Stephano, a steel steamer of 2,143 tons owned by Bowring Bros. There was no way for these ships to communicate since neither of the Keans understood Morse code for lights or semaphore. Therefore, Abe told Wes that he, Abe, would raise one of the Stephano’s after-derricks if his ship was in a patch of seals. This verbal agreement would spark the resulting disaster.

On March 10, 1914 (according to Chafe), the sealing ships left their ports. The Stephano left St. John’s and the Newfoundland left Pool’s Island (and the Southern Cross left Channel–Port aux Basques). Toward the end of March the Newfoundland was jammed in Arctic ice. At only 568 tons the old wooden-wall steamer Newfoundland had not been able to reach a seal patch. Wes was forced to depend on his men’s searching the ice for scattered seals. The Stephano was about five to seven miles from the Newfoundland and in looser, lighter ice. Wes could see it moving and he could see the Stephano’s men working on the ice. Finally, on March 30, in the late afternoon, Wes saw the after-derrick being raised on the Stephano. Wes informed Tom Dawson, one of his master watches, that he would send his entire sealing crew under the leadership of the second hand, George Tuff, to the Stephano in the morning (i.e., Tuesday, March 31). Dawson said that Wes had told him that the four watches could spend the night aboard the Stephano and the Florizel, which was near the Stephano and commanded by Wes’s brother Joseph. Furthermore, Dawson relayed this information to the men in his watch. Westbury admitted to Lloyd at the Enquiry that he had said to Tuff on the morning of March 31: “You reckon on the Stephano for the night.”

At about 7 a.m. the four watches, led by George Tuff, left the Newfoundland to walk to the Stephano. It was difficult walking and 29 men (according to the Enquiry report) turned back. These men, who had not returned as a single group, gave different reasons to the Enquiry. Stephen Jordon, from Pouch Cove, who turned back around 10 a.m., was considered an ice master in his watch, which meant he would lead about 10 men while on the ice. He testified that

when we came to the side of her [Newfoundland] he [Westbury] said “who gave you authority to come aboard? Why did you not follow your master watches?” He said a lot and I said, “Well, Captain Kean, speaking for myself, no one told me to come aboard.” He said, “what did you come for?” I said, “I saw dirty weather coming on and the best thing was to come aboard my ship if I could.” He was ten minutes before he allowed a man to board her. (“Report of the Evidence from the Sealing Enquiry, 1914-1915”)

Another sealer who turned back, 52-year-old Alpheus Harris of New Chelsea, Trinity Bay, related his story to the Enquiry:

I left the Newfoundland about 7 o’clock and traveled until 20 minutes to 10. I had my watch and it was 20 minutes to 10. The weather was getting pretty close and I said to Roland Critch that I was going aboard again. We took the five seals we had killed and went aboard. The weather was beginning to get thick. The sky was overcast and it was snowing very fast. It was not cold, a sort of mild snow. I reckoned it between 5 and 6 miles from the Newfoundland when we turned and I dare say it was between three and three and a half miles from the Stephano. . . . Roland Critch, Edgar Short, Charlie Evans, and Joseph Francis turned back with me. They all belonged to Hant’s Harbour. There were more men on ahead of us turned back and got aboard the Newfoundland before we did. . . . My partner had a compass. . . . We got aboard between 2:30 and 3 o’clock . . . I never went on the ice without a partner and one of us had a compass. . . . I would not trust to any master watch if I was on the ice in a snow storm. I am capable of guiding myself. I was not going to tell him [Dawson] that I was going back to the Newfoundland because it was his duty to take us back there. I went back to the Newfoundland. I knew nothing about Tuff leading the crowd at all.

Obviously, Harris, at 52 and nine springs at the ice, figured he could and should look after himself and his friends.

The Newfoundland’s men reached the Stephano at about 11:20 a.m., where they were invited by Abe to come aboard and have their dinner (the midday meal was always referred to as dinner; lunch was a snack or a mug-up). Some managed to get a cup of tea, usually cold and unsweetened, and there was a bag of hard bread but no butter or fat pork. Most men had hard bread with them. Lemuel Squires and three or four men managed to find a small quantity of cooked beans. After about 30 minutes (11:50 a.m.) Abe ordered the Newfoundland men off, telling them he had taken them about two miles closer to the Newfoundland and that seals lay just southwest. He ordered Tuff to kill the seals and then return to the Newfoundland. Abe said that they should hurry and get overboard because he had to leave the area and pick up his crew about five to six miles away. However, while they could see the Newfoundland when they boarded the Stephano, the weather had gotten worse in the half hour they had been aboard, visibility had deteriorated, and the Newfoundland could not be seen when they were leaving the Stephano.

By this time it was snowing, with the wind from the southeast, and a storm was brewing. Despite misgivings and arguments by Dawson and others, Tuff led the men southwest in search of the seals as Abe had commanded. They struck some whitecoats much earlier than expected, which made Tuff realize that they were farther from the Newfoundland than he had thought. Then they saw a flag that had been stuck by some of the Florizel’s crew, which confirmed this. By now, between 12:30 and 1:00 p.m., the storm had increased, and Tuff decided to begin the walk back to the Newfoundland. He ordered Dawson to lead the way, and Dawson, followed by his assistant master watch, Hiscock, began to walk back. They both had compasses in their bags and it was more expedient for Hiscock to reach into Dawson’s bag and check Dawson’s compass. They travelled southeast by east and came upon the track left by the smaller group of men who had turned back at about 10:00 a.m. with a small tow of four or five seals marking a bloody path. The path disappeared at times under snowdrifts and was affected by shifting ice pans and had to be located again and again. At about 5 p.m. they lost the path.

The master watches tried to gather their own men together on separate pans, but with limited success. Mouland got his men on a separate pan, and they built a shelter at about head height. Dawson did the same, but Jones did not take control of his men, who went with Dawson and the pan became too crowded. The shelters provided some relief from the wet snow, but around midnight the wind changed from southeast to northwest and it began to freeze. Dawson’s shelter, built on the edge of the pan, protected the men somewhat at first. But after midnight it provided no protection as rain and wet snow changed to freezing snow. After midnight the men began to die.

Meanwhile, John Tizzard, the bo’sun on the Newfoundland, asked Captain Wes if he should blow the ship’s whistle. Captain Wes replied, “there is not much need because all the men are aboard the Stephano. . . . You can give it a blow or two if you like.” Between 4 and 5 p.m., just as Dawson had lost the path, Tizzard gave the whistle two blasts, and that was it. According to Sydney Jones, master watch, he heard the whistle between 4:30 and 4:45 p.m. The Newfoundland’s men were about a mile or so from the Newfoundland at that time and some heard the whistle. It was determined later that, had the whistle been blown regularly between 4 and 6 p.m., all the men would have gotten aboard.

Wednesday morning was stormy and cold. The Newfoundland’s men were heartbreakingly close to being seen by the Newfoundland, Stephano, or Bellaventure—but not so. They spent another night on the ice. Thursday morning, with the storm over, Tuff and a few others managed to board the Newfoundland and several reached the Bellaventure, whose captain, Isaac (John) Randell, ordered a wireless message to be sent to neighbouring ships announcing the tragedy. Randell ordered men overboard with stimulants and, later, makeshift stretchers, as Wes Kean was also doing. The sealing steamers picked up the survivors and the dead bodies, with the Bellaventure loading 58 dead and 35 survivors. When this became known to the acting premier, John R. Bennett, and the executive council, they asked Alick Harvey if the Bellaventure could be ordered home with the bodies and survivors. He agreed, and so ordered. Captain Wes Kean kept George Tuff and Arthur Mouland to help him bring the Newfoundland to St. John’s. The Bellaventure headed straight to St. John’s. Captain Billy Winsor in the Beothic and, as Cassie Brown wrote in Death on the Ice, with “callous bad manners,” decided he would race to St. John’s to celebrate his status as the first arrival and largest cargo: “[H]er arrival was greeted with silence.” Then the Bellaventure arrived with its flag at half-staff. Some men were taken to hospital on horse-drawn ambulance sleighs; others were carried or assisted to the Seamen’s Institute, where a temporary morgue and a temporary hospital had been set up. A terrible snowstorm had come to an end, but a political and public relations storm was just beginning.

At the icefields, the sealers were becoming hostile to the idea of continuing the hunt. William Coaker, on board the Nascopie, suggested that the hunt be suspended, but Job’s wired him from St. John’s that Captain Barbour would use his own judgment. According to Brown, seven men on the Diana refused to work, and Mark Sheppard, with others on the Stephano, also refused. On the Bloodhound the men laid their gaffs and ropes on the quarterdeck and refused to work or allow anyone else to do so. The crew would not even work the bunkers, and the ship drifted toward the Grand Banks. They finally agreed to work, provided they headed directly for port. Abe Kean ordered the Stephano to St. John’s and into the drama of a public Enquiry. There was an immediate Enquiry by Judge Knight, but a larger more inclusive Enquiry was to follow.

As pointed out, the judicial Enquiry was chaired by Chief Justice Horwood and included assistant justices Emerson and Johnson and it began on November 30. Forty-four witnesses gave testimony beginning with Captain Westbury Kean. Kean, whose testimony took up 44 pages of typescript, spent longer than anyone on the witness stand. He does not impress this reader with his testimony, and the commissioners must have been equally unimpressed. He testified that he was 29, had spent 15 springs at the seal hunt, had three years experience as captain at the hunt, all on the Newfoundland, but did not know how many men were in his crew until he was shown a copy of the articles with 186 names. When asked to name the men in charge of the Newfoundland, he replied: “Well, the navigating officer was myself but I had another man, Green, which the company asked me to take out and he assisted me by taking the sun and anything like that.” When asked if this man was called Captain Green, he replied, “Captain Green he is in the summer but aboard the ship he was called doctor because he looked after the medicine chest.” (As navigator, Green received a share of the seals but no wages.) His other officers were four master watches, four assistant master watches, and four bridgemasters. He said his ship was southeast of the Funks on the morning of Tuesday, March 31, and that it was so indicated on his chart. When questioned about his chart, he admitted he had left it at home in Brookfield, Bonavista Bay. When asked about the men who turned back, he could not say when they had arrived on the Newfoundland but guessed it was between 12:00 and 1:00 p.m., and he could not recall if he had had his dinner before they arrived. He did not know or could not recall the movements of the barometer on Monday night, Tuesday morning, or Tuesday afternoon. He did not know if the Newfoundland carried an outside thermometer and pointed out (incorrectly) that a thermometer’s movements have nothing to do with forecasting the weather. In fact, he showed a remarkable lack of knowledge and an inability to remember wind changes and ice movements that occurred before and during the disaster.

Captain Charles W. Green, the navigator, upon being questioned, displayed training and knowledge which must have made Wes Kean cringe. He testified that the barometer read 30.40 at 8:00 a.m. on March 31, 30.15 at 4:00 p.m., and 29.80 at 8:00 p.m. On April 1 at 8:00 a.m. it showed 29.50, noon 29.60, 4:00 p.m. 29.70, and at 8:00 p.m. 29.80. He recalled that the men who turned back arrived on board the Newfoundland between 2:00 and 3:00 a.m. and, because the weather was worsening, the whistle blew constantly until all these men were aboard. (He said 34 men came back!) With a falling barometer and a falling thermometer he would expect a cold storm, but a falling barometer and a rising thermometer would indicate a mild storm. A rising barometer and a falling thermometer would indicate fine but cold weather, and if both were rising, he would predict milder weather. Asked about his opinion and whether he expressed it to Wes Kean, Green said, “I go on one of those steamers as navigator. Captain Kean does not want me there. I am put there by the owners. If I say to Captain Kean I think it is going to be stormy today, the answer is, ‘oh, what do you know about it.’” He continued:

When the men left the ship on Tuesday morning they were going on board the Stephano. I heard Captain West. Kean tell Tuff. I was in the cabin. As far as I could understand the men were to go on board the Stephano and, the day being fine, they would have worked at seals and put up on the Stephano that night. That was the understanding, that they were to put up on the Stephano that night. There was no understanding as far as I know about what they should do if the day were not fine. Captain West. Kean was not expecting them back that night. He said in the afternoon that the men were on board of his father[’s boat] and they would be alright that night. He did not show any anxiety whatever that night. We saw the men board the Stephano. We could not see them leave because it was too rough and we thought on account of the weather coming so dirty that they would not leave her any more. . . .

I have been to the ice twice. That is not all my experience at the ice. I have had a little experience in Greenland and Baffin Land from here; I was Master of the S.S. Neptune from here to Greenland; I have been to Greenland in the Beothic on an expedition; I have been to Greenland in the Arctic and spent two winters up there. I have had considerable experience on ice. I have spent 41 days on ice continually.

Green pointed out that sealers should wear flannel instead of fleece-lined underwear as flannel soaks up perspiration and one doesn’t get cold, but one needed a canvas jacket to keep out the cold. He thought that skin boots were better than leather boots because they remained soft and a foot could move in them. He believed that a heavy sweater worn under a canvas jacket with no front opening was the best outer clothing. Furthermore, the Newfoundland had only a whistle, whereas she should have had blue lights and rockets, and every master watch should have a blue light. He also explained that men holding a masters certificate of competency should be able to use semaphore and Morse lamps at night, adding, “[a]ll men holding a Master or Mate’s certificate of competency have to be able to use these signals before they get their ticket, before they pass the Board of Trade examinations.”

Green also explained that the compasses set on the Stephano would not allow for the deviation caused by the magnetic pull of the steel ship, and thus when the Newfoundland’s crew left the Stephano and returned to the ice and away from the influence of the steel steamer, their compasses would not retain the same magnetic direction as that observed on board the ship. He felt that master watches should be sealers with at least 10 to 13 years experience and should pass an examination before becoming a master watch. There should also be at least one man aboard who knew how to rig a jury mast in an emergency, and the log should be kept according to Board of Trade rules. He described his actions when they recognized the disaster:

The first signal that went up was put up by Capt. Wes. Kean—a coal bucket and he came to me and said that something terrible had happened. We could see the Stephano plainly then about four miles to the other side of us and he spoke to me about putting the signal up and I put a signal up. That was the first signal after the coal bucket. I put up the International code signal of distress then. I hauled down the coal bucket.

Captain Green showed clearly why these Newfoundland ice skippers were not trusted by the companies to have the knowledge and experience of professionally trained navigators and thus the companies forced them to take navigators to the ice with them.

The evidence heard at the Enquiry included information on food and clothing and living and working conditions in general. The food was adequate for the officers, including the assistant master watches and bridgemasters, who ate with the captain. However, it was revealed that the men between decks received only basic food: hard bread, butter, and tea made up practically every meal. Sometimes boiled pork and duff were served and usually pea soup on Saturdays. The problem with cooking for up to 270 men was the lack of cooking facilities. As Alick Harvey said, it was impossible to set up cooking ranges (stoves) in such limited space. Consequently, a testimony showed, salt fish and hard navy beans were often given to men who had no place to water and cook these items. Clothing, as mentioned, was often inadequate and fleece-lined underwear was replacing flannel and homespun, but that depended on a sealer’s circumstances.

The testimony contains many comments about the role played by Captains Abe and Wes, but Abe was regarded as chiefly responsible for the disaster. Tuff also received serious criticism. John E. Hiscock from Carbonear, the assistant master watch under Dawson, testified:

George Tuff said in his evidence that the most active men were those who came through. I want to say here that if Geo. Tuff was so active on the bridge of the Stephano as some of the men who lost their lives[,] he would have looked to the crew more and would not let them be put out into a storm to perish. He also said that men at the ice get just as good food as they do home. I am a fisherman and I get better food home than ever I got at the ice. George Tuff may get it in the [captain’s] cabin. I would say here that for a man like George Tuff to leave a ship with no compass—is that man capable of looking after a crowd of men? I thought George Tuff was making arrangements with Captain Ab. Kean to come for us after we had been killing seals for a while. Capt. Ab. Kean said he wanted to get on to pick up his own men. If the weather was too bad for his own men to kill seals why did he put us on the ice to kill seals? It seems to me that he did not care anything about us as long as he got his own men.

Captain William J. Martin, navigator of the Stephano, gave evidence that indicated he was as trained and as professional as Captain Green; and Captain John Isaac Randell likewise. In addition to having a “foreign-going ticket” Randell had spent three years as an ordinary sealer and three as navigator on sealing ships. His evidence also included that the Bellaventure carried wireless, flags, a Morse lamp, rockets, and blue lamps. He demonstrated that the differences between non-qualified Newfoundland captains like Wes and professional captains like himself were substantial.

Meanwhile, getting back to the activities that went on during the storm, the testimony indicated that the Newfoundland’s crew had not been totally forgotten by some of the people on the Florizel and the Stephano. Patrick J. Barkley, the Marconi operator on the Florizel, testified that Captain Joseph Kean ordered him to send a message to Captain Abe: “Look after the Newfoundland’s crew and ours [Florizel] and we will look after yours.” The message was sent, received, and acknowledged, but Captain Abe testified that the message he received had not mentioned the Newfoundland’s crew, and no written copies survived; and Joseph could not remember the incident. The chief engineer on the Florizel, John Reader, testified that Captain Joseph expressed his concern about the Newfoundland’s men to him also. There were other references to the Newfoundland’s crew being out in the storm attributed to crew members of the Stephano on Tuesday and Wednesday but no evidence that concerns were relayed to Abe as far as we can tell from the evidence presented. It was difficult to find many witnesses who remembered in detail evidence that would have supported the case against Abe. Captain Joseph denied or forgot pieces of evidence that may have hurt Abe’s defence, and the second hand and senior master watches reacted similarly. Most likely these witnesses did not want to jeopardize their chances of further employment at the icefields.

The Report of the Enquiry, written by Horwood and Emerson, concluded that “Tuff committed an error in judgement” when he did not make an arrangement with Abe that the Stephano would return for them in the afternoon. But,

a grave error of judgement was committed by the captain of the Stephano in sending them [Newfoundland’s crew] to kill seals at the time and in the circumstances without arranging with them that the Stephano would return to enable them to board her before night.

The minority Report written by Johnson stated that Abe was simply helping the Newfoundland’s crew to kill some seals and that the disaster was an act of God. Both reports suggested changes and improvements that the colonial government was advised to pass into legislation.

The Newfoundland government began to pass sealing legislation in 1873. In that year Newfoundland was most concerned with assisting the sailing ships in their futile effort to compete with the newly introduced steamers. The earliest date of departure for the former was set at March 5, but March 10 for the steamers. In an equally futile effort to conserve seal stocks, the killing season was set at March 12. In 1879, the prohibition of killing “cats”—newly born pups—was added to the legislation. In 1883, the Act simply set the time of departure; nothing else was changed. The killing of seals after April 20 was prohibited in 1887 and steamers were forbidden to go out on second trips after April 1. Again, conservation of the stocks was the objective. In 1892, laws regulating the departure of sailing vessels had been repealed and the date of departure of steamers was established at March 12, with an added clause prohibiting the killing of seals before March 14. Finally, in 1893, an Act to prohibit the killing of seals on Sundays was passed. This legislation was passed to satisfy the Methodist constituency of the northeast coast primarily and became a contentious issue, as some captains and men ignored it. Captain Arthur Jackman (Catholic) was probably the most famous captain to do so, and subsequently paid a fine. In 1895, the end of the spring seal hunt was set at May 5, and second sealing trips were permitted. Crew members were not to be forced to remain on the ships for such second trips because many sealers needed time to prepare for the Labrador cod fishery. The Newfoundland government, facing its greatest financial and economic battle after the Bank Crash of 1894, tried to increase yields of seal pelts in 1895, and in 1898 it provided a bounty to encourage the building of sailing ships for sealing. In 1898, a more comprehensive Act was passed, with a steamer departure date set at March 10, and the killing season set at March 12–May 1. Prohibition of second trips was once again established and steamers also could not carry more than three men for every seven tons of gross registered tonnage or a maximum of 270 men. In 1899, a sealer’s share was protected from being attached by any business except by the sealing company for credit issued to them when they signed on for the voyage. As some Scottish ships had been using St. John’s, a 1903 Act prohibited the landing of seals in Newfoundland by any ship that did not clear from a Newfoundland port.

With the rise of the Fishermen’s Protective Union (FPU) and the success of the Union Party, under the leadership of William Coaker, legislation was passed in March 1914 to improve the lives of the sealers. This Act set up regulations that applied only to steel steamers. The sides of the lower deck where the men slept were to be sheeted with wood as well as the top deck itself to protect the men from frost. Portable iron-framed berths were to be provided. Steam pipes were to be used to heat the men’s sleeping quarters. A room was to be set aside for sick and injured men and a doctor (or medical person) was to be signed on the ship. However, steel steamers less than 850 tons were to be classified as wooden ships. Other clauses applied to all steamers: not less than one pound of soft bread was to be given to each sealer three times a week; beef, pork, potatoes, and pudding was to be provided for supper three times a week; breakfast was to consist of beans and fish and brewis alternatively; onions, potatoes, and turnips were to be the ingredients in soup on Saturdays; fresh beef was to be supplied once a week, or if not available then canned beef; and cooks were to be excluded from any other work. Sick or injured men in the wooden ships were to be transferred to steel ships if possible. Wooden ships departing for the Gulf could not leave before March 12, and steel ships had to wait until March 13; all ships were not to leave for the Front before March 14. The killing season was to begin on March 15 on the Front, March 12 in the Gulf. Finally, the companies were to pay for the transportation of sealers to their homes in the event that the trip was a failure—to a maximum of $4.

After the Report of the Enquiry of 1914/15 the government was forced to consider further the working conditions of the sealers. Thus, in May 1916, an Act was passed that included: sealers could only be on the ice between daylight and dark; ships’ captains were to send out search parties for any missing sealers; all sealing ships had to carry fire rockets; ships with over 150 men must carry medical practitioners; ships were to carry a certificated person; cooks who excelled at their work during the voyage received a bonus; a Board of Examiners appointed by the Governor-in-Council would ascertain the level of competence of second hands and master watches; sealers were to be compensated for injuries; the sealers’ one-third share of the pelts were to be sold to the highest bidder; and dead sealers would be placed in coffins and conveyed home. The 1916 Act was the zenith of seal hunt legislation.

Nineteen-fifteen was the most financially depressed year in the history of modern sealing. Only 47,000 seals in all were taken, and while the Bonaventure paid its men a respectable $64.68 each, the next highest share was only $26.80, paid by the Eagle, and the third a lowly $11.02, paid by the wooden-wall Terra Nova. Except for the Bonaventure’s, the voyages were financial disasters. The Florizel paid only $7.45 per man and the Beothic $6.10, while the Adventure and the Bellaventure paid an irrelevant 62 and 67 cents, respectively. The decreasing value of seal oil, the declining seal stocks, and the outbreak of war in Europe the previous August played a role in the transformation of the Newfoundland seal hunt. And Wes Kean was not given another sealing ship to command until 1921, when he was put in charge of the old Ranger.

The following year, 1916, was much better, but as Munn pointed out, “the expenses connected with such steamers made it necessary to get big trips every year” (Chafe’s Sealing Book, 26). As he said, sealing provided work for only one or two months per year, and while Newfoundland had the finest fleet of icebreakers in the world between 1906 and 1914, it could not afford to maintain this fleet because the ships were not competitive as freighters. Therefore, when the Great War began, the owners took the first opportunity to dispose of “this splendid fleet.” The Adventure, Bonaventure, and Bellaventure were sold to Russia in 1916; the Stephano was sunk in 1916 by a German submarine about five miles off Nantucket while en route to New York; and in 1918 the Florizel, while en route to Halifax and New York, went aground not far from St. John’s with a loss of 94 lives. By 1920 the Newfoundland sealing fleet consisted of nine steamers, mostly old wooden-walls; by 1923, it had declined to eight.

In 1922, George Allan England, an American adventure writer, managed to persuade Bowring’s to allow him to go to the seal hunt on one of its steamers. He sailed on the Terra Nova under Captain Abram Kean. The resulting book, Vikings of the Ice, published in 1924 (and reprinted in 1969 as The Greatest Hunt in the World by Tundra Press, Montreal), remains the only true published observation of the hunt as it then existed.

However, the fleet would be supplemented during the following years by other ships, including steel steamers that were employed most of the year at other activities—for example, the Nascopie, whose main enterprise was transporting Hudson Bay Company men, families, and supplies. Nevertheless, Bowring’s decided to invest once again in a steel steamer—one especially adapted for the annual seal hunt—and in 1929 the Imogene was added to the fleet. The SS Imogene, 715 net tons, 379 nhp, was built for Bowring Brothers by Smith’s Stock Co., Southbank-on-Tees. Bowring’s may have intended to place it under the command of Captain Abram Kean, the commodore of the sealing fleet, but, according to at least one source, the Imogene was late arriving in Newfoundland in the spring of 1929, and Kean went to the ice in charge of the Nascopie, which at 1,488 tons was the largest steamer in the fleet that year. Captain Al Blackwood, Brookfield, Bonavista Bay, was appointed to command the new steamer and had a successful season; he was highliner with 35,511 pelts—7,000 more than his nearest rival, Captain Billy Winsor in the Ungava, 1,115 tons, owned by Job Brothers.

By the late 1920s “fast fur” was becoming more valuable than seal oil. This was the result of the continuing trend of traditional oils being replaced by petroleum products (although trade distortions during the Great Depression no doubt aggravated the situation). The implications for the industry were that ships were required to make every effort to reach the whitecoat patches, kill and load, and return to port as soon as possible. As a member of the Bowring family and firm, Derrick Bowring, explained:

Originally the seals were caught for their fat. The fat was the marketable product which had the greater value. By [late 1920s] . . . that had changed. The fat was a by-product and . . . it was the return from the furs and the hair seals [skins] that were important . . . [and the] idea was to get the whitecoat while the fur was still fast . . .

[The] “fast fur” . . . could be handled as a furrier’s skin . . . [while a skin] or one with the hair or fur loose . . . had to become a tanned item . . .

Therefore, finding whitecoats early and bringing their pelts to port with despatch became more essential than ever before because

[the] fast furs . . . would take the lightest dyes, and if you allowed a skin on board to become oxidized, it would turn an earthy sort of yellowy colour and it wouldn’t take a light dye. You had to dye that sort of a chocolate brown, which was not as marketable.

The Imogene was designed and built to meet these new demands.

Although much of the steel fleet had been dispersed, wrecked, or torpedoed during the war, other steel steamers were employed on occasion throughout the 1920s and 1930s. For example, the Beothic II, Ungava, and the Hudson’s Bay Company’s Nascopie were used as freighters for most of the year, but the Imogene was built expressly for the seal fishery. Strong and narrow, with powerful engines, as Derrick Bowring explained, it had an icebreaking bow and was designed to ensure that pans of ice were deflected away from the rudder and propeller:

The Imogene was very narrow and very deep. The propeller, therefore, was down below the ice and you could use a larger, slower-turning propeller. For sealing it doesn’t matter what speed a ship can do, she’s useless unless she has bollard pull. In other words, from a standing start how many tons can she push? It’s like a bulldozer compared with a pickup [light truck]. The bulldozer has that enormous bollard pull. The Imogene could worm her way through heavy flows when no one could even follow in her wake. She could lose every other ship out there. That was a great advantage. She could worm her way miles and miles and get into the seals and be in there for days alone. [She was unlike] regular ice breakers [which] have a wide beam to create a wide wake and a big round bow. The Imogene was a speciality boat . . . different from them all [other ice breakers] . . . [and] built to travel through ice. [emphasis added]

The advantages of the Imogene as a sealing ship were obvious. Its performance as a sealer met all expectations, and its qualities were widely admired. Although the Imogene was built like an icebreaker, it was too narrow to be useful as an icebreaker: its narrow track prevented other freighters from following. It was also practically useless as a freighter because it was expensive to operate and had limited carrying capacity. After a successful 12-year career as a sealer, the Imogene was lost on a reef in the Strait of Canso (between Cape Breton Island and the mainland of Nova Scotia) while returning from the Caribbean with a load of salt. It was never replaced.

As pointed out, the spring seal hunt was generally confined to the last two weeks of March and the first two weeks of April. The sealers/fishermen wanted to get back home in April because they had to await their turn in St. John’s harbour to unload the pelts before returning to their homes to prepare for the summer cod fishery. As well, their plots of land generally had to be prepared for planting potatoes, turnips, and other vegetables. The Labrador fishermen, from Conception Bay to Bonavista North, had to prepare for their summer voyages to Labrador, while those in the Torbay area and the Southern Shore got ready for their local inshore fishery. In addition, the sealing ships could not stay at sea for too long because, once the pelts in the hold became warm, the fat would render into oil and run down in the bilge, and become useless. The sealers had a saying, “When young fat begins to run it goes like butter before the sun.” Therefore, this pressured the ships to return to port as early as possible and captains who hesitated to do so were sometimes forced to by their sealers.

Meanwhile, the mercantile firms involved in the Newfoundland seal hunt changed somewhat during the war (1914-1918): from a total of 20 steamers in 1914 to 13 in 1915, 11 in 1916, 12 in 1917, 13 in 1918, 10 in 1919, and 9 in 1920. At the same time, the price of fat increased from $4.75 per cwt (hundredweight, 112 pounds) of fat (young harps) in 1914 to $6 in 1916, $8 in 1917, and $12 in 1918. The price remained high in 1919 ($8) and 1920 ($11) but settled back in 1921 ($4) and 1922 as the post-war depression set in.

Job’s sent out four steamers in 1914, Harvey’s four, and Bowring’s six. The smaller firms, including Baine Johnston’s, sent one, Crosbie’s two, and James Baird’s one, for a total of 20, including two firms not usually involved in sealing. Harvey’s sold the Newfoundland to Job’s in 1915 and its three icebreakers to Russia in 1916, but the firm had actually stopped sealing after the 1915 season. In 1920 Bowring’s sent four steamers to the ice—the wooden-walls Ranger, Terra Nova, Eagle, and Viking. Job’s sent the Neptune and the Thetis, Baird’s Diana, and Farquhar and Co. Sable Island. Baird’s ceased sealing after the 1922 season and Baine Johnston only operated occasionally after that season. In 1927 only Job’s and Bowring’s remained in the industry, although the FPU and other businesses and operators joined in on occasion. In 1931, the Viking exploded near the Horse Islands and the American “talking picture men” Varick Frissell and A.E. Penrod were among the 24 killed. Sealing was in decline. In 1932 only four steamers brought in cargoes; the Neptune and Ranger had to be towed into port, the former with a broken shaft and the latter had lost its propeller. About 36,000 seals were taken in the vessel hunt and for the remainder of the period, 1933-1941 (inclusive), the number taken averaged about 150,000 annually.

Several incidents in this period deserve to be described in some detail. In 1933 most of the fleet did well, and this is evident in some of the interviews. Andy Short referred to that year as “the year of the big trips.” Short was aboard the Ungava commanded by Peter Carter and supplied by Crosbie-Olsen when it came upon a patch of old seals basking on the ice. The seals could not escape because the ice was tight, and the crew slaughtered over 4,000. Their cargo became the heaviest in the history of sealing. However, the damaged skins were not as valuable because it was difficult for the skinners to slice them off. Nevertheless, the men made over $80 each. That same spring Jacob Kean in the Beothic steamed into White Bay, always a risky endeavour because the bay is V-shaped and a ship can get blocked in if the wind changes. This happened to the Beothic and its crew spent the spring there with the men becoming increasingly unhappy. The other incident occurred in 1939 when the Ranger was nearly lost in a storm on its way to the Gulf. The fires went out and the ship, after several near misses, was finally towed to St. John’s. After repairs it went to the Front and managed to secure a reasonable load.

The price of seals did not change much during the 1920s and 1930s. Between 1924 and 1931 pelts fetched from $4.75 and $5 per cwt, dropping to $3-$4 in the early 1930s and recovered to $5-$6 by 1941. However, as Bowring pointed out, the catches of whitecoats for their fast fur should have been measured other than by weight because it was the fast fur which was so valuable—not the oil.

The evolution of shipping used in the Newfoundland spring seal fishery unfolds from the open shallop of the 1790s through the small schooners and into the large brigs of mid-century followed by the wooden-wall steamers beginning in the 1860s. It culminated in the age of steel beginning in 1906, although, ironically, the wooden-walls not only coexisted with but actually outlasted the steel fleet. Always, however, sealing took up only a portion of a vessel’s time and activity. Early schooners and brigs were used in the Labrador cod fishery in the summer and in the coasting and foreign trades in the fall and winter. The steamers were employed in transporting the island’s fishing families (particularly those from Conception Bay) to and from the Labrador coast in the summer and fall, in the coastal freight trade and passenger trade (as the latter expanded), and in the foreign trades. Only the Imogene was built exclusively for sealing. It could not even operate as an icebreaker because of its narrow beam. Derrick Bowring observed this drawback first-hand at the ice in 1937 while on board the steamer. The Imogene freed the Terra Nova (a Bowring’s vessel) but the old wooden-wall then became jammed in the former’s narrow wake. As Bowring pointed out, when one builds a top-of-the-line icebreaker, “you sacrifice something else, you sacrifice carrying capacity.” The Imogene was difficult to use in ordinary trading because it could not carry enough “to justify the cost of operating it.”

The evolution of ships in the Newfoundland seal fishery from the 1790s to 1940, from shallops to the Imogene, covers almost the entire history of the Newfoundland spring seal fishery—certainly its rise and decline as a significant industry. As an epilogue, four old wooden-walls went to the ice in 1941—the Neptune, built in 1872-3; Terra Nova, 1884; Ranger, 1871; and Eagle, 1902—and they brought in 42,666 pelts. In 1942 the old Ranger, during its 69th spring at the ice, was abandoned in a storm, while the remaining two steamers, Eagle and Terra Nova, brought in a total of 4,698 pelts. Due to the war and the problem of finding crews, there was no spring seal fishery in 1943, and both the Neptune and Terra Nova were lost that year while engaged in the foreign trades. The Eagle was on its own in 1944, skipped the 1945 season, but participated again during the springs of 1946 through 1949; in these last years it was accompanied by oil-burning Newfoundland motor vessels and by Norwegian oil-burners—which were first reported as being at the Newfoundland seal hunt in 1937. (The contrast between working and living conditions on Norwegian and Newfoundland sealing vessels came to the attention of the Newfoundland sealers and brought improvements to the latter.) In 1950 the Eagle, the last of the wooden-wall steamers, was ceremoniously sunk outside St. John’s harbour by it owners, Bowring Brothers.

The changes in shipping technology had both obvious and subtle effects on Newfoundland, its economy, and the people. Because of this industry, and the development of a seasonal Labrador cod fishery, Conception Bay and St. John’s experienced a relatively large concentration of population during the 1820s and 1830s (which facilitated the movement for political change). This was probably the most obvious change. Also important, but not documented to date, was the expansion in shipbuilding up until mid-century. The building and repair of ships for the seal and Labrador cod fisheries was certainly a major component of the economy of the many sealing harbours as well as of the economy of the colony as a whole. The economic impact on Newfoundland created by the export of large quantities of seal oil changed the colony from the site of a skeletal infrastructure for a migratory cod fishery into a colony with substantial towns. However, the introduction of petroleum into the marketplace and the subsequent decline in seal oil prices had a strong adverse impact on the total economy beginning in the 1860s, while the introduction of steamers caused the economies of sealing towns, especially the large towns in Conception Bay, to decline swiftly and irretrievably. Furthermore, steam and steel technology led to over-exploitation of the seal herds. Advances in technology did not translate into increased income for the fishermen/sealers.

After the outbreak of World War II, Newfoundland’s strategic position made it the preferred site for British, American, and Canadian armed forces bases, and St. John’s became a convenient convoy terminal. The Newfoundland seal fishery was finished but it was resurrected as a Canadian industry in time to meet the animal rights protest movement. But, the history and oral traditions of sealing ships and sealers have remained a vital part of Newfoundland’s culture and history.

Part 1

LONG INTERVIEWS

SETTING THE STAGE

Derrick Bowring, b.1916, Int.1986 [retired managing director, Bowring’s]

I suppose as long as I can remember I can recall something about the seal fishery because my father was in the London office of the company and he was the chief marketing agent for Bowring Brothers’ sealskins. His department was responsible for selling the skins that were produced on this [Newfoundland] side. The market was mainly in England or in Europe. So I had a faint introduction to the seal fishery, but I really became connected with it in 1935 when I knew that I would be coming out to Newfoundland.

I’d just left school and I was then taken to the tanneries that handled the skins and to the furriers who also marketed them as a separate operation. I remember thinking at first they were all a bit smelly and a bit dirty, a bit hard to handle, and I couldn’t tell one from the other. I could tell a fur from a tanning skin because it had hair on it and the other one didn’t. At the stage they were when they reached England, they had been simply packed in puncheons in salt and that was the way they arrived on the other side. Then they were culled for what was known as a “fast fur,” which could be handled as a furrier’s skin or one with the hair or fur loose, and that had to become a tanned item.

So I was looking at sealskins before I ever saw Newfoundland. When I came out in the summer of 1935, of course the seal fishery for that year was over, but I did see the skins from the other point of view of being packed from the bulk salt piles on the Southside and being shipped over to England. In that sense I’ve always been familiar with it, and the seal fishery was relatively important to Bowring Brothers. The company’s investment in ships and plant was quite considerable, and they had to keep the thing in motion.

At that time we owned five ships. The pride of the fleet was the Imogene, and then there was the Beothic, which was also a steel ship. The other three, the old Terra Nova, the Eagle, and the Ranger, were the wooden ships.

The Imogene, interestingly enough, was the only ship up to that time that had been specifically built for the seal fishery. The others, the wooden ones, had been built as whalers; the Beothic, a steel ship, was one of the World War I American quick-production jobs built to beat the U-boat game, and she’d been converted for the seal fishery. The Ungava was another sister ship of the Beothic owned by Job’s, and she was the same.

The Imogene had been built in 1929 specifically with the seal fishery in mind and because of that fact she was vastly superior in the ice. But to obtain good ice-breaking qualities, you sacrifice something else, and in this case we sacrificed carrying capacity. She could carry ample sealskins [pelts] to make it a thoroughly paying voyage, but she was a very difficult ship to use in ordinary trading in between periods. For example, in the coal trade, she couldn’t carry enough coal to justify the cost of operating it.

They were the five ships I first remember, and then there was the Southside plant with the fat-rendering cookers and the boilers to provide the steam and all the machinery for the skinning machines and the others for preparing the pelts. I remember it all being rather slippery and not unpleasantly smelly, but certainly smelly. Well, there it was. When you’re 18, you accept what’s put in front of you as being something that it should be. So those are my earliest recollections of it.

Originally seals were caught for their fat. The fat was the marketable product which had the greater value. By the time I remember the seal fishery, of course, that had changed. The fat was a by-product of it; seal oil was an edible oil, as opposed to a technical oil, so that you produced as much of it as you could. It had a market price geared to other edible oils, and it was sold usually in the Canadian market to people like Lever Brothers or that type of company, and it was quickly disposed of. It was usually sold, in fact, before the seal fishery for that year took place. And when the oil was produced, and had been cooked and bleached, the best price for oil was obtained from what was known as “water white.” It was virtually water white if you looked at it in a bottle. Well, it had low acidity and low, what we called “unsaponifiable matter,” but at that point it was the return from the furs and the hair seals that were important to the financial result, particularly the fur which led, of course, to the whitecoat. The idea was to get the whitecoat while the fur was still fast [when they started to moult, they were no good for the fur market].

Hence, the Imogene could reach them when other ships couldn’t, and so the marketing of furs was virtually all done in England. There was some pottering around with it in the States, but it was not a market that was really significant. And also the same applied to the hair seals or the “ragged jackets,” as they were called.

The sealskins were tanned in the United Kingdom, and I remember at that point the tanning was done by a company called Bevington’s in South London, and they used the old traditional tanning methods known as vegetable tanning, which produced perfectly good leather, but, unfortunately, it was no use in the shoe trade, where there was the best demand for leather, because this leather would stretch; and no shoemaker wanted leather that would stretch after he’d made it into a shoe.

So the great problem, and it was about 1935-37, and I know my father was endlessly searching for a tanner who could “chrome-tan,” which was a chemical tanning process which produced leather that the shoemaker would accept, and you’d open up a whole new market. He eventually found the man, almost by accident. A typical little, tiny tannery in London, a minute little spot, you know. The man’s name was Duckworth, Frank Duckworth, and his family had been tanners since William the Conqueror, I should think. He thought he could chrome-tan a sealskin—and he did. So the upshot of that was that he chrome-tanned skins, which were then introduced to the shoe trade, and they were acceptable. They were marketed to the Clark Shoes [Co.], and they’re still on the go today, very well-known, good quality shoe. We sold a great many sealskins tanned by Frank Duckworth. Because old man Duckworth didn’t have any children, the tannery was eventually bought by C.D. Bowring and Company, and it was operated as a subsidiary of theirs. But chrome-tanning was a very important part of the marketing process, and it opened up an entirely new field.

As I said, the oil just went at whatever price the edible oils were. The furriers were, of course, of interest to the fur trade, mainly for trimming. You didn’t see many garments made entirely of seal fur—whitecoat fur. Mostly it was made into collars, cuffs, muffs, trim around the edges. And there was plenty of market for the fast fur, and we did very well.

Of course in the 1930s we were still in the Depression and there wasn’t that much of a good market for anything anywhere. I know by the time the war started in 1939, we had a very large stock of untreated sealskins in London that had been shipped over. Of course, they soon got gobbled up like everything else during the war; everything was used up that was available, and we very quickly were out of our stock of sealskins, and, of course, during the war, there was no seal fishery [very little].

The period I remember really well, that from 1935 to 1939, was really the last years of the seal fishery. During the war we lost the Imogene, we lost the Beothic, we lost the Terra Nova, we lost the Ranger, and we were left with the Eagle, which was wooden, very old, and she was ceremoniously sunk after the War because the cost of maintaining her was beyond any returns you could expect. We built one little wooden vessel, which was called the Terra Nova II, but she was very small. She pottered around in the ice. She brought in a few seals, but it was only a joke compared to the seal fishery beforehand.

We converted an ocean-going tug, an American wooden, ocean-going tug, which was strengthened for ice at enormous expense. It was a farce at the seal fishery, and when we realized that there was simply no way that you could build a ship or buy a ship or convert a ship that could support itself out at the seal fishery, and at that point we, Bowring Brothers, gave it up.

And, of course, the seal fishery was really ended partly by economics in that way; you couldn’t afford to employ an expensive ship in that industry and, secondly, it was finished by the helicopter. The minute anybody got out to the seal fishery, it was obviously doomed because it’s not a pretty sight. It’s nice to go steaming around the lovely white ocean and looking at the icebergs and see[ing] the occasional tracks of a polar bear or something. It’s all very romantic, but in fact it’s just an unpleasant spectacle—the seal fishery itself.

You have heard of the Viking disaster, and that was one of our ships. She was used by the filmmaking company for them to take scenes at the ice, and, in the process, they blew the ship up. They caused a great deal of grief and misery, and people were killed, and the ship was lost. We always thought it was because they had taken some dynamite out in order to make some spectacular scenes with icebergs or growlers or whatever, but nobody knew, because the ones who were mixed up in it were lost.

From that date on, we would never take a passenger to the ice. Never, ever. Occasionally there was the odd scientist who wanted to go out. If we ever allowed them out on the ships, there were to be no cameras, no publication, no anything, and they had to sign an agreement to that effect. But there was hardly anybody [who] went. I remember when I was out myself that I was quite disgusted that I wasn’t allowed to take any of my friends with me. You know, it seemed a nice sort of occasion that you could have two or three friends along. “No, sir! You’re going out and that’s that! We’re not going to have anybody there who isn’t part of the actual operation.”

And you know, what finished the seal fishery, of course, was the publication of all these horrifying pictures, some of them faked—a lot of them faked. Often times, they weren’t even at the Front, they were up in the Gulf. And the skinning alive of seals was done by the people faking them, who had nothing to do with the seal fishery. But it’s exactly the same if you allowed the general public into a slaughterhouse: we’d all be vegetarians because dear little calves and dear little lambs and dear little everything else are being done in. It’s not a very nice sight and it’s certainly no better sight out at the seal fishery, added to which the little white seals are cute-looking things. I mean, I saw them myself. But what finished it off was the minute helicopters started landing lunatics out there, it was doomed, and that’s that. I doubt if it will revive.

It wouldn’t revive mainly for economic reasons. Referring back to the Imogene for a moment: the Imogene could steam through at 3 or 4 knots when everything else was jammed. It was unbelievable. I’ve seen it myself—that all our other ships and Job’s ships just sitting there. Naturally it was a competitive business and the Imogene was duty bound to help Bowring’s ships and leave Job’s ships jammed. That was the game.

I mean, if they were in real trouble, she would help, but not otherwise. I remember once we were steaming through ice up near Belle Isle, through which the Imogene could go, say about 4 knots, and here was the Terra Nova absolutely belching smoke, you know, plenty of steam up, just not able to move. Well, we slipped across her bow to give her our wake and got her into the wake, but she couldn’t even hold the wake because a pan would drift into it and stop her and then the thing would close in, and there were limits to how much help you could give.

The Imogene was built as an icebreaker; she had the icebreaking bow. She had a stern that enabled a pan of ice to capsize and run down the side of the ship tilted up. If you haven’t got the proper stern, the pan of ice will straighten out at the end and knock the blades off your propeller. So she had a right stern with a gradual runaway that enabled the pan to level out before it got to the propeller, and she never lost a blade, but she could get to the whitecoat seals in the patch while it was still fast fur. That was the economically important thing to do. The Imogene holds the record for the largest number of seal pelts brought in, but she doesn’t hold the record for the greatest weight brought in. That belongs to the Ungava. The Imogene would get in, get her load of fast furs, and you wanted to get them back as quickly as you could because the best furs would take the lightest dyes, and if you allowed a skin on board to become oxidized, it would turn an earthy sort of yellowy colour and it wouldn’t take a light dye. You had to dye that sort of a chocolate brown, which was not as marketable.

There was always experimental work going on with the furs in trying to keep the product that we shipped as white as possible so that it would take pale colour dyes, which were much more marketable than the dark ones. I remember we drummed them in sawdust, we washed them in various solutions. We almost had a great sort of laundry room on the Southside at one time in which skins were, I think, first drummed in sawdust, then they were washed in a great laundromat thing. The object always being to keep them as white as we could, but the most important part, really, was keeping them white on the sealing vessel.

So she’d get her load of whitecoats, she’d pick up a few beaters, which were valuable because they had short hair, and she’d pick up a few bedlamers, and then she’d call it quits and beat it back to land her catch. The others would be out there picking up bedlamers and old seals and hoods and Lord knows what because of the weight, and they’d take a good weight of seals. That was always a rather stupid part of the seal fishery. Traditionally, the shares were based on the weight, the price set for the catch was so much a hundredweight, which obviously was geared to the days when the oil was the important thing and the weight of oil was what counted. When it became that the fur was more important, the weight was fixedly ridiculous and, yet, that’s the way it went right until the end. The price that was set at the beginning of the voyage was geared as so much a hundredweight and that’s how they were paid. Obviously, the company did far better off a load of fairly lightweight white, fast-fur whitecoats than it did off a great heavy load of bedlamers and old seals.

The Imogene in that sense justified herself, but it was ludicrous. The cost of the Imogene was over $300,000 in 1929. The same ship built after the war was well over $1 million and today it might be umpteen million—absolutely implausible to build it. When you look at the new Caribou, a ruddy old ferry which I think cost $100 million or something. That’s almost enough to tell you that no seal fishery can stand anything approaching that. She was a ship that obviously could handle all the other ones, and if we had a couple of Imogenes, it would have been a very nice seal fishery, producing economically and giving you as much as you could market. Satisfactory business to limit that sort of production.

Various firms engaged in chartering ships for the seal fishery. The Caribou, the ferry on the Gulf, was chartered once or twice. The Sagona was chartered as well. I think most of the chartering came when the chartered vessels belonged to the government or the Newfoundland Railway. They were part of the coastal service or the Gulf service. If you could charter them cheaply enough, it was worth doing. If the price of skins and the market looked promising, that was done.

The Commission of Government was in existence in those days and they were, as governments are today, always trying to create a bit of employment. If they could get something going at the seal fishery, well and good. They controlled these railway vessels and they would charter them to people who wanted to prosecute the seal fishery at pretty giveaway rates. In fact I remember one superb row, in fact it was on when I came out, which had to do with the Caribou.

The Caribou was a very good iceboat: she was Dutch-built and, except that she had a lot of passenger accommodation, she was a very similar boat to the Imogene, and she was very good in ice. The Commission of Government were willing to charter the Caribou for the seal fishery, and Bowring Brothers certainly wanted to charter her, but, for some reason that nobody has ever explained to me, she was chartered to Crosbie’s, who had nothing to do with the seal fishery whatever. They weren’t in it, never had been, but they thought it was, you know, like they thought we made a lot of money out of it and they’d like to get an entry into it on the cheap, as it were, because if you can charter a vessel and use it for six weeks and hand her back again and have no maintenance in between, you’re very comfortably away.

And the row was that: Sir Edgar Bowring was the senior one at the time and he was belting into the government because he said that was absolutely outrageous to ignore the people who kept the thing going for years and were in it seriously but, then give the break of this kind to a fellow outside the industry who hadn’t done anything with the seal fishery. Well, that raged for a bit and, you know, people weren’t speaking to other people, but they chartered her to Crosbie’s. She was very good at the ice, but that was the only time she was out, I think.

The Sagona was fairly often out, but she wasn’t worth chartering. She wasn’t very good in it. I think the Kyle probably went for a year or two. We would have chartered the Caribou on that particular occasion because she was a good icebreaker, but we didn’t bother with any of the others. Bowring’s also owned the Florizel and the Stephano that were on the Red Cross service to New York. In most years the seal fishery was an off-season for that trade, so they used to go out. The Florizel went to the ice a number of years. You’d just shut off the passenger accommodation. She was a very able ship in the ice. But chartering from our point of view was never anything considered very seriously unless it was an outstanding ship. More often we had more than enough capacity for seals. It’s a question of how much you can sell. No use loading yourself up with seals that are unsellable [unsaleable].

The only advantages that were there in using your own vessels were you knew their capacity, you knew their ability, and you had total control of them, so you knew their machinery was working. We never seriously considered chartering anything for sealing except for that episode of the Caribou, which led to a lot of hard feelings all round. The old wooden ships that we owned were simply tied up when they came in to St. John’s and they stayed tied up except for maintenance and when they were on dry dock. They’re very expensive things to maintain, but they simply couldn’t carry enough ordinary freight to justify the cost of operating them.

The Beothic was the best one because she was built originally as a proper cargo carrier and she could, if the freight rates were marginally high enough, carry coal from Sydney to St. John’s, or something of that nature. Actually I remember her carrying a cargo of pit props from Tommy’s Arm in Notre Dame Bay to Barrow in Furness, simply because freight rates at that particular period were high enough to justify the effort, but basically she was tied up, too, for most of the year.

The price was agreed upon by Bowring’s and Job’s on the telephone. There were only two companies that I remember who were in the seal fishery seriously, and one was Job’s and the other was Bowring’s. Job’s never had more than, in my time, more than two ships. I don’t know why Job’s were still at it in those days, to tell you the truth, because they weren’t busily engaged, as we were, in the marketing end of it. They didn’t have any sort of establishment there. They marketed it in the old way. They’d sell the oil. They used to sell their fur and leather unprocessed. They sold them as raw skin. We never did if we could avoid it. So Job’s would almost be compelled to go along with whatever price we’d set, I would say. Well, we knew them all pretty well. There’d be a telephone call: “Well, we’re going to set prices at so and so.” Job’s would probably say, “Oh that’s terribly high!” because they didn’t have the market that we did. But they went along with it.

The crew owned a third of the seals—that was the basic share. The cooks, the firemen, the engineers, the navigating element, the stewards, and the trimmers; these people had a certain guaranteed monthly pay. The others got shares in the seals; the captain got a nice little chunk out of it, and there were other people called bridgemasters, master watches, assistant master watches, and cooks, and people who took responsibility of one kind or another, all came in for an extra slice of the cake.

We always tried to get the captain who was the most skilled at getting his ship to the seals, getting a load, and getting back as fast as he could. In my memory of it, the captains were pretty well the same men year after year. Obviously they changed prior to that, but sometimes captains made mistakes in taking a ship. On the whole we had five ships and we had five captains who were graded unofficially in order of seniority, and the senior one had the choice whichever ship he wanted, and the second and so on, and the last man got what was left.

When I first came out, Abram Kean was an old man then, but he was still taking a ship to the ice, and he was certainly senior captain by every measurement. I think the governor of the day had got him recognized as the sort of commodore of the sealing fleet and he could fly a blue ensign, which was a quite a mark of honour. But he could have the choice of our ships. Well, he’d been out in a number of them and, at the time I came out, had been going in the Beothic. Before I came out, the Imogene appeared on the scene, and he looked at her and thought, “She’s a bit small. No, I don’t think I want to have the Imogene. I’ll stick to the Beothic.”

So the second man, who was Al Blackwood from Wesleyville, was given the choice, and he took the Imogene and he was with her for the rest of the time and he did very nicely out of it. He was extremely lucky that old Kean didn’t quite see the point of this ship that was built for the job.

Then Stan Barbour had the Terra Nova and Charlie Kean had the Eagle and Captain Richard Badcock had the Ranger. Now, Barbour came from Trinity, and over the years we’d always had Barbours and Keans; it ran in families. Charlie Kean, who had the Eagle, was a nephew of Abram Kean. In the period I remember, that is up to 1939, there was no change in those. They took the same vessel every year. Billy Winsor was a permanent fixture in the Ungava for Job’s and J.C. Dominey had the Neptune. He was lost during the war.

They were all characters. In the period I remember they never changed. They had the same ships and they probably took the same crew all the time. The thing I do remember mostly is the great mistake that Captain Abram Kean made in not taking the Imogene and the bit of luck that old Al Blackwood had in getting her, because he, up to that point, had had the Eagle, which was a good ship—best of the wooden ones.

They were characters of the first order; they all wanted, naturally, to select every single one of their crews and there was more fuss and bother, and basically they did select certainly 80, 85 per cent of the men, and, of course, they all came from their own settlements or own areas. If you came from Wesleyville, you weren’t going to have anyone from Conception Bay. You know, the best men were always in your bay. I don’t know whether Badcock, who came from Bay Roberts, I don’t know whether he took mostly Conception Bay people or not. Mostly they preferred Trinity Bay and Bonavista Bay, and they came from all over the place. There was always a great kerfuffle because what you earned from the seal fishery was a worthwhile contribution to your income.

And, of course, the local merchants liked to get men out to the seal fishery who owed them money, and that was a thing we had to be frightfully careful of. We were aware that went on, and you see Bowring Brothers were in the wholesale business. They were supplying all these merchants, some of whom had credit. Credit, my God, was a real problem in those days. If you had supplied some outport merchant for many years, he was totally unable to pay you, because he, in turn, didn’t get paid by the people to whom he gave credit. He liked to collect a few coppers by whipping them off to the man he could get a berth for at the seal fishery. Well, if that man was a good sealer, it didn’t make any difference to us, but if he was just some old deadbeat, we weren’t a bit interested in that.

However, the captains chose their crews most of the time, I’d say, of about 85 per cent. The other 15 per cent of the berths led to more uproar, and almost hard feelings, in a way, because even if you’d kept every berth and gave them all out yourself, you still wouldn’t have enough to give them to all the people who wanted them.

You see the seal fishery was more than a money-making thing; it was a great old holiday.* After a long winter, cooped up at home, you know, cutting firewood, the seal fishery was a very nice little break for an awful lot of men who liked it because of its bit of adventure and there was a bit of pay attached to it. Altogether it was something that a great many men wanted to go on, so berths were very much sought after, and this led to a lot of silliness. But the captains, on the whole, chose their crews. They had to, because they were the ones who were responsible for getting the catch and, if you were going to saddle them with a lot of undesirables, you weren’t going to do very well.

The only thing the owners picked were the engineers for the ship and the navigators, because most of the sealing captains didn’t have their deep-sea tickets. They were mostly coastal skippers and you couldn’t clear a ship without a proper certificate. So there was always, on each one, a master mariner, who went under the name of navigator. He was a highly necessary member of the crew. So they were all appointed by the owners. The bo’sun and the chief engineer were permanent employees of the company who were always on the ship, either at the seal fishery or for maintenance. All the engineers and the stokers [firemen] were hired by the owners.

The navigators were hired by the owners on the basis of their necessary certificate; they were licensed mariners. They were very necessary because there’s a lot of carelessness went on in the seal fishery. Expensive pieces of equipment those ships were, you know, not toys to be run around in. Nor were they dories. There was a good deal of slapdash use of them.

You see one of the things you had to do at the seal fishery was conserve your coal because there was a limit to how much coal you could take with you and, since you couldn’t get seals after dark, the method of conserving coal was to do what they called “burn down” for the night. That is, bank your fires down and just keep the very minimum of steam on. You weren’t going to go anywhere because you were nicely established in the icefields—so there you sat.

Now, what they used to do was put the bow of the ship into the biggest pan of ice they could see and leave the engines running. Now, there was always an engineer, naturally, on duty, and firemen. They would put her into the pan of ice, leave the engines running “slow ahead,” and the reason for that was it kept your wake open. The propeller turning, churning water back would keep ice from building up astern, and when you wanted to get out, get going in the morning, you had something to back up into and take a run at it.

So you always had her running slow ahead, but slow ahead on some ships could drive them along at several knots if they’re in open water. The chief engineers, the seamen part of the crew, and the navigators, occasionally, having done all this, the ice pan that you stuck her bow into broke or drifted aside or she slithered off sideways, and she’d be steaming through the ice at 2 or 3 knots, and a lot of the time you were fairly close to land. You could just as likely pile into Cape Bonavista because, although there was a watch on the bridge, since she wasn’t going anywhere, they could be holed up in the wheelhouse smoking or playing forty-fives [card game]. They didn’t pay as much attention as they should have, and the people who did worry were the engineers and the navigators.

They were endlessly popping up to see “where we are now.” One of them told me, a chief engineer, Will McGettigan—he only died the other day—he said, “I got out. Whenever we were near land, I hardly went to sleep at all.” He said, “I came up one night, and we’d burnt down in a patch of ice, put her in a big pan with the engines running dead slow. When I came up, here we were steaming at 3 knots through open water heading for Cape Bonavista.” Well, he woke them all up you know . . . but that’s why the navigators and the others were a very, very important part of the ship. They didn’t interfere in any way with the seal fishery thing except to say, “Well, you can’t take her there.”

But there were endless old tricks that went on. In the Imogene with Blackwood when I was out, when we left St. John’s, and we were pretty quickly into some fairly heavy ice, and, to my mind, we were steaming through it very nicely. But according to Blackwood, she wasn’t really, she wasn’t doing what she’d done before. She ought to be able to do better than that. But then he’d look back from the bridge at the huge funnel—she was a very powerful vessel and there would be the foghorn, siren, and the steam safety valve. And he’d look at that, and he’d say, “You know she hasn’t got a plume of steam coming out of the safety valve. You haven’t got the proper pressure on.” This was to the chief engineer.

“Oh, yes, we have, you know I’ve got to run her a little with correct pressure anyway. It’s not a matter of putting more on. If I put more on, it’ll only blow off.” So this sort of argument went on for a bit, and Blackwood wasn’t satisfied. The chief didn’t really care. I mean, he was running it the way it should be run, having regard to his owner’s interest and, anyway, that was that.

Well, that night, after dark, when all had settled down and everybody retired to their bunks, two of the engineers went up the funnel—they had a ladder for getting up to it—and they drove a small wedge of wood into the outlet of the safety valve. A lovely plume of steam came out. All they did was just narrowed the opening. Next morning, himself [Blackwood] said: “There, now she’s going! Now she’s really moving. Look at that bit of steam. I told you!” And not an ounce of difference in the pressure, but just the psychological benefit for the captain that she was now properly equipped to go to sea.

I mean, that sort of thing went on. There was always the tale that the Ranger was not really very powerful, she was old. She used to go to the Gulf actually, not the Front, but the tale always used to be that “Oh, no, don’t blow the foghorn. If you blow the foghorn”—which, of course, was a steam-driven thing—“Don’t blow the foghorn, you’ll take 2 knots off her speed!”

There was always a difference in a way men took these ships, particularly the Imogene and Beothic, to the seal fishery, only Abram Kean had his deep-sea ticket. He was a properly qualified master, but the others weren’t. Their biggest ship was sailing off in a schooner. Take poor old Will McGettigan on the Imogene; when you were steaming in fairly open water, she could do 15 knots, and if you hit a pan of ice at that speed, it was the most awful clang. God knows what damage it did. But they would say, “Gee, she’s a big steel ship. She can put up with that. What are you complaining about?”

I remember one time all the ships, that’s our five and two of Job’s, were up, we’d really finished with the main patch up in Belle Isle, and we’d all drifted south into the Straits. We all wanted to get out, but the Imogene was the only one to make it. We wanted to get near another patch of reported seals somewhere near Grey Islands. So we were heading off in that direction in relatively open water, certainly able to move easy enough, but the poor old Ungava had got herself pinned on the other side of the Straits, where the ice was heavy and she couldn’t wiggle. So as the Imogene headed out, and the Ungava was in sight a few miles back, we got a wireless message from the Ungava: “I’ve damaged my rudder. Could you help me out?”

Blackwood, first of all, he said, “Are you sure that’s what you got?” “Oh yes,” said the fellow, Dick Ryan, the wireless operator. So I said, “What are you going to do about it?” “Nothing.” I said, “Well, God, you know, this fellow’s in peril.” “Not at all! He’s not in peril. Don’t believe a word of it.” So we just steamed straight out of the Straits, left him up there. And I was sort of half-worried. I figured that’s not the way that seamen operate, you know, the rules of the ocean and so on. So we went out, and that’s the occasion when we helped the Terra Nova, but we couldn’t keep her in our wake, she couldn’t hang onto it. So anyway, off we went.

And then by the evening of that day we got into heavy ice ourselves and we had to butt. Well you’re not making much progress when you’re butting. By God, we hadn’t been butting for more than a couple of hours when the Ungava, the Neptune, and the whole shooting match came right up to our stern. I said, “My God, that’s the Ungava!” “Sure it is,” said Blackwood, “I told you there’s nothing wrong with it.” And sure enough, there wasn’t.

In fact the ruddy Neptune damn near smashed her bowsprit on our stern because she got into our wake and she was a fairly able ship, rather like the Eagle. So she was belting along in our wake, you know, a few knots and we brought up in an ice jam that stopped the Imogene. So our method was, don’t try to get in too far. Put her astern and back out of it quick to get a run at it. Well, the Neptune wasn’t looking, you know. She didn’t realize we’d been stopped by the ice and, by jeez, I saw this bowsprit, it overhung our stern before she stopped. I mean, she could have done us some damage, so this was simply not paying attention. So that’s the way they operated at the seal fishery.

Some of the things they do that are, to me, miraculous. We’d put 300-odd men out on the ice in four watches, and they would disappear beyond the horizon. I never saw any of them in a patch of seals. I said, “My God, we’ll never find them again.” And in the evening, the whole ruddy lot turned up. They called the roll, and everybody was there. Amazing, the way they managed, because we’d been wiggling around in the ice picking up pans of seals all day, you know. There were things like that the men were extraordinarily clever at. At other things they were careless and inattentive.

The worst bloody people at the ice actually were stowaways, because stowaways were not on anybody’s crew list. They just materialized from somewhere, but you couldn’t lose them. They were just young teenagers who’d come aboard. Every ship always had them. You’d try to flush them out before you left, but there were always a few who managed to escape the search, and they were a pest because they’d be over the side and out getting seals. They wanted to bring back flippers: this was the big deal. And, of course, nobody was responsible for them. I remember the Imogene, after the crew had been picked up at night, and somebody said, “What about the blankety-blank stowaways?”

And they went, checked them out, two of them missing. Well, how long had they been missing? Well, nobody knew. They might have been gone for days. Anyway, they appeared. They were out on the ice somewhere. But that caused more trouble and nuisance because nobody had them on his list. I mean the master watch knew that he had 50 men, and he had to account for all of them, and he did it every single time. He had a deputy who helped. It was routine. But nobody had any stowaways listed.

In the days before the wireless, when Arthur Jackman was one of the great sealing captains, he was in a place you didn’t want to get, up in White Bay, because you could very easily spend the whole spring up there if the weather turned against you. You know, if the wind was from the east, you’d never get out. He was in there, or partway into the bay one year, and he got a nice patch of seals and he didn’t want anyone else in with him. So the other ships, he could see them on the outside, and he said, “You know they’ll probably come in unless I do something to make it unattractive.” So he piled on coal and blanketed it down until he had black smoke coming out of his funnels, you know, like a forest fire. And the rest of them from outside saw him. They said, “By Jesus, he’s jammed in there! We better not get in there.” They all sheared off.

When they all disappeared, he lowered the boom. Got on with his private patch. Some of the other ships could well have been ships with the same firm. But the captains were always inclined to look out for themselves, and I think when I was out that I was an embarrassment in a way to the captain because I was just as interested, and he knew it, in how the Terra Nova did, or the Eagle did, or the Beothic did, as I was in the Imogene. And under normal circumstances he would give them a sort of a little bit of help if it wasn’t too inconvenient. But if he didn’t like the idea, he’d just shear off, and say, “I never saw you. What were you doing? I thought you were all right.” But when I was there, it wasn’t quite so easy. I’d say, “Are we going to help the Terra Nova?” And he’d say, “Oh yes, yes. We’re going to help the Terra Nova,” he’d say, and we would, but I suspect I wasn’t too popular. Owners were a nuisance.

Some ships signed on the stowaways as sealers, but we never did it. Every one of our ships pulled out from the wharf and stayed out in the stream in the harbour for a half an hour or more searching for stowaways, and you always found some and you landed them. We never signed them on. You tried to make life miserable for them in a sort of semi-humanitarian way. You wouldn’t give them any decent accommodation, for sure. They were a nuisance, a perfect nuisance! They were just a perfect pest to everybody. They had to be fed, and, as I say, you had to be sure you didn’t lose them. They were totally out of hand, you know. Nobody had any control over them. As for signing them on—not likely! Let them have a share! No, sir! And you couldn’t turn a blind eye to them because you were out there with a hell of a lot of men on a ship, all of whom you had to bring back.

Now, Abram Kean was fairly old when he was going out in his latter years. And in those days it was the sort of problem you were always running into in those days when pension plans were not in vogue and people worked, on the whole, until they dropped. It was the sort of standard procedure and Abram Kean was well into his 80s. My uncle was the chairman of Bowring Brothers at the time in the late 1930s and I think he simply came to the conclusion that you couldn’t, in all conscience, send a ship to the ice with a man in charge of her who was that old. Not that there was anything visibly off, but it was just not reasonable, and so he was, I suppose you’d call it, retired. I mean he was told that “Look, we simply must make the change.” He didn’t like the idea, thought it was ridiculous, and that he was as good as ever he was.

I had that same problem very soon after that when I became responsible for what they called the stores’ operations at Bowring Brothers, at 26 or 27. It was just after the war and I had four managers, who were 79, 74, 73, and 69. The youngest was my present age, and I was, to them, an absolute nipper of 27 or so. It’s impossible. No pension plans, no nothing. But you can’t go on. That’s when Bowring Brothers’ pension plan started, because I had to pension them. But, however, that’s nothing to do with the seal fishery, but the same applied to Abram Kean. He just went on until his age came against him. In his opinion it didn’t handicap him, but in our opinion it was not right to send a ship to the seal fishery in [the] charge of a man of that age. He didn’t like that idea at all. He was as good as new. That’s what happened, and it happened in so many things. It was not just the seal fishery; it happened all the time. People did go on, and the wretched employer was always in trouble. He had to do something one way or the other. It would be manoeuvred around: “Look here, you resign; we don’t fire you.”

We used to insure our ship and our cargo, and we had liability insurance. In my day we never had a disaster. Fortunately there was never a problem after the case of the Viking, and that wasn’t really the seal fishery. She was only out making this wretched film, but it cost the company a lot of money in pensions being paid to people who were disabled. I don’t know whether that was the cause of it, or what, but we always insured for any liability or disasters of that kind.

You had to think of the ship as a ship, and the ship as a sealing platform. The ship as a ship had to be treated according to the Merchant Shipping Act, and you couldn’t neglect that. You couldn’t, for instance, send any of those ships to the seal fishery without a master mariner with a ticket on board. Whatever he was called—he could have been called the chief steward—but he had to have his ticket. And obviously with the engines and that you had to have engineer[s]—the Imogene carried four engineers. The chief never stood a watch. He was free roaming and almost in the way. The chief engineer was the company representative more than the nominal master.

The sealing master was a sealing master. On the whole we considered that a lot of the sealing masters didn’t have too much regard for the ship itself, and if it hit a lot of pans of ice very hard and put a lot of dents in the plating, it’s an expensive game for the owners next year in dry dock to take off the plates and straighten them out and straighten the frames, and so on, you know. It was the chief engineer who looked after the owner’s interests more than the captain, I would say.

There’s one interesting anecdote that I should tell you about. Immediately after the war—we’d lost the Imogene in the war—and we were still very much interested at that time in the seal fishery. This would be 1945, ’46. We figured we must replace the Imogene with just such another and that was going to cost about $1 million plus, which in ’46 was one hell of a pile of money, and it was obvious that you couldn’t justify spending that much money on, let’s say, another Imogene which could only go to the seal fishery and possibly get a bit of off-season trading but probably wouldn’t.

So you had to have some non-sealing period of employment for her. And the most obvious thing to us—because the Caribou, which was the railway’s ferry, had been lost—the obvious thing to us was, we’ll build this vessel, we’ll fit her with passenger accommodation, and we’ll make a deal with the Commission of Government, which Newfoundland had at the time, that, “Here, we’ll build the vessel. We’ll use her for the seal fishery, and then you run her on the Gulf as a ferry boat instead of the Caribou, and we’ll charter it to you at whatever we can work out.” Anyway, this whole proposition was presented to the Commission of Government as a serious venture. It would have been very useful, very good. No, no, they couldn’t, the answer came back after a bit of thought. No, they couldn’t do that. That was far too favourable to us. We were asking the government to subsidize the ship.

And it gave my uncle, at the time, the greatest satisfaction, because he said, “Oh well, if that’s what they think, we’ll soon fix that. We’ll go to them and say, ‘Well do it the other way round! You build the ship and we’ll charter it from you for the period we need it. So that if it’s too favourable for us, then you take the favourable side.’ We’ll do it on exactly those terms.” Well, I don’t say it even embarrassed them. They just turned that down, too, and that was that. It was simply not feasible to build it unless you had a firm proposition for the non-sealing season.

There were several characters that were well-known in the St. John’s seal fishery. Probably the most famous one was the bo’sun of the Terra Nova and later the Eagle. He was a fellow called Tom Carroll. There’s a mountain in Antarctica called Mount Carroll after him. He was one of the permanent people on as bo’sun of, I think, the Terra Nova and then the Eagle in the end.

He had been a whaler in the days when you went after whales by rowing after them. You stuck a harpoon in them and then chased around the ocean.

Tom Carroll was one of them and, boy, was he tough! Even when I knew him, he was an old man. He lived to be over 90, and he was quite extraordinary, really. He was a seaman to his fingertips. Couldn’t read or write, and I don’t think he could write his name, but when it came to the rigging of a ship and the maintenance of her, and there was nobody could touch him. He was like Abram Kean: he went on and on and on and on, and I mean into his 80s, into God knows what. I know he was with us when we still had the Eagle. And he was still bo’sun on the Eagle, but to protect the company, we had forbidden him to go up into the crow’s nest on the mast. “Tom, you’re not to go up the ruddy mast,” because, I mean, it would look awful if he fell out of the rigging or something and broke his neck, you know. What are you doing, letting a man that age go.

So he was flatly forbidden, and he got it writing. Not that it did any good to him in writing, because he couldn’t read it, but the letter was passed to him by the manager of the Southside premises to explain to Tom exactly what it said. So one of my colleagues who was involved with the ship was over on the Southside and he went on board the Eagle to get hold of Tom and ask him something. Couldn’t find him anywhere, so he went to the wharf office and asked the lot, “Has anyone seen Tom?” No Tom. Anyway, he couldn’t be found, so that was that. It transpired later on that he’d been up in the ruddy crow’s, up in the barrel up on the top of the mast, and then he saw this Jeffrey Milling, who was a director of Bowring’s, and who had been the one who’d forbidden him to go up. When he saw him down below, he ducked down in the barrel and he stayed there until he’d gone. Then he emerged, you know, right as rain. I mean, you couldn’t stop the man.

There was anther funny incident: The Eagle wasn’t doing anything at this particular time, and she was tied up in St. John’s. The chief engineer was on board and so was Tom Carroll, minding their own business and looking after the ship. Now, St. John’s was a major naval base and most all the other ships were tied up or were at sea. The fellow in charge of the escorts was a captain who lived in the top floor of the old Newfoundland Hotel, where he had his headquarters. He sent a naval messenger to the Eagle with orders. All he could find was Tom Carroll, who took the message but he couldn’t sign for it because the poor old boy couldn’t write nor read. So, Tom stuck it in his hip pocket and went about his business. Several days later Bowring’s got a telephone call from a man who said, “I’m Tom Carroll’s son-in-law, and I think I ought to let you know about this because, because old Tom just handed me a piece of paper that he found in his pants which he says seems to be two or three days old. It seems to be a naval message.” The fellow in the office said, “Well, what does it say?” And he said, “Well, I’ll read it to you if you like.” It said it was addressed to SS Eagle and, you know, Master, SS Eagle. “Proceed to sea immediately to position so and so and so and so to assist. Such and such a vessel has lost its propeller in the ice.” You know, Tom couldn’t read it. He’d forgotten about it. The son-in-law got a bit panicky, I suppose. They didn’t know but Tom might be clapped in the clink for aiding the enemy. It was just a bit of stupidity, typical bureaucratic naval operation. The Eagle couldn’t have gone to sea. She didn’t even have a crew on board; she didn’t have a steam operator. But that was Tom.

There were other bo’suns who were characters. One that comes to mind, he couldn’t have been more than 5 feet tall—Billy Barfoot, who was the bo’sun of the Imogene. I can remember that he used to drink a bit, but everybody did; it went with the job.

One of the noticeable features of the seal hunt was that, when the vessels sailed for the seal fishery, it was a big gala event—signal flags flying and all the rest of it, and people down to see them off, and a lot of blowing of sirens and foghorns and the rest of it, and a great many of the ships didn’t really have quite enough steam up. They’d chuff out, but they weren’t much use if they hit any ice, because the firemen were all drunk.

The firemen were signed on and given an advance and, so, they hadn’t had a drink in weeks, so it all went into the liquor store and you couldn’t get a proper head of steam on the ship until you’d sobered up the firemen. I mean, I know in my diary I’ve got a note, “Not making much progress. Firemen still drunk.” Well, that was a recognized feature of it. I mean the engineers knew. They tried to get one or two firemen who would be sober and, of course, there was a limit to how long they could go on stoking.

The Imogene carried a lot of coal and 12 firemen shovelling coal. There were six on and six off, but they could heave a lot of coal into the boilers of a ship. Anyway, they always started the voyage with a good old “waggo” so steam was not at the highest pressure that it might have been. However, 24 hours later, everything was back to normal.

Well, the crews were always entertaining, really. Another paid man on the crew was the wireless operator. He was provided by the Marconi Company. They were interesting characters because they’d been on all kinds of ships. You know, they were employed by Marconi, and they were put on ships as the people required them. The thing I never realized before was that they could recognize who was sending the message and not only listen to the dit-dit-da, he’d say, “That’s Joe Blow.” It was just like handwriting; they could tell the way they operated. It just sounded [like] a lot of blips to me, but not to the Marconi men. Once they knew who was on which ship, they didn’t have to read the part that said who it was from. Well, who did we have? Dick Ryan.

Dick could recognize every operator in the place. When I was out, because we rented the radios, the wireless sets from Marconi, and we had all these operators and things. When I was out they gave me what they call a frank, you know, free message sending, which he dit-dated into Signal Hill, and then the fellow there, it wasn’t an official message to be delivered by a cable company, he’d pick up the phone and telephone whoever I’d send it to, and just give them the message over the phone. Poor old Dick! He got some queer messages back and forth over it. He didn’t really know half the time what he was sending because I mean when you are out at the seal fishery most of the time you’re not doing anything except steaming around looking for the darn things and, so, you’re there for six weeks. You run out of books, you run out of magazines, you run out of conversation; you’ve said everything to everybody on board, and you’re down to doing things like crossword puzzles and so on. And then you haven’t got a dictionary with you. We used to use the wireless, you know, “What is so and so?”

And a rather astonished uncle in St. John’s: “What on earth are you doing?” And I said, “Well, I’m doing a crossword puzzle and I need to know a certain word.” He couldn’t believe that I was using the wireless operator to find words for my puzzle.

Eventually we got out of the seal industry completely. The Southside premises was scrapped and sold to Husky Oil in recent years, after I’d retired.

The only thing I regret about the seal fishery—and it couldn’t have happened anyway because the ship was lost during the war—but the Terra Nova should have been put in the sort of dry-dock museum the way the Fram is in dry dock just outside Oslo. She would have been a very interesting tourist attraction—the Terra Nova herself, the one that went to the Antarctic to bring back Scott’s body. It was a most important industry to Newfoundland in the early days, but it will never be revived.

[*Mr. Bowring was the only informant to mention that some sealers viewed sealing as a holiday or as an adventure. I suspect that he came to that conclusion on his own. It was always about the money, and during the Great Depression, free food was an attraction as well. Furthermore, as he goes on to say, captains, local merchants, and clergymen knew that their reputations and income depended on giving berths to active, productive sealers.]

Bertram Shears, b.1895, Int.1976 [retired senior secretary, Bowring’s]

I was born in St. John’s, 31 December 1895. I was 15 when I went to work with Bowring’s in 1910 and began as office boy or junior, collecting accounts and doing whatever you were ordered to do at that time. The office in those days had high desks and inkwells, blotting paper, steel pens. Our job was to see that the inkwells were properly filled every morning; one side would be red ink and one side black ink. Lot of ruling in those days: you ruled off your ledger. Great deal of attention paid to keeping things in order like that. You saw that a clean blotter was there for the bookkeepers. They stood at tall sloping desks to put their ledgers on and right on top of that were brass rails on pillars, see. If your desk was 6 feet long, there’d be perhaps four pillars with brass rails across to put books they weren’t using on top.

Those old desks were well made. They were mostly walnut, high-class desks. Then, to make things easy to walk to and fro in front of your desk to do posting, there was a stand or step with a sway to it, and people walked to and fro on that. There was a stool there, too. Sometimes he might sit down or, if he had a helper to do some work for him, he might be allowed to sit down. But as a rule, you didn’t have that privilege of sitting down in an office. You were supposed to stand. These were the bookkeepers. Our job was to tend them, see that the books were all out and in order for them to post in the morning. The office hours for the staff was 8:45, junior staff; others came in at 9; supposed to close officially at 6, but you got away when you could. Then we put the books in when the work was over. We had a very busy day and took directions from anyone who gave them to you; do some correcting, or go down to the stores nearby, or go down to the wharf to see somebody on the wharf or one of the vessels. You worked around the office and had to go to the telegraph office. But there was an elderly man as a full-time messenger. You went up and got the mail, of course, and posted the mail, a variety of duties, and answer the bell in the private office; the private office was a little further in, a little electric bell. The director would give us some instructions. Usually two directors resided at the same time there. They sat opposite each other at a long table. Then you had to answer the telephone, too.

In those days they had two telephone instruments. They had a number, 251, I think it was, and they had another with a special connection to the side where the seal factory was.

When the seal fishery time came around, we were all kept busy and everyone was doing something. They had shore stewards, whose job it was to see that things were got together in time for the seal fishery: place orders with tinsmiths, sailmakers—to make tarpaulins—and anything necessary.

Our marine superintendent would have to see to it that all the ships were in order themselves, because when the seal fishery was over, they were cleaned off and repaired, because there was a lot of damage done, as a rule. Then the time came to take on quantities of bunker coal. In some cases we’d get a ship in with that coal. Everybody’d want so many tons of coal, and she’d come in at a certain date and each ship would get its quantity from her—that was in the fall, see.

I moved on to other jobs through the year. On one occasion I was dealing with mail orders. We’d get a lot of mail orders in those days from different parts of the island. People sent in, ordering different merchandise from our various stores. We had different order forms for each store. There was grocery, hardware, dry goods, and perhaps one for provisions. So, as you saw what they wanted, you wrote it down on the specific order form, copied from the letter, and that was called over to make sure you hadn’t missed out anything. Those orders were signed then by one of the directors, who had that responsibility, and they would go to the respective stores and their orders would be filled. Sometimes they’d be small orders, sometimes quite substantial. That would be an open account. They’d know they were regular people, and, if a new name came up, they’d probably introduce themselves in some way or other or have some method of dealing with a newcomer. But we had large numbers of people that just wrote in to get their goods. There was a lot of trust. You had reliable dealers and customers. My responsibility for a while was looking after that section of it. Ryans, King’s Cove, were customers. Honourable James and Honourable Dan [Ryan] would come and have a chat and read the paper.

We had Hiscock as well as Lewis Dawe—big Labrador businesses. After six or seven years, I became a junior bookkeeper. The ledgers in those days were divided into sections: an outport ledger, two sections A-L and M-Z. City ledgers, another ledger for ships that came in we were agents for, for we were ships’ agents, and we’d have ships from different parts of the world.

I worked up through the ledgers to the main or control ledger. Then I was company secretary, corporate secretary, and in 1964 I retired—over 53 years with Bowring’s.

The Stephano and Florizel were actually not Bowring’s. They were part of the Red Cross line. The Red Cross was founded back in the 1880s, and there were a lot of Newfoundland shareholders, business people invested in that. It was managed from the Liverpool office of E.T. Bowring and Company. Then the operation was New York, St. John’s and Halifax. Those three ports a fortnightly service—the Florizel and the Stephano high-class passenger service and freight and general cargo—fish and oil to Halifax, etc. When it came to sealing time, they would give up the summer cruises, come to St. John’s and prepare for the seal fishery. They were usually chartered to Bowring’s. Furness-Withy made a proposal to take over the operation, which was accepted. The Furness boats that came to Newfoundland weren’t Furness-Withy; they were part of the Furness-Warren line (originally the Warren line, and taken over by Furness).

The most famous ship Bowring’s had was the Terra Nova; in the 1890s they bought her. She was built in the 1880s and was operated by the Dundee Seal and Whaling Company. In the early 1900s she went on an expedition to look for Scott in 1904; they bought her from Bowring’s. Then Captain Scott got up another expedition in 1909. Some officer came out and looked at the Terra Nova, talked to Bowring’s. They took the Terra Nova. She sailed in 1910, returned to Newfoundland in 1913. Her figurehead was removed from her and put in the National Museum in Cardiff, I think.

There was the Aurora, an old Scottish sealer, an oak vessel. She was purchased and refitted in 1911. She was lost later on the South Seas. I think she was carrying coal. The Viking was Norwegian-built, a sealer and whaler; [it] blew up in 1931. The Ranger—an old Scottish sealer and whaler—and she was a little different in her hull work; she was lost down on the northeast coast somewhere in the early 1940s. The Eagle, from Norway, was originally the Sophie. When she came out, she had sort of a bluff bow. They had her some years like that and then decided to give her a yacht bow. Mr. Taylor, the shipwright, fitted the modern bow. She stayed around till 1950. She was sunk intentionally off St. John’s. On a Sunday afternoon, July, 1950, she was towed outside the harbour. She was outfitted with a new set of signal flags, and she was sunk at a particular point with all flags flying. The Kite, built in Germany, was a small steamer. She was so small they used to say that the Kite had to stop to blow her whistle. She was lost in north Newfoundland. She was on charter. The Sagona was built by Sir John Crosbie, and the Fogota, I believe. We did charter the Fogota in 1918, I think, for the seal fishery.

In 1929 Bowring’s built the Imogene up in Stockton-on-Thames, I think. Built by Swift Docks Company, she came out in 1929 just in time to go out to the seal fishery. Captain Cy Taylor from Carbonear, he brought her out. She was lost in 1940 in a place called Boom Rock up near Cape Canso in September, shortly after a big storm.

A little while before that we bought the Beothic II from the Beothic Steamship Company. She was originally an American vessel converted by Job’s, who owned that company. The Beothic Steamship Company converted her and strengthened her for the ice and so on. We bought her in 1936 or thereabouts and she was lost in, I think, about 1940 down there at Lavee au Pigeon, north of St. Anthony, that way. She was lost in a snowstorm in December in the coal trade. That took our two steel ships at a time when they would have been invaluable. War was on and you couldn’t replace them—the Beothic II and the Imogene—two lovely ships. And what was ironic was here they were operating within our own waters and away from the submarine menace.

The Nascopie was a Job’s ship, a steel ship. Several ships were sold to Russia about 1916. The Beothic I was one of them. Mr. Alex Harvey was the promoter of steel ships. It was his idea. Adventure I, Bellaventure, and Bonaventure were steel icebreakers built to their own order in Britain. They were sold to Russia. One of the features was their special bow, sloped inward so you rolled up on the ice and crushed it—designed for that purpose. Once one of the ships was in New York harbour and they had half the shipping fraternity down looking at her operating in the ice in New York. They’d never seen a ship break ice that way.

The Florizel and Stephano were that type, too, you see. The Thetis, I think, was built by Captain Farquahar of Halifax—none built in Newfoundland, no facilities for it. There was a small dockyard over in Harbour Grace during World War I which did some small vessels; it was organized by a Norwegian concern. The Iceland was Baine Johnston’s steamer.

Farquhar, steamship owner and operator in Halifax of the Vanguard, a wooden Baine Johnston vessel, a Scots vessel; you see, Baine Johnston’s headquarters was in Greenock, Scotland, and they had their ships built there. They also had a plant operated by Murray & Crawford in Harbour Grace. They outfitted their sealer from there and manufactured their seals over there in Harbour Grace (Murray & Crawford Ltd.).

Munn’s in Harbour Grace were in cod and seal oil, very high quality oil produced in Harbour Grace, outfitting ships: butter, pork, beef, flour, molasses, split peas, hard bread, ropes and wires and naval stores of various sorts. Sometimes the ships would take sails and use them as tarpaulins. Tinsmiths to get tinware, big pots, big pans, boat’s kettles; stock of fresh meat which was lashed to the rigging when they went out; it kept nice and cool.

The captain would get his crew sometimes from his own neighbourhood, Bonavista Bay, Trinity Bay, etc., and would get so many tickets, entitling “N” a berth on the “N” and signed by the captain. Sometimes the ships sailed from Bonavista Bay; might go down to Greenspond and sail from there, but they might be signed on here.

Perhaps the firm would say we’re taking so many tickets and they would give them to certain dealers. It would be published in the newspaper when the crew would sign on; a little office on the wharf, bring in their tickets: special agreement. When they signed, you gave them a crop note entitling them to take up goods to the value of $9—their name and number—whatever they required. When the time came to settle, he was charged $12 for that. If the voyage failed, that was all forgiven. Everybody lost then. We’d buy a lot of gaffs and prises and stacked [them] up on the ship, bundled them all over the deck. Tow ropes were also provided. Pan flags were provided also, “R” for Ranger, “T.N.” for Terra Nova, etc.

When the pelts were weighed, that was the gross weight of the pelts. To make up the actual net weight, from that, each type of skin or pelt had an amount which brought it down to net weight.

Skins were exported to be used as leather in England. From the ’30s on they were used for furs. Those whitecoat skins would be put in a revolving drum with a certain type of sawdust, turn on the motor, and it would revolve and turn a greasy-looking skin into a clean-looking one. Those would be sent off to England later on in casks to be processed in the fur industry.

In 1927, I think, they introduced digesters, couple of stories high, filled with fat, and then live steam would be circulated in it to start cooking it.

Two hundred and fifty-six gallons in the Newfoundland tun—four hogsheads of 63 gallons.

Our hogshead was 64 gallons. We bought all our seal oil and cod oil at 256 gallons to a tun or 64 to a hogshead. We always used imperial gallons.

First our salt was bought in English tons, then in metric tons, which was used in Spain—2,204 pounds, whereas the long ton is 2,240 pounds.

Bowring’s rented land from the Admiralty up to the time the development of the harbourfront began. Then the Canadian government took over all properties for the Admiralty. This land, rented from the Admiralty, was near St. Mary’s Church and known as Mudge’s. It had been leased to Nicholas Mudge and Co., but was taken over by Bowring’s in the 1840s.

Cyril S. Chafe, b.?, Int.1976 [master cooper, retired manager of Bowring’s sealing plant]

I was born in St. John’s and I went to work for Bowring’s in 1917. From office boy I went to serve my apprenticeship as a cooper, and after working at the coopering trade for 16 years, I became a master cooper in 1936. In 1948 I was appointed manager of the sealing plant that used to manufacture the seals that the ships brought in from the icefields.

In the 1920s, when the ship would arrive, the men had to discharge the pelts. They had to throw them on a jig, an old-fashioned jig, and they were weighted on a swinging beam. The tallymen would tally it down, and the pelts would be wheeled away from the ship. There were two tallymen: one for the ship and one for the firm.

The pelts were all weighted by the quintal [112 pounds]. Then there were deductions of the weight of the fat for scraps of meat that was left on the pelts: 1½ pounds for each young seal, 6 pounds for a bedlamer, 10 pounds for an old harp, and 20 pounds for an old hood. Then there were deductions for holes: 10 cents for a single hole, 20 cents for a double hole, maybe 80 cents or $1 if the fur was [sun]burnt.

In the 1920s the pelts were skinned by hand. We had 25 skinners who would skin, on an average, 7,000 a day. One skinner would skin on an average 300-350 young harps a day. Mr. Cook, on the Southside, established a record of 656 for one day’s work. It was sort of a race on between Job’s and Bowring’s. He had the record for a nine-hour day and it still holds. Now, they wouldn’t skin 7,000 every day, because it would take longer to skin an old one than it would to skin a young one. The skinners worked at different trades during the rest of the year.

The skinners were paid by the pelt: 6 cents for a young harp, 7 cents for a young hood, 10 cents for a bedlamer, 10 cents for an old harp, and 30 cents for an old hood. Now, if they cut a hole in a skin, they were charged 10 cents for it. They averaged about $18 to $20 a day—for a week or two or three a year—which was a lot of money at that time, because the union rate of wages at that time was 30 cents an hour all over town. Clerks down on Water Street were receiving $10 to $12 a week. It was good for the skinners at that time of the year, because a lot of those men were idle in February and March.

The skinner’s table was a long table sloping away from you. There were just room for two pelts, and the apprentice had to serve five years at this table putting pelts on it for the skinners. You had to put the pelts on the table just right for those old skinners, because if it wasn’t, they’d lose a bit of time shifting the pelt to get it the way they wanted it.

The young fellow, or the tender, as he was called, would put the pelt on the table, and cut the tail off. When the skinner finished skinning this one, he’d go over to the other one and, while he was gone there, the tender would scrape off any scraps and put up another pelt. The seal skinner paid the apprentice $1.50 or $2 a day and sometimes he had to tend on two or three men. It meant a lot of stooping down. Sometimes the skinner would let the apprentice skin a pelt and he’d tell you what to do. But if you cut it he would be out 10 cents, so you didn’t get much chance to try.

You served your apprenticeship of five years and then you had to wait for someone to die to get a table, because they had only about 50 skinners altogether in St. John’s. We had 25 and Job’s had 25. That was enough. They’d produce enough fat to keep the machinery going.

They each had a skinning knife and a leather stall for your thumb—where you pressed on the back of the knife—and a steel. They wore a barbel [or barvel; apron] made out of calfskin with the fur inside. There was no heat in the building where we were skinning the pelts, so when your hands got cold, you just put them inside the barbel so they’d get warm. The knife, 10-inch blade and curved, was sharpened with the steel, and we’d always finish the sharpening stroke with the wire edge turning up, and not down. The seal skinners had a union—I’d say the oldest union in North America. It was formed on the Southside, where the Upper Dundee Company had its premises.

Then the companies got skinning machines to skin the pelts in place of the men. The union was against the skinning machines. The companies first tried them around 1890 or 1900, but they didn’t work. But in 1925 they brought in machines again. They didn’t cut out any labour, because it took just as many men to operate the machines. We had six machines over in our factory: two skinning machines and four fleshing machines. And quite a number of the men went to work on the machines. The machines were quicker. We had two, and they were capable of doing 6,000 to 7,000 pelts a day.

First, the pelt would go through a band knife on a conveyor, and that would take the fat off down to one-quarter inch of the skin. Then it would go through a fleshing, which was a cylinder with a rubber roller so it couldn’t damage the pelt.

Now, in the olden times the seal oil was sunned. They’d put it in shallow tanks with a glass roof on it and they’d bleach the oil by sun and ship it away in wooden barrels. It was called “water white” seal oil. A good lot of it at them times was shipped around the world to the various churches, and they’d have a floating light. It was also used for the manufacture of soap.

At that time there was a big demand for soap and a big demand for leather. They didn’t use seal skins as furs at that time. They all went into the manufacture of leather. It was only in 1926 they discovered they could use them for furrier purposes. They were then shipped as furs, and that brought the value of the skins up.

In the early 1920s they had grinders, and the fat was taken and put through a grinder. Then it went through the sausage cutter, a long tube with a lot of knives in it. From there it went into a tank, where it was cooked with a jet of steam. The oil would float off and run down in the receiving tanks. Then the residue that was left would be pressed in small bags. In 1925 Bowring’s got digesters like they used in hog factories. They cooked the fat quicker and not a better grade of oil and a quicker process and a bigger yield. We used to ship it by tanker to England, where they made Sunlight Soap.

First when I went to the Southside in 1917 I had to bring the books and the watchmen’s clock from the Southside over to the north side, walk up the Southside, across the bridge, and down Water Street, and pick up the mail. I was at that for six or seven months.

At that time you had to go to work at 6 o’clock in the morning and you had to walk and be at work at 6 and not five minutes after. So I used to leave home on Casey Street to walk to the Southside. It used to take me 20 minutes. At 8 you’d walk home to your breakfast and be back again at 9—one hour to walk 2 miles and have your breakfast. At 1 o’clock, you walked home again and back to work at 2, home at 6, and if you had to work in the nighttime, you’d go back at 7 and work till 11. In the dead of winter we’d go to work at 7 and lots of times you’d have to make your own path through the snow down the Southside. Then you wouldn’t come home at 8; you’d come home to your dinner at 12.

My father was a cooper by trade and after six or seven months I started my cooper apprenticeship. We repaired oil barrels. We’d get those barrels from the oleomargarine factories. We had three here at that time, and you had to serve five years as an apprentice. After five years you became a full-fledged cooper, with high wages compared to the times; $24 a week, 40 cents an hour; the majority of tradesmen were getting 20, 25, and 30 cents.

The barrels were all made by hand. Wet coopering and dry coopering were called tight work and slack work. A tight worker made a barrel that would hold oil and a slack worker made fish barrels. Fish was packed in half-drums, drums, casks, donkeys, and various kinds of barrels. A cask held 4 quintals of dry or 5 quintals of Labrador; a drum, 128 pounds to the Brazil market; half-drum, 64 pounds. In the shop at that time slack workers used to work on piecework. They had to make, say, 15 drums a day.

Herring, turbot, and trout were shipped in pickle in wooden barrels, and so was cod oil. Years ago the coopers had to make the 100-gallon puncheons to ship the seal oil away in. The wood came out from England in blocks, squared. They had to cleave them and make the staves out of them, join them, and then make the barrel and hoop it right up. You had to chop the piece of three-by-three with an axe, dress it with a knife to make the stave round, and then you had to rise it up and close it. That was tight work.

There was plenty of wooden barrels at that time. There were no gasoline barrels, but all the kerosene was imported into Newfoundland in barrels. Then Imperial Oil came here and established a plant over on the Southside in 1914, 1915. They used to bring the oil in, in tankers, put it in the barrels, and ship it out to the outports. That’s where the fishermen would get barrels to put their cod liver oil in—kerosene barrels.

You were allowed one apprentice on each mercantile premises. He had to work in the building. He wasn’t allowed to go outside and do his work until his fourth year. They followed the old tradition from England, and whatever days you missed in your apprenticeship over the five years, you had to serve them as back time. If you missed a month in your five years, you had to serve that for nothing before you became a tradesman. After five years you were a cooper—no exam. You joined the union then. It depended on yourself then. If you were a good one, you got a job. If you weren’t, you got nowhere.

In 1892 the old Cooper’s Union was formed. Their slogan or motto was “United we stand; Divided we fall,” with a picture of a man putting staves together. It was a very strict union. You had an adze. If a man was packing fish, and picked up the adze to clinch a nail, he was grabbed. Some old coopers would likely chop his nose off. A labour man wasn’t allowed to do a cooper’s work—not even to drive a nail.

When my father retired, I became a master cooper. There had to be a master cooper on each mercantile premises, and there were all premises on the Southside and the north side. The master cooper didn’t do any coopering. He was a foreman; he was an inspector for the Department of Fisheries; and he had to know how to gauge oil.

However, boxes soon took the place of wooden fish drums, and steel drums took the place of wooden barrels, especially after they began to ship gasoline in steel drums. Then the coopering trade began to die.

The last time I needed a fish barrel I was manager at Bowring’s. It was needed to go on a spar on the Algerine like a crow’s nest. Bert Harvey was the only cooper I knew could make it, and he was working with Harvey’s on the Southside. So I had to make it myself. It stood 6 feet high and was about 80 inches in diameter. It had a hatch in the bottom, and it was strong because a man’s life depended on it—70 or 80 feet in the air. The man would go up to the bottom, push up the hatch, and when he was inside, the hatch would fall down, and he would stand on it. That was the last barrel I made.

Harold Abbott, b.1913, Int.1986

When I was around 13, 14 years of age, we’d be listening to the old people’s conversations about the seal fishery. In the nighttime they’d congregate in certain houses and that would be the topic, in a good many cases. They’d be speaking about the ships at the seal fishery, how many seals they pelted, and that sort of thing. Listening to the old people talking about the seal fishery, it was only natural that I became interested myself.

Around the age of 18 I decided to try for a berth. My father was a fisherman, and he would ship his catch to the merchant in Bonavista, J.T. Swyers Company Limited. Mr. Swyers would have so many berths that he would get to the ice, and I went over to see him myself. I was talking to his son, Bert, and told him I’d like to get a berth to the ice. He sort of smiled at me, and he said he’d do his best. In those days there were a lot of people looking for berths to the ice, and you considered yourself fortunate if you were lucky enough to secure a berth. Anyway, after contacting Bert several times, I succeeded in getting a berth in the Eagle.

Now, the Eagle was one of the older ships, and he said to me, “Maybe when we go in St. John’s we might be able to get a better berth than in the Eagle.” And it so happened that we went in to St. John’s with the sealers on the train, which was about 12-18 hours’ journey in those days. After we got in St. John’s, the first or second day, I think, I saw him, and he said he did have a berth in the Ungava, which I considered, and he considered, too, was better than a berth in the Eagle.

After three or four days in St. John’s, you’d go down to Job Brothers, and you’d take up what the ice-hunting people would call a crop. You’d get maybe a knife and other things that you needed, that you’d thought you’d need out on the ice. You’d take up the sum of $9, and then when you came back from the icefields, you’d be charged with $12 for the $9 worth that you had taken up before you left St. John’s.

Anyway, I remember in the Ungava that the Captain was Peter Carter from, I think, Greenspond [Newell’s Island, Bonavista Bay]. And his son, Sam, was with him. We sailed from St. John’s, on, I think, the 10th of March. You were allowed to take the seals on the 14th. That year we entered the ice down around Cape Bonavista. After three or four, or maybe four or five days, we got further north and the ice was much heavier.

Anyway, around the 18th of March, the news [wireless] was that the Imogene was into the main patch of seals. Now, the Ungava and the Beothic were two sister ships, as far as I know, and the ice was heavy and we were butting the ice side by side for two days, and the Imogene at this time was into the main patch of seals. Captain Al Blackwood was her captain.

After two days we got into the patch of seals, too. As I remember now, we understood that there were 11 vessels [but only six steamers] in the same patch of seals. I remember distinctly being on the ice and you couldn’t even see the smoke of another vessel. That would give you an idea of how large the patch of seals was. Captain Al Blackwood, he secured, I think it was, around 50,000 or 55,000 whitecoats [55,636 total seals]. Anyway, after the patch of seals was cut [harvested], we secured around 30,000 whitecoats, and then it was picking up scattered seals. You’d be what the ice-hunting people would call quintering from the side of the steamer.

There’d be sidesticks on each side of the boat, three or four heavy planks about 6 by 6 [inches] and they’d be 3 or 4 feet apart, something like a ladder coming up the side of the boat. Then it would be mostly the young fellows that would be on the sidesticks. The vessel would be proceeding quite slowly through the slack ice, and as you’d see the scattered seal on the ice, the fellows that was on the sidesticks would jump and run, and whoever would get to the seal first, of course, would kill it. Maybe you’d kill three or four seals and perhaps it would be three or four men out at the same time. You’d have a hook and a line from the steamer. You’d hook your seal onto the hook, or two or three seals, whatever the case may be. You’d take the seal and carcass as it was. You’d just slit it open down the middle and hook it on and let it go aboard the boat.

Now, aboard the boat, you would have your buddy, your bunkmate and most of the sealers would have barrel on the barricade of your steamer [enclosed area of stern or deck, where the men put their boards]. Your buddy would be watching this seal, or your seals, when they came aboard; otherwise, when they get up on deck, if your buddy wasn’t there to get it, you’d be looking for your seal, maybe, when you’d come aboard. That was how you would fill your barrel with carcass and flippers. Salt it in.

You’d probably get a quart of salt from the cook or whoever you could get it from and you’d sprinkle a bit of salt on the seal as you’d fill your barrel and then you’d get some [salty pot] liquor from the cooks and throw it in your barrel. You’d fill your barrel in this way. You couldn’t have better seal than what was put up in this way. It was a bit of salt and liquor from the cooks where they’d be cooking the salt meat for about 225 men, seal hunters, and, of course, the ship’s crew [firemen, etc.]. This is the way that you’d secure it [the seal meat that you were taking home].

Now, after a while all the young seals would be cut [killed and sculped]. And then you’d go after the older seals—the bedlamers. Well, there’d be so many gunners selected from the ship’s crew to go on the ice. There would be a gunner, and maybe with that gunner there would be one or two fellows that you’d call “dogs.” They’d carry the cartridges for the gunner.

Now, if you had a good gunner, it meant that you’d have a lot more work because you were supposed to get a snip of the tail of each seal that the gunner killed. If your gunner was good, as I said before, the dog would have a lot of work. Anyway, I happened to be dog for a fellow by the name of Raymond Dyke from Bonavista. I would say he was a good gunner, because if there were two gunners selected to put out on the ice, he usually would be one. I tried to make sure that I’d do my part if he killed a seal; I did my running over the ice to take a part of every tail that he killed. It wasn’t easy, with a bag of cartridges and that. But you’d sort of get used to it.

This spring I’m referring to [1933], now we got enough older seals to make up around 40,000 seals [49,285]. Then we bore for St. John’s. After a day, a couple of days and a night, we arrived in St. John’s [April 17]. We went over on the Southside to Job Brothers. The next day, or pretty soon, we started to take out the seals.

The ship’s crew would be divided into watches. One day there would be so many watches on and you’d be taking out the seals. The rest of the crew would be free to go where they liked. The men that were on the day’s work landing the seals, they would take the flipper that was left in the seal and that would be cut out. In the evening, when the day’s work was finished, what flippers that was cut out were shared. If you landed 10,000 seals that day, you’re supposed to have 10,000 flippers.

Sometimes there would be an order come from some places like the orphanage or maybe the hospital—anyway, this is what you’d hear among the crew. There would be so many flippers given to those institutions. What was left in the evening would be shared up among the crew.

If I remember correctly, you’d get maybe four dozen flippers for each man. That was, that’s a day’s work. The price, as I remember it now, that we got for the seal flippers, that first spring I was to the ice, was 30 cents a dozen. You couldn’t sell them all then for 30 cents a dozen, because I remember giving them away to people that I knew in St. John’s. Anyway, it would take you maybe four days to discharge the seals. You be on for two days, so you could get around eight or perhaps you’d be lucky enough to get ten dozen flippers. You’d sell them or give them away.

As I remember now, we had around 40,000 seals. Then came the day when you would be paid off over in the little office over on the other [north] side of St. John’s. If I remember correctly, the amount of money that we got for each man at this particular time for 40,000 seals, was $89 and some cents [$80.36?]. But in those days $89 was quite a lot of money. This is how I spent the first spring to the seal hunting.

Now, if you want to know about how you worked when you were out to the seals, well, first when we struck the seals you’d be on your legs around 4 o’clock in the morning. Your master watch, he would be sure and have his men alerted around 4 o’clock in the morning. And in the boat I was in, the Ungava, you’d go up in the galley. There was a place to sit down with tables. You’d have your breakfast. I don’t remember what—you’d have boiled beans and bread sometimes.

You’d get your breakfast and then everybody would go down in their berth and get ready to go on the ice. Now, what you would take on the ice for the day would be: you’d have a tin on your belt with molasses in it. It would be hooked on your belt behind. You’d have your knife and sheath on your belt, all ready for to go into action when you’d get overboard at the seals. You’d have a bag [often called a nunny bag] to keep your items in, a small amount of rolled oats and you’d have an orange, maybe, that you’d bought in St. John’s before you went out. You’d have perhaps four or five, or five or six Gibraltar candy. This is what you have for your lunch out on the ice in the day [usually supplemented by hard bread and raw seal hearts]. But, anyway, as soon as daylight, when the captain saw the right place to put out his men, out they’d go. There’d be so many men down on the sidesticks, and they’d get over with their gaffs and their ropes around their backs.

They’d start in to pelt the seals. The steamer would go on and leave you. I remember that there were times when you didn’t even see the steamer—you wouldn’t know she was out there. You wouldn’t see her at all. You’d see men here and there, all scattered over the ice. You’d have your flag with you, or maybe two flags. You start in then, the master watch would tell so many men to start in around here and pick up the seals. Now, sometimes the ice would be bad: it would be heavy ice and it would be bad, it would be heavy ice and it would be hard to get over it.

Down among the ice, the little whitecoats would be hid away. Anyway, this is how you had to get the seals in some cases. This spring the seals, I think they averaged around between 40 and 50 pounds per pelt, which was good. Some seals [pelts] would weigh as much as 70 pounds. You’d kill maybe two, four or five seals or whatever was in the small area where you were; you’d kill what seals were there with your gaff. Then you’d tie up two seals and, if the ice was good, perhaps you’d tie up three seals, depend on the size of the seal and what the ice was like [slippery or dry].

One of the men, maybe in your lot there would be three or four men, or two men, and you’d stick a flag. Then you’d haul your seals to the flag and you’d take them off. You’d have them laced up with your rope and you’d untie them and you’d drop them where the flag was. This was how you’d spend the day at your seals, and when you cleaned up your seals around this way, you’d decide to walk, maybe, another 300 or 400 yards. If you saw many seals, you’d stick another flag. Where you’d pick up your seals, you’d stick a flag. Then you’d pick up your seals around there in the same way as you did the first. You’d have your flags stuck in the middle of the seals. You’d have some spun yarn rope tied on your flag and you’d tie it on your pelt to keep your flag upright so’s the captain would know where he had to come pick up the seals.

Now, you wouldn’t see your steamer, then. That would be maybe around the middle of the day. So, when you get your day’s work finished, perhaps you’d see your steamer, he’d know, he had his course and that he had his men laid out in a line. Where he went in the evening then depended on what the situation was, where he was to at the particular time. He’d come back maybe around dark, perhaps sometimes before dark and pick you up and pick up your seals at the same time, and sometimes he’d go and pick up his men first and leave the seals. It all depended on what things were like.

There would be some times, I remember being on the ice until 1 o’clock in the night. All the men and the master watches would congregate on the one place. They’d wait then for the steamer or maybe there would be three or four lots of people. But they’d all come together and get on a good sheet of ice, where the flag was at and so on. [Two flags side by side informed the captain that their men were gathered at that particular site.] Then they’d just wait, that’s all they could do. Wait until the steamer came to pick you up. On one occasion, I remember it was around 12 or 1 o’clock at night before we got picked up.

But the weather wasn’t bad and you’d be all right and you’d go around then while you were waiting for your steamer to come. If you saw some flippers that was left on the ice, you would pick them up because you had to take the other one in. You’d go around and, if you were lucky enough, you’d pick up a dozen flippers. You string them on your belt, you see, tie them on your belt. When you got aboard then, if you got aboard okay, by then you’d have your flippers and you put them in your barrel and salt them in this way. You wouldn’t take any carcass aboard.

Now, you can imagine, maybe 30 men waiting for your steamer to come up. Then they all would rush to get up the sidesticks with their gaffs and with a dozen flippers or a half a dozen flippers on your belt and trying to get aboard the steamer. But most of the people were young and, once you’d have hands ahold to the sidesticks, well then you’d bring your body and what you’d have tied on. This is how you’d fill your barrel, in this way. Now, this is how I saw when the first spring I was out to the ice, and I enjoyed it, to tell you the truth.

I don’t know what there was about it that made you want to go again, but as for me, I’d be longing for the next spring to come because I’d go out to the ice. You’d be out there and some fellows wouldn’t shave from the time they left St. John’s until they got back. The day before or the night before, perhaps they’d shave and clean up. But as for me, I didn’t grow much of a beard myself. I certainly enjoyed it out to the ice. But one thing about it, I didn’t go on the ice on Sundays. I was trying to live as good a life as I could, and I didn’t think I should go onto the ice on Sundays. But I wouldn’t be the last to be there on a Monday morning. I wouldn’t have to be called twice to get out of the bunk.

Now, this is all you saw to the ice when I was at it, and that was a good many years ago. I was only around 18 or 19 years old. Today I’m 73.

We’d have church service on Sundays. I don’t remember the man’s name, but there was a man and he was bo’sun on the Ungava. On Sundays we would gather in what we’d call the mess room or the galley. Anyway, it was where the tables were. He’d have service and, as for me, I enjoyed it. But I can’t remember the man’s name. Now, I do know that he was bo’sun on the steamer. But he was at least a middle-aged man at that time. I guess he’s passed on to his reward by now.

It would be one service and whosoever will might come to the service. The people—there’d be quite a few people—40, 50 people gathered in that room. He’d have prayers; he’d have a talk on the Bible. There’d be some people would get up and give their testimony. We’d have someone to pray, and I enjoyed it, although I was just a young man.

We used to wear to the ice what they call moleskin [hard-wearing cotton fabric] pants. Now, one thing you—more or less—was you had to have and that was a pair of skin boots. If you didn’t have a pair of skin boots, you was considered not fitted for to go to the ice, in those days. But now, the people now [1980s], as long as they got on a pair of logans or a pair of rubber boots.

But anyway, I got my first pair of skin boots. I bought them in St. John’s. I don’t remember just how much I paid for them. They were considered light for going over the ice, and they’d have leather taps on them and heels and you’d have what the old fellows used to call sparables and chisels. [The latter were larger and used for the heels while the former were smaller and used in the soles.] You’d have them in your boots so as to protect you from slipping on the ice.

Then you’d have, in my day you didn’t have any parkas because there was no parkas as is now in these days. But a lot of people used to have what they call a white canvas jacket. I remember I had a white canvas jacket with a sort of a hood on it that my sister made. Well then, to go out on the ice with a white canvas jacket, it didn’t look too good. The first thing you would do when you killed the first seal was you’d get the blood and you’d put it all over your jacket to smear it up with the blood of the flippers. I remember an old fellow from Bonavista, Fred Phillips. When he’d pelt the first seal, he was so much overjoyed that—I can see him now—he took the seal and he threw it up, the pelt, as far as he could in the air and then rubbed the blood in his jacket. That’s how it was when I was at the ice.

To get from here to St. John’s, you’d get on the train in Bonavista. You’d go in the cars with just those wooden seats. It took you six hours to get from Bonavista to Clarenville. Then if you were lucky, you’d connect with the train going in to St. John’s. While you were in Clarenville, you had to stay in the station or in your [train] car—with 30 or 40, because there would be at least 30 or 40 going from Bonavista, and some people would take advantage and go up on the sealer’s train. It was cheaper to travel on the sealer’s train. There’d be a nice crowd in Clarenville. Some would be staying in the old waiting station there. You’d go down to the boiler house to boil your kettle—most of the fellows would have a small kettle among three or four men. You’d go down there and you’d boil the water and come up and steep your tea. You’d get a mug of tea and you’d have a lunch with you to take along.

Now, then, when the train would come through, you’d connect, and you’d get on the train going in St. John’s. You’d get into St. John’s maybe 9 or 10 o’clock, around there, the next day. So it’s approximately a 24-hour journey from Bonavista to St. John’s to go to the ice. Now, there were fellows coming up from the north side of Bonavista Bay from Greenspond and those places. They’d come up and connect and they’d had to have maybe two or three days’ walking, as far as I understand. They’d come up and come in and connect with the train in Gambo. We’d get in and then there’d be a rush to go down and get your berth in the boat that you were going in. You’d be in your boat then for, maybe, two or three days—three or four days, perhaps, before you’d sail, getting ready to go to the ice.

You’d have three or four pairs of socks and that sort of thing and you’d always have a spare pair of mitts that your mother or your sister would knit to put in your sack that you carried on the ice, because you never knew when you’d be caught out and be out all night. I always had a spare pair of mitts, woollen mitts, and a pair of socks in my knapsack [nunny bag] on the ice, and you’d have your compass in your bag in case it came stormy, rough weather, so as you’d take off [a compass course] where the other men were and where your steamer was and that sort of thing.

You’d take along a cake with you, a special cake, and you wouldn’t cut that cake until you struck the seals. You’d have a cake that your mother made for you. Then, when you got into the seals, some of the fellows anyway, or most of the fellows, would cut the cake, and you’d share it out among your buddies around where you bunked. Now, where I bunked in the Ungava was down in the hold. There was 150 men in the old hold with bunks all around the sides. Three men in a bunk—around 150 men down in the one place.

I had a bunk filled with shavings; it wasn’t a real mattress. It was sort of a bunk bed made out of brin or burlap—whatever you want to call it—and shavings in it. You’d make the best you could out of that. [Men collected shavings from the cooperages and carpenter shops to put in the brin bags for mattresses.]

Before you left St. John’s, you’d go and you’d get a tin pan and a fork and knife or perhaps you’d buy that, get that out of your crop. You’d take along that and you’d keep that down in your bunk. When the time came that you had to go up and get your meal, somebody would sing out dinnertime, or whatever it was, and you’d take along your pan and your fork and your knife.

You’d go up, and the cook, or so many cooks, would put your meal, whatever it might be—salt beef, duff and pudding sometimes, and that sort of thing, potatoes and turnips—and you’d put it in your pan. You’d eat what you wanted. Then you’d come out with your pan and on the side of the steamer there was a tap. You’d let the water run in your pan and you’d stir it around with your fork and you’d tip it over and let it fall out. That was how you’d clean out your pan. You carried it up and put it in your bunk again until the next meal.

Sometimes when you were into the seals, you’d have flippers cooked. They’d make flippers and gravy. You’d have a lot of lopscouse—what they called lopscouse—a sort of a soup for meals. Well, as far as I’m concerned. You’d have bread. First, you’d have some—what do you call it—baker’s fog, that’s what the old fellows used to call it—baker’s bread. That wouldn’t last for very long because it would only be what they’d pick up in St. John’s.

Then you’d have the bread they’d put up and you’d have hard bread and that sort of thing. As I remember, I didn’t find the food too bad. I had a good appetite and that sort of thing. One thing about it, it couldn’t have been too bad because every spring when you’d come back, you’d be around 10-15 pounds heavier than when you went out. That’s the way I found it.

And then there was a meal of young liver from the seals. When you’d come off the ice in the day, you’d bring aboard, strung on your belt, enough liver to cook. You’d get a pan from the cooks and you’d get a piece of fat pork and you’d get an onion, maybe two. You’d cut up this whitecoat’s liver. You’d carry it up in the galley and, with your fat pork and your onions, you’d put it in the pan and you’d cook that. Brother, you’d have to go some place a long ways to get something better than that.

That was one meal that I certainly enjoyed. You’d have that then, then you’d come down with your pan. You’d have the pan, it would be about 16 inches long and about 6-7 inches wide, you’d have that filled up with liver, and you’d share it out among your bunkmates and the fellows that was nearest to you until it was all gone. Then the next night or some other night then, somebody else would do the same thing and share it up with you and that sort of thing. That was a real treat, as far as I’m concerned. Yeah.

Then the scattered fellow would know the cooks. We had a fellow near our bunk by the name of Pat Duggan, I think his name was. I don’t know if it was Duggan—from Melrose anyway—and he was the kind of fellow he knew the cooks who cooked for the staff. They’d have baked beans. Pat would go up and maybe there’d be some left over. He was the kind of fellow he could get a meal and he’d come down a share it with you. That would be real good because when the beans are cooked for 250 men, you wouldn’t expect them to be as good as if they were just cooked for 10 or 15 or 20. You’d get a scattered meal like that when Pat would go up and get it. I used to enjoy them. He’s dead now. But you wouldn’t get that every day because he wouldn’t take the time. Just now and then.

The crew would be divided up into watches, you see. The master watch, he had so many men. You’d be on four hours and off and maybe you’d be on the ice all day. You came aboard, you got something to eat, you’d have to go on watch. You’d stay then until your four-hour period was up. You’d be stowing seals or getting ice aboard, that sort of thing, whatever there was to be done. Then when your watch was off, there’d be another watch come on for another four hours, and you’d go back to your bunk and get some rest. That’s the way they’d have it: four-hour watches.

Yeah, the master watch would come down. Usually he would come down and [say]: “Come on, me cockies, we wants someone to go out and get ice aboard, and we got some seals to stow and ice down,” that sort of thing. The seals would be stowed down in pounds. There’d be pounds built in the hold of the steamer with heavy planks and the pounds would be about maybe 6 or 7 feet square. You’d stow your seals down there: a tier of ice and a tier of pelts, and keep them that way.

In the boat, the Ungava, that I was in, they must have taken on quite a drop of water before we left St. John’s because you wouldn’t have to be getting ice for water. But in others like the Eagle they’d be getting ice for water, that sort of thing, more often than you would in the larger boats like the Ungava and the Beothic, you know.

Nobody in the family would tell you not to go to the ice. They wouldn’t tell you not to go, but I don’t think they were, my mother especially, I don’t think they was very enthusiastic about their son going to the ice because they all heard about the disasters like the Newfoundland disaster. There were people from Bonavista who had been out and they were left crippled for life owing to losing their feet by frostbite. Some had died. Hughie Mouland and Henry Edsel from here were in the Newfoundland disaster. I’m sure there were others but I can’t remember their names right now. This was why the women, especially the mothers, weren’t very enthusiastic about their sons going to the ice. But that didn’t prevent the young men. There was something about it that you liked.

My father used to go to the ice. Listening to the old fellows talking sort of stirs you up to do the same thing. But they were in the older boats. I remember my father talking about when the ice hunters wanted more for their seals in St. John’s. They went on strike [1902], and they tried to haul the sealing ships up on Water Street in St. John’s [only the Neptune].

There was an old fellow from Bonavista who always went with Captain Billy Winsor. He always went by the name of Big Jack Abbott, and he was always a master watch. I happened to be in his watch the first spring I was out. He was a fine man, he would not ask the men to do something that he would not do himself. He worked just as hard, if not harder, than the men that were supposed to be under him. He was a big man, and he wanted his work done. But he certainly did his share. I liked him because he didn’t send anybody else where he wouldn’t go.

Now, I said the first spring I made $89 [$80?]. The second spring I was out [1935?], I had to be paid home by the government. We only made $14.

Everybody got along pretty well. Sometimes you would get jammed in the ice. When we were jammed in the ice on the Ungava, there wasn’t much to do, and there was nothing to do when you were off watch. You’d spend your time making buckets from a piece of gaff handle, using your pocket knife. I remember making at least three or four sets this particular spring. The next spring, when I went to join the boat in St. John’s, I saw the man that bunked alongside me the spring before. The first thing he said to me was, “if we get jammed, I want you to make me a set of buckets.” I said, “Okay,” but we never did get jammed. I haven’t got a set of buckets that I made; I gave them all away.

At night, if you had some time off down in your bunk, you’d be listening to the other fellows spinning yarns a lot of the time. I remember one fellow from Trinity who spent a lot of time in the States. When the Depression came, he was forced to come home. We all used to listen to him. He’d be telling lots of stories about where he worked in the States. Some fellows would be singing songs. Uncle Neddie Parsons from Greenspond was a good entertainer. He’d sing songs like “I Drinked out of a Puncheon.” You’d listen to those fellows and you’d be surprised how they could entertain people. They might not have had any education but I say they were well-educated just the same in certain things [chuckles].

I enjoyed every minute of it out to the ice; I always looked forward to going. But I was only out five springs. Then I started to work on land.

I was never out overnight or in a storm, but sometimes the boat would be late picking us up. While we waited for the steamer, we’d be picking up scattered seals, marching around to keep warm, or telling yarns.

You didn’t get much for your own flippers, maybe 30 cents a dozen. I remember three or four fellows from Bonavista; instead of getting rid of their flippers in St. John’s, they decided to take their ice-hunting box and fill it up with flippers. Now, I think the box at that time would hold 13 dozen flippers, and that’s what they did. They filled up their box, three fellows, and when they got out to Clarenville, they sold them. Now, in St. John’s, they could only get 30 cents a dozen for them. When they got out to Clarenville, they got $1.50 a dozen. That was a lot of money in those days—more than they’d get in St. John’s. Thirty cents a dozen, for a dozen flippers, that was a lot of meat for a small lot of money.

Quintering from the side of the Ungava could be dangerous. I did not fall in the water myself, but I do remember seeing three or four men fall in when we were quintering from the side of the Ungava. That was with Captain Billy Winsor. The ice was what you call “slob.” But they got them. But they didn’t look very good at that time. The boat was going very slow and Captain Billy Winsor handled it very good. But he was some concerned just for a few minutes.

Sometimes your boat wouldn’t be able to get to the pans, and then they’d send out the ship’s crew to haul the pelts to the ship. You’d go out, maybe 100 men, in line, that way. You’d take a couple of pelts, sometimes we wouldn’t take no more than one, depends on what the ice was like, if the ice was what they call hummocky, hard to get over, they’d get up on the pans of ice and pull the seal up and get over it that way. The vessel wouldn’t be able to get through the ice.

I have seen it when it was great big sheets of ice, I suppose, half a mile long. There were seals by the hundreds on the one sheet of ice. This particular time I was on the ice with a fellow from Bonavista by the name of Joe Phillips, and, believe it or not, we only stuck only two flags for the day, and we worked like dogs. This fellow, Joe Phillips, he wouldn’t stop to eat, and I was just as bad because I wanted to be as good as the other fellow. He’d eat going along, and the seals were so thick that you didn’t have to lace them up, you’d just reeve your rope through the flipper holes and pull them along, three or four or whatever you could pull along. Anyway, all day we only stuck two flags. He’s dead now, poor man. But work! My dear man, you had to go some to beat Joe Phillips on the ice. He was wonderful. He was only a young fellow like myself, maybe a couple of years older. Yeah, yes, sir. But the seals were some thick. I can’t remember just how many seals we did get now, but we got over 20,000 anyway, young ones.

The fellows that I bunked with were all from Bonavista; the fellow next door, Wallace Abbott, this was the first spring; there was a fellow, Al Keel; there was Fred Phillips; and there was a fellow by the name of Jimmy Best, well, he was an older man; and Tom Hicks—that was my buddy who filled the barrel with me, that I was telling you about. He’d be on deck. He was a man in his 40s and I’d be only 18. Well, I’d be on the sidestick getting the quinters and he’d be up, when they’d come aboard, to make sure we got them and put them in our barrel. There was Big Jack Abbott, he always went by the name of Big Jack; then there was his son, Hezekiah; Jim Keel, Roy Keel; Uncle Harry Wade; man by the name of Ed Skiffington; Elias Mouland, he was in the Newfoundland disaster, but still he didn’t give it up, he was out in the Ungava the first spring I was out. Yeah, yeah. There was more than that now, but I just can’t remember their names right now. Some of the others I knew included Victor Hicks, who was in the Viking disaster, Baxter Brown, Charlie Norris, and Charlie Downer, an old fellow who people really liked. I think he was from Greenspond.

You were talking about the ice. I’ve seen where the ship couldn’t get through the ice. The captain would put all the men—every man that was aboard—on a line out ahead of the steamer. I can’t remember what kind of line; it must have been a rope, a heavy rope in those days. They’d get out ahead of the steamer and try to help her through the ice. Then they’d put down little kegs of powder on a long pole and a fuse on it. This keg would be around a half-gallon can full of powder, or at least as big as a quart can. They’d find a hole in the ice out there some place and put that down and light the fuse. When it would blast off, it would blow the ice, break the ice up.

I remember the Ungava and the Beothic butting the ice side by side. You could throw a keg of bread aboard either one of the boats. They were so close together that when they’d come astern, sometimes they’d strike. There was a toilet on the underpart of the vessel on the quarter deck. I remember the Beothic backing up when she was going astern and beating the toilet off the Ungava. But the old Ungava and the Beothic couldn’t get through, that’s how heavy the ice was.

But I saw the Imogene come through the same ice and she’d go on—no slack—just a slow motion. The pans of ice turning from her bow and she going on. See, that’s the difference. So that’s an uneasy place to be, too. We were two days butting the ice and with the news that the Imogene was into the main patch of seals.

Some fellows wouldn’t sleep at night—all eager to get there. To give you an idea of the size of this patch of seals that we were in the first spring we were out—I can’t confirm this for sure—but the news we got is there were 11 vessels into the one patch of seals. Now, what I’m going to say now is the truth, there were times when you wouldn’t see even the smoke of another vessel, not even the smoke of your own vessel, because she’d be gone out of sight. That gives you an idea how big the patch of seals was, estimated at well over 200,000. The Imogene took 55,000, and the Ungava and the Beothic took around 25,000 to 30,000 each, and then the other boats, the Neptune, the Terra Nova, the Eagle, and others, I don’t remember the rest of the names. But there were 11 boats into the one patch of seals. That was what was reported at the time. I know for sure, you couldn’t see the smoke of another steamer at times.

Now, they say, there’s no seals. They got a closed season on them. As far as this what they’re talking about the Greenpeace, as far as [being] inhumane to seals, I don’t think—now this is my personal opinion—I don’t think there’s anything better than the gaff that they used when I was at it for killing a seal.

Now, you’d go up to a seal and he’d be looking up at you and give him a smop on the nose and he’s dead—he’s dead. Then you’d strike him on the head again to make sure that he was dead and you’d turn him over and pelt him. He knows nothing about what’s done, the seal. Now, I never saw any cruelty other than what I said. I was killing hundreds. I admit they do look pitiful when you go up and look at it—the little whitecoat looking up at you. What do you think they were put there for? That’s what they were put there for, for man to kill and for the use of man. It’s the same thing as the fishes in the sea. What about all the foxes they shoot for sport and all this sort of thing?

Wallace Abbott, b.1909, Int.1986

I was fishing on the side of Bonavista Cape, right in under the Cape, Cape Cove. Right in under the Iron House [cod trap berth?], that’s where we had our traps for years. Twelve summers I worked there. I fished out in Cape Cove. Rough spot, especially when the winter came.

In the summer, you wouldn’t make all that much money, and if you could get a berth to the ice, it would be very good. I got the berth to the ice in the Sagona through the skipper. The Port Union Trading Company was sending the Sagona to the ice. He gave us the berth; half of Bonavista would go to the ice if they could have got a berth at them times. The skipper that I was fishing with got a berth for me, through the firm, through the merchants.

This was the first berth I got. We went to the ice that spring with Martin George Dalton [1929]; he was a nice gentleman captain, captain of the Sagona. It was a cold spring, but I saw that man frostburn his face in the bridge. But we didn’t do nothing with the seals; we only got 8,000 to 9,000. That’s all we got. The Sagona was a nice little old boat for a passenger boat, but she was no good for the ice.

We struck heavy ice, and we would be using dynamite all the time. Half our crew would be out on the line hauling the Sagona. And those aboard would run back and forth rocking her. Sometimes a scattered man would fall down on the tow line, and people would walk over him. I believe we made somewhere between $35 and $40 that spring.

All right, that was all right. We never enjoyed much that spring. When you don’t get the seals, brother, there’s nothing for you to do. All right, that was in, I forget now [1929].

The next spring [1930] I had to get a berth on my own. A friend and I went over to Port Union and got there 11 o’clock. He had two dogs and I had two dogs and this was the first of March. Port Union is around 11 or 12 miles. We waited on the wharf, and we talked to Jack Scammell. He had a lot to do with the Union Trading Company, you know. He was a fine man, but he liked his drink. Who don’t, eh? We had seen him that day in the evening and we went to his house and asked him if there was any chance of a berth. Well, he says, “No, but when Charlie [Blackwood] comes down, I’ll be there’ and if he’s got a berth, you’ll get it.” That’s what he told me, and he told the other fellow.

All right, the Sagona came and Jack Scammell went aboard at about 12 o’clock [midnight]. And he never come out of the captain’s room before 1:30. And when he came out, buddy, he was just about soused, you know. He drank at that time. Well, it wasn’t every time you would get it [liquor] anyhow. There was no liquor sold around here anywhere, or Port Union either. The steamer came from St. John’s. We stayed on the wharf, afraid we would miss him on the boat. That was about 1:30 in the morning, and she was calling the roll [of the men with berths] the next morning.

He said, “I’ve got one berth boys for two of us, one berth.” And, “All right,” he says to the two of us, “draw for the berth.” And we drawed there and then, and my friend got the berth. “All right,” he says to me. “Wallace,” he says, he knew me, you know. “Wallace,” he says, “you go home and come back tomorrow morning fore she sails,” he says. “Bring your bunk and box. Bring your belongings.”

We left Port Union at 2 o’clock to go back to Bonavista. It was a bad storm, and we got lost on a pond and couldn’t find a way off, and the dogs started fighting. The four dogs, you know, and the mess we was in, my son. Well, I suppose I never swore so much in my life as I swore from the time I left Port Union till I got to Bonavista.

Jim had the berth see, and I with neither one, and I was going on spec now with no berth. The train was leaving Bonavista at 7 o’clock in the morning. So I took my bunk and my box, that’s all you had now, you see, and carried it up to the station. Jumped aboard the train and went on. Bought the ticket to the Cape in Port Union and got aboard. I was signed on before Jim. I had my berth before Jim.

Well, brother, I got so hungry, I never had no money, and I had carried no grub over, and we were there all day, you know. And I was starved to death when she come in Catalina. Now, I was in her the year before and I knew all about her. That was the year I was with Charlie Blackwood, the last year I was with Charlie Blackwood.

I got aboard the boat and went for the galley, grub store, where they kept the grub, the stewards were looking out after that, the food controller and the stewards. All right, when I went in I opened the door—nobody around, not a soul. Cause I knew where to look. I was going in now to get something to eat.

And, brother, look, when I went in there, a can of beef there, a round can of beef, this round, about 3 inches high. It was put there for me, I said, I always said it, and I believed it, it was put there for me. I took six cakes of hard bread, pound of hard bread. The room was full with hard bread, and this one can of beef. Oh, I don’t know if it was fit or not, but I ate it. And, brother, I ate six cakes of hard bread and the can of meat. Now, I was safe for the night. I’d of been starved; I don’t know what I would have done only for that.

Everybody was saying, “Now, she’s not going today, anyhow,” ’cause it was blowing hard, my son. But at 9 o’clock she slipped up, and she was only a small boat. And she was loaded, cause she was loaded with coal. She was a coal burner with 170 men. One hundred and seventy men and a load of coal, and she couldn’t carry enough coal. They had to build pounds on her quarter, right around her quarter, about 3 feet high. That was all coal for later; she couldn’t carry enough coal without putting it on deck, too.

All right, we came down to Bonavista Cape, and the wind was northwest. She was cutting the wind, the land, you know, a bit. All right, brother, when she got down to Bonavista Cape, we were bunking in the hold where the seals would come down. We was the last aboard of her and all the rest of the fellows had the choice berths. We got down in the hold, up in under the deck of her, you know. There must have been 15 or 20 of us there under the coamings [a raised frame around the hatchway to keep out water, often covered with a tarpaulin in heavy seas]. We were down in our berths when she turned Bonavista Cape, and they put down the hatches and tarpaulins and wedged them where the water wouldn’t get down in the hold.

We got in our bunks and that porthole, my son, we could only see the blue water. If she’d gone down, we’d have down with her, because there was no way to get out.

When we came up, there was nothing left on our deck. The galley was gone. Big duffs [made with flour and water] were rolling around; the coal was gone, the sidesticks were gone, and the flooring made out of board was gone. She had a steel deck and they had rough board over the steel to save the steel from the chisels in our boots. We had to go into Newtown to get everything sorted out.

Charlie Blackwood was the captain, and he had four or five brothers with him in her that spring. They were like dogs; they were the real water dogs, too—those Blackwoods. Al Blackwood, the fellow that was [captain of] the Imogene, was his brother, too. The same spring there was Charlie, Pete, and Martin. There was four Blackwood brothers. I forget the other fellow now, the fourth one. All good men, all good men, and Peter, too, all good men they were. Peter was second hand and one fellow was barrelman. They were dogs; they were dogs of men for work, for the ice, fish, and everything.

We managed to get 16,000-17,000 seals, and that was very good. She wasn’t loaded, but we did very good. We made between $60 and $70 [$58.28] in the spring. During that trip, I gave myself a hard beat one evening. Every watch was left there killing seals when we could get seals, but there was no seals to get this time. This day we jumped over to get the flags [of another steamer]. I wasn’t supposed to be over there at all. But I jumped over with the other watch because I was on deck, you know, and you had your knife and sheath and belt on all the time anyhow. You lived with it on, you almost slept with it, your sheath and belt on you, around your waist and when you’re on deck you had your rope on, too, because you didn’t know when you had to jump. Because that was it: when you had to jump, you had to go.

I jumped—I was foolish enough—jumped over, but me buddy, now this fellow I was talking about, Jim, he didn’t go. He didn’t go, but I went, foolish-like. All right, this was about 3 or 4 o’clock in the evening, and we got to the seals. I forget the master watch. I had to follow them, you know. It was just the same as if it was my watch then when I was into it. Now, you wouldn’t have nothing to do aboard, only in your watch, when your watch was on. But when your watch was on, if you were out on the ice, when you came aboard, if your watch was on, you had to go to work, you still had to go to work. Passing coal, there’s always a job with you on that one, the Sagona, passing coal with baskets. Some fellows fill the baskets. Other fellows pass them right, throw it away, making room to stow seals. And there were seals, always something to work.

That was all right. This was before my story now. We took three seals a man, everyone agreed on three seals a man. We laced them up from a flag [belonging to another ship!] to haul to the Sagona, and you know what, buddy? The boat turned stern on to us, and went on. And we were hauling and hauling and hauling. We could see her and thought she’d come back. She never came back, first nor last. And people began to get dirty [angry] about it, you know. People begin to get dirty and went on terrible, my son, some people were. So we all got on a pan and the ice was bad, too, brother, bad enough, people falling in and everything. We all got together, all hands said slip them [seal pelts]. Some fellows slipped them in the water, all hands slipped their seals, three a man that was around, that was a watch then, around 40 or 50 men.

And I was not in that watch at all. I wasn’t supposed to be there. I got roped into it. I done it on my own. And that was all right. We put the ropes on our shoulders, coiled around our shoulders, and give it to her for the ship. And we got aboard that ship, my son, we got aboard that ship in the night about 12 o’clock.

She was taking ice, taking ice to melt, boil down, taking ice. On a growler, laddie, you knows that’s how we got ice for water. Chuck it aboard and melt it into water. Sometimes, the water would be so salty, my son, it’d be like salt water. When I got aboard, I had to go on my watch. Our watch was on. You had to go on when you had your trip. But see, brother, some people had it all right—some people. The way it was with me, I kept me hand up with anyone, that’s the gall I had. There’s no one who didn’t want to do nothing for Wallace, but some people was not like that, was not like that at all.

Oh, it was a hard spring, heavy ice, and I dare say we got a lot of them [seal pelts] from other flags, other boats. Because I know we took them from Blackwood’s brother.

Now, that was all right. We come in Port Union and that’s where we took them out, in Port Union. I never washed, I never washed, I never showered till I came here in the house. I never stripped nothing, never even took off me pants at that time, you couldn’t, brother, you couldn’t at that time.

You wouldn’t get neither bit of good grub you know, not from the galley. You would only get hard bread, thousands of hard bread, if you was any good to eat that. Hard bread and butter—you’d get thousands of that. You’d get your whack, what they calls your whack; allowance, they called it, but whack, we called it, once a week. You’d get a baker’s loaf and some baked on board. You’d get to eat a baker’s loaf, and sometimes you couldn’t get the knife through it. Sometimes when we’d be on watch what we used to do was get the hearts and liver and fry it and the flippers. Fry it in the night on the watch you knows in the galley. Because there’s nobody in the galley in the night, you know. We’d fry a pan of hearts and livers or flippers and that, and so many of us would get together and eat it. Now, that was a funny trip, brother, going to make a dollar. All right that was over.

Now, the next spring, I was going again. But the Sagona never went, that was the last spring she went out of Port Union. I was here the two springs she sailed out of Port Union with two different captains. [I have no record of the Sagona going to the icefields again.]

The next spring [1933], I got to go to the ice I went with another fellow then in backside we’ll call it, backside the other side of this Cape. I asked him if he would be able to get a berth for me. Now, this man that I was with was a real fish dog, you knows, a good fish killer. Always, always did well. “Yes,” he said, “I’ll get a berth for you.” And he got a berth for me on the Ungava. Now, that was a better berth, see buddy, in the Ungava with Peter Carter in St. John’s. I had to go to St. John’s.

When the time came, we went. She was berthed on the Southside of St. John’s and whenever you got in St. John’s, see brother, the first thing you had to do was scrabble for your bunk and box and try to get over to get a good berth for sea, get a good berth for sleeping. That was your scrabble—that was the trouble in St. John’s. And you had to get a berth before they were all took up, because some berths were not as good as others.

The Ungava had 270-275 men—that was the crowd that was in her. And she was 200 or 300 feet long. The Ungava and the Beothic were alike—big boats, big straight boats. In the Sagona, you had to eat on your box in the hold, but on the Ungava you had tables just the same as you had in the lumber woods, in the cookhouse. Tables on each side of her, right up and down the ship.

If you bunked on the port side, well that’s the table you had to eat on her deck, which was all closed in, see. That was the table, that’s where you had to eat on the port side. It was great satisfaction, and we got better grub, too, with that. There were three or four cooks, and we had plenty of salt beef. You could eat all the salt beef you liked, and a man who didn’t eat salt beef, well, there was no place for him to be, to the ice. But that’s all we lived on, hard bread and salt beef and stuff like that.

We went, went out to the ice with Carter. We struck the seals. Brother, I never seen them so thick in me life. Well, she brought in the heaviest load [1933], not the biggest number—that was the Imogene. We had around 45,000 young harps [and the rest were old seals].

Besides killing the white coats, we’d be quintering for seals, and we be getting the hoods. The hoods are not like the harps; the harps are all together. The hoods are all in families—the dog and the bitch and the pup lived together. We’d go for the pup, because they were better than the harp, but you couldn’t make much because they were too scattered.

A fellow from near Catalina and another fellow from Bonavista and me—dead now, the two of them—and I’m the only living one. We got the pup and, when we got the pup brother, the dog came up and he run down and he jumped on the pan; he came mad for us, for the three of us. Anyhow, we tackled him. He was five or six or seven hundredweight. He was as big as a punt almost. I fought and I broke off my gaff, and then I had neither gaff. The other fellows fought him and we got him, killed him, and then we drove the handle of a gaff down his throat. [This was to save the sealers from the possibility that the dog hood was not dead, but only stunned.] There were people to the ice who would run miles from a hood and some people who wouldn’t even shoot them—afraid of them.

That was the last spring I was to the ice. We came into St. John’s in the Ungava. Oh we were over a week in St. John’s taking out the pelts. And we’d go down on Water Street selling flippers, 20 cents a half-dozen. We’d have them in half-dozens with a bit of spun yarn run through them.

I was with people who was to the ice for 50 years, old men, in Bonavista, too. Wore themselves out to the ice. There was a wonderful crowd in Bonavista used to go out to the ice seal fishing. A wonderful crowd.

The late years, or the war times, people didn’t go cause there was a better way to make a dollar. I went in the lumber woods, and sure there was plenty of hard work. Then when Gander started, I went into Gander. Then I came home and I happened to get a job on the highroads, that was about 1940, ’41. I was on the highroads until I retired.

When I went out to the ice, there was no use for nobody to talk to me about nothing. I went for to better meself. I couldn’t better meself on the land at that time, and you went for the dollar. No man went to the ice for the pleasure of it, because there was no pleasure in it. It was only plenty of hard work, plenty of hard work. But no one went there for pleasure now. You went there to make a dollar, and that was a gamble. If you struck the seals, you might make a few dollars, and if you didn’t strike the seals, that was it. We made, I believe it was, around $100 [$80.36?] that trip with Carter, around that, $100.

When you sailed to the ice, you’d be in watches. You’d didn’t know whose watch you were in until you’re way out. On the way out the master watch would come down and take all the names of the watch you were in. The ship had three or four master watches.

The bo’sun would give you the batons and a piece of rope. Now, you had to splice an eye in that—a round eye, not the regular eye, but a round eye in a rope, because they would use that one. If you got into a bad place and wanted to hook a rope with your gaff, the eye was opened. You could hook the rope, even if you was towing seals. And then you have to seize the end of the rope, you’d have to seize the end of it, with sail, all sail winded on so it wouldn’t ravel out or anything. So that’s the way it was.

Everybody, my son look, was one family to the ice, one family. You had your knapsack and everybody had a canvas jacket, a white canvas jacket made. There were no parkas then. A white canvas jacket, and you had skin boots. You would get them made and they were great boots and you’d tie them with a sting around your knee so the slob and the water wouldn’t get in. They were great boots with the pants. I got three or four pairs made when I was going to the ice. The local people made them here. But now those late years they don’t use skin boots anymore. They use the rubber boots and taps them with leather. But they’re not so good as the skin boot. Now, there was a boot.

We’d have sparables and chisels made before we went out. I used to go up the tinsmith’s and get them made. [Sparables were small bits of sharp metal driven into the soles of the boots, and chisels were larger pieces of sharp metal driven into the heels of the boots. This prevented slipping on the ice and some ships like the Sagona covered their steel decks with boards to prevent damage.]

And you get the crop in St. John’s. We got $9 whether we made anything or not, but if you made anything, you had to pay back $12. You could get oilskins and a cape ann [cap] and a pan [and knife, steel] or whatever with the $9.

That was it, boy, a hard racket. It was a hard racket, but still everyone wanted it. Everyone. People didn’t care. The second two years I was out there was a dead man aboard each year. He was on deck till we came in, salted in a big square box on her quarter. Salted right in, full of salt. One from north side of Bonavista Bay over there in St. Brendan’s. And the other fellow was up there around Torbay. They got a cold, got a cold and pneumonia. There was no doctor and there was nothing then that you could do.

Hard place to die, though, I guarantee you, brother. It was a hard place to die. And we had it comfortable compared to some people going to the ice [we could go by train]. But the men on the other side of the bay [Bonavista Bay] had to walk to Gambo to the railway, walk to Gambo, just to get to the railway. They walked from Greenspond, Wesleyville, and all those places. And there were a lot of people from there that went to the ice. A lot. You couldn’t get away from them. No odds what ship you were on, there were always Bonavista Bay people.

They used to walk from here, too, because I did it once when the trains were blocked with snow and we had to walk to Clarenville with our boxes and bags, boxes and bunks. No odds where you went, you had to have your box and bunk, because if you didn’t carry that with you, you had nothing. You had your stuff in the box. You never had much grub, but you’d have a cake or two, baked in iron pots then. You had to keep that for your lunch bag on the ice. You’d have a can and you’d have a stopper in it and you’d have that full of molasses, and you’d have a bag of oatmeal and raisins. When there’d be any snow on the ice, you’d make a hole, put the oatmeal in it, and stir it around, mix it with the snow. The snow would turn to water and that would help the thirst, too.

When I was pelting seals, I used to put a piece of seal’s heart in my mouth and chew it the same as tobaccy. Every day that was the first thing I’d do, get a heart, suck that, and I’d chew it all day. That’d quench the thirst; you wouldn’t get thirsty then.

You couldn’t get much with any nourishment. Only the rough old grub. The hard bread was the most of it you could get. Yes, sir, the most you could get. The most I could get was hard bread. You’d have a cake in your box, too.

You’d have a bottle of rum in your box. That was there, but if anyone knew you had it, my son you was badgered to death, badgered to death, even by the master watch. If they knew you had a bottle of rum and especially a fellow what likes the drop, you were badgered. It was different when the war years was on. Then they had it all the time. They’d pass it around, and some would come from the captain’s cabin. It was typical to get a drink every evening, after you came off the ice, everyone would get a drink.

For breakfast, we got beans, and tea, and bread. Sometimes we got baked bread and we’d get all the hard bread we liked. We’d go up with our boat’s kettles and get breakfast and carry it down and eat it on our boxes.

In the Ungava now it was all on the table—the jugs of tea, big enamel jugs, two-gallon jugs, salt beef and pork and beans. And your bread—you’d get a loaf every week. That was the allowance every week, and a block of butter. We call it a block, a pound of butter.

And there was one fellow there, when he come down with his butter—now the wooden bunks, they were board, all board—and he wouldn’t put the butter in his box at all. “Father always told me,” he said, “hang everything up.” Father always told him, he says, to hang everything up when he was going to the ice. And, anyway, he says in the lumber woods, “Don’t let nothing down on the floor, hang everything up,” and he took the block of butter and a big 4-inch nail and drove the nail right through the block of butter and nailed it to his bunk. And we used to ask him, “What you got your butter there for?” “Oh, Father always told me I had to hang everything up.”

And every man would try to get a barrel and fill it with carcass and flippers whenever you had a chance, especially when we were quintering. You could buy a barrel or sometimes get one from the cook. It was hard work.

And Sunday was like any other day. If she was in the seals, brother it made no difference, you had to cut them. You had to work like it was any other ordinary day. But the good man, he wouldn’t go out; if he was religious, he wouldn’t go. It was his choice. It was his choice. He could go or stay, but someone else was doing his work. I say a man, if he was in his right mind, there was no place for him on the ice. If he was a religious man, there was no place for him, because if he lay up, which he did, someone else was doing his work for him. Someone else was doing it for him. There was no Sunday service in the Sagona. But the Ungava did; they would go up to the tables and have their prayers: RC, United, all the good Christian people. What you’d call Christian people, but they wouldn’t go overboard. But the RC people, they didn’t mind it. They’d come up to church and go to work. But most of our people were reverent on the Sabbath day.

And quintering then—that was shooting them seals. Each gunner had two or three or four dogs that carried the bullets. I was two springs a dog after that with Alec Dyke from here in Bonavista. There was a family of them and they was all gunners, guaranteed whatever they pointed at they killed. That was in their blood. That was in the family of them, and I was to the ice with two brothers of them. The two of them stuttered and how much did they laugh—the best kind of people in the world. Stewart Dyke was older than Alec, and he was an ordinary sealer. But Alec had the gun all the time. He wouldn’t go out if he didn’t have the gun. I got dog with him and a fellow from down Bailey’s Cove, a Keough fellow, and me. Two dogs to the one gunner. He carried only his gun and a few bullets. The dogs carried a full canvas bagful. The dogs had to cut off the top of the tail of the seals that were shot so the captain would know how many were killed that day.

One day, I was on the edge of the pan, and it broke. I went in the water, and it washed the cap off of my head. I would have drowned if the other dog wasn’t there, because the shells were around my shoulder. He hauled me in and I took off every stitch. This was around the last of March. That’s usually the time that quintering starts, after the seals were cut, after they take to the water. I took all my clothes off. The other fellow wrung it all out, wrung out my boots, and I put it all on again. You was into that then till just about dark, till just about dark.

And we went a little ways, not very far, and in goes this fellow. The same thing, right, washed the cap off his head. I hooked him with the gaff and got him on the ice and done the same thing with him. Poor fellow, he’s dead now, too. They’s most all dead. There’s only a few of us left now, only a few of us left now, that’s all. That’s the way it was to the ice, brother.

There was lots of dirt and lots of lice, but I worked with two good captains, Peter Carter and Charlie Blackwood, and if you want to talk to somebody that was in the Viking when she blowed up, go see Israel Ayles. He lives over there by the station, the railway station, up in the harbour there, you know, the little harbour in on the road. [Ayles was not interviewed.]

George Adams, b.1911, Int.1987

[living in St. John’s at the time of the interview]

I was 13 years old when I went to the Labrador coast down in Groswater Bay, down in Indian Harbour, fishing with my father. My brothers and I were used to the water, and I didn’t mind water. I wasn’t a bit nervous or nothing like that. I used to go down in the schooner there in 1924, ’25, and ’26—schooner from Brigus, owned by the Palmer brothers. And then after that I used to go back and forth on the old steamer Kyle. I used to go down in the spring on her and come back in the fall. And we had to go ashore down there; we had a home down there, a bungalow, and our stage—a pretty little harbour. There was a hospital down there, too, run by the mission.

When I went to the ice in 1931, we took the train. Furey’s bus was running then but not in the wintertime. They started in the late 1920s but they only used the bus after the snow was gone and until winter started again. The bus was better. It was a little black one and it was quicker. It was about three hours or three and half hours on the bus, but the train would take five or six hours.

That year, 1931, I was 20 years old, and Captain Billy Bartlett, that’s Bob’s father, had so many berths sent him from Bowring Brothers. I went out and got a berth on the Viking from him. There were six or seven of us from Brigus and Georgetown. In fact three from Georgetown were killed on her: Bartlett and Linthorne, and, I think, a man Kelly. There were 15 or 20 from around Brigus and some from around Poole’s Island, where the captain came from.

The Viking was a wooden ship, and she had a high barrackhead on her. She used to steer by two big wheels back aft: two guys on the front wheel, and two on the back. Young Abram Kean was captain [a nephew of old Capt. Abe]. He was a very mild-mannered man; you’d never hear him cursing or swearing. He’d yell out to you and tell you to do this or that, but that’s all.

That was a hard spring. About 12 or 14 miles off Poole’s Island, it got pretty rough. The Viking had a big pound of coal on deck, and we had to shovel it all overboard to try and lighten her. She used to pump her own water, but with the shaking in the heavy sea the pumps got clogged with coal dust. She was taking on water, and the water was nearly up to the plates down in the stoke hole. If it came up to the fire, it would put the fire out. So around 11 o’clock in the night the master watch came and said, “Boys, come on deck and try to get the water out of her, or this is going to be another Southern Cross.” The engineers rigged up pumps on deck with two handles, and two men got on one side and two men on the other.

It was so rough we couldn’t get down to the pumps because they had a rope tied where we came out of the forecastle right back to the bridge. When the sea would pass over, we’d run and grab the line and get up on the bridge. Underneath the bridge they put ropes on the pumps and we used to haul and slack off and the other fellows would haul. All night we were at that, trying to get the water out of her. We were like that all night. We used to take turns and around 4 o’clock in the morning I went aft and asked the boys at the wheel if they wanted relief. They were there nearly all night. Dicky Walker, a good sailor he was, from Brigus, he was there. And young Bartlett from Georgetown.

We were there about an hour and a half and the captain sang out to us, “Boys, we’re going to run her. Watch yourself when she comes around.” And we put her hard over and came around; and she came around and never took a sup of water. Now, the snow stopped, and the wind started to abate a bit, and in an hour or an hour and a half it was as calm as it is here.

So we had to go in to Poole’s Island and get some cooking gear, pots and pans, because everything we had in the two galleys was washed overboard. They lowered a boat and three or four hands went ashore and brought back whatever they wanted for cooking.

Then we left, and the next thing we got jammed up in White Bay. We were stuck in the ice in the mouth of White Bay, around Cape St. John. There were no seals in White Bay, and we wanted to go up farther north because the Imogene and the Ungava and the Beothic were up around the Straits of Belle Isle.

Now we were stuck, and a bunch of us, perhaps 30 or 40 or 50, went aft and went down to the cabin where the magazine was at and started putting powder in tins. They were about 5 or 6 inches by 3 inches in diameter, and they were made out of tin. We used to put them on poles and shove them down in the ice and light the fuses. After we used about 100 tins, we got our boat loose.

We broke loose, and the captain decided to steam north. When we got to the edge of the ice, there was a heavy swell in the ice because of the storm. We had struck a storm before that, and there was still a heavy swell on in the ice. There were 30- or 40-foot swells, and she was going mad; we were rolling and the ice was coming in on our deck. It was too risky out there right at the edge of the ice, so we decided to spend the night in the ice. So we turned around and steamed back and burned down in the ice.

Sunday was a nice day and a nice night—a beautiful night. The weather was good, but the sea was pretty rough. Varick Frissell and the other two Americans were taking pictures running over the ice that day because they were going to make a movie. I think they were going to call it White Thunder. But when the ship blew up, Frissell was killed, and they lost all their equipment and everything.

Anyway, I was lying back in my berth getting a smoke for myself, about 8:45 on Sunday night. Some of the boys were on deck; some of them were around talking when she blew. And once she blew, everything in the ship went dark, because we lost our lights. They had the power magazine in the cabin down aft, and that’s where she exploded. We slept in the front, in the forecastle, and that’s what saved us.

We had just left St. John’s, and she was blocked with coal, so when she blew, she blew back; the coal stopped her from blowing ahead. Only for that, she’d have killed us all. But she blew back and took the bridge and all with her. The bridge went, and Captain Kean was picked up 30 or 40 feet from the ship. She blew out everything, right down to the water’s edge. Cleaned her right down to the water’s edge, and she never touched us at all.

I got out of bed in the dark and looked for my clothes. Now, I couldn’t see nothing; it was some dark, and I couldn’t find my clothes. But I did find a suit of rubber clothes I had hung up at the end of my berth. I got that and I tried to find a cap and a pair of mitts, but I couldn’t find a thing. I just had a pair of pants, no overalls, and nothing warm to put on. I got my boots; I knew where they were, underneath the berth, and I found them and got them and got up on deck.

It was light on deck because of the fire, so I put on my boots and hauled on my rubber clothes. I had neither cap, neither pair of mitts, but as it happened, it was a warm night—only about 30 degrees Fahrenheit.

We got over to the dories—we had four or five dories—and we got them overboard, and we got on the ice. We saw the captain on the ice, trying to crawl, and we picked him up. He was shook up a good bit from the fall and in pretty hard shape. We picked up one fireman, who got out through a porthole, but the rest of the firemen and engineers were all killed. We didn’t see Frissell; you couldn’t see anything. The only thing you could see was the flame from the fire on the ship. You couldn’t see anyone who was blowed clear of the ship.

It was about 10 o’clock in the night, and we didn’t know where we were. But Captain Kean knew right where to go to get to the Horse Islands. He said, “I’ll tell you where to go. I can’t walk, but I’ll tell you where to go.” So we got four or five dories. We got the captain aboard one, the firemen aboard another, and so many men at each dory pulling it over the ice.

We left the ship about 10 o’clock in the night. We travelled all night and at daylight we could see the island. We didn’t know where we were going, but the captain knew. We had to leave two or three dories because the bottoms went out of them. We were on solid ice then, so we didn’t mind. We travelled all night, and about 4 o’clock in the afternoon we got to the island. It was only a small place—must be seven or eight houses—and the families there knew about the Viking. They were in their little church on Sunday night and [had] heard the explosion. When they were coming from church, they saw the flames.

Just before we got to the Horse Islands, we could see the people down to the beach. We had the captain and fireman in one dory, and the landsmen came out in a punt and they took over. There was a heavy swell in the ice, so they threw out ropes to us. We ran over the ice, holding on to the ropes, and got ashore. We had a job getting ashore. Then we went to the houses there.

In one house there were five of us, and we had a stowaway from the Viking; his name was Michael Gardiner. He used to stay with us on the Viking, stay where we were sleeping, and we’d feed him. In fact there were two stowaways on the boat—another young fellow, Cronin. But he used to stay with the firemen, down in their quarters, right where the explosion was, and he got killed, the poor little fellow; he was a nice little fellow.

There was a wireless operator, a fellow named Bartlett, on the Horse Islands, and he got in touch with the rest of the ships and told them there was an explosion out there, but he didn’t know what happened until we got in on Monday afternoon. When we got in on the island, he interviewed us all—got our names who was safe, who was gone. We lost 24 men.

The other ships came. We left the island on Friday and walked out to the Imogene and got our lunch aboard her. She had on board our navigator and our wireless operator. They transferred them to the Sagona, which had come from St. John’s, and we walked over the Sagona, too. We got on the Sagona, and we stayed on her Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.

Then the Prospero came with provisions, because the Sagona didn’t have much food. The Prospero had to bring food for the people on the island, because we eat all they had. We eat everything; we had them cleaned. We got aboard the Prospero and came to St. John’s. The Sagona got in a few hours after us. We got in here and they brought most of us up to the Falkner House. I was there in that hotel two days.

Squires was prime minister. He came to see us, shook hands with us, and gave us $50 each. We were lucky to get that, but, still, we lost all our belongings, our clothes, and everything we had. We had nothing left. But we were lucky, not like other poor buggers who were lost.

That was my first trip. I didn’t go back to the ice until 1937. I was only out twice. The second time I went out was in 1937 on the Ranger. It was only a month from the day I left here till I got back. We got in quick and we got in first. We all got a pipe and some tobacco for being the first arrivals. And we had a lot of flippers, and no trouble to sell them. We were the first in and parked over there on the Southside, and Bowring’s sold all our flippers and carcasses. We were fortunate.

A couple got nothing, including the Neptune and the Ungava. When I came home that spring, I went with the Buchans Mining Company. I came back to Brigus in 1943 and went to work with the railway, and in August 1976 I was pensioned off.

Lester Andrews, b.1921, Int.1986

The first trip, I went to the seal fishery with Captain Charles Blackwood in 1938 in the Sagona. We had about 150 men [152] and we left Wesleyville on the first of March and walked to Gambo, 60 miles. We joined the train, and we spent 18 hours getting to St. John’s. The old train got off the track on the way in, and by the time we got on board the ship in St. John’s, the cooks had our meal provided, but all the duffs had gone as hard as rocks. We left St. John’s for the Gulf on the 3rd or 4th of March and began killing seals on the 13th. We were the first ship in from the seal fishery that spring, and we shipped our seals at Port Union. We shared $81 [$85.73] a man for our spring’s work.

The old custom then was that the Imperial Tobacco Company used to give you a pipe and two plugs of Beaver [tobacco]. Now, being around 17 years old, I didn’t enjoy Beaver or the pipe very much. I didn’t smoke at that particular time. I gave the pipe to my old friend I went to the ice with.

Now, we had to call at St. John’s for coal, but that didn’t count. We had to get in to Catalina before anyone got in to St. John’s in order to get the pipe and tobacco, because that was the place we were shipping our fat. So we, we were fairly lucky.

The pelts were taken out in Catalina and skinned; the FPU [Fishermen’s Protective Union] had a sealing plant there. By the way, the Sagona was chartered by a company called Ullman Company [E.S. Ullman Syndicate, New York].

Well, the Sagona was a steel boat [420 tons] that was used by the railway at that time as a passenger boat. She was a nice little boat in the ice. When she got ballast down good, she could handle the ice very good. But when she had no weight aboard her, she was useless; she was what we call a “cranky” boat. She was easy to tip back and forth until she got balanced, but that made her all the better for getting through the ice.

I thought it was a great job first when I went to the seal fishery. I was only young, and you’d be surprised how far that $80 could go. You’d get a nice suit of clothes for $10 then. I got one of those nice blue tams for 50 cents, and a blue raglan for $14.

The eating conditions were not good. You had to get a lunch up on deck in a big pan and then you’d go down in the hold. They had bunks built up, down in the hold, on top of the seals; it was what they called between decks. The coal would be under the lower decks and the crew would sleep on the lower deck.

On the Sagona it was a little better than most because you had some room, owing to her being a passenger boat. The crew was stowed away in the room. Myself and about 10 of us slept in the “post office,” two or three fellows in each bunk. Looking back at it now, it was terrible. But the Sagona was good.

The next spring [1939] I went out in the Terra Nova, and that was something else. It was an old wooden boat. They were steamers and every day you’d be shovelling coal until you got an officer’s job, and then you could tell the other fellows to shovel coal. In 1939, we went to the Gulf again, with Captain Stanley Barbour, and that was the same spring the Ranger went there and got stalled, full of water, and they had to get her towed down [to St. John’s].

We had a real bad spring. We got up there and got jammed all the spring—didn’t get any seals. When the ice loosened up to get around, all the whitecoats were gone. We landed back again around the latter part of April with $5 [$4.49] a man.

And the next spring I was with Captain Stanley Barbour again, but we were in Beothic. She was a steel boat, and we had 200 [225] men. She was a big-sized boat [1,077 tons]. That was a tough old spring, too. We got around 40,000 or the weight of 40,000 with the old and the young [33,001].

A lot of boats went to the seal fishery. There was the Ungava and Imogene, them big old boats. But we got as many seals as the other fellow that spring. The officers slept in the cabin, but all the workmen slept in the hold down with the seals and the coal. At that time we didn’t know no difference, but it was a dog’s life. I’ve got a dog now that belongs to my grandson, and I wouldn’t let it go in the berth that I slept in for all the world.

I’ll never forget the first day we were “burnt down” with seals in the Sagona and we had a crowd of young fellows who had never been to the seal fishery before. And the captain said to one of the older fellows now, “You better take out those young fellows and give them the idea of pelting the seal.” I went out with an old uncle, Piercy Winsor, and he got me out and started, showing me how to pelt the seal. I thought it was awful bad when the blood came. When you pelt the seal, you stick the knife in and the blood will come out.

That looked pretty tough. But it didn’t take me very long after to get the idea of it. I’d been there a couple of days before you had it. Now, some people could pelt more, sculp, some people says sculp, others say pelt; some people could sculp a seal a lot quicker than others. Maybe where I could pelt 10, another fellow could pelt 15, or where I pelt 15, another fellow would only pelt 5. But that was only just like everything.

I took a couple of days to get it all sized up. But we were running and jumping and going. We were hardened into it because we young fellows home would be hauling firewood with dogs, we had to go 7 to 8 miles to get a load of firewood [at home]; we were all muscled up, there was no mistake about that, we were really in shape.

But boy, it was a tough, tough old life, although everybody used to try and get there, because some years you’d make some money—not very much—you went out and make $40 or $50. It was a good help. It wasn’t no money, but it was good in that time. But it was a struggle.

Nineteen forty-one was the last spring I went out for a while; and the war on then so we didn’t go to the seal fishery at all. I didn’t, because we were in the coasting trade and time wouldn’t allow you to do it.

Until one spring Captain Stanley Barbour called me and said he wanted me to go to the seal fishery with him again. Boy, I can’t remember that year now, but it was after the war. I think probably in the late ’40s or early ’50s. I went up there with him in the Lady Cecil. Well now, that was the beginning of improvement in the living conditions of the seal fishery. All the crew members had a good place to stay then, and you had your individual berths away from the seals.

Then the next spring I went with Captain Stanley again in the North Voyager—that was an old passenger boat from the North Shore, Quebec. She was something like the Kyle and she had good living conditions as well. She was one of those diesel boats, diesel engines—now that was a lovely boat, and we didn’t shovel any coal.

The captains were all good men, but I’m going to speak my mind, and Captain Sidney Hill was my favourite. He had great ideas, and he was a man who could almost read your mind. And he was a great old fellow for getting seals aboard. Some of the skippers would kill the seals, but Captain Sid was more interested in getting aboard what you had killed. He often said to me, “Now,” he said, he never called me my name while I worked with him two springs; he always called me by my father’s name—Harry. He’d always say, “Harry, boy, two seals aboard is better than a dozen on the ice. You’re sure of those.” He was my favourite captain.

The latter years I used to go with Trinity Bay fellows. They were all big men. By God, I was too afraid to say anything to them. One of the first years I was with Captain Stanley Barbour up in the Gulf, I was only about 18. I didn’t know a man aboard of her, only the captain. I knew Captain Stanley because he came from down around Newtown and was connected with the Barbour’s.

The rest of me buddies was all old big men, boy—Trinity Bay people, big men at that time. They’d wear those big moustaches all coiled up. I got used to them after the first of it. Old fellows like Bill Spurrell and Jack Hayter—all those fellows from Trinity Bay were good men. I remember out with Allan Miller and Sandy Randall—that was the two fellows stands out in my mind above all men that I knocked around with. Those two men stand out in my memory. They were about 6 foot 6 [inches] I suppose. Boy, they may not be 6 foot 6 inches but they were really tall men, and they were big men. Oh, I guess Uncle Sandy and Uncle Allan Miller were 260-270 pounds. Sometimes we’d have to tow seals to the ship because she’d be jammed. You’d go up and get up to the pan and take the seals, and Uncle Sandy and Uncle Allan would be the two leading men. I used to say “My God, sure they’ll be aboard before we get halfways.” But them two men knew exactly the step to take, that another fellow would keep up with them. Although they were big and strong, they would never take any more seals than I would take because they did not want the other men to try and take as many as they could take.

We would have men from all parts, almost every bay. We’d have fellows from St. John’s, Conception Bay, Trinity Bay, and Bonavista Bay. Captain Stan had a lot of men from Trinity Bay. Captain Les Winsor and Captain Sid would have men from here [Bonavista North] and the Twillingate area. I don’t know of anybody from further north than Twillingate. We’d have a lot of people from St. John’s or the St. John’s area, Conception Bay and St. Phillips. There were not too many from the real St. John’s.

The best ship of all was the Imogene. She was never jammed; she had good power, but a fellow had to know how to use her. Captain Al Blackwood had her for years and years. He had her when she came out new, and he never had her jammed. She was always going, and unless the ice was loose, she’d never burn down. The Imogene was everybody’s favourite; everybody tried to get a berth in the Imogene. You’d never get a berth there; someone had to die to get a berth there.

The whitecoats usually take to the water around the 21st or 22nd, 23rd of March. But if a big rain came before these dates, it would hurry them into the water. Rain would make them used to the water. They won’t go in the water before they got to, those whitecoats.

The coal pounds were all washed down. Then we had those longers, sticks of wood, 2 to 3 inches thick, and we’d lay them down on the bottom of the pounds and that would give the water a place to run.

Every Sunday evening when it would get dark—7 or 8 o’clock then, in the night—some old fellow would hold a church service. We’d have some Roman Catholic people having the rosary on the other side, or they’d have theirs first and we’d have ours afterwards. There was an old fellow from Trinity Bay that we used to call “the minister.”

But some fellows didn’t want to go on the ice Sundays. One spring I was master watch and I had eight men in my watch who were professing men and didn’t like to work on Sundays. So this morning, Captain Sid says, “Andrews, where’s your men to?” I said, “Boy, I got all good religious men, don’t work Sunday.” So, the captain says, “all you can do about it, suppose boy, all you can do about it.” Captain Sid had a quick way of talking.

I was on the ice all day until we came aboard. By and by dark came. Now, after dark, in the nighttime, you stowed down those seals that you put aboard in the day. You stowed them down away in the night. So we went to supper and my watch came on 12 o’clock in the nighttime, and we had to go start stowing seals.

The eight men walked up to me and said, “Now, Les, tell the boys to all go and lie down, and we’ll stow away the seals. We didn’t work today boy; we don’t like working on Sundays but we’ll do the work from now.” I said, “Good enough, boy.” So the eight men went and they stowed more seals than all the watches aboard. I was telling Captain Sid about it the next day and he said, “All good men, boy,” he said. “Poor buggers,” he said, “they couldn’t work, didn’t feel like working Sundays. What can you do about it—can’t force a man to do something he doesn’t want to do.” But they were good workers; they were good men.

The only bad experience I had at the seal fishery was the year that two men died. It was some kind of bowel disease, and the crew got upset and wanted to go in; they went on strike, so the old skipper abandoned the voyage because a couple of other men got pretty sick as well.

I served as a master watch a couple of springs. That paid a little better. A bridgemaster got a little bonus, the second master watch a little bigger bonus, and the master watches split a share. Sometimes the second master watch worked as a scunner, but it really depended on the skipper. Captain Sid Hill’s master watches could look after the men, stowing the seals, hoisting the coal, and moving ballast. But Captain Stanley Barbour’s master watches did the scunning, and the second master watch looked after the men [the second master watch was often referred to as the deck router].

My father spent a lifetime sealing. He never gave it up until he was too old to go. My uncle did not go sealing. He would always build a boat in the spring and make $60 or $70. I liked sealing, and I went as often as I could. I’ll never forget the first [kitchen] range that I had—it was what we called a range—we used to have the old-fashioned stove. I bought the range from the seal fishery and I bought it with flippers. It was not taken out of my share but out of the flippers that I brought in. I’ll never forget. I paid $150 for it. Boy, that was a big deal when I came home with that range.

The seal fishery is gone. It doesn’t mean too much to me personally now, but there was a lot of people, boy, lost a lot of money by the seal fishery being downgraded by the Greenpeace organization. Because actually that’s what killed the seal fishery. The Greenpeace came here and they spoiled the markets. So there was a lot of poor devils with those longliners that used to make two-thirds of their living or probably more. I think that was bad, and there was no shortage of seals. I knew that the last spring I was to the seal fishery, because we covered patches of seals, my God they were uncountable.

Wilfred Andrews, b.1903, Int.1986

George Tuff had so many berths to give out, and we had to haul two loads of wood for our berths, and this was my first time to the icefields. The first thing we had to do was to make sleighs, small sleighs for our packs. Then we had to walk 60 miles to Gambo, where we got on the train. When we got into St. John’s, we went down on Bowring’s wharf. Wesley [Westbury] Kean was our captain, captain of the Terra Nova.

Kean was a good man, perfect man, couldn’t get no better. He was good to his crowd and we could get along pretty good with him. I was out with Captain Kean for four springs. But now Captain Stan Barbour was the best captain that I sailed with. I was out with Captain Bill Winsor, too, and he would swear on the crowd over nothing, he didn’t care what he said. I was out with Captain Sid Hill, and we were jammed for 16 days and he was a good captain. I was also out on the Ranger, the Ungava, the Sylvia, the Eagle, the Viking, and the Neptune.

I was on the Ungava with Captain Billy Winsor when the Viking exploded in 1931. When she exploded, we were up on the Straits, and we left and came down. The Imogene was the first steamer that got to the shipwreck. Captain Abe Kean, young Abe, was captain of the Viking when she exploded. They were carrying a lot of gunpowder, and when she exploded, she blew half her stern off.

I was out on the Sylvia with Captain Wesley Kean in 1938. She was big ship; she had five decks. We slept down on the third deck. She could carry a lot. She was 1,913 tons. She belonged to Furness-Withy and was used on the Gulf for passengers. Her captain was Ern Kean when she worked on the Gulf.

Now, the worst ship was the old Viking. The hatches were above us where we slept between decks. And when we were lying in our bunks the seal pelts used to fall on our bunks sometimes. And the old Ranger was pretty bad. She was worn out when we went on her. The Terra Nova was good and the Ungava.

The Ungava had a separate place for eating. You didn’t have to sit on your bunk and eat, like pigs, or no better than pigs. We all looked very dirty when we would come in to St. John’s. We used to go to this street and get our wash before we could go to the barber shop to get a shave. We used to sell flippers, and I bought a brown serge suit of clothes and a pair of glasses.

When I came aboard, the first thing some men asked me was, did I want to buy some flippers—they didn’t know me with my glasses and new suit. It was great sport. I loved it. I loved when the time came to go out. And we came home more times on a free pass than with money.

I was on the Ungava in 1930 when they made the movie [Varick Frissell]. Sometimes they would get us to put our rubber clothes on and get us to jump in the water so they could take pictures. Then they would throw artificial snow. They had big propellers around, and it would look like a big storm. We would run through this snow, and we would haul pelts along the deck and on the ice in this snow while they were making pictures. Captain Bob Bartlett was aboard and he was all dressed up and all powdered up and he used to roar and shout.

When we were jammed in the ice, there wasn’t much to do. Some fellows would make molasses beer—they would get yeast and molasses from the cooks—and we would fry up flippers or bake them in the oven and drink beer at night. And the cooks used to help drink the beer, too.

Another time we were short of tobacco; we were out a long time. One fellow from here, from Musgrave, bet me a stick of tobacco that I couldn’t lift a barrel of flour, and I lifted it and put it on top of another barrel.

Some Sundays were rough if there were seals around because some fellows wouldn’t go on the ice to kill seals on a Sunday and other fellows would.

I fell in the water once. I was quintering for seals, a couple of us were, and I slipped and fell in. One fellow from Twillingate saw me and thought I was an old seal, and he was going to bat me. After I shouted, he got out on the pan, got me, and hauled me in. I must of been in the water about a half hour. I was shrivelled right up. They had to hoist me aboard. Captain Wes went and got a mug of rum and gave me.

One old man I knew was Tom Carroll, a bo’sun. He must of been 80 years old then. He gave you your rope and gaff handle. But then you had to splice the rope and lash the iron gaff to the gaff handle.

Captain Wesley was a great captain, but he always felt blame for the Newfoundland disaster. But the disaster wasn’t Wesley’s fault: that was the old man’s fault, old Abram. That disaster made Wesley very careful. He’d always say, “Boys, if you see anything of a storm working up, come aboard.” He always seemed to dread sending his crew on the ice.

It was a hard life, but we all wanted something to do in the spring.

Fred Badcock, b.1916, Int.1987

My first trip to the ice was on the Imogene. We were on the Labrador coast collecting salmon for Monroe’s business, and Monroe’s got me the berth that year. I could’ve gone with my uncle, Richard Badcock, on the Ranger before that but my father and two brothers were on the Ranger. So as a rule you wouldn’t want too many of one family on one boat in case anything happened. And also I had to stay home because we had cattle to look after and there was always work to do at home.

In fact, I had to cancel my berth one year because my mother heard that the Ranger was in trouble in St. Mary’s Bay and nobody knew if she was going to make it. We knew about the Ranger’s trouble because the ships that go in the Gulf always sail from St. John’s a few days earlier than those going to the Front. So we knew before the fleet for the Front left that the Ranger was in trouble. In fact, the Imogene had to tow the Ranger to [St. John’s] harbour.

It was hard work, but everyone was used to work then. We didn’t notice that the work was hard. Also, the men from Conception Bay and the northern men all got along. In fact, Stan Barbour’s head gunner, Ikie Parsons, was from here, and I was one of his dogs. We had to paunch the seal and cut off the tip of the tail. The sculpers coming behind would sculp and haul the pelts to a pan.

We dogs would have 10 boxes of shells, 500 shells each, in a satchel. You’d carry the shells on your back if the ice was hard and safe, or you’d carry them in your hands if the ice looked dangerous. Ikie Parsons’s family were always using guns. They went birding along the beach, and when they were fishing on the Labrador in the summertime, they were always after geese and other birds and seals for their dinner. On the ice the gunners used a 44-40. It was a heavy rifle, but the shell was only about an inch and a half long.

We had lots of food and in the night sometimes we would fry up liver and hearts. And just about everybody would get a barrel of seal. The year that I was in the Beothic, my brother was in the Ungava, and Father and Will were in the Terra Nova up in the Gulf. We had four barrels of seal at the house at the one time. There were people here who had just as much as we had because we gave it all away, just about.

My Uncle Richard was second hand to Captain John Parsons from here. After that he got his own ship. He was in the Viking, the Ranger, and the last year he was in the Terra Nova.

Sometimes was worked side by side with the Norwegians. They used smaller and a different type boat, and although I was never aboard their boats, they seemed to be cleaner than us fellows. There were lice aboard our boats. One fellow, Coady, was so lousy we stripped him off, took his clothes, and hove it overboard, and then we took him and coated him over with kerosene. Me and the fellow I slept with used to take kerosene and sprinkle it around the bunk and around our boxes.

One fellow, Roland Batten from Bareneed, had the mumps in the Imogene one spring. He was laid up for a week or two. The doctor on board looked after him. He wasn’t a real doctor; he was a druggist or something.

No matter what the condition, we got through.

Harold Badcock, b.1914, Int.1987

In order to get my first berth, I went down to Bay Roberts and went to see my uncle, Esau Badcock. He lived next door to the captain, and I went over and asked the captain for a berth. He told me to go home and cut up wood for my mother, and my uncle got the berth for me.

We went out in the Ranger and went to Port aux Basques, where we got clearance for the Gulf. When we got nearly to the Magdalen Islands, we got stuck in the ice. We were jammed 17 days. We used to leave the ship at daylight to go looking for seals, and we would get back at dinnertime [lunchtime] with a tow of seals. Then we’d go back again for another tow, and get back about dark. We killed and towed 7,000 pelts to the ship. We managed to blast our way out of the ice. Captain Badcock was in charge.

One time when I was on the Ranger, she went adrift off Placentia Bay and we drove out to sea [1939]. The Newfoundland came up and took off some of the men and the crowd of us who were left kept the pumps going. The Newfoundland was going to come back again, but she wasn’t able to make it. A crowd of men went in the galley and gave up, and that’s where they stayed. The ship rolled back and forth.

Uncle Bob Dale from Bay Roberts was the man who kept us going. He had more experience than us young fellows. We never saw the master watches, the second hand, or the bo’sun. I don’t know whether they gave up or whether they were seasick. I know we didn’t see them.

One of the boys went down and asked the skipper for something to eat, and he gave us a part of a cheese and a big pan of square biscuits, but nothing to drink. But now, Skipper Badcock was in the bridge nearly all the time. The Ranger used to roll down 45 degrees, and you’d say for sure she was never coming back.

The Newfoundland got a line on us but the line burst. All our boats and dories were swept overboard. And we managed to get into St. Mary’s Bay. The Imogene took us in tow and hauled us into Trepassey. Then the cooks came out when we were safe and cooked a big boiler of soup.

If she had gone down, every man would have gone with her. The boats were beaten up and the life jackets were no good. They were old and soggy, and when we threw them over, they all sank. We came back to St. John’s. Captain Badcock was old, almost as old as the Ranger, so he gave it up and another crew went out, but I wasn’t aboard.

Another year, the boats that went in the Gulf found no seals, and we all came up the west coast and there was no seals; and we came up through the Straits and still no seals. We got nothing that year, but some people said that there were seals in the Gulf but they were inside the Magdalen Islands.

One year [1933], we struck old seals not far from the Narrows. They got stranded on the ice when the wind changed. But the skins were no good because there were so many holes in them. When we got to St. John’s, they saved the fat which wasn’t that valuable, because the seals were old, but they threw the skins out over the wharf.

One year, a man went right off his head. We got him down and the doctor gave him some pills. That got him quiet, and they got a straightjacket on him. George Porter from Port de Grave and Gordon Dawe from Clarke’s Beach looked after him. He was really sick. When we came in, they took him to the asylum up by Bowring Park.

It was a hard life. You’d get your rations when you went aboard. You’d get a mug and a half of white sugar, a pound and a half of butter, and a bun of bread. That was besides your meals. You’ll get this every week then. Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays were duff days. They used to take the beef out of the barrel and put it in the boiler; it was as salty as the Bay of Biscay.

We were supposed to have fresh beef on Sundays, but we’d only have that for a few Sundays and it would be gone. Sunday evenings we’d probably have rice and prunes, or different kinds of jam. In the mornings, we would have beans one day and lopscouse the next. That had some meat, potato, turnip, and carrot and flour doughboys.

Dinnertime on Wednesdays we had fish and pork fat and onions and thickening. Now, that was for the crew. The master watches and the scunners had separate cooks, and they’d have fresh meat every Thursdays and Fridays—they’d have something different. They ate back aft. The quarters of beef were hung up in the rigging and sometimes we would climb up and cut off a piece.

If we got a lot of seals, we had to take the coal out of the pounds below deck, pass it up, and throw it overboard to make room. There were probably five pounds on either side, and three or four or five up the middle of the hold. They used the pounds to separate the seal pelts. If the pelts were put down in one bulk, they could move to one side and tip the ship over.

For every tier of fat there was a tier of ice, but the ice wouldn’t last. And if the ship was out too long, the fat would start to render out and run down in the bilge water. That’s why we couldn’t stay out too long.

In St. John’s we would sell our flippers and any carcass we had, and we would go in the London Café on Water Street. It was a Chinese restaurant. We could go in there and get fish and chips, a piece of pie, and a coffee for 25 cents. And when we’d go in there, everybody there would leave because of the smell. Now, you’d have a half-decent pair of overalls on, but the seal smell was still on you.

Now, sometimes it would take two or three or four days to unload the seal pelts. A lot depended on whether there was another ship before you. And every night you would sell your flippers, and blow the money. A bottle of Screech was $1.50 and a flask was 75 cents. I’d always have a barrel of seal to take home; one year I had two barrels—a barrel of carcass and a barrel of flippers.

There were food controllers on board. Some of them were no good. They didn’t stick to the rules. They were with the merchants. But Phillip Snow, from Bay Roberts, was a good Food Controller. He made sure the crew got what was written on the paper. If there was fresh meat due to them, and there was no fresh meat, they would get flippers. And if there was rice one evening and prunes another and jam another, you’d always get it. The only year we had a good Food Controller was the year Phillip Snow was with us. He was a good man, and he made the trip much more pleasant.

Robert Badcock, b.1910, Int.1987

I got my first berth in 1930 because Jack Littlejohn encouraged me, and we went over to see Captain John Parsons. He was captain of the Terra Nova that year. Captain Parsons asked me how old I was, and I told him 19. And then he asked me if I was ever fishing before, and I told him I was codfishing and salmon fishing and stuff like that.

Then he asked me who my father was, and I told him, and he said, “That’s enough, you come the 26th or 27th of February, and I’ll give you your tickets to go.” We were supposed to go to St. John’s by train, but there was an awful lot of snow and the train couldn’t get through, so the Terra Nova came into Coley’s Point, where I lived at the time. (Three or four years before that the men from here had to walk over to Bell Island on the ice and then walk along Bell Island and went on the ice again and went to Portugal Cove and then St. John’s.)

We got our crop from Captain John’s store. It was just up there [pointing in the direction]. Captain John’s store was up there, and he lived right across the street from it. It’s a tavern now [1987], and his house was the next house above the library right on the corner [pointing again].

It was a pretty miserable trip. We had a bunk down in the dungeon—that was underneath the forecastle. And that’s where they kept the beef and pork barrels. You’d have to take away the ladder and take the cat-hook down. The cat-hook was used to hoist up the barrels. There were about 32 men sleeping down there—three or four hands in a bunk.

I was in a bunk with Jim Gosse from Tilton and Ed Gosse. We got a barrel of seal cocks between us, a full barrel. They were all between 8 and 10 inches long. You’d sculp the seal, and if there were large male seals, you’d cut the cock out and stick a hole through the slack skin and put it on your belt. Sometimes the belt was full of cocks. But you only got them when you found old seals. The young were no good for that.

Most of the older seals were shot by the gunners, and then the gunners’ dogs who carried the cartridges paunched the seals. When the sculpers came up, they’d go for the old ones because they were after the cocks, although the fat of the old ones was not worth as much as the fat of the young ones. The cocks were your own, and the flippers you brought aboard for your barrel. But you had to keep an eye on the cocks, because others might try and swipe them. We had a government food controller. He got his share of fat, but he would take any cocks or flippers he could find. The most we ever got was 28 dozen in our barrel, and that was the year we sold them for 75 cents a dozen.

And sometimes we would take a bottle to collect the galls of the liver, and the Chinese would also buy these. They would pay $35 for a rum bottle full of gall, but you wouldn’t take a rum bottle on the ice—you might take a little liniment bottle or a Redways bottle. A lot of people took bottles of Redways [a popular medicinal drink] to the ice because you could drink that mixed with water to go with your hard bread. The best year for cocks was 1933 on the Ungava.

And the Chinamen were waiting for us, and we got 75 cents a dozen. We took the head out of the barrel and we showed them the cocks, all iced in. At first they offered us 50 cents a dozen, but we held out for 75 cents. But we had to bring them over to the Newfoundland Laundry behind Springdale Street. They washed them, cleaned them, and skivered them up from a needle and twine, and hung them over the stove, and let them dry. They would buy whatever you had. But the Chinamen counted them out themselves.

One year, I was a dog for Gordon Tucker, a gunner, and we went after the hoods, but we couldn’t kill them with the guns. So Uncle Ned Badcock from Shearstown said, “If I had someone I could depend on, I’d go bat them.” You see, the old hood could blow his cap up and bullets would bounce off the cap, which would protect his eyes. Uncle Ned told me to come with him and told me to hit the hood’s hind daddles [the hind flippers]. So I did, and when the old hood swung around, Uncle Ned hit him on the throat under the jaw. When you killed an old dog hood, you had to shove the gaff handle down this throat as far as you could in case he wasn’t completely dead. If he wasn’t completely dead, he could raise his head and even break the gaff off, but he couldn’t bite you with the gaff down his throat. The hood pelts were awfully heavy, and you were lucky if you could haul one, and they had cocks nearly as big as your arm, about 11 and 12 inches long.

Captain John Parsons was a fine man, but he was rough. We were out one year and were up in White Bay after the old seals. We had all our coal burned, and the ice was all small, so we couldn’t walk on it. That was a tough year.

The worst storm I saw was in the Ranger [1939]. We were going to St. Lawrence but the snow came on so thick and the wind was blowing so hard we had to heave off. We were adrift four days, I think. The Kyle was on the inside of us. She was making her regular run in the Gulf. They were talking on the Marconi when the wires came down on our ship. You could hear the Marconi, but we couldn’t send a message out.

On the third day, the Newfoundland came up to us and the lops were so high you couldn’t see her at times. She was coming towards us, and when we broke out on top, the wave must have been 50 feet high. The bowsprit of the old Ranger [Newfoundland?] went into our stern. The bowsprit broke off and damaged the foremast.

The Newfoundland tried to get a line to us. They put a barrel overboard with a big rope, and we hooked the line and hauled the cable aboard. We shackled the cable fast to the chain, and that broke. I think had we been towed towards Trepassey we might have got there because about two days afterwards the Imogene took us in tow and towed us to port in Trepassey.

Some people claim that the firemen and the engineers had got drunk, because there were three fires and the water douted them. We were at the mercy of God at the time, and you wouldn’t get 5 cents for your life. And the pumps were hard to handle. They had two big wheels on them, about the size of a cartwheel, and it took seven or eight hands on each side, but the coal used to clog them, so we had to hoist the water up. There was a lot of talk about it, and old Abram Kean wrote letters to Skipper Dick Badcock in the newspapers.

One year I got a berth when I went in St. John’s on spec [without a ticket]. So we went aboard and asked, and he [captain] asked if we’d been out before. We both said yes and he said to Curlew, “I though I saw you somewhere before, weren’t you out?” “Yes,” Curlew said, “I was out on this one last spring, but I was too late when I sent for my berth, so you said.”

“Well, boy,” he said, “there’s three men who haven’t arrived yet, and if they don’t arrive by 8 tomorrow morning, come down and you’ll get your berth.” So of course we were there about 4, waiting, two of us, and he gave us the berths. Anyway, this was the old Ungava. She was just like a train going from station to station. You didn’t have to go to starboard, nor port, you could go straight on along through solid ice. She would steam about 9 knots because she was big and heavy.

But the Imogene had all of them beat, because she was powerful. She’d go past us at about 18 knots. Once she picked us up off the Funk Islands through heavy ice. We hauled the pelts up to her and put them in a strap. When we got aboard, he said, “The Ranger’s jammed in the ice about 25 miles to the west of us.”

And she went around and picked up our crews, and when she got them all aboard and all the pelts aboard, she was right full on deck. Then he straightened her to where the Ranger was to and there was the Ranger and the Eagle and the Thetis. They were all jammed and so close together they could sing out to one another. Then he went in and made a whirl right around and put them in a bay of water. That Imogene was just like a hotel.

The old steamers like the Ranger, Eagle, and Thetis were rough, and the cooks were just like blacksmiths. They’d knock the head off a barrel of beef or ham-butt pork and they’d have a dip net, dip it out and put it in the boilers in the galley. After it was in the boiler for so long they’d take it out and cut it up. And that would be served with duff on Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays.

We had a bit of fresh meat the first month out because they’d have three or four cows strung up in the riggings. This fresh meat was like smoked ham from the smoke in the galley and it was frozen as hard as cement.

They would take it down and saw it up and then cut it into pieces and boil it. On the last of it, when I was out, you’d get some cooked seal carcass or flipper. We also used to get soft bread, a bun or a small loaf, every second day, I think it was. And out on the ice hard bread and rolled oats and sometimes a drink of Redways mixed with water would be our midday meal.

Sometimes life was really hard, but other times we did very good, and we always had lots of food, even if it wasn’t the tastiest.

William Badcock, b.1912, Int.1987

My uncle, Captain Badcock, got me a ticket on the Ranger and he was her captain. I signed up at Bowring’s in St. John’s. On our first trip, we left St. John’s and went to Port aux Basques, and were there one day, one Sunday, and the next evening we got up to Bird Rocks. We were there four or five days waiting for the seals to come down out of the Gulf and we got 7,000 or 8,000 that year—that was the first year I was out.

The next year we left St. John’s and we went right up into the Gulf, way inside the Bird Rocks. We were jammed up there a short while, but there were lots of seals. In fact, we were up there before they pupped. Then we got in a storm of wind, and we blowed outside the Bird Rocks and missed the rest of the seals.

Then the next year [his third trip], we went on up there and we got in heavy ice. We came down off Cape St. George and got in heavy ice. In fact, most of my trips to the ice were in the Gulf. We did a lot of towing in the Gulf. You’d go overboard in the morning and you couldn’t see the steamer and you’d get your tow of seals and come back. One tow of seals a day.

One spring, I was down on the Front, down to Belle Isle. We got jammed there and we got almost up to the Funks. We got a few seals there, and we got jammed again, and we never got free until we got up to Bay Bulls. That’s the year when they had the big seal catches [1933].

You had to watch the weather going up to the Gulf. One year, we spent two days in St. Lawrence because we could not take a chance with the stormy weather because there were two big piles of coal on deck, one on each side.

Not all days could you go on the ice. We’d get up in the morning, and if the weather was satisfactory, we’d go out on the ice. If weather came on, we had to go back to the steamer. Now, sometimes you’d have a couple of good days, and 50 to 150 men could kill a lot of seals. I have seen them out there where you had to haul the seals clear of each other in order to sculp them. I saw three or four years like that.

One year we got nothing, 7,000 or 8,000 and we were 12 or 14 days and never got overboard. Times like that some fellows would be down in the hold playing an accordion, playing cards, and making buckets. To make buckets they’d take an end of the gaff and cut two buckets, one on each side. And some fellows brought them home and put them in their houses. There were a lot of days wasted at the ice. And that’s what happened in those disasters. Men would be forced to go overboard because they had no seals, and once overboard sometimes they couldn’t get back.

My living conditions were a bit better most times because I was master watch for six years. We lived right up forward, but there was a cook for the engineers, skipper, wireless operator, and the navigator. He’d cook for us master watches as well. And the steward would bring our grub to us. We ate separate from the ordinary sealers.

When I was on the Ranger, we had three master watches, and each master watch appointed a scunner. The scunner would go up in the barrel and direct the ship through the ice. In the old Ranger, there were bunks on each side and a table in the centre. I found the food good enough. We’d have fresh beef twice a week, and brewis, and we had potatoes and turnips.

Down in the hold, the crowd would have fresh beef every Sunday. And we fellows would probably have a bit of brewis in the morning, maybe an egg, maybe a bit of bacon, beans, and things like that—regular grub. Now, when we went on the ice, everybody carried something in a grub satchel. And most people carried a bit of rolled oats with a few raisins in it, and we’d mix that in water and that would be our lunch for the middle of the day.

But the men in the hold got their food from the galley, and each bunk’s crew would send one man to get the food. A bunk’s crew were the men who slept together in the one bunk. There might be two, or three, or four men in a bunk. And if the seals were plentiful and we needed more space for the pelts, there might be four or five men in a bunk. The old Ranger was one of those old wooden boats, little power, and she couldn’t go through the ice too well.

Now, the sealers’ job in the Gulf was different from the job at the Front. At the Front the watches would be dropped off in different places by the steamers and one watch might find very few seals, while the other watch would find a bigger patch and get more.

But in the Gulf pretty well everybody was more equal because the ice was flat and it was sheet ice and the men towed most of their pelts to the ship, if the ship couldn’t get through the ice. But if you got stuck in the Gulf, you could be there for a while because the ice didn’t move. On the Front, the ice was breaking up more.

Now, Captain Badcock always had a barrelman. My father, Elijah, was a barrelman for a few years, and Bobby Bradbury was another for one year, and Arthur Menchions was one as well. Now, my father became a second hand for a while and he was in charge of everything on deck.

The big boats like the Ungava and the Nascopie had quartermasters as well. They would look after deck work also and make sure those big boats didn’t back into a big pinnacle of ice or anything that would take the blades off. Also on the Ranger we didn’t kill seals on Sundays, but on some ships they did kill on Sundays.

When we came ashore, each watch would be split in two. I’d take half my watch and the other fellow [assistant master watch?] would take the other half. So the three watches would be divided into two groups of men. One group would land the fat the first day, and the second group the second day; you’d be on today and off tomorrow.

It might take three or four days to unload the fat, and as the fat was being unloaded, the flippers were cut off, and there was a fellow tallying them. And everybody got a share of the flippers to sell for themselves or to take home, for that matter. Also, there were two shares of the seal pelts set aside for the three master watches. Now, that would be in addition to the master watches’ regular share. So we master watches got one and two-thirds shares of the seal pelts.

The year that we were the first to arrive in St. John’s [1937], we got $12 a dozen for the flippers. The last ships to arrive would get much less. And besides that, we would try to get a barrel of carcass. In fact, we had two barrels between us. Myself and Uncle Dick had a barrel, and George and Father had a barrel.

One year, we left St. John’s in the Ranger heading for the Gulf. We ran into a storm and got driven into Placentia Bay [1939]. The wind was easterly. Then the wind came from the northwest in heavy gales and drove us off the land, and water came in and put the fires out.

Then we had no power, and everybody was trying to survive. We had to use buckets to get the water up, and we were at it day and night. The Newfoundland came and took one boatload of men, I think about 14. Then she stood by until the Imogene came. It was hard to keep from going overboard. We got wet of course, but we all had sparables and chisels in our boots, so we didn’t slip. And then the Imogene came and towed us to port.

I went sealing between 1932 and 1941. Mostly on the Ranger with Uncle Dick, and once on the Terra Nova also with Uncle Dick. My father and uncle were also sealers.

Miss Elsie Barbour, b.1900, Int.1986

[Captain Carl (b.1900) and Mrs. Dorothy Barbour were also present]

[Martha Drake speaking] This interview was set up with Miss Elsie Barbour, who lives with her brother, Captain Carl Barbour, and his wife, Dorothy. However, as Captain Barbour was home at the time, Miss Barbour kept calling to her brother to confirm or clarify certain events. He eventually sat down and joined the conversation. I call Miss Barbour Aunt Elsie because Captain Barbour is my brother’s father-in-law. Therefore, a number of years ago this is how she was introduced to me. During the interview, one of her cousins, Ted, was visiting and joined in the conversation occasionally.

Aunt Elsie: The Barbour family owned a firm in Newtown, Bonavista Bay, and the firm’s name was J.E. & S. Barbour, named for the three brothers: James, Edward, and Samuel. Edward was my father and Carl’s. When James left the business, it became E. & S. Barbour. The family dealt in the fish business and supplies. And over the history of the firm, it owned 37 vessels in all. The firm also opened a branch in St. John’s. Captain Carl was master of various vessels with the firm, and I worked at the firm as bookkeeper beginning in 1918. [Captain Stanley Barbour was a cousin.] I was born in 1900, and Carl was born in 1908. And when Carl was four, our father died.

Carl went to the ice once in 1934 on the Terra Nova under Captain Stanley Barbour. And he was bridgemaster that year, but broke his leg and didn’t go back to the ice.

Capt. Barbour: So many people from Newtown went to the ice, and my mother used to say if there was a fire in Newtown, there wouldn’t be a man available to put it out. We generally had a duck supper the night before the men left for the ice. The next day the men would leave to walk to Gambo, hauling their few belongings with them. The food was usually plentiful on the ships but the flour duffs were very hard. Captain Wilf Barbour brought home two duffs on one occasion and nailed them on his gateposts, where they stayed for years. The year I was out we had a lot of ice blindness and sometimes men had to fumble their way to the toilet in the stern of the ship. The ice blindness was caused by the glare from the sun coming off the ice.

Before we went into business my father and all my uncles went to the ice, but then the business kept them home. Only Uncle Lester didn’t go to the ice.

Aunt Elsie: When the men were at the ice, the women would take the opportunity to hook mats. Everybody had their patterns to go by. There were wonderful patterns: Newfoundland dog, ships, and sceneries. The women made all the hats, mitts, and sweaters for the men. They needed warm clothes. The men would go to the Labrador coast in the summertime, down around the Straits of Belle Isle, and bring back maybe 1,000 quintals of codfish. They would unload it, and go back to the Labrador while the women made the fish. The women made all the fish in those days. They had to put it in salt, wash it out, and spread it on the flakes. Also, we used to buy fish from different places, and some of it would be damp, and we had to put that on the flakes to dry. Sometimes it would start to rain, and we would have to run, take up the fish, and cover it. And we had to help saw the wood and cleave it.

Dorothy: I like Newtown because you can go and open the door of any house and walk in. And you’d certainly be entertained with a lovely social cup of tea and a nice chat. Getting the news. Not backbiting, but some do, you know, backbite. But I never did backbite. I don’t like that word backbiting anyway. And we would have lots of company come to the house. Mother would entertain them. Some were our workers—what we’d call our servants. And when they would visit us, you see. In the same place. And Mother would say, now get a cup of tea all ready because he couldn’t go away without a cup of tea. Oh, no. Very hospitable in that way. And we enjoyed their conversation and they enjoyed an evening off from their family and children. So that was the life, my dear, in the outports. But now, if you want to go to a person’s home, you’ll have to ring—phone. Will you be at home tonight? Oh sorry, I have an engagement. I have to be out. That’s how it goes in the city. In the outports—nothing like that you know. There was no telephones, you see. You’d just go to their door and walk in. Yes. And you would be received royally, my dear. Royally. The best they had, they’d give you. And you couldn’t come away without a social cup of tea and a nice chat. And the chat would be about their work, how they were getting on.

Some had pitiful stories to hear. [This was during the Depression.] Because their families were growing up, and they were on the dole—in need of this and that. Many’s a time a rap would come to our porch door. We’d go out. Of course we’d always invite them in. “Mrs. Barbour, would you have a such and such to give me?” A such and such—food, you know. “We haven’t got this” and “We haven’t got that.” And Mother was such a tender-hearted woman; of course she couldn’t say no. And she’d always pity those people who were in want and in need. And we had a lady that lived in Newtown; she was our servant once. But she married and lived in Newtown. She came from Bonavista. And they became very poor. Well now. Pack up a parcel now and send it over to Mrs. Collins. You know, she’s in need of food.

And every Sunday there was a sick man. He was sick on his bed for 20 years. Every Sunday she would cut out his dinner and dessert, and our servant would have to go to that home to deliver it. The wife of the man who was sick was certainly glad to see a woman coming in with a parcel, I tell you. My dear, pitiful, very pitiful. But what can we do without friends, eh? Yes. That woman was so clean. They had no canvas on their floor but you could eat off their floor because she had it scrubbed white, my dear. White. The floor was white. Wooden floor, you know. It was scrubbed white. So clean.

And the stoves—you’d see your face in them. And they used to use this old stove polish. They put it on and then they’d have to shine the stove. My dear. And all the dust that would come from the stove polish that they would have to take down their curtains and wash them up. That happened in Newtown with lots of women. They wanted their stove to shine, to see your face in them. In the meantime, it would soil all the curtains. And only give her extra work. Oh my dear. Such is life, my dear.

Such is life. But they all come through it. Some way or another, it was very good. They grew their vegetables, turnip and potatoes, and their cabbage. And some had carrots. We always had carrots growing, and parsnip. My sister would see to that. And she loved to be outdoors working, especially in the garden. And there wouldn’t be a weed in her carrot beds or turnip beds. She’d go out every day, pick out every weed she’d see. There wouldn’t be a weed to be seen. And we had a little dog, and she lived with my sister who looked after the garden. And she would go out and sit down in the garden and wait until Sybby would be finished with her work before she’d move. The dog was devoted to Sybby. And Sybby was devoted to her. I can see her garden now. Not a weed to be seen. She loved out of doors. I used to see to the flowers. We had nice flowers growing, too. Some of them still come up. And we had lots of lilac trees. I always used to go down to Newtown, but we don’t go much anymore.

Martha Drake: This was the end of the tape and we all went over to the table to have tea and cookies.

Nath Barrett, b.?, Int.1987 [Mrs. Barrett was also present]

I was fishing on the Labrador and shipping my fish with G & M Gosse. Captain Peter Carter and Stan Mullett were down there fishing as well, and I got a berth to the ice from Captain Peter. So I went to the ice in 1933 on the Ungava. That was the year of the big trips.

The Beothic and the Ungava were old cargo boats. They couldn’t go up on the ice. They had to butt it, but the Imogene was a real icebreaker. She’d go up on the ice and break it down under her. One year in the Ranger we got jammed just off Cape Norman [western tip of the Northern Peninsula]. The seals were scattered everywhere, and we spent most of our time walking. Once we found a number of komatiks or slides and we figured that landsmen with their dog teams were stealing some of our pelts. I guess the ice broke away from the shore, and they had to abandon their komatiks.

When I was with Captain Wesley [Westbury] Kean, he always lectured us before we went out on the ice. He was concerned that we be very careful. I guess he never forgot when he lost the men in the Newfoundland disaster.

Mrs. Barrett: I remember when Nath sent me a message. They had been out in a storm, and he sent a message to let me know that they were safe. Walter Crane was the wireless operator, so he brought the message to me.

Nath: One year I had to get a medical. I went to Dr. Drover in Bay Roberts and I told him I would pay him the dollar when I came back from the seal hunt, but I never got around to it, and this was during the Depression. Then my wife and I had to go to see Dr. Drover later.

When I saw him, I told him that I owed him a dollar. Well, he said not to worry about it—that he wasn’t going to take it. I put the dollar on his desk, and when we were leaving, he came out with us, and when I got home, the dollar was in my pocket. He must have slipped it there while he was talking to me.

Now, on the big steel ships you had your sleeping quarters and your mess hall. But on the older wooden boats like the Ranger, you had to take your food in a small bucket that we called a boat’s kettle. However many men were together, one of them would go and get the pork and the duff and bring it back to the bunk, and everybody would share it. Now, on the ice most of us had a little bag of rolled oats and raisins and we put that in our grub bag and ate it during the day.

One thing I don’t agree with, and that’s the way they condemn the gaff these days, because a man’s life often depended on a gaff. Once I was towing seals on loose ice, and I fell backwards into the water. The man behind me stuck his gaff in my coat and helped haul me out. I had to take off every stitch of clothes right there on the ice and wring it out. I had extra socks and somebody gave me a sweater.

The worst thing down in the hold of the old Ranger was the lice. I remember myself and Eric Smith and Ern Gosse and Uncle Jim Tucker were sleeping together. Arthur Gosse and Clem Flynn were sleeping below us. The lice were so bad that they took off their clothes and changed into other clothes; they put elastic bands around the bottom of their rubber pants and around their wrists and necks and that’s how they had to sleep.

“Uncle Jim,” I said. “Take off your shirt.” “Nothing on me,” he said, “boy.” “Well,” I said, “take off your shirt and give us a look.” He took off his shirt and you talk about the lice. I said, “Uncle Jim, nothing I can do with this. Throw it overboard.” “Aye, my boy,” he said, “throw it overboard.” We were burned down in the ice and the only drop of water that was around the steamer that’s where I threw Uncle Jim’s shirt.

When I came down in the hold, Uncle Jim said, “Where’s my $5?” I said, “What $5?” He said, “The $5 in the pocket.” But the shirt was gone.

In the Ungava there was a fellow from the lumber woods who had a lot of lice. Now, there was so much space between the steel bunks in the Ungava and fellows would have a piece of spun yarn strung from one bunk to the next for hanging socks and cuffs on. We picked off 14 lice that were crossing on this piece of spun yarn.

We always brought home a barrel of seal and gave it away to our friends. The younger fellows would stand on the sidesticks (the big boats had sidesticks) and you could kill a seal as you passed by, haul it aboard for your barrel.

Oh yes. It was a good life—good life—but it was a hard life.

Clarence Bartlett, b.1909, Int.1987

When I got my first berth to the ice in 1926, I was in school at that time, and I had signed on for exams—the intermediate exams. Anyway, I didn’t have much time for school. So I said to my mother, “I’m going to the ice this spring.” My mother says, “You’re not going to no ice. Anyway, I’m not going to fit you out to go to any seal fishery.” “Whatever,” I said, “I don’t want much fitting out anyway.” After being to the Labrador the summer before now on my own, you understand, I had everything else. I only wanted something or other. “Give me a pair of mitts, that’s all I want.”

So anyway, I went up Saturday. Left school, and Saturday I started to walk from Bareneed to Brigus, which I suppose was about 9 miles. Anyway, I went in and saw the old man, old man Bartlett—that’s old Captain Will Bartlett. He was sitting behind his desk in his office. He looked at me like I was bad, you know. So whatever, he said, “What are you looking for?” I said, “Looking for a berth to the ice, sir.”

To the ice. There was no such thing as seal fishery then. It was the hunt to the ice. He looked at me, sized me up, you know. I was about 6 foot 1 [inch], I suppose, then at that time. But anyway, “How many,” he said, “do you think you could sculp in the run of a day?” “Well, I suppose, sir,” I said, “I could do as good as anybody starting off. Everybody has to learn.” I was bent on getting the berth, you know. I wasn’t going to come out of that office without a berth. Of course, I think my mother kind of forewarned him. She didn’t want me to go to the seal fishery anyway. Anyway, I ended up with the berth.

I came home. My mother said, “How did you get on?” “I got the ticket,” I said. They gave you a ticket, you know. I said, “I got the ticket to go to the seal fishery.” She says, “You haven’t?” I said, “Yes.” I can see her now. So anyway, all right, she was determined she wasn’t going to do anything for me to get ready. But I didn’t mind that.

So I came into St. John’s. I signed on. In the meantime you’d take up $9 worth of crop, they used to call it. And when you came back from the ice, you were charged $12. So I only got $6 worth of crop, and we got aboard.

We were jammed the whole spring up in the Gulf, and Captain Bartlett was really upset. He was as wicked as they came, and yet his father was so good. We got into the Gulf, and we got in St. John’s around the 4th or 5th of May. The Canadian icebreaker managed to get us out of the ice a couple of times. So we got in here, and we were paid off $12.28.

The guys who had the full crop, they had 28 cents. But anyone didn’t have the whole crop was paid off $3.28. The ones who had 28 cents had to be paid their fare home by the government. The fare at that time was 90 cents. A sealer’s ticket was 90 cents to go around the bay, from St. John’s to Carbonear.

So of course I had $3.28. I wasn’t able to get a government ticket. However, I went up to the station and I pushed in $2 for a ticket. I was only going to get $1.10 back out of a $2 bill for a 90-cent ticket. But the guy there pushed me out $4.10.

So I looked at him—his name was Batten. Buddy now, this fellow Batten I was telling about. I think he’s dead now. Batten give me the nudge, you know, to take the money and go on, see. You know there was a lineup, naturally, a bunch of sealers in the old station down there. I pushed back the money—$3—and kept the $1.10. “What’s that?” he said. I said, “I only gave you a $2 bill. I only gave you a $2 bill. I’m only entitled to $1.10.” He hauled it in. He never said thank you, nothing at all.

So, anyway, my friend Batten says, “You bloody fool—that was the price of a fine bottle of rum for going around the bay on the train.” I said, “Boy, look, when I was going to school, we used to have a copybook at that time, and you’d have to write down the full line in the copybook. One of those copies was honesty is the best policy. I never forgot it.” That year I celebrated my 17th birthday at the ice, March 16th.

We were so poisoned that spring with everything we could hardly speak to one another. In the ship we were jammed up there for a month sometimes. You’d get up in the morning and you’d start to walk. And you’d walk down till you couldn’t see the tops of the spars, and then we would turn around and walk back. Then the next day you’d walk in a different direction, and that’s what we did all the time. And that’s how we got the 3,000 seals.

We didn’t run out of food and we didn’t run out of coal. There was plenty of hard bread, and we’d get soft bread twice a week and milky tea. The first four Sundays we had fresh meat, but after that it was all salt pork, salt beef, beans, fish and brewis, and molasses duff. We had four cooks and sometimes they would cook seal meat for us.

We made water from the ice on the high pinnacles. We’d cut the ice and passed it along from man to man and then it was thrown in an iron tank. Then they put the steam on that and melted it. Now, the water was greasy and dirty because the men kept their mitts on, and they handled the ice, coal, and the few seal pelts we got.

We all slept down in the hold on what was the second deck. The deep hole was for the coal and the fat. You’d get your dinner in a pan or your soup in a boat’s kettle, which held about a gallon. And you brought that down to your bunk and you sat on your box and your bunk and you ate it.

The only services that were on board that spring was held by the RCs when they said the rosary on board and everybody usually went to that. There was really nothing to do because we weren’t allowed to go hunting seals on Sundays anyway.

A number of men got snow-blind. My friend Batten had to be led aboard one day, and we had to put used tea on his eyes. One thing I never had any trouble with was ice-blindness. In fact, I never even had to wear goggles. See, you notice my brows? If you got full eyes, you know, your eyes are out, poppy, you’d be blind in no time. But anybody with a high brow, with your eyes kind of back, recessed like, you’d never get [ice- or snow-]blind.

Another problem was seal finger and that happens when the grease gets in the joint. If you had a nick or little cut and you use your fingers to haul the pelts along or to turn them over, it was easy to put your finger in the eye of the seal, and that’s what they used to say caused seal finger or swile finger [and sometimes that finger would be permanently damaged].

Water Street was covered with snow when we would get to St. John’s. And there would be horses and slides the whole length hauling our bags and boxes down to the wharf. The only bit of Water Street that was clear was the streetcar track. The truck men would charge us 10 or 15 cents to haul our box and bag.

Now, my father went to the ice all his life, but when I went he was getting tired of it. And that fall coming home from the Labrador fishery, my father was drowned. Father was gone and I had a sister five years old and a young brother and my grandmother to look after. So I had to go back to the seal hunt the next year. I was looking after the family, and I was only 17 or 18 years old.

And I went on the Neptune. We went up in the Gulf again, and we got a big load. But we were killing too many seals, and we knew we couldn’t take them all, and some of the men began to question what we were doing because we didn’t want to become another Southern Cross. Captain Will Bartlett wanted to kill, kill, kill.

We got jammed in the ice again because two big sheets swung around together and one went over the other and raftered. The sheet that went under, went under us, and we had to pump. We had to get out on the ice in case she sank, but then the pressure eased up a bit. We got into Port aux Basques and got some more coal.

Meanwhile, the heat from the engine and the propeller shaft was heating up the pounds, and the fat was running, melting down in the bilge water. We got into St. John’s in early May, and the first man who went down in the hold to start loading the pounds, he went down to his waist in nothing but blubber oil.

Some of the pelts had no fat left on them, and Job’s, who had hired the ship, they said they would charge us for damaged skins. We said if we were charged for damaged skins we were going to throw them over in St. John’s harbour. If they were no good to us, they were no good to them. I can see the crowd now, Morris Job Taylor. He was in charge of Job’s at the time. He came up there and, I tell you, fellows made for him. They were going to have his scalp if he hadn’t changed his mind.

After being jammed for so long, what we all went through, we should have been out of the Gulf with 28,000 or 29,000 good seals without having been told to kill more and more and more. We could have had a good load of good fat, because the seals were averaging 50 and 60 pounds. They were big whitecoats, and the whitecoats are always bigger in the Gulf. And we couldn’t even bring home any seal meat because everything spoiled because we were out so long.

Well, my first spring in the Ungava was good. This man, Mr. Bowring, who used to work down to the Lighthouse Department, he got the berth for me that spring with Captain Billy Winsor. That was a good spring and we made a good bill. That was the spring we had some of the movie crowd with us [Varick Frissell, 1930]. We’d drop them off in the morning with all the equipment and we’d go on. Anyway, we’d go on and kill and pan. When we would finish up killing and panning all day, Frissell used to put a man or a couple of men out to haul pans.

They would take the equipment out with them and sometimes they used to do some work on the ship. I remember one time they had a great big aeroplane propeller. It was like a motor, like a large fan. They had that set up on deck on a stand, and we’d be on deck with our oilclothes on, and they used to spray us with water. Then, there was somebody with—it looked like cornflakes only it was white. They used to scatter this, and it used to blow around. You didn’t know but you were in a blizzard of snow. That would all stick on to your oilclothes and make it look like there was a real storm. This was where they were taking the pictures. They gave us $5 for that, in the spring when we got in.

The next year, 1931, I got a ticket to go on the Viking, but I didn’t like the Viking, and I was hoping to get a ticket on the Ungava. So when I didn’t get a ticket on the Ungava, I gave my ticket for the Viking to my friend, Bill. And that was the spring that the Viking blew up.

But you know the talk was around. The talk was around all the time they were taking those pictures. Some people thought there was going to be a wreck. And I think that is what they planned for the old Viking. The only thing about that was that there wasn’t going to be too many aboard of her. There wasn’t going to be anyone aboard of her when she went up, to my mind. They had enough powder and dynamite to blow her to kingdom come.

That was all stored in the stern in big cans. That was for blasting—blasting the ice. I know it must have been a terrible time. I was talking to some of them after. Bill Boone came out of it all right but he had an awful time trying to get to the Grey [Horse] Islands.

My last trip was on the Ungava. That was the year that we killed all the old seals, 1933. I also remember coming home on the train after we got back from the ice. They had really rough coaches for us, and many would be drunk, and then the rackets would start. Some fellow would be accused of spending half his time in the bunk out to the ice and he would start to fight, and sometimes in Brigus Junction the conductor would throw off the real troublemakers and make them catch a train the next day. From Brigus Junction we would go to Port de Grave to Carbonear. After that I served on the police force for 25 years.

Roland Batten, b.1916, Int.1987

I got my first berth to the ice from A.A. French, who had a wholesale and retail business in Clarke’s Beach, and the four times I was out to the ice, I always got my ticket from A.A. French. The first year I think, 1935, I was on the Imogene with Captain Al Blackwood. Billy Beecham, Bill Christopher, and me, we slept in the one bunk, and another friend, Harold Martin, was in another bunk.

The first time we met the seals we all went overboard and I didn’t have the heart to kill the first seal I saw, but Billy Beecham said to me, “Kill them, Batten. The captain is looking at you.” I killed one and brought it over to him and he showed me how to sculp it. We spent a couple or three hours and Billy Beecham sculped 35 and I sculped 25. We had over 33,000 all together in that trip.

I remember being out in the Eagle with Captain Charlie Kean and in the Ungava with Captain Billy Winsor. The Eagle was a pretty old boat and not as good as the others. I was in the Eagle when she struck a big piece of ice which punched a hole in her. So we had to get the emergency pumps and the hand pumps to keep the water down while the bo’sun and some men went down and fixed the leak temporarily with canvas and cement.

She was rolling a lot and Pete Barbour and myself took the first watch for the night up on barrackhead. Steward Gaulton from Bonavista Bay was the master watch, and he came up and said, “Boys, you got to stay here. I can’t get any man to come up, because they are all seasick.” He stood on watch while we got a coffee and came back.

The spring I was with Charlie Kean, we saw our first seal, which was a small whitecoat. The captain sang out, ordering someone to get it. Two of us jumped overboard, and I got it, killed it, and somebody threw me the seal dog hook and pulled it about. I brought the seal and the carcass up to the captain. That was what he always wanted. The first seal brought aboard was his and was to be cooked for him.

I liked all the captains I sailed with, all four of them. Captain Al Blackwood was a soft-spoken man never known to swear, and Charlie Kean was practically the same. They’d always say “me darlin’ boys.” But Billy Winsor was a rough man who swore a lot. Now, Billy Winsor was also a great captain, a darn good captain.

There was a doctor aboard all the ships, but I never saw him do much. Mostly you carried your own remedies. A lot of men carried a mickey of whiskey or rum, and you never opened it until you got a cold. But you always carried it in your grub bag, and you also carried a bottle of Redways.

In order to get drinking water, we had to get pinnacle ice and put it in the fiddly [pinnacle tank]. But we never brought water on the ice with us. We would put a little molasses in our grub bag, and when we were thirsty, we put some in the snow and eat it. A lot of fellows would panch [paunch] a seal and kick a little bit of snow in the carcass and drink the blood.

The snow would cool the blood off, because the blood of a seal is very hot. Now, they would only drink a couple of mouthfuls. They wouldn’t [drink] any big amount. The blood is so hot that I have seen men with cold feet opening up a seal and standing in it. You’d get your feet warm in a hurry.

We always had lots of food, and most everybody would have a cake or two baked by their mothers or sisters. Now, in the Imogene and Ungava there were mess rooms where we could sit at the table, but in the old Eagle we had to bring the food to our bunk and eat it there.

On Sundays we didn’t draw any blood, but we could go on the ice and haul pelts to different pans. That meant doubling them up so each pan would have more seal pelts and they’d be in more of a straight line for the steamer to pick them up, which saved time. And somebody would generally lead prayers in the mess room and down in the hold, if there was no mess room.

We had lots of food: beans, [lop]scouse, turnips, potatoes, and we would have three duff days—raisin duffs with molasses in them. We had hunks of salt beef and salt pork, and sometimes on Sunday nights we had rice and prunes. On the big boats there was lots of bread, but on the wooden ones you’d only a small amount, maybe a bun.

But in the night you could cook a feed of seal, flippers, a piece of carcass, liver, or whatever you wanted. You’d get pork and onion from the food controller. The food controller was the supervisor over the food, and it was his job to make sure that everybody got a fair share of what was required.

Lots of times we would get crawlers in our bunks—that’s lice. What we used to do was get burlap and put it around the bunk and grease it with kerosene oil. That would keep them away. And you wouldn’t let anybody strange sit on your bunk, because you didn’t know who had lice. Once a fellow who wanted a top bunk over me had lice, and we made him clean himself up.

After we got back to St. John’s, we unloaded the pelts and threw away our old sealing clothes. We always sold our share of flippers and a lot of men would get a bottle of liquor. Sometimes we came home by train and sometimes there would be a truck in from around the bay.

I remember when we put our barrels of seal and our boxes and bags in the back of the truck and came home ourselves in the back of the truck. We always had a bag for our rubber boats and oilclothes, and we had what we used to call a Labrador Box. When we’d get home, we would give every neighbour a piece of seal carcass, depending on how big the family was.

Jack-Allan Beecham, b.1903, Int.1987

I was on the dole in 1930 when I got a berth to the ice on the Viking with Captain Badcock. The Viking came into Bay Roberts and that’s where we signed on and boarded. Captain John Bishop had a general store where we got our supplies. The store was over there where the Belmont Hotel is now. [According to Mr. Eric Jerrett, Mr. Beecham was probably referring to the store owned by Captain John Parsons, because John Bishop had a lumber business and a mill. The Belmont was originally owned by Captain Fradsham, and it was later acquired by the Bradburys.] The Belmont Hotel is run by the Bradburys. That was a good year [$43.24 per man]. Captain Badcock gave me a berth the following year on the Ranger, and we went in the Gulf. That was much different from on the Front. The Front was covered with pans of ice, but the Gulf was one big sheet of ice.

You always had a doctor, a sheep doctor or a dog doctor or some kind of doctor. If you fell sick, he hauled down your shirt collar, threw talcum powder around your neck and rubbed it in. Now, you’re all right. I don’t know if he carried any medicines, I suppose he did. There was a lot of ice blindness. Men would be ice blind every day or two.

After we unloaded our pelts and sold our flippers, we would get the train home to Clarke’s Beach and we would walk from there. I always tried to bring home a meal of flippers.

Jacob Best, b.1900, Int.1986 [Mrs. Agnes Best was also present]

I got my first berth with Captain Abram Kean on the Terra Nova in 1918. My uncle got the berth for me. He used to have three or four berths. There were certain men that the captains knew that had the privilege of getting three or four tickets. I made 17 or 18 trips in her, and in all I was out about 30 times. And I was out six springs in the Imogene. She was the fastest and the best ship of all. And I was out in the Eagle as well.

We’d leave here from Brookfield about the 2nd or 3rd of March and walk to Gambo. Sometimes we would do it in a day, more times it would take two to do it. Then we had to wait in Gambo a day or two or three for the train. The old trains had special cars for the sealers. There was a stove in the car where you could boil your kettle. I survived the seal hunt but my father died out there. He was second hand for Captain Jacob Kean on the Sagona. He had a bad ear and he went to the ship’s doctor and got the medicine and went up in the barrel. Somebody said, “Where’s Davy to?” and the cook said “He’s up in the barrel. Go up if you want to see him.” So, he went up and found my father dead. The ship brought him back to Brookfield. He was about 60 years old.

I was out with a lot of the old captains. Billy Winsor would cuss on you, “Oh you bloods of bitches!” And he would swear all the time. Captain Wes, he was very good. I liked him. Captain Abram was a good man and he would never swear, most he would say is, “What in the devil is you fellows at there?” Captain Abram was good with the stowaways, too. Sometimes we had as many as eight or nine. He would put some with the firemen, and sometimes they would help stow the seals, and Captain Kean would sign on a scattered fellow as a sealer. I was also out with Les Kean.

Nineteen thirty-three was a great year. Nearly everybody got a great load. I was in the Imogene that year and we got over 55,000 seals.

Mrs. Best: When they would get into St. John’s, almost the first thing they’d have to do is go down to Riverhead [West End]. There used to be a mill there and that’s where they would get shavings to stuff in their bunk cases or brin bags to put on their bunks for sleeping on. Then they would get their crop, $9. If they made money, they paid back their crop at $12. Sometimes they only made enough to pay their crop and probably get a bottle of rum. Whether they made a good voyage or not, they had to have their bottle of whiskey or rum.

Now, when he went with Les Winsor in the Linda May [Ed.: after our period] he used to make $100-$200, and he used to make extra tallying the pelts. But usually in the older ships he would be a master watch. Once we bought an old-fashioned wood range, the ones with the warmer on top, but the money was very important because it would buy food for supper and if we didn’t have it we had to get everything on credit and depend on fishing.

The seal fishery was really important in our day because if he made a poor voyage the children would have to go without. It was hard on the women, too, because you never knew what minute there was going to be a storm and we worried all the time when they were out. We never knew what time we were going to get bad news. There was always a bit of a fuss when they got back; we were all glad to see them. They would get a good welcome home.

Now, when they came home the women would have to scrub the grease and blood and everything out of the clothes. Jacob always took a clean set of clothes, underwear and that, and nine times out of ten he would bring that back in the bag untouched. But the clothes he was wearing were dirty. They were dirty, just like dogs they were. And they had to work like dogs and the merchants got all the benefit. Very little money for the men, especially in the olden days, very little benefit.

Now, before he went out, I had to knit socks and vamps and mitts. They would always carry a fair share of these, eight or nine pairs of socks and three or four pairs of vamps and probably a half-dozen pairs of mitts. And in later years, we used to make rubber caps out of old rubber clothes. We would line them with flannelette and these would keep their ears from getting cold and keep the rain off them. And we would have to line their underwear with fleece lining. We would line that at the knees and the backside and put an extra piece in the front part.

We had a lot to do and before they went we had to help them prepare enough wood for the spring and stow it up in our porches or stores, and that had to last while the men were gone. Many times I have been out sawing wood and my fingertips would be numb. He would haul the firewood out from the woods and the two of us would have to saw it up because the children were all small.

Jacob: We always sold flippers in St. John’s but we didn’t bring many home with us. My buddy and I would bring back a barrel of salted seal between the two of us and everybody would come by for a meal of seal.

Now, Agnes had an uncle who was lost in the Greenland disaster. He was nearsighted and they never found his body so they figured he must have walked over the edge of the ice and drowned. And there was a man from Templeman, Wesley Collins, he was out in the two disasters [Newfoundland and Greenland]. He survived both of them, but he lost one of his legs in the second. I don’t remember the first, of course, because I wasn’t born, but I remember the second. It was a very sad time. There must have been ten or 15 from around home.

Sundays were special days mostly. Some of us would work and the others wouldn’t. I used to work. But now the fellows who didn’t work they could be sleeping or reading or whatever, but come 12 o’clock midnight the master watches would be up and get them to work. They would have to work all night, stowing seals, and whatnot, until the next morning.

Agnes: My father often talked about sealing. He told me how lousy they were out there with all kinds of dirt. He used to say that they were actually like dogs, and if they got overloaded with seals, they had to sleep on top of them. Naturally, the captain was going to fill the ship as much as he could, and the men had to throw their bunks down on top of the seal fat and sleep. Now, if that’s not like a crowd of dogs, what is? Now, Jake was fortunate enough to get work on the deck. He was usually a bo’sun’s mate or scunner or master watch and he would usually eat in the tophouse.

Jacob: Like I said, all the captains knew their stuff, but the man who stayed at it most was old Captain Abram. He stayed at it until they wouldn’t give him a ship anymore. And he always wanted to be up in the barrel as much as possible looking for the seal, not scunning—the scunner would be in a lower barrel. Because he was the man who directed the ship through the ice. It was the barrelman who was on—who always looked out for the seals in every direction. Old Kean wore a big fur coat and when he got too old he would take off the fur coat, climb up in the barrel, and some of the men would hoist his fur coat up to him.

I was at it so long that I lived to see better times in the ’40s.

Thomas Best, b.1920, Int.1986

I was probably 15 years of age the first time I went to the ice. We walked from Wesleyville to Gambo with 75 to 80 pounds of luggage on a sled that we pulled behind. The train car had an old Dixie stove, and we could boil the kettle on that. It cost $3 then from Gambo to St. John’s.

I got my ticket on a Bowring’s boat from a skipper man at home by the name of Kean. There were four men in each bunk that time, and we were on the Eagle and had to eat our meals in the hold. I went out to the seal hunt about 25 years and I had every job on the ship over that length of time. I was an ordinary sealer, quartermaster, bridgemaster, barrelman, a first mate, and finally a captain. I started in the mid-1930s and it must be about 1970 when I gave it up. I had to go as navigator with Captain Bill Moss, who didn’t have a navigator’s ticket.

I was nine years of age when I went to the fishing business, and as I was walking up the steps in the Labrador schooner, my father said, “You’re like a sucking bear. Your size is yet to come.” And from then on, you had to look after yourself, from the day I was nine years old up to today. No one would look after you, because people were too plentiful. That’s the way it was up there. And the first one you’d give a back answer to, you were finished for eight or 10 years without getting off the land.

Even going fishing with anyone or getting to the seal fishery. Because where I came from, the merchants had control of the place. There were two or three merchants. They owned the schooners that were going to the Labrador, and they used to run them for companies in St. John’s. And whatever they said was law. They were the people that supplied you with goods and whatever you needed. And the first word, and you’re finished. You’d be cut off from everything. But that’s the way it was when I was going to the seal fishery. It’s a hard life, yes.

One year when I came in from Wesleyville, I went aboard the ship and put my clothes bag on the bunk that I was going to take. I went back on the street, and when I came aboard that evening my clothes bag was gone. They said that a couple of corner boys had taken it. I had nothing to wear out to the seal fishery except for the dress clothes that I had on. So, I went down to the courthouse and told them my problems. Finally, a policeman came in with two fellows, and one of the fellows had one of my shirts on.

Between the two of them they had all my clothes, but it was half lousy because they used to sleep around here and there. The judge asked me if I wanted the clothes, but I said no, it was too dirty. So, anyway, I went out to the seal fishery and I used to steal the skipper’s clothes. The skipper used to miss his clothes every now and then and didn’t know who the hell took them. On the way in from the seal fishery he found out that I stole the clothes, and he was going to dock me $25.

It happened he came to my home and was a good sport. He said, “I would probably have done the same thing if I was in that predicament.” The captain was a big man [probably Captain Bill Winsor], and he was a heavy built man. I used to wear his clothes with strings around my body to keep it up. He was a good man when we were getting seals. But when we weren’t getting seals, you couldn’t look at him. He would curse you up and down.

One spring we were up around the Magdalen Islands and we had what young seals we could get, and there were no old seals at all. But the skipper wanted to stay and get some old seals. We were getting short of coal, and the crew went on strike. If anyone as much as put their fingers on the rail to jump overboard, their fingers were in danger of being broken by somebody with a gaff. The strikers would not allow anybody to go overboard. I was in the bridge when one fellow came up with a gun.

I said to Captain Billy Winsor, “They’re coming up on the bridge now.” And then he said, “Take the gun,” he said, “and any man that puts his foot on the step to come up on that bridge, shoot him.” He said, “Don’t shoot to kill, but it don’t make no damned different if you kills them or not.” And you had to do it, regardless. And we shot off a few rounds of bullets, and that kept them from coming up in the bridge. If they got up, they would have taken over, you know. And we had them guns until we got in Corner Brook. Now, this happened after the war.

The first spring I was out, I think I made around $80 or $90, including the money I got for my share of flippers. My father took all my money. He might give me a quarter now and then if I wanted to go to a dance. Where we lived, there were no dances allowed. I used to have to walk 3 miles to go to a dance once or twice a year, and Father would give me a quarter. Most fellows would be 18 or 19 before they went to the ice. But I was lucky that I managed to go so young. And when I got home, everybody wanted to know how I got my ticket, but I didn’t let them know because the next year there would be too many others looking for their ticket.

Jacob Bishop, b.1903, Int.1987

The first time I went to the ice was in 1929. I joined the Beothic under Captain William Winsor [it must have been the Ungava]. He was the sealing captain. Captain Faulk, a Norwegian, was the navigational captain and the year-round captain for the company. I came to St. John’s with the rest of the fishermen and joined the ship. I was appointed mess boy and my job was to bring the food to the captain’s room and serve the officers. Then I had to clean up after them. I was very handy with cooking. When we got back to St. John’s, I was one of the ones hired to clean up the passenger accommodations. We had to clean out the mess of the sealers and wash and paint and get the ship ready for his trip down north in the summer.

When the time came to go down to the Arctic, I went down as second cook. That summer we went to Greenland, Baffin Island, and all over the Hudson Bay. We carried the missionaries; the Bishop of the Church of England and the Bishop of the Catholic Church and young missionaries as well. I came to their attention because I was always a good singer, and sometimes they would stop to listen to me singing in the galley while I was cooking.

When we came back, we went to Sydney to take a load of coal back to Newfoundland. The captain was going to have a party the next day for the government people and the Mounties that were leaving the ship. When I got up in the morning, there was no cook in the kitchen, so I got the key from the chief steward and went in and prepared breakfast for the crew and officers. I tried to get the cook out of the bunk but couldn’t because he was ashore drinking all night and got drunk.

So, I started working on dinner. There were some eggs left over from the summer voyage, so I got some eggs and I made some mayonnaise, then I got potatoes and made a potato salad; I made a beet salad and I had three or four different kinds of coleslaw. Captain Faulk came into the saloon after I had the table set. When he saw the food, he asked the chief steward if there was something special going on. The chief steward said “Oh, that’s that young fellow in the pantry. He did that.”

The captain came in and said, “Why don’t you get that chap to go with us the summer? There’s a job for him here. We could use him.” So the chief steward offered me a job cooking on the summer voyage. I said, “Yes, sir.” Then the cook got fired and I became the chief cook. We took a load of coal to St. John’s and from there we went to Spain, Italy, and Sicily with codfish. That was the fall when many schooners were driven out to sea, most of them on their way to Bonavista North with supplies. Job Barbour in his schooner Neptune II was driven off and spent 48 days drifting and ended up in Scotland.

The second spring I went out on the Ungava again and Frissell was with us. His movie men had a big plane engine and they would throw white stuff into it like small bits of paper to make it look like a storm. They would dress up some men and get them to walk through this storm, where they used a plane propeller to create the wind. The men would have rubber suits on, and the bits of paper would stick to them so it would look like it was a real blizzard.

I was the chief cook, but I had a couple of assistance cooks, and one was my uncle. We did the regular sealing and then came back and did our regular trip to the North. Then I joined the Nascopie. I spent 10 years as the chief cook on the Nascopie, and in 1942 I left the Nascopie and became chief steward. I was a chief steward until I retired.

While I served on the sealing ships, we would cook the regular food for the sealers but we also cooked for the fireman and the captain and the officers. The officers ate in their quarters, the firemen ate in their quarters, and the sealers had their separate place as well. I used to help the sealers with the lunch they took on the ice but the only cooked meals were for breakfast and supper.

Now, I can’t say I was a real sealer because I didn’t go on the ice very much, but I cooked and served the crews for four or five years at least. And I was always paid a wage whether we got seals or not. I was on the go day and night because everybody ate at different times. Now, we had a pretty good life, but before my day things were much harder. My father told me many times that he would get shavings at the cooperages in St. John’s and put them in a brin bag, go down below, and scoop out a hole in the coal for his brin bag, and that’s where he slept. They had hard times.

Jesse Codner, b.1910, Int.1986/87

Well, I was 16 years old the first spring I went to the ice. I fished with my father here [Torbay], and we had merchants down to Job’s. Every fisherman had a merchant then. They’d get their supply of salt and such stuff, see, and I got a berth in the Ungava with Billy Winsor.

We sailed off for the icefields the 6th of March, and going down the Shore it was breakfast. You had an old boat’s kettle then and went up for breakfast. I was a first time young fellow in the bunk. I was sent to the galley to get the food. This old fellow was cook. There were two or three of them. And he dipped down with a goddamned great big long-handled dipper and he dipped up this stuff and he hove it into the boat’s kettle and I shoved in my kettle for tea and I got a kettle of switchel, perhaps it was three or four days old. I brought it down and I said, “Boys, what is this? What is this?” I asked the old fellows.

“Oh,” he said, “that’s [lop]scouse.” There were four or five pieces of old turnip floating around like pieces of cork. You couldn’t eat it. And little bits of salt meat. That was breakfast. A little pan of hard bread I brought down with me. Get that into you and get on the ice.

We were down off of the Funk Islands. We got seals there; we got about 22,000. It was two days of young fat. From there on after, the young were killed, we went after the old.

Well, I was only a young boy. I wish I was as smart today, though. I had a toothache all the spring. I got lousy. I went on deck and I used to curse and cry, do it all! I thought if I got in again I’d never come again anymore. Oh my God Almighty. We got in on the 28th of April. We had 42,000 pelts. Well, after the end of a week, that was all of it. I was ready to go again. Well then, that was that spring.

Another spring—I’ll tell you the story. Captain John Whelan was a navigator. Now, Jacob Kean was an ice captain, and he was sailing without a navigator. I knew Whelan. He sent me in to Jacob with a note—a letter to get a berth. Now, he wasn’t going into her. I went in and knocked on Jacob’s door, in there by Bannerman Park. He was a drunkard, you know, drank like a fish.

Front door was beat open, the glass out of it. “Come in, boy.” I went in. He took the letter and looked at it, walked back and forth the room four or five times. He said, “Boy, hard world, ain’t it?” And I said, “I don’t know, Skipper. Perhaps people into it is hard, not the world.” He said, “Yeah, boy, yeah.” He said, “Tell Captain Whelan I’m sorry. Can’t get him nar berth, cause all the berths [are] gone. Took them down to the office.”

I left. By the Jesus, wicked, couldn’t get a berth. That was it. I was out in St. John’s the day they sailed, and when I went down the cove here the Beothic was hung up. Jacob Kean was only an ice captain and he couldn’t go without a navigator, and Captain Johnny Whelan was a navigator and decided to go with him.

So anyway, when he saw me, he told me to come aboard. Now, I had a horse on Pleasant Street and no one to drive her home, and my mother had to be taken home. Gordon Thorne was standing on the wharf, and I sung out to him, “The horse is in the cove, drive up to Pleasant Street, and pick up my mother and take her home.” I went down below and I was three days down there. There was 33 Torbay fellows aboard of her. There was 32; I made it 33. Now, I had nothing to wear but what I stood in.

So we went down the shore. Be gar, she broke down, down off Baccalieu or somewhere. Something wrong with the engine room. She drifted off, be gar. Whelan sent down for me. Someone come to the hold, he said, “Is Codner down there? A fellow by the name of Jesse Codner.” “Geez,” I said, “What is it? They’re going to put me ashore.” And I went up, he said, “Go in to Jacob. He’s going to sign you on.” I went in. He said, “Well boy, how’s ye feeling?” I said, “All right.” He said, “A good night and a clear conscience and a few miles away we’ll be into them.”

So I came out, and Captain Whelan said, “What have you got to put on?” I said, “I stands right in the centre of my clothes bag.” “Well,” he said, “I have a spare pair of skin boots there that I used to use years ago.” So he gave them to me. Blessed Jesus! There were about 10 years old and perhaps nine lying up. They were dried right up. They gave me a crop: a suit of oil clothing, a pound of tobacco, a knife and sheath and steel, and a belt—that was my crop. All right. So that was all right.

Be gar, we got under way again and we did get into them. We killed about 21,000 seals. We picked up after the first day killing. Young harps. Now, the spring before he was up in White Bay. The Eagle or something got a whole load up there. So [now in 1933] he picked up the previous day’s kill and beat off for White Bay. He run down, run inside of Patrick’s Point, the other side of the Horse Islands. She got jammed. She was 33 days there jammed.

Now, Baird sent her out. He had her chartered for one month. There was only a month’s grub aboard of her, that was it. Be gar, we were a week there, and we went on allowance. Go up and sign your hand in the morning for a cake and a half of bread. That was it.

Boys, oh boys! We were jammed there solid. They started blasting her out. Just as well to try to get that hill out of it over there. Then she listed, and the ice started coming in over the rail, and we were all night cutting it up and heaving it off on the other side. Come in over this side and heave it down the other side. It put a hole in her side like a puncheon. If it was a wooden vessel, she was gone then. That was all. That died away then and she filled right in there.

Well, that was it. They were going to get the crew to travel across to Patrick’s Point and go travel up the country. That was something then. You’d never make it. You’d never make it. So anyway, we had to settle down for it, anyway.

Cake and a half of bread a day. Sleep all day. You wouldn’t find a man on deck in the middle of the day, no more than a white bull. But all night long we were up acting the buck, anyone strong enough to do that. So anyway, another steamer, maybe the Northern Ranger or maybe the Kyle, she came down with some grub. She never got in to us.

That evening a fellow went on deck and said there was a crack in the ice. An hour after that, you wouldn’t know where the ice went. Went apart everywhere. We steamed out and got a bit of grub. That was the 29th day of April, and Jacob came on the bridge that evening and said, “I got orders from Bairds—could have three or four more days on the ice.”

So half the crew struck. Went down below. That was it. Billy Bowe was the ringleader of that strike. Billy was dressed up pretty, he was on the barrackhead with a white shirt, collar, and tie on. Some fellow was playing the accordion, just ribbing Jacob, I suppose.

I said to my buddy, I said, “Christ, we were 33 days here, it won’t matter much for the other couple of days, the hell with it, I’ll go.” So we went on the ice, and Jacob was going to give nar cent to the fellows that struck. Well anyhow, we went on the ice. We got, oh, I’d say 700 or 800 old pelts and came aboard.

But anyway, we were on the last pan picking them up when they run up to the pan. He sung out from the bridge: “There’s a swile over there in a swatch,” he said. “Can either man get over to get that?” There were four or five of us on the pan, and I jumped and ran, and broke the pan in two. The other fellows coming behind couldn’t get across, see. So they come up and picked up their pan, the pan we had there. Then they pulled up for me. Now, during the time we were on the ice, Jacob asked Captain Whelan, he said, “Where’s the fellow you brought aboard on your back when you come? Where’s he to? Is he down below, too?”

Captain Whelan spied me. He said, “Jacob, come over. There’s the man I brought aboard on my back when I come. If you’re going out next spring, I’ll pick a crew for you.” That killed him; he never spoke. So that was that trip. We got in the 3rd day of May. We made it to Bay Bulls, steamed down the shore. Yeah, that was that trip.

Oh my God, was there ever hard feelings between the men and the captain. Now, Jacob was nothing, and his son was a Catholic, see. So Good Friday, I think it was, we were having a little something back into the little hospital on the Beothic. The crowd of men were going up and down, going in kissing the cross and walking out again.

So Jacob came and Ron Shanahan [a coal trimmer, and the present editor’s great uncle] was up on the bridge and he said, “Ron, what’s going ahead? Lord Jesus, what’s going ahead this morning?” Ron said, “The boys are having a few prayers back there.” “Oh the Lord Jesus,” he said. “Go back and tell them to give us a few prayers to get this one out of here.”

Oh my, oh my, Jacob Kean. We came in on the 4th of May, and his wife came down. “Well,” she said, “Jacob. You made an awful shag of it, didn’t you?” “Plugged her up in the bay and jammed her up. And everything else came in loaded down.” The biggest trips ever brought in. The Imogene had 52,000—the most that was brought in the country. The Ungava had 48,000—the heaviest trip was ever brought in. We come in with 21,000 on the 4th of May.

I was out over 14 years and I served with a good few captains. I didn’t like Billy Winsor, but Peter Carter was the loveliest old man ever you see the like of, and he brought in just as many seals as the other fellows. And he looked after his men.

Old Abram Kean was an old bastard, God forgive me. He should have been shot years ago. That old son of a . . . He came down to the hold on a Sunday morning with his fur coat on, shoved his head down, “Get out and double up them pans. If I had men like youse, I wouldn’t have nar seal to my credit.” No, I didn’t like that dirty old thing. He drowned men, sure, and everything. He drowned them there in the Narrows, hauling them out through on the line, left the blood on the ice where the fellows went and got you in the blades. All blood on the water and ice and everything. He got away with that. He got away with the crowd froze up on the ice [Newfoundland disaster]. He got away with that. He wouldn’t get away with it over in Russia though. He thought he was God. He’d sooner have the seal than the man. He was after seals. He wasn’t bothering about the men’s welfare. Now, old Jacob was saucy, you know what I mean, but he was all right, you know. Now, Charlie Kean was another lovely man, and I think Jacob was his uncle.

It was a great life.

Andy Short, b.1900, Int.1973, 1976, 1986

The first spring I went to the ice was in 1925. I went with old Captain William Bartlett from Brigus in the Viking; she was blowed up after, down there off the Horse Islands. My father always went with Captain Bartlett, mostly in the Gulf, and he always could get a few berths from Captain Bartlett. So I made up my mind to go to the ice, and my father got me a berth.

We left St. John’s around the first of March because a ship going to the Gulf would always leave a few days ahead of the northern fleet. We passed up around Channel and we sighted the Burnt Islands and there was a neck of water. The captain put her in the neck of water, and we went on and followed that neck of water right in through the Gulf, and we never stopped until we stopped in the patch of seals. I heard the old sealers that were aboard say that it was the first time they had ever seen it happen so easily.

My father was the food controller that spring, so he wouldn’t go on the ice. But when everyone come up on deck, my father had his gaff and all. You see, there were four of us our first spring out; three from Brigus.

The captain says to him, “Bill, boy, where’re you going?” He said, “I’m going on the ice.” “No,” he said, “you’re not going on the ice. You’re going to stay aboard this one and look after your job.” “No, sir,” he says, “I’m not. I’m going on the ice. The cooks got their orders what to do.” “Oh,” the captain says, “all right. Take the four of them with you and show them how to sculp.” So he took us and showed us what to do. There was nothing to the job.

On the first it was all right, the seals were nearby, but then we had to go a good ways from the ship and haul the seals a long piece. On Sunday morning the captain came on deck and said, “Now, boys, anyone who wants to go on the ice can go, and anyone who doesn’t want to go, need not go. You don’t know how quick we are going to get caught in the ice and we could be here till the first of May. Through all hands going today, although it’s Sunday, we could make quick work of it.”

So everyone went on the ice. We had an awful lot of seals panned. Now, three seals were as many as you could haul any distance on dry ice, but if the ice was watery you could haul more because they would float along. So anyhow, everybody went and everybody used to take four or five, because it was good hauling. But they were big; whitecoats in the Gulf are heavier then to the Front. We hauled a lot that day, and Monday was the same. Soon we had the load hauled alongside and some stowed down. We didn’t take all we had panned; we couldn’t take them, because the way it was in days gone by you would kill a lot in case you lost some.

We got enough and we got up steam and we came down and we passed along by St. Lawrence. Captain Forward was the navigator, and I was appointed wheel master in the watch. When we got down off St. Lawrence, Captain Forward went down to Captain Bartlett, and he said, “I believe we are going to have a dirty night. I don’t like the look of it.” Captain Bartlett came up and looked around, “We will let her go on,” he said.

I was to the wheel all the ways down. I took it just up from Cape St. Lawrence. So we went on and by dark it was getting worse. The wind came right from the eastward, and we had a heavy load of fat. In fact we had two big pounds on deck, and the Viking was an old slow ship and she was not making too much headway. Now the watch I was in went off and the other watch took over.

Captain Bartlett came up and looked. It was snowing pretty thick now and the wind was in from the eastward and breezing up. He said, “If I had my time back again, we would have gone into St. Lawrence.” Captain Forward said, “It’s not too late yet.” We were about 15 or 20 miles below St. Lawrence and you couldn’t see very far; dark was setting in on us. Captain Bartlett said to Captain Forward, “Do you think that you can make St. Lawrence if we did turn back?” “Yes,” says Captain Forward. “I’ll make St. Lawrence.” “So all right,” he says, “if you think we will make St. Lawrence, we’ll go back. It’s a poor night to follow on.”

So Captain Forward turned her around and when he turned her around he came down in the hold to me. I was with my watch off. “Andy,” he says, “would you come up and take the wheel.” I said, “What’s the trouble?” He said, “You were to the wheel all the way down since we left St. Lawrence, and you made no mistakes. I was watching you all the time. We are going back and I’d like for you to come and take the wheel. If you can make the same steerage going back as you made going down, I got no worry about making St. Lawrence.” I said, “Yes, if that’s the way it is with you, but I don’t profess to be any better to the wheel than the man who is to the wheel now. What will they say—for me to go up and take the wheel from him?” “That’s no matter,” he said, “about the man to the wheel now. I’m asking you to do this for me. There’s 170 lives aboard this ship, and if we miss St. Lawrence, it will be bad.” I said, “Yes.” So I went and took the wheel and I took my own wheel crew.

There were two wheels, one aft and one forward, but the two of them were fast to one another. He told me the course to steer. It was gradually getting worse, worse, worse, all the time. By and by there was a big sea heaving in, coming kind of quick. The fellows to the after wheel had no compass, I was watching them, I had the compass. Sometimes it would be hard on me, because they didn’t know which way I was heaving her. So I said, “Now, boys, don’t touch the wheel till I tell you. Stand there but don’t touch the wheel. If I want to give me a hand starboard or port, I’ll tell you.” So I steered, and we went on and on.

Captain Forward was in the bridge, and he had his compass in the bridge. Every now and again he used to look down on me and see how I was doing, and then he would go and watch his compass. It was impossible to keep her right straight; you couldn’t do that. Sometimes she’d take a yaw, perhaps she’d go two points to starboard; when she’s come back the two points, I’d give her two points on the port, and then I’d steady her up. One time he came down, “Andy,” he says, “you’re giving her too much to the starboard.” “Well captain,” I said, “I’m also giving her the same thing to port.” “Remember,” he said, “we are going right for the light.” “Captain,” I said, “if you don’t make the light, don’t blame me.” That’s all he said. He went on.

By and by, Gushue, my master watch, came up. He walked back and forth and then went up in the bridge and had a look around. He said to Forward, “Is that a light just off there?” Forward said, “It could be.” They watched and watched and by God they saw it again and she was going right straight for the light. But they were not sure it was the light. You know you keep looking for something and you think you see it. It must be 10 or 15 minutes and by God they were sure it was the light. When Forward came down, “Andy,” he said, “that’s as good steering as ever I saw done. That light is as straight as you could draw it. I got no worries now. You’re going to make it.” So we went into St. Lawrence and dropped anchors. But blessed God, what a night we had. We had to give out our two anchors. It was a hard, hard place. It was a hard place to get in, in the night, I’ll tell you that, but we did it.

I went down in the hold. Then young Bill Bartlett, the captain’s son and second hand with him, came down. He said, “Andy you got to go up, the captain wants you.” I went up to where Captain Bartlett and Captain Forward were. They were talking, and Captain Forward said, “Now, there’s the man that steered down and steered her back. I doubt if there is another man in this ship could steer the course and be so correct as he did it tonight. I blocked him a couple of times on his course. I told him he was going too much to starboard, but he said he was taking just as much to port as he was to starboard. Don’t thank me: here’s the man you can thank for putting the ship here tonight.” And that’s what Forward said. Anyhow, we had a few drinks there together and I went and turned in.

That was Saturday and we were there all day Sunday. It was an awful hard time—a really bad night—and it was said we were lucky to get into St. Lawrence. They said if the Viking had to be out that night, she would never do it. She couldn’t do it with a load of fat, because fat wasn’t like anything else—there was a big sag to it. Monday morning we left and came to St. John’s and discharged our seals. [Int.1976]The Spring of the big trips: 1933

In 1933, I got a berth with Peter Carter on the Ungava from Monsignor O’Brien. At that time, there were so many going to sea it was an awful job to get a berth. And everybody had the one crew, all the time. But Monsignor O’Brien—he was Father O’Brien then—got me a berth. The Ungava was chartered by Crosbie and Captain Olsen—I think he was a foreigner. I think there were couple of St. John’s businessmen with Crosbie. They chartered the Ungava for 18 days. There were 231 men on board, including Willy Rielly from Torbay. We always went out on the ice together.

We all left St. John’s handy about the same time. We went down the same old course as the year before. We came across a few seals all right, and then we came across a good patch of seals where the Imogene was. The Imogene was into the seals three or four days before either other ship got into them because she had a crate on her propeller to protect it and she could go astern just as good as she go ahead. Anyway, after a while we punched into the seals towards the Imogene and we got 18,000 out of it. That was what they called the main patch.

Captain Blackwood had the Imogene and Captain Hill had the Eagle. The Eagle was the nicest boat for going out there because she was so short and she had good power. The Eagle got a load and was the first to dump its coal to make room for the pelts. In those days, the boats took a load of coal, but when they struck the patch, they had to dump it. I wish I had what coal what was dumped down in White Bay.

Anyway, we started in picking up scattered ones. I suppose Peter Carter wired in and told them that the patch was cut and seals were scarce. And they wired him back and told him to come on in with what he had. So we left to come in and we struck heavy ice—very heavy ice, rafting ice. When we got between Baccalieu and the Funks, but closer to the Funks, we got jammed.

We were there all that day and all that night and part of the next day. The master watch went to the bridge to have a look. Peter Carter told him to go up to the barrel to see if there was a lake of water we could get to. He looked out to the westward, in towards the land. And he saw everything black, and he thought that it was all water. So he came down and he told the captain, “Captain,” he said, “if you could get in there,” he says, “about 4 or 5 miles, there’s a big lake of water.”

The captain told the crowd in the engine room to start her up, and they did. But we couldn’t clear her. We put down powder cans and blasted, blasted, blasted, but couldn’t clear her. The master watch went into the barrel again, and this time he could see better because the snow had stopped. He came down and said to the captain, “Captain, I believe there’s seals in there.”

Now, it was all hands overboard, gunners and all the watches. The gunners started to fire at the seals and that patch went into the water. The gunners called for us to come back and get behind them because some of us could get shot. We didn’t mind them and went on, and according as we went the ice got tighter. I got so tight that you could walk along with your eyes closed in regards of falling in the water. Well, there were seals as far as you could see, as far as you could see with the naked eye—a body of seals.

So, all of the batsmen got in a line and started killing them with their gaffs and we killed up till 11 o’clock, just before noon. They were old seals, bedlamers and old harps. They were all on the ice. Seals get up on the ice in hot weather and they rest. We killed, and killed, and killed so much we put the flags everywhere. Captain Carter sent the cooks out, and the second hand with coffee. It was late in the evening so we had time to sculp only a few.

So the next morning we started sculping, and we were sculping for just about a week. They were hard to sculp because those were heavy pelts and it was tough to find strong pans of ice. Finally the Ungava got to us; she got into where we were and we started picking the pelts up. And when we got the last pan picked up, we were up off Western Bay Point, up in Conception Bay. There were eight winches on the Ungava and the eight winches were going. I’ll tell you the seals were coming aboard of her.

Now, there had been a lot of sun and many men were ice-blind. Willy Rielly and myself and a few others were all right. I say we didn’t have 30 men to go on the ice by now; the rest were ice-blind. When you went down in the hold, you wouldn’t know but it was a crowd of children crying, with the pain in their eyes. I know there was one man from Bonavista Bay—he was an oldish man—and he was sitting on the bunk with his pipe in his mouth.

I went down in the hold to get a bit of tobacco, and this oldish man said, he was gone for a smoke, and he says, “My son, for God’s sake, will you come and light my pipe for me?” The heat of the match used to make his eyes worse and he couldn’t light his pipe. I lighted the pipe for him and myself and Willy went back to work—we went and got the last pan. The Ungava she was overloaded and we had two pounds on deck. We had a pound on each quarter of old fat.

We left. We put the flags on her and away to go for St. John’s. The captain hauled her in towards Pouch Cove slowly because the ship was down in the water and her iron plates were covered. She was very heavy, and if she touched any kind of an old growler it could push a hole in her. So, we got in anyway. When we got in, Bowring’s wharf was lined off with loaded ships and so was Job’s wharf, too. We had to tie up and wait till some discharged. It was two, three or four days waiting.

We started to unload. We had to unload the old fat first because it was on top of the young. Then we started taking out the young. We thought we were going to make a wonderful lot of money. Everyone was sure they were going to make nothing under $100. But when it come out in the paper that night, it said the Ungava’s crew was going to make $40.

When I went down in the morning, we were told we were going to paid $40, and we said there must be something wrong. One master watch went in to get it, to take his money. And there was one old man, he jumped up on the head of a barrel, and he said, “If you goes in there, and takes that you’ll never reach home. You won’t get off of this wharf. I’m going to tell you; you be very careful what you’re about.” They were getting dirty [angry] and arguing with each other. The next thing we saw a couple of policemen coming down. But no one paid any attention to them at all. Then we seen here comes Olsen, and he went over to Job’s, and when he came back, “Boys,” he says, “I can’t do any better than $40, Job’s won’t pay any more.” You see, Job was buying the fat from him. “And I can’t do any better than $40 a man.” Some people said, “We’re not standing for that.”

So he left again and must be gone a half hour or more. While he was gone, the chief of police—and I suppose he must have had what force was in St. John’s. Well, we got a force, too. See, we had around 260 batsmen right there. And they were fit to do anything that morning, I’ll tell you. So this old man, he was speaking for the crowd. So he told the chief of police, “Now, sir,” he said to him, “Mr. Chief of Police,” he said, “the best that you can do is take yourself and your force and go up and control Water Street.” He said, “You’re not controlling us. We’re a crowd of men that’s looking for our rights. And we’re not causing any trouble. But,” he said, “we will. If you interferes, there’s going to be big trouble. So the best thing,” he said, “I can tell you, sir, is go up and control Water Street. Look out for the public up there. Not us! Don’t bother us at all.” And so the police chief and the policemen left.

Then Crosbie came down and went over to Job’s office. He came back with Olson and says, “Now, boys, I’m only proud you didn’t take the $40, but the best we can do is $80. All the old fat is over there on the wharf. The ship is over there and it’ll come over and take what they’ve got hove out—damaged skins. The ship can dump them out wherever they like. They don’t want them.”

You see, the seals were up on the ice and they got sunburnt, and we knew that ourselves when we hoisted them aboard because the skin used to break in the flipper holes. They were no good. So we considered it all over and took the $80, and they did what they liked with the fat. That was the only way we could do it.

That was the spring of the big trips, but the other ships got their fat in the main patch. The only one, I think who didn’t do much with it that spring was Jacob Kean in the Beothic. He got tangled up in Patrick’s Point, White Bay. He thought that the seals were up in White Bay. And when he got in, the ice packed in on the land on Patrick’s Point, rafted ice. And they had a hard time of it. That was unusual in my day because ships would hardly ever go into White Bay. It was a very queer thing to do. But, the man just made the mistake.

It’s hard to say who of any captain was better than another. Old Captain Kean had a wonderful name, but he always had the best ship, or one of the best, and that is why he got all the seals. It’s like me fishing out of here [Harbour Grace]. If I got a big boat to go to, we’ll say, Cape St. Francis fishing and you got a small one, you can’t go as far and before you get to Bell Island I’m off Cape St. Francis fishing. But that would not mean I’m a better fisherman. The captain I liked sailing with was Captain Isaac Barbour. Isaac Barbour was a good man and he was a quiet man, you heard no nonsense out of him. Isaac Barbour was a fine man, that’d be my man.

But the year [1929] we went with him in the Viking to the Gulf we made nothing [$9.46 a man] because the old ship was too slow and we were the last to reach the seals. And it was worse the following year in the Thetis, also in the Gulf, with Captain Samuel Wilcox [$4.49 a man]. That year we met the Terra Nova in the Gulf under Captain John Parsons. He was close to us. When it came on dark, we heard this screeching. We were ahead of the Terra Nova so Wilcox says, “Captain Parsons, I think there’s ever so many seals here.” That’s the words he said. “Yes,” said Parsons, “according to the screeching there’s no trouble to get a load of fat here come daylight.”

And when it came daylight, there wasn’t a thing to be seen, only a screecher [a whitecoat that has lost its mother]. Well, there were no oaths on that screecher that day. When you hear a screecher at night, you’d swear there were billions of seals there. There wasn’t one. So, anyhow, we got nothing, only got 40 pelts or something.

My best year was the first year I was out with Captain William Bartlett in the Viking. I made almost $100 that year. That year we must have killed two loads of seals. At that time, there was no such thing as kill your load. It was kill, kill, kill, kill. Everything was destroyed.

My father always went sealing with old Captain Bartlett, Bill Bartlett, Bob’s father, and mostly Conception Bay men went with Captain Bill. Sometimes he barely made enough to pay his passage home. But when they went to the Gulf, they always got bigger pelts. I don’t know why but there were always bigger pelts in the Gulf. My father was hard working and experienced, and Captain Bill always talked to my father and he would get my father to show the new hands how to sculp the seals. My father was a good man at that. He kept going to the ice until he had a heart attack and had to give it up.

I know he went out a few springs with Arthur Jackman and he said he was a rough man, a hard man but he was a good man to get seals. Well, he wasn’t a hard man on a man that was doing his work, but a man that wasn’t doing his work or was lagging in his work or anything, he was hard. You see Sunday was an awful day out there. Some of the people wouldn’t work. The Methodist people thought more about their religion than we did, the Catholic people. They were Sunday men. A few would work but a good many would be aboard because that was their religion. Jackman didn’t want none of that.

One time Captain Abram Kean went down to Bowring’s office and Bowring asked “Captain Kean, where are you going to hit the seals to this time?” And he had a big map there, one of them great big Newfoundland maps so he took the stick and said, “There is where I’m going to hit the main patch.” After Captain Kean left, Captain Jackman went in and Bowring asked him the same question and “I don’t know, sir, not yet.” “Well I’m going to show you,” he said, “where Captain Kean is going, right there”—and then he pointed.

And Jackman looked at it. “Mr. Bowring,” he says, “if Captain Kean hits the seals there,” and he was an awful man to swear. “If Captain Kean goes, there you can look out for the Terra Nova coming in clean, she’ll get nothing.”

Captain Kean left the next morning in the Aurora. When it came dark, Jackman was a good piece behind them. He put barrel of coal on the ice, a pan of ice, and he put a torch off it. He cut off east of them, put out all his lights, and went on. By and by the others saw the lights and thought that Jackman was broke down. Next morning, there was no sign of Jackman; no one knew where he went. So they all went down [north], took their cut, no seals. Went here, went there, went the other place; got no seals.

By and by they started to move southern again to see what was up in the bays, and when they got up around south of the Grey Islands, the barrelman says, “God,” he said, “sir,” to Captain Kean—“Captain, there’s smoke out there. She’s coming in this way and that’s Jackman and he got a log-load of fat.” “He have?” Captain Kean said.

Jackman was good. I’d say that Jackman was about the best of them at that time, according to what I used to hear the men talking. A wonderful man. He came from the Southern Shore. He was brought up, I think, in Fermeuse.

Now, the Barbours and the Keans and the Blackwoods were from the Bonavista area, and they were in the fish business with the Bowring’s. So they sold Bowring their fish, and they were in charge of his sealing steamers. I went with old Captain Abram. In fact, I was with him in the Beothic when he reached his million seal mark. Old Abram used to like to go up in the barrel, even when he was an old man. He had sealskin clothes and a big coat that came down to the tops of his boots. He looked like an old dog hood.

He was a wonderful man. He was a good man, there’s no doubt about that. But he wasn’t a man to take any mercy on men. He thought that the men were animals. He had no mercy on them whatever. No matter what the weather was or what it was like you had to go. Yes, sir, that’s what you did. And he’d get up in the morning say when you first start, struck the seals there, and he’d want every man on the ice to wait until he finished his talk. He’d make a speech then about this, that and the other thing, your master watches and all this kind of stuff. I was a master watch with old Kean.

I was in the Viking with Captain Isaac Barbour when she sprang a leak [1929?]. She sprang a leak, and we had to come to St. John’s. There was an old Spracklin from Brigus; he was a wonderful man [maybe second hand?]. The water was just about up to the fires, and you couldn’t get a man to go in the stoke hold. And old Spracklin said to Captain Barbour, “There’s one man I’ll get.” So I was bridgemaster then. I was sleeping in the hold, but I was eating aft. He came down, and he told me: “I can’t get a man out of all the watch.” I said, “Boy, I’ll go and do what I can.” I got down in the stoke hold and pulled the bucket up full of water, hoisted it up, and we kept the water down. Anyway, we saved her.

We got to St. John’s and he told me I should be a master watch and to go and have the test. Isaac Barbour must have had it in his mind to give me master watch because he told me to go and get my papers. Captain Abram and his son, Wes, and another son tested me.

Another time Ben Evely, a master watch, asked me to go icemaster. I said, “Yes.” So I went with him icemaster. When we got so far going, we saw there wasn’t a seal to be seen. And it was blowing and the snow drifting, and frosty. We went on and on and by and by Evely says, “Andy, you can stop here, boy. I can’t go, but you can go if you like.” Now, I was icemaster and I had a good fellow from Brigus and two fellows from Gull Island, two Stockwoods, and when they went on I went out to the westward. And I walked, and when we got so far, one of the Stockwoods got a galled heel so he had to go back and myself and George went on.

Well, we kept on walking and, by God, we walked into as clever a little patch of seals as ever you saw in your life. There were 215 seals and every one was in sight. And we started to kill them, and we killed them. When we got them all killed and panned, we started to look around. There wasn’t a sign of a man, not a man on the ice. So I said to George, “Boy, there’s nothing left for us only to go aboard.”

It wasn’t very late in the day either. But you see you finish quick because the seals were right thick. You could kill six or seven within the length of your gaff handle. We weren’t long slaughtering them. George was a good hand sculping, too. We sculped them and panned them and then we went back.

Now, we didn’t want to go aboard, I hated to go aboard before the day was out. But it was getting dark anyway, time to go aboard anyhow. And she was jammed. So Charlie Kean was second hand and Wes was navigator. When we got up so handy, old Abram sang out, “Do you see them men, Charlie?” There were only two of us.

“Yes, sir,” he said, “I see them. They’re a good piece yet.” Then there was a lake of water between us and the ship and we had to walk about 3 miles extra. And it was just after dark. By and by he shouted: “Charlie,” he says, “do you see them men?” “Yes, sir,” he said. “They’re here alongside.” So we got aboard and when we got aboard we went down in the hold.

Someone came along, and he said, “The two men that’s just come aboard got to go up. The captain wants them.” George was in an awful way, see. I said, “We’re going to get it now.” Figured we were going to get the calling down for not coming aboard with our watch. So we went up and he was up in the bridge. He came down. He said, “What’s your name?” I said, “My name is Andy Short, sir.” Now, my uncle Pat Short went with Kean a good many springs. He said, “Who gave you the berth?” I said, “Father O’Brien.” “Oh yes,” he said, “I know him.”

And he said, “What’s your name?” he said to George. And George got frightened to death, but he told him the clergyman gave him his. “Oh,” he said, “you’re two clergymen!” (laughing). “It must be that he didn’t let you come aboard, when the rest of the men come aboard. If not you gave me a tormented mind but you should have been aboard the ship.”

I said, “Captain,” George wouldn’t speak at all. I had to do all the talking. “You know, Captain, you look at my boots I’ve got on, probably you’ll see the reason why.” He looked down and the snow was all blood, frozen on the boots. He said, “What’s that? Blood?” I said, “Yes. We were killing seals all day.” He said, “What?” I said, “We were killing seals all day.” “You tell me,” he said, “that you killed.” “Well, sir,” I says, “I sculped 101 and me buddy there, he must have sculped 105 or six.” “Is that so,” he said. I said, “Yes.” “And what happened to all the rest of the men,” he said, “they never got there?” “Well, I don’t know, sir.” Now, see, the crew, all hands were talking like it was a goddamned lie I was trying to get on with. “Where are the seals to?” I said, “Out there on a pan about 5 miles east of this.” Anyhow, after a while he got the steamer clear. Now he said, “Did you have any supper?”

I said, “No, sir.” John Rose of Salmon Cove, he was the cook and the dishes were all put away, the galley closed up for the night. “No, sir,” I said, “we had no supper but I’ll guarantee you I could eat me supper now.” He said, “You’re going to get your supper.” So he called the cook to get it for us. He said, “Wes, take the men to my cabin, my table and see they got their supper and it’s a good one.” And he said, “Give them a drop of hot stuff that you got.” So we had two or three drinks of rum. He said, “You’re telling me the truth.” I said, “I’m telling the truth as this is the Thetis [1931], I told you the way to go.” Anyway, we got our supper, we got about two or three drinks of rum with this. And when we picked up the seal pelts that we panned they all believed us.

There was one fault—one thing I didn’t like about Captain Kean. He’d go off and leave you, be gone all day. Picked up pans that you panned probably last week some time. Only for the Imogene we would have been on the ice all one night, and a bad night, too. He went out picking up pans we panned about a week before. He got stuck. All the master watches got together and got all their men together. Kean wired the Imogene and it was the Imogene came and got us. Got aboard 12 o’clock in the night.

There was a lot of stealing, stealing seal pelts that belonged to other ships. Well, we would shove their flags down through the ice and up in the Gulf was the worst place of all, an awful place, up there. See the way it was when you’d sculp the seal and if you’re in the Viking, you’d cut a “V” in the fat. In the Imogene you could cut an “IM” or just an “I,” see and that would stay there.

Men from around St. John’s would take a box for their stuff and a barrel for seal if they could get on. The men from the north had a bag and a little slide that they hauled to the railway station in Gambo or Clarenville. They had a long way to go.

You know the way it was going to the ice, everyone on the ship would get something; would have something, a barrel of seal, a 10-pound tub of fat, a box of hard bread, butter. You see you’d get your allowance, and you ate what you wanted and brought home the rest. Butter, tea, and all that stuff. What you didn’t eat, you’d keep.

Sometimes we had long tows. Sometimes you’d have to make two tows a day. There was a lot of towing done in the Gulf, a lot of towing done there. See it was dry ice and it was very hard. Hard towing. The best time to tow, you know, is on watery ice. You can haul three times as many on watery ice as you could on dry ice. Sometimes there’d be a crowd of men in a long tow and the leader had to tow slowly so everybody could keep up. I’ve often seen men leave their tow and go ahead and cut the tow rope of the leading man. I remember Uncle Jim Fry was ahead once in the Gulf and Uncle Bill Coady told him to slack up, not to go so fast. Uncle Jim said he didn’t know he was doing it. Uncle Jim didn’t know until he was face on the ice. Uncle Bill let go and cut his tow rope. We always got an old man to lead the tow. A young man would kill the others. But towing in the Gulf was easier, far easier, than on front because the ice sheets were smooth while the ice on the Front was rough and raftered.

Whenever we got old seals, we always had a chance to get the seal cocks. And 1933 was a good year for that because, like I told you, we killed a lot of old seals. The gunners would shoot the old seals and the gunners’ dogs would cut off a piece of the tail. This was because each gunner had to bring aboard a piece of tail from the old seals to let the master watch or the second master watch, whoever was in charge of it, let them know for sure how many were shot.

Before that gunners often pretended to shoot more than they said and then when it came time for the ship to pick the pelts, there were fewer pelts than they reported. The gunners didn’t have time to cut out the cocks and neither did their dogs. Each dog was carrying 160 and 170 cartridges on their backs and they had to keep up with the gunners. It was the sculpers coming behind that got them.

When you sculped an old seal, when you ripped it down, you cut out the cock and you drove a hole between the grizzle [gristle] and the bone and then strung it on your belt. Every day you might get one or two but now not everyone would be at that, only some of the ship’s crew. When you took them aboard the ship, you put them in your box and you’d keep them in ice all the spring up on the barrackhead. The cock from the harp seal was about 6 to 8 inches long, and the hood seals was about 8 to 10 inches, and a good 1 inch thick. Now, we wouldn’t take the testicles, just the cock. But you never got them in the Gulf because in the Gulf all we used to get were the whitecoats. But on the Front there were always older seals to be got.

My father never got cocks because he always sealed in the Gulf. Now, the sealers around St. John’s knew more about this than the sealers from the outports and they knew that the Chinese laundrymen wanted the seal cocks and we didn’t know why. But they said that it made the starch whiter and stiffer. And there might be something in that because when I got a shirt from the laundry the collar would be as stiff, it would almost cut my neck. And this is how I learnt about it.

The first time I came into St. John’s on the ship there was this fellow Gerry Joy. He got the money for his cocks and he bought a bottle of rum. I got in [con]tact with him. He used to like his drink and the next spring I went out and I got a few, only about ten or twelve, but he got a lot. Now, other men thought that the Chinese made handles for walking canes from the cocks, but I always thought that they used the cocks for medicine.

Now, most of the St. John’s fellows had their cocks sold before they went out because they knew the Chinese laundrymen but the rest of us would be on the deck when the ship came in and right away the Chinese would come aboard. They couldn’t speak English very well but we all knew what they meant. They’d say, “You cock, you cock?” And you’d say, “Yes, I got cocks.” Then, “Let me see them. Let me see your cock.” And then you say, “Yes, I’ll show you the cocks. I’ll show you the cocks.” So he’d look at them and say, “What you want? What you want for cock?” Supposed you’d day, “Twenty-five cents a cock.” Then he’d say, “All right, me have. How many you got?” The big cocks from the hoods could be worth 35 cents. And there’s some would have a lot. I’d get $10 or $12 but I saw sealers making $25. There were people who made $100 on cocks but mostly we didn’t have time for it.

You see the main problem was to get them because mostly we got old seals while the ship was steaming slow through the ice. Every time we’d see them the gunners would go over the side, and their dogs, shoot the seals and then they had to keep going. So, we sculpers had to jump out, sculp the seal, cut off the cock, and have the pelt ready for the ship to winch aboard. Sometimes we just didn’t have time to cut off the cock. But it was a nice bit of extra money. And we all needed the money.

Mrs. Martha Andrews, b.1916, Int.1987 [wife of Cater Andrews]

[Josephine McGrath speaking.] Mrs. Andrews, your father, Captain Sid Hill, was a famous sealing captain, and I was wondering could you give me what you remember about your father going to the ice? I don’t remember too much but Dad was born on November 4th, 1885, in Wesleyville, and my mother was born in 1890, in Wesleyville, and from Dad’s boyhood he was always a seafaring man. He went fishing and, soon as he was old enough to go to the seal fishery, he went. I think with Captain Edward Bishop, and that was his mother’s brother.

Mrs. Andrews: Dad’s first time going as a captain to the seal fishery was in 1932 [1933] in the Eagle. And I remember that day quite well because there was a wedding in Newtown [BB]. Now, we had walked to Newtown the day before, and after the wedding we walked back and we got home around 3 o’clock in the afternoon. When we did get home, there was a telegram there from Bowring’s telling Dad he had been accepted for the Eagle, for that spring, to go to the seal fishery.

And our house that day was some bustle. Men from all over were coming to get a berth, and that’s something that I’ve never forgotten. He went captain of the Eagle for four years, and then the Beothic for three years—the Imogene in 1940 and the Eagle again in 1941. He was in the Imogene the spring before she was lost in the summer. She was lost off Canso, Nova Scotia; she was bringing home a load of freight or something.

I remember when Dad used to go to the seal fishery. It would be such an exciting time. Even before they went there would be some sort of a supper where they would all get together and celebrate. Dad always had a dog team that took him to Hare Bay, and from Hare Bay there was somebody always met him there and took him to Gambo.

But all of the other men would leave quite early in the morning, and each one had his sled, made to pull their belongings. I heard Dad say so many times that in Gambo the men would have all of those sleds, and before they’d get on the train, they’d leave their sleds, and all the children would try to get one; everyone wanted a sled. All the sealers carried pork toutons, also called pork buns, that’s like sorta biscuit with cut-up pork instead of raisins. They were delicious—they were really good.

All the men in Dad’s family went sealing. His brother was a sealing captain, Tom Hill, and his brother Samuel always went to the seal fishery and he had another brother James, who always cooked on the sealing boats. And there was another brother Edward, who went sealing as well. They were all involved in it. It was that and the cod fishery in the summer. And when he gave up the cod fishery in the fall he was lighthouse supervisor for Labrador. And if you didn’t go to the seal fishery, you just stayed home in the winter, and the men occupied themselves by getting wood for the fires.

They always brought home flippers and liver. And the first day they got back we would always look forward to that meal in the afternoon—of fried liver. That was delicious, but I haven’t had any for a long, long time.

Sometimes a whitecoat was born dead, and that whitecoat did not shed its fur. Dad and others always tried to get a [stillborn] whitecoat and have it mounted in St. John’s. My mother always had one. Also, my mother had a sealskin coat that was made at Ewing’s, I think in England. Right now I have that coat made into a mat, and it’s beautiful. It’s a rug, a large rug. Mr. Leslie Green, the furrier from Mitchell Furs, made it into a rug for me. Dad had a fur coat and a fur hat and he always wore these when he was captain. He always wore them on the bridge.

When the sealing boats were out for a few weeks, we would get reports on the radio. There were only one or two radios in Wesleyville then, and around 11 o’clock we’d go to a house or somebody would come to your house and tell you the news of the day. Every vessel [and] their catch for the day would be recorded, what they had on board, and what was on the ice. The ships sent wireless messages to the firms and the firms reported it to the radio stations.

[Josephine: A lot of people called him a gentleman.]

Hmm, hmm. He was. I shouldn’t say it because he was my father, but he was. He was a calm, peaceful man. He wasn’t one of those who would drive men out on the ice. And he went to the seal fishery for more than 50 springs.

His favourite ship was the Imogene, but the Eagle was sort of a pet ship. We were sad to see her being towed out through the Narrows and sunk in 1950 by her owners, Bowring’s.

In 1933, the first spring that Dad went out, they really had a big trip and Captain Blackwood brought in over 55,000 seals. The men made up a song that was almost 20 verses. Here are two verses from my scrapbook:

Come all of you seal hunters and listen unto me

While I’ll tell of the spring now in 1933

And hark just for one moment

I’m quite sure that you will

To hear then of the Eagle’s crew

And the brave young Captain Hill.

Now the Eagle is loaded it’s homeward we’ll steer

We must give credit to all of those three engineers

Who are down there in the engine room

The throttle in their hand

And doing their very utmost

To keep her from being jammed.

Dad was a most unassuming man. He was an expert seal hunter and he gave every consideration to the men who sailed with him. His shipmates of the 17 springs that he was in command of sealing ships—his memory has been cherished by them. He died in 1961; he was 73 years old. He was a wonderful father; we had a good family. Mom and Dad were married 28th January 1913 in the Jubilee Church. There were seven of us: Shirley Madelaine, Martha Iona, Gerald Irving, Oston Newman, Molly Minerva, Olga Bernice, and Julie Lane. And of that family there’s two left: my brother Gerald and myself. All died young—53 and 54 years old.

My husband, Cater [Dr. Cater Andrews, Department of Biology], passed away in 1978. He was really interested in the seal fishery, and he had quite a collection [of papers]. He had letters from the most important people, like Lord Shackleton. And I gave the material to the University. Dr. Fred Aldrich, Dr. Les Harris, and Dr. George Story [since deceased] are the executors of the collection, and they have given Dr. Shannon Ryan exclusive access to it now. Dr. Aldrich always keeps in touch with me and everybody appreciates the collection that Cater gathered.

Part 2

INTERVIEW EXTRACTS

WITH SELECTED TOPICS

Accident: Mrs. Elizabeth Breen, Thomas Dawe, James Fleming, Ron Goodridge, George Hoddinott, Arthur Kelloway, William Joseph Moores, Lewis Sheppard, Cyril Smith, Cecil Spurrell, Christopher Sturge, Ernest Wheeler

Age: John Crawford, Eric Gosse

Alcohol: Jesse Codner, James Fleming, William Gifford, Doug Gosse, Pat Gosse, Thomas Hayden, Tom Keefe, William Lowe, Arthur O’Neill, Israel Pearce, Charlie Short, George Winsor

Argentia: Henry Warford

Assistance: Cecil Spurrell

Attitude: Captain Samuel Blackwood, Eddie Bowe, Pat Gosse, Maxwell Humphries, William Joseph Moores, Stephen Mullins, Mark Parsons, Andrew Short, Richard Sturge, Gordon Thorne, Jabez Tuff, Ernest Wheeler

Badcock, Captain Richard: Jack Boone, Edward Fitzgerald, Frank Flynn, Lionel French, Wallace Menchions, Arthur O’Neill, Andrew Parsons, Alfred Snow

Baine Johnston’s: Gordon Thorne

Barbour, Captain Stanley: James Fleming, William Gillett, George Parsons

Barrel: Thomas Bragg

Barrelman: Stanley Sturge

Barrel of Seal: Cyril Butt, Roland Carter, William Flynn, George Parsons, Taylor Porter, Captain Ches Winsor, Thomas Woodfine

Bartlett, Captain Bob: James Fry, Taylor Porter

Bartlett, Captain William: William Boone, Harvey Dawe, Mrs. Ruperta (Paddy) Murphy

Beer: Fred Bragg, Thomas Bragg, Jesse Codner, Robert Doyle, Roy Keel, William Lowe, Richard Sturge, Ernest Wheeler

Beothic: Fred Bragg, Cyril Butt, Heber Keel, Edward Martin

Berths: Fred Bragg, Cyril Butt, Henry Butt, Harvey Dawe, Heber Gill, William Gillett, Pat Gosse, Edgar Hoskins, Maxwell Humphries, Job Kean, Heber Keel, William Kelloway, William Lowe, Thomas Maddox, William Joseph Moores, Gus O’Flaherty, James Oliver, George Parsons, Mark Parsons, Taylor Porter, James Rossiter, Edward (Ned) Russell, James Seymour, Andrew Short, William Spracklin, Stanley Sturge, William Sullivan, Thomas Swain, Gordon Thorne, Wilfred Tucker, Jabez Tuff, Abi Tulk, Henry Warford, William Way, George Winsor

Blackwood, Captain Al: Pat Gosse, William Joseph Moores

Boots: Warrick Horwood, William Joseph Moores, Mark Parsons

Bo’sun: Lionel French, William Gillett, Allan Parsons, Henry Warford, Stephen Whitten

Bowring’s: Fred Bragg, Stephen Whitten

Bridgemaster: William Gillett

Bunks: Roland Carter, Edward Fitzgerald, James Seymour

Burnt Out: William Gillett, Maxwell Humphries

Captains: Roy Keel, William Lowe, James Rossiter, Richard Sturge

Carbonear: James Oliver, Thomas Woodfine

Caribou: Fred Bragg, Henry Butt, Thomas Maddox, Gordon Thorne

Carpenter: Wilfred Vincent

Carter, Captain Peter: Don Fowler, Arthur Rideout

Cats: William Gillett, James Oliver, Robert Power, Thomas Swain

Changes: Cyril Butt, Doug Gosse

Chinese: John Will Brazil

Clothing: Eddie Bowe, Fred Bragg, John Will Brazil, Stephen Burry, Roland Carter, William Codner, Robert Doyle, James Fleming, William Gifford, William Gillett, Thomas Hayden, William John Leaman, Mrs. Alice Nugent, George Parsons, Robert Power, Christopher Sturge

Coaker: Stanley Sturge

Coal: George Burry, William Hussey, William Lowe

Cold: William Hussey

Coming Home: Job Kean, Wilfred Vincent

Compass: George Burry, Christopher Sturge, Wilfred Tucker

Competition: Stanley Sturge

Conflict: Allan Clarke, Cecil Spurrell, Stanley Sturge, George Wilson

Copying: Andrew Parsons, James Power

Crop: Thomas Bragg, Cyril Butt, Doug Gosse, Pat Gosse, Wallace Menchions, Taylor Porter, Stanley Sturge

Danger: George Parsons, Lewis Sheppard, Stanley Sturge, Gordon Thorne, Jabez Tuff

Death: Heber Keel, Fred Morgan, John Parsons, Mark Parsons, Taylor Porter, James Rossiter, Christopher Sturge, Wilfred Tucker, Ernest Wheeler

Deck Router: Maxwell Humphries, Abi Tulk, Wilfred Vincent, George Wilson

Deck Sheathing: Lewis Sheppard

Demographics: William Lowe

Disasters: Job Kean, Allan Winsor

Doctors: John Crawford, Mrs. Pauline Harris, Stanley Sturge

Dog: Robert Power

Dominey, Captain John: Thomas Bragg, Roy Keel

Donkey Men: Robert Doyle

Dory: Lionel French

Duties: Eddie Bowe, Thomas Bragg

Eagle: Heber Keel, William Lowe, Harold Squires, Stephen Whitten

Engineer: William Lowe, Arthur Rideout

Equipment: Eddie Bowe, Jack Kelly

Ewing Furs: Mrs. Philip Escott

Explosion: Roland Carter

Falling In: Eddie Bowe, Thomas Bragg, Stephen Burry, Norman Cobb, Ernest Collins, Harvey Dawe, William Flynn, Pat Gosse, Heber Keel, Sam Mifflin, Arthur Street, George Winsor

Family History: Heber Keel

Fights: Cyril Smith

Firemen: William Boone, Thomas Bragg, Jesse Codner, Robert Doyle, William Lowe, Arthur Street

First Arrival: William Gillett, William Lowe

First Trip: Eddie Bowe, Allan Clarke, Jack Dodd, Edward Fitzgerald, Frank Flynn, William Flynn, Thomas Kane, Thomas Maddox, Sam Mifflin, Andrew Parsons, Lewis Sheppard, John A. Smith, William Smith, Stanley Sturge

Flags: William Lowe

Flippers: Thomas Bragg, Edward Fitzgerald, Sylvester Hayes, Roy Keel, William Kelloway, William Lowe, Andrew Parsons, William Short, Arthur Street, William Sullivan

Food: Robert Boone, Eddie Bowe, Fred Bragg, Thomas Bragg, Robert Doyle, Edward Fitzgerald, Lionel French, Heber Gill, William Gillett, Pat Gosse, Charlie Hayward, Heber Keel, William Lowe, Cecil Mouland, Stephen Mullins, Israel Pearce, Robert Power, Andrew Short, Stanley Sturge, Ernest Wheeler

Food Controller: Cyril Butt, Cyril Maloney, Stephen Whitten

Fresh Water: Eddie Bowe, Doug Gosse, Edgar Hoskins, George Winsor

Frissell, Varick: William Gillett, Thomas Hayden

Frosters (Chisels and Sparables): William Coady, Job Coles, James Power

Gaff Handles and Brooms: Jesse Codner, Barth Walsh

Galley: Arthur Kelloway

Gambo: Thomas Bragg, Roland Carter, Andrew Ford

Goat’s House: William Lowe

Greenland Disaster: N. Parrot (Alf Burge)

Gulf: James Fry, Arthur O’Neill

Gunners: George Burry, James Fleming, Pat Gosse, Captain Thomas Hounsell, Arthur O’Neill, George Parsons, Gordon Thorne

Hard Bread: George Parsons

Harp Seals: William Joseph Moores

Hill, Captain Sid: Heber Keel, Watson Lane, Sam Mifflin

Home: Thomas Bragg

Hood Seals: Eddie Bowe, Fred Bragg, Jesse Codner, James Fry, William Gillett, Eric Gosse, Pat Gosse, Thomas Hayden, Frank Hynes, Cyril Maloney, James Mason, Sam Mifflin, Allan Parsons, Stanley Sturge, Gordon Thorne

Horses: Lionel French, George Parsons

Ice-Blindness: Cyril Butt, Henry Butt, Roland Carter, Jesse Codner, Doug Gosse, Pat Gosse, Thomas Hayden, Tom Keefe, William Joseph Moores, Gordon Thorne

Imogene: Captain Samuel Blackwood, Thomas Bragg, Stephen Burry, Eric Gosse, William Kelloway, William Joseph Moores

Jammed: Frank Flynn, Paul Healey, William Lowe, Wallace Menchions, William Joseph Moores, Mark Parsons, Herbert Sullivan

Kean, Captain Abram: Jack Boone, Robert Boone, William Boone, Stephen Burry, Cyril Butt, Don Fowler, Madeline and Eric Gosse, Thomas Hayden, Sylvester Hayes, Edgar Kean, Job Kean, Roy Keel, William Kelloway, William Lowe, Jerry McCann, Wallace Menchions, Sam Mifflin, Hans Noseworthy, William Noseworthy, James Oliver, Israel Pearce, Gilbert Pottle, Stanley Sturge, Wilfred Vincent

Kean, Captain Charlie: Robert Doyle, James Fleming, Roy Keel, Stanley Sturge

Kean, Captain Jacob: John Crawford, Paul Healey, William John Leaman, Stephen Mullins, Gordon Thorne, William Way

Kean, Captain Nathan: Captain Abner Kean

Kean, Captain Westbury: Stephen Burry, Pat Gosse, Edgar Kean, Lewis Sheppard

Knife: Thomas Woodfine

Ladysmith: William Lowe, Chesley Marshall

Landsmen: Norman Cobb, Ned Hynes, Jack Kelly, Jack Kinsella, Dorman Sacrey, Nelson Snow

Learning the Ropes: Eddie Bowe, George Burry, Eric Gosse

Levi Chafe: Angus Chafe

Lice: John Will Brazil, Edward Fitzgerald, Don Fowler, Pat Gosse, Thomas Hayden, William Lowe, Edward Martin

Living Conditions: Eddie Bowe, Fred Bragg, Thomas Bragg, Edward Fitzgerald, William Gillett, Doug Gosse, William John Leaman, Ernest Wheeler

Loose Ice: Henry Butt

Loss of Ship: Gordon Thorne

Manhood: Gordon Thorne

Marks: Fred Bragg

Master Watch: Warrick Horwood, William Joseph Moores, Stanley Sturge

Mercer, William (Magistrate): Tom Keefe

Money: Thomas Bragg, Stephen Burry, Cyril Butt, Norman Cobb, Doug Gosse, Pat Gosse, Job Kean, Roy Keel, Sam Mifflin, William Joseph Moores, Robert Power, Stanley Sturge

Murray and Crawford (Harbour Grace): William Kennedy

Navigator: Thomas Bragg, William Joseph Moores

Neptune: Allan Clarke, Robert Doyle, William Gillett, Arthur O’Neill, Robert Louis Stevenson

Newfoundland Disaster: CBC Broadcasting (Des Brown interview), Fred Bragg, Andrew Greenham, Thomas Hayden, Charlie Hayward, Heber Keel, Arthur Kelloway, Cecil Mouland, Hughie Mouland, Allan Parsons, Robert Louis Stevenson, Gordon Thorne, Jabez Tuff, Malcolm White

Northern Men: Charles Goodridge, Pat Gosse, Thomas Woodfine

Norwegians: Edward Fitzgerald, James Fleming, James Gillett, Joseph O’Brien, Mark Parsons

Old Seals: Charlie Short

On the Ice: Eddie Bowe, Cyril Butt, Doug Gosse, Eric Gosse, Pat Gosse, Wilfred Vincent

Panning: William John Leaman, Lewis Sheppard

Pastimes: Cyril Butt, Harvey Dawe, Job Kean, William Joseph Moores, Henry Warford

Pelts: Fred Bragg, Thomas Bragg, Cyril Butt, Andrew Ford, James Gillett, Paul Healey, Stanley Sturge, George Wilson

Pelt Tally: William Lowe

Penis: Jesse Codner, William Gillett, Charles Goodridge, Lester Hiscock, William Lowe, Hans Noseworthy, Arthur Rideout, Allan Winsor

Polar Bear: Edward Martin

Prank: Chesley Marshall

Preparation: Eddie Bowe, Pat Gosse, Job Kean, William Joseph Moores, Walter Power, Captain James Wheeler

Quartermaster: William Gillett

Quintering: William Kelloway, Jabez Tuff

Ranger: Watson Lane, Roland Russell, Stanley Sturge, George Wilson

Religion: John Will Brazil, Don Fowler, Doug Gosse, William John Leaman

Return Trip: Cyril Butt

Running Ice: Robert Doyle, Jack Kelly

Safety: Maxwell Humphries

Salvation Army: Roy Saunders, Richard Sturge

Schooner: William Gillett

Screecher: George Parsons, Andrew Short

Scruncheons: Lionel French, Lester Hiscock, Hans Noseworthy

Sculping: Roy Keel, Stephen Whitten, Thomas Woodfine

Scunner: Thomas Bragg, Edgar Kean, Stanley Sturge

Seal Eating Habits: Harvey Stone

Seal Finger: Cyril Butt, Roland Carter, Robert Doyle, Frank Flynn, Heber Gill, Pat Gosse, Thomas Hayden, Sam Mifflin, Wilfred Vincent

Seal Fries: Robert Louis Stevenson

Seal Oil: Jack Kelly

Sealskin Boots: Raymond Combden, George Parsons, Thomas Woodfine

Sealer’s Box: William Sullivan

Sealers’ Sweep: William Kennedy, Ted Murphy

Seal Whiskers: Lester Hiscock

Ship Supplies: Stephen Whitten

Ships: Fred Bragg, Thomas Bragg, Henry Butt, Cyril Cornick, Edward Fitzgerald, Frank Flynn, Edgar Hoskins, Maxwell Humphries, Taylor Porter, Captain James Wheeler, Stephen Whitten

Sickness: Edward Fitzgerald, William Hussey, Edward Martin, Alfred Snow

Sidesticks: James Seymour, Arthur Street

Signing On: Stephen Whitten

Sleds: Captain Ches Winsor

Southern Shore: John Will Brazil

Square Flippers: George Bath, Jesse Codner

St. John’s: William Lowe, William Joseph Moores, George Parsons, Robert Power

Stealing Pelts: John T. Boone, William Gillett, Heber Keel, Arthur O’Neill

Steward: Thomas Bragg

Storm: Mac Boone, William Boone, Thomas Bragg, Cyril Butt, Harvey Dawe, William Flynn, Lionel French, Captain William Gillett, Mrs. Carrie Kirkland, Wallace Menchions, Joe Mugford, Andrew Parsons, Ronald Rowe, Cecil Spurrell, Stanley Sturge, Henry Warford

Stowaways: Fred Bragg, John Crawford, Charles Goodridge, Eric Gosse, Sylvester Hayes, William Lowe, Arthur Maddox, Edward Martin, Hans Noseworthy, George Parsons, William Short, Robert Louis Stevenson, Captain Harry Stone, Stephen Whitten

Strike: William Christopher, Robert Doyle, James Fleming, William Gillett, Heber Keel, Allan Parsons, Stanley Sturge, Gordon Thorne

Sunday: Cyril Butt, James Fleming, Pat Gosse, William Lowe, James Oliver, Taylor Porter, Christopher Sturge, Stanley Sturge, Wilfred Vincent

Superstition: Harry Stone

Swatch: Andrew Ford

Tame Seal: Mark Parsons

Terra Nova: Allan Clarke, Andrew Parsons, Stephen Whitten

Tickets: William Joseph Moores

Tinsmiths: John Fleet

Tobacco: Thomas Bragg, Paul Healey, William Lowe, Robert Power, Alfred Snow

Torbay: Doug Gosse

Towing: George Burry, Edward Fitzgerald, Chesley Marshall, William Joseph Moores, Arthur O’Neill

Tragedy: Jack Kelly, William Lowe

Train, Conception Bay: William Boone, John Crawford, Robert Power, George Wilson

Train Dispatcher: Ray Lahey

Ungava: Fred Bragg, Henry Butt, Thomas Maddox, Robert Power, William Sullivan

Unloading: Cyril Butt, Edward Fitzgerald, Eric Gosse, Pat Gosse, Gordon Thorne

Viking Disaster, 1931: George Bath, Walter Gaulton, Heber Gill, Sylvester Hayes, William John Leaman, Arch Linthorne, William Lowe, William Joseph Moores, James Oliver, Israel Pearce, Walter Power, Ernest Spracklin

Watch: Heber Keel, William Joseph Moores

Watch (Dog Watch): Pat Gosse

Wheelsmen: Cyril Butt, Taylor Porter, Walt Spracklin

Whelping: Jack Dodd, Arthur O’Neill

Whitecoats: Henry Butt

Wilcox, Captain Sammy: Fred Morgan

Winsor, Captain Billy: William Boone, Jack Dodd, Pat Gosse, Thomas Hayden, Ephraim Kelloway, Arthur Maddox, Thomas Maddox, Dorman Sacrey, Gordon Thorne

Wireless: Robert Louis Stevenson

Women: Jack Kelly

Work on Board: Thomas Bragg

Work on Shore: Paul Healey, Lester Hiscock, Hans Noseworthy

Work on the Ice: Thomas Bragg, Cyril Butt, James Power

ACCIDENT

Breen, Mrs. Elizabeth, p. 2

My brother Harry Melendy was out to the seal fishery. They were using dynamite and they set it, but it didn’t go off. They went back to set it again, and it went off, and the explosion struck my brother in the face—his chin, his face, and his eye. I was working in the Lunatic Asylum and, when he came in, I went down to see him, and he was in poor condition. He lost his eye, and, when he came out of the hospital, he went home, but he was never the same. He passed away from the effects after about three years. [SRPW 704]

Dawe, Thomas, pp. 23-26

I was sculping and didn’t wipe the blood off my finger, and it froze. I never knowed it happened until I took my cuffs off to roll a cigarette. The tops of my fingers were black. I was out there a month. I suffered some, too. The index finger rotted, and I pulled it off myself. I had to work for a full month like that, with only one hand to do anything with. The captain, Stan Barbour, was old [1948?] and I suppose he thought it wasn’t as serious, because, if he had wanted, he could have sent me in. There were ships coming in while we were out there. When I got in, they put me in the Merchant Navy Hospital and the doctor took the three fingers off. The company gave me $150 for compensation. My wife wouldn’t get me ready no more. That was it. I’d go out no more. She said she’d never get another stitch of clothes ready for me to go sealing. She didn’t want no more part of that. [SRKB 801]

Fleming, James, p. 20

Our watch was on and I was driving the winch about 12 o’clock in the night. The cable got slack, and he must have tripped. The cable went over, and the loop went around his neck and brought him in under the winch. Killed him stone dead. We got him aboard and built a box and shaved him and washed him and put him in the box and salted him in. Then we put him up on the quarter[deck]. [SRPK 330]

Goodridge, Ron, p. 10

Someone was having a crap in the outhouse on the stern of the Beothic when the Imogene cut in too close and cut the outhouse right off the Beothic’s stern [1934]. He went down in the water, but they got him. [SRMJD 506]

Hoddinott, George, p. 17

I was shipwrecked once when ice hunting. I was wheelmaster that spring [1907] in the Greenland. The bridgemaster sang out, “Go astern.” And when she was going astern, she struck a little piece of ice no bigger than a barrel. The blades came off and went down and stuck in her keel. We tried to get the blade out of the keel but couldn’t do it. So we drifted and, after a while, when she got on the outside part of the ice, we all agreed to leave her. We got aboard with Jimmy Barbour in the old Iceland. He told us to come aboard and he’d do what he could. That’s all the man could do. He said, “When a man gets out [of] the bunk, you get in. When you see a man crawl out, you crawl in.”

Then we sighted the Vanguard coming. Six of us asked the captain if he was satisfied for us to leave. “Go on,” he said, “there’s more room for the others that’s left behind.” So we took our gaffs and went over to the Vanguard. By this time the Newfoundland had our bags aboard and we steamed up alongside her. I was as blind as a bat, and I couldn’t go aboard to get my bag, so another fellow got mine for me. We were aboard the Vanguard a long time. Anyhow, we got in St. John’s. Now, we didn’t know whether we were going to get either cent. But we went up and we got $24 each. And the Greenland went to the bottom. [C402/67-35 (JDAW/Fred Earle)]

Kelloway, Arthur, p. 13

One spring out in the Narrows they were blowing the ice up with powder to get through, and a big piece of ice pitched on him [Grandfather] and broke him up. I don’t think he was out that spring. He had to come back. [SRKB 854]

Moores, William Joseph, p. 37

One spring in the Imogene we were supposed to be in 8 o’clock the following morning because she had a charter. We struck a patch of old seals off Fogo and picked up 700 or 800 bedlamers. We fooled around the time we should have been steaming in. Well sealing, I suppose, was more beneficial. It was dense fog. You couldn’t see nothing, and you couldn’t run a log because there was too much drift ice. So we bore up some time that evening and came on that night. We were steaming 8 or 9 knots, double lookouts, and only her searchlight on. We made Baccalieu the next morning. There was a boat there—we heard the horn. The man on the boat said, “You’re about 4 miles off Baccalieu.”

Now we straightened her out for the Narrows. Couldn’t see nothing with fog. We were doing about 14 knots. He was pushing on her now to get in. The next thing you know, we were heading for the high land in Torbay doing 14 [knots]. A man from Torbay saw the land, and old Captain Taylor [navigator] was shaving. He came out and grabbed the telegraph. She was powerful, and she picked up. Now the row started. Who changed the course? Harold Penney, the wheelsman, said Captain Blackwood changed the course. If it had been in the night, her head would have turned back and she’d be gone down in 16 fathoms of water. There wouldn’t have been one soul sove. There’s how accidents happen. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

Sheppard, Lewis, pp. 24-26, 27-28

In 1939 there was a German ship coming in through the ice and she beat in her bows [SS Bochum]. She sent out an SOS, and we went to her assistance in the Imogene. Wes Kean was captain. We put our mate and others aboard, and they must have got a lot of liquor off this boat, because they all got drunk. We didn’t put a line aboard of her. She just steamed in our wake through the ice. I know they were drunk because we had Uncle John Roberts with us, and he was Salvation Army and he didn’t drink. He told us that night on the barrackhead. We were up on the barrackhead with our rubber clothes on—there was bad sleet. Uncle John Roberts was barrelman with us, but he was up on the watch that night with us taking a lookout. I heard a horn, and pointed. They said, “That’s on Cape Spear. We’re all right, we’re going right, that’s Cape Spear.”

Uncle John said, “That’s not the horn on Cape Spear. That’s the horn on the Narrows! We’re shooting down; we’re shooting down the shore.” There was a big searchlight on her what we had on her for picking up fat. They turned the searchlight on and Torbay Head was right ahead of us. The other ship was coming in right on top of us. We went full astern and backed into the big German ship. They couldn’t stop as quick as we stopped. They come like making a mess of her. It was close. I suppose within two or three minutes we’d have been all gone, because we’d have beat her right in. Captain Wes Kean never got a ship in Newfoundland afterwards. He went away.

I had a brother fell in the hold. We called him for going on 12 o’clock watch and we went to the mess hall [Imogene]. Uncle Henry Gaulton was our master watch, and he took off a couple of hatches. It was night, with no lights on. Vic was a young fellow, about 18 years old, first spring out. As soon as he ate his lunch, he went to get his clothes to go working. He didn’t know the hatches were open, so he went down. There happened to be a few pelts down in the bottom and there was a plank to stand on stowing pelts. He pitched on the pelts and his head hit the plank. He had his teeth all beat up and his lip ripped right through. We had a doctor aboard, and he sewed his lip inside and out. He was laid up for a long while. [SRKB 850]

Smith, Cyril, pp. 12-13

Captain John Parsons cut down Billy Winsor in the Narrows. Billy Winsor was in the Beothic and they were supposed to go out the Narrows at half speed. Whatever Billy Winsor did, he was going to put Captain John Parsons ashore. Captain John Parsons was in the Bonaventure, and so he wouldn’t go ashore. He gave it to the Bonaventure and ran into the Beothic and ripped the arse off her. Billy Winsor lost his spring. [SRKB 864]

Spurrell, Cecil, pp. 4-5

My father was chief gunner with Captain Abram Kean. He was out there a good many springs. He got broke up out there. Somebody left a hatch off, but the tarpaulin was hove over it. My father was a quick man. He jumped, and went right on down through. They took him up in blankets, presumed to be dead. They put him aboard the fastest ship, the Grand Lake, with Captain Job Knee. He was ready to go in to St. John’s. They carried him in and put him in the hospital. He came out of it. The doctor said that the only thing that took him out of it was a strong constitution. [SRBH 716]

Sturge, Christopher, p. 24

[Interview included Reuben Stokes] He was beat up when they were blasting; Harry Melendy, he never got over it. He always lighted the fuse with the poker. He said it wasn’t lighted, and someone said it was lighted. He knowed nothing before it was gone. We were on the hauling line and we heard them bawling out that there was a man killed. He wasn’t killed, but he was handy enough to it. [SRBH 719]

Wheeler, Ernest, pp. 4-6

[Ranger, 1939, second trip] We had three men broke up. You see, the boats never had much power, and sometimes you’d get jammed. When you’d get jammed, you had to get out a big line, get out on the ice, and haul, and help the ship through. You’d haul her ahead so far. She’d stop and go back and you’d let go the line. When she was coming ahead, you’d take up the line and run on again. So this day we were out and we let go the line and there was a bight in the line which went down over a pan of ice. When she came back astern, the line brought up and the pan burst clear and took three men. They were broke up. They were badly hurt. We had to get a dory out and get them aboard. We put them in the dory and hoisted them on board the ship. They were three weeks in pain, but there was no coming in, and no such thing as helicopters in those days. We got clear of the ice and came south to see if we could pick up some old seals.

We got off [at] St. Anthony and the captain decided to go in and see if the hospital in St. Anthony would take these three men. Sure enough, we got in to St. Anthony. We went into the edge of the ice and lowered down the dory. We put the three men in the dory and the whole crowd of us took them right to the hospital door in the dory. They had to stay. They were too bad to come back aboard. [SRBH 722]

Wheeler, Ernest, p. 33

I got a good fright one Easter Sunday morning. We ran into a herd of old seals and three of us gunners jumped out. The first one I shot at, I killed. The next one, I don’t know. I heard the shell go off, but the seal never moved. I shoved another shell up and pulled the trigger. I thought my head was gone. The second shell was damaged and the bullet stopped in the barrel. The last one I fired burst through the side of the barrel by my hand. I never got a scratch, but for a long time I had a ringing in my ears. And then we had to pay for the gun. If you lost a gun or anything like that, the whole crowd had to pay for it. [SRBH 722]

AGE

Crawford, John, p. 9

I was out there with old men, too. I was in a steamer one spring with a man 73 years old from down around Newtown, Bonavista Bay. He was 50 springs at it then, and he was a smart man.

[SRKB 822]

Gosse, Eric, pp. 15, 17

There were swilers who had good reputations and who could get a berth with anybody, anywhere, anytime, and they were really good. These fellows could sculp a seal in jig time, and they could copy from pan to pan. They were usually young men in their late 20s and early 30s. There were a good many schooner masters aboard her [Imogene], and they were men in their 50s and older; some of them would have white beards after a week or two. They were given a break. They didn’t go on watch at night; they didn’t bring pelts aboard her, or hitch them on, or stow them down. They were good sealers, but they were not used in extreme times. But they were all active. The Imogene was high and they’d go down the sidesticks and work all day, and they’d climb up with no problem. It was a prize crew and a good captain [Al Blackwood]. [SRKB 825]

ALCOHOL

Codner, Jesse, pp. 6, 12

I often had a bottle of rum and four or five bottles of moonshine in my box. Jim Young would take the key off me neck and put it in his box so I couldn’t drink too much or give it away. A big mug of punch with moonshine and a drop of hot water was really good when you came aboard. We did this but now the northern men wouldn’t. They had too far to walk and many of them didn’t drink. Moonshine was the mainstay. [SRPK 355]

Fleming, James, pp. 12-13

Poor old Norm Dyke. He went up to the bond [liquor] store and got four bottles of whiskey to bring home. He had the four bottles in his suitcase—a suitcase made out of board with hinges on the bottom—and he had it on his back, with a stick through the handle. There was no pavement in St. John’s then; it was all old brick. When Norm got to the station, the bottom came out of the suitcase and the four bottles went down on the bricks and broke. Norm got down and drank what he could from between the bricks. He said, “I’m ruined, I’m ruined, I’m ruined.”

We used to have wonderful times. Coming home on the train [to Bonavista] we used to open the bottles of liquor and put it in a teakettle and pass it around. You’d get loaded fast. [SRPK 330]

Gifford, William, p. 12

If you come aboard with your feet wet, you’d go aft and get a drink of rum. Old Jack Maloney, a big man, he’d make sure he’d full his boots every evening on the way coming aboard and go back aft and get his drink of rum. I’d get neither drink because I didn’t want to full my boots; I’d rather come aboard dry. He liked his booze, and he’d have his drink every day. [SRKB 818]

Gosse, Doug, p. 20

Anyone who could afford it would have a bottle or a couple of bottles of rum with them for the nighttime. If you were going on watch at 12 o’clock, you’d take a drink of rum and something to eat. There wasn’t much liquor on the ship, and no one knew what you drank. No one said you were allowed to drink or you weren’t allowed to drink, so you’d do it. [SRPK 317]

Gosse, Pat, p. 11

We’d have a drop of moonshine. The poor northern men, they had nothing like that. We’d have a drop of moonshine, a flask. We’d mix a drop of Redways [tonic] with it, if anyone fell in. [SRMD 411]

Hayden, Thomas, p. 18

If you fell in, the chief steward would give you a drink of rum. One fellow from here fell in. He was a fellow that liked his liquor. So when he went to the chief steward, the steward took the bottle and the glass and started to pour a little drink. He said, “Hold it now. Don’t put too much. I never tasted rum. I don’t know whether I like it or not.” Certainly, the natural thing for the chief steward to say was, “Here, take it yourself and pour it.” That was the last time the steward said that. [SRKM 513]

Keefe, Tom, p. 13

Most everyone would have a drop of rum going out, but most would keep it in case they got a cold. Of course, if anyone took any out of his box, it didn’t last long. [SRKB 811]

Lowe, William, p. 42

If you were working seals all day on the ice, they might have a kettle full of rum when you were coming aboard. The master watch or somebody would give you a drink, pour it in a mug, and all hands would get a drink. We’d get it once in a while, not too often. But if you fell in, they’d give you a drink. Some fellows would jump in to get a drink. [SRCJL 902]

O’Neill, Arthur, p. 56

When you were working hard, you’d get a drink of rum. When we were up in the Gulf towing those long tows, they had an old three-gallon teakettle of rum on the ice by the ship and a mug. I don’t know if it was pure rum, but you came up with your tow, took one drink, and you’d go on again. There was lots of rum aboard, but only on a special occasion you’d get a drink—for example, if you fell in. [SRKM 516]

Pearce, Israel, p. 8

I’d take a scattered bottle of shine [moonshine]. That was good and strong. Oh yes, I’d have a scattered bottle of that. [SRBH 710]

Short, Charlie, pp. 11-12

I’d carry a bottle of rum. For the nighttime. Cold weather. In the mornings I’d get up and take a good drop of it. That would warm you up. A cold day on the ice, you’d want to keep your blood warmed up. [SRBH 702]

Winsor, George, pp. 5, 15, 23

You’d go get the first seal of the voyage and bring it aboard and that would be called “wet the tail.” They’d cut the tail off, and the officers would have a drink. Sealers got nothing. Dogs got nothing. They called us dogs.

Some fellows would have a scattered drop of rum in a small bottle, put it in their pockets, and carry it on the ice. I did lots of times. We’d carry a couple of bottles out. You’d have a drop in a small bottle, have a scattered wet. It would cheer you up a little bit. [SRKB 807]

ARGENTIA

Warford, Henry, p. 8

Nineteen-forty was my last trip because I went on the Base [Argentia] in 1941. [SRKB 863]

ASSISTANCE

Spurrell, Cecil, p. 19

We came to get our crowd together for leaving to walk to Gambo, and we had one man who was sickly. I said, “Do you think you can do anything after you gets out there?” “Yes,” he said, “if I could get aboard the ship, I think I’d be all right.” I said, “Then you wants help to get to the ship?” “Yes,” he said. I said, “Will you trust me to get you to Gambo?” He said, “You knows I would, but you can’t do that. That’s too much to ask you.” “You give me your pack,” I said, “and I’ll put that in Gambo.” So that’s what we done, and he got out to the icefields and got his part of the seals. [SRBH 716]

ATTITUDE

Blackwood, Captain Samuel, p. 6

I didn’t like the seal fishery. I got sick and had the flu for a while. I didn’t like it. [He was on the Imogene with his uncle, Al Blackwood.] [SRMJD 502]

Bowe, Eddie, p. 21

When you were working for the dictator, anything could happen, and you couldn’t talk back. You could not talk back. The government at that time [1920s] was heedless because the government had to go to these people [the merchants] for money for the slush fund in the elections, and if they didn’t say yes to the money barons, they were out on a limb. It was hypocritical dictatorship from the start to the finish: might made master. [SRPK 301]

Gosse, Pat, p. 18

When you’d come home [from sealing], you’d be tired, and you’d say you’d never go again. But when it came round to spring, my Jesus, you’d be waiting for it to come. Waiting for it to come to get the bit of money. There was nothing else to do. [SRMD 411]

Humphries, Maxwell, pp. 12, 24

I loved ice hunting; yes I loved the ice hunting. I enjoyed every hour I could get out there. The hard work was only fun. It was all hard work at them times, whatever you were at. [SRBH 720]

Moores, William Joseph, p. 8

It wasn’t what you were going to make. It was the adventure, more or less. The few dollars was all right, too. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

Mullins, Stephen, p. 5; pp. 7,9

We used to love it then, love for the seal fishery to come. Because that’s all there was then. There was nowhere else you could go, only to the cod fishery. Then you’d be home during the winter months. You’d be longing for the first of March to come to get away.

Sealers’ life is a hard life, but I loved to go. I’d long for the train to come. If I was a young man, I’d go again, because it was great fun. [C317/66-25 (JDAW/Fred Earle), SRPK 333]

Parsons, Mark, pp. 3, 11

I loved it! Oh my sonny man. After the first spring, that was it. Every spring when January came, that was it. Out to the ice! I wished it was time to go to the ice. I loved it. I would sooner go at that than I would go catching codfish. Best thing I ever went at, regards of liking it. But first when I went out, I didn’t like it, the first day or two. I said to myself, “Well I’m out here to kill you [whitecoat]. I got to kill you. Look out! Here she goes.” [SRKM 507]

Short, Andrew, pp. 62-63

Getting a berth to the ice was in your blood. You’d come home [from the Labrador] in the fall of the year, you’d go in the woods, you’d haul out your summer firing and your winter firing, and still you were looking forward to a berth on the ice. If you never made a cent, you’d get a box of hard bread and a bit of butter, and they’d be damn scarce if you wouldn’t get a barrel of seal. [SRSR Reel 3A 07-26-86]

Sturge, Richard, p. 23

The merchants took all of the money. We’d get the seals, but the merchants took all of the money. That’s how they got so much today—what they robbed from the poor. [SRPK 336]

Thorne, Gordon, pp. 3, 22

I liked it. In the spring of the year you’d go out to St. John’s. You’d meet all your friends that you were with the spring before and everybody would be so happy and jolly. “What one are you going in?”—that’s all you’d hear. You’d meet all those people. Everybody was delighted to get together again. Yes, it was good. I liked it. Although some people gave it an awful bad name, I never saw too much bad about it. [SRMD 410A/B]

Tuff, Jabez, p. 26

Father [George] didn’t want me to go to the seal fishery. He’d take the shirt off his back for me to get an education. He went to school three days in his life, and he knew what it was not to have an education. But I came out of school around 12 years old, and I went in the woods. We had to do that to survive. We had wood stoves and we had to go 8 to 10 miles in the country for wood. [SRBH 724]

Wheeler, Ernest, p. 37

I enjoyed it to the best, enjoyed it to the best. The times were hard. Six cents a day in Depression times. You’d be tickled to death to get out to the ice to try to make a few dollars. [SRBH 722]

BADCOCK, CAPTAIN RICHARD

Boone, Jack, p. 6

He was a lovely man, but he wasn’t rowdy enough. He’d be down among the boys. [SRKB 827]

Fitzgerald, Edward, p. 16

There was no better you could get than Captain Badcock. Very quiet man. You’d never know he was on the ship. But his brother Lige (Elijah), the second hand, you could hear him bawling from French’s Cove to Brigus. [SRKB 814]

Flynn, Frank, p. 23

He was one of the best. Captain Winsor was a bit loud and his brother, Jabez, the second hand was loud, too, always bawling and howling. But Captain Badcock, you wouldn’t hear him speak over his breath hardly—a very soft, mild man. [SRKB 802]

French, Lionel, pp. 22, 26

Captain Badcock was a good man with men, and he was a good skipper. The best time the Ranger ever paid was after he took her. He was good. He was on the bridge all the time during that storm in 1939. He was quiet—a great man for the men. Joking with the men. You never heard him bawling. But some people want to be heard. It don’t matter if it’s something or nothing; they just want to be heard. He wasn’t like that. The rest of all those skippers were northern people. He was the only man from this way [Conception Bay] in my time. [SRKB 812]

Menchions, Wallace, p. 17

The next year [1940] we went up in the Gulf on the Terra Nova with Captain Badcock. That was his last trip. I asked him why he give it up. “Well,” he said. “I had to give it up. All you fellows went to work on the American Bases, and there was more money to be made on shore.” [SRKB 856]

O’Neill, Arthur, pp. 26, 58

Captain Dick Badcock was a lovely man; you couldn’t get better. He was a very nice man, a quiet man. You’d never hear him bawling or swearing. All you could hear him say was, “Come on, me cocks, come on, me cocks.” That was a Bay Roberts word. He was a lovely man. And if you done your work with him, you had no trouble. He’d always send you your berth. If you didn’t go get it from him, he’d always send it through the mail to you. When he liked you, that was it. As long as he went to the ice, you went.

The spring I was in the Viking [1931], Captain Badcock was in her. The next spring they gave him the Ranger to go in the Gulf. I had a berth in the Ranger. On the train to St. John’s, the conductor or the brakeman, or the baggageman, came along. He said, “I got a berth here in the Viking. That’s a better berth. You better take it.” I said, “No, I’m going with that man, Captain Badcock.” [SRKM 516]

Parsons, Andrew, pp. 7, 9

Captain Badcock was a good man in the Gulf. He knew the Gulf pretty good. He used to be second hand to Captain John Parsons on the big boats. He was very careful with men. He thought more about a man than he did about the ship. [SRKB 843]

Snow, Alfred, p. 6

Uncle Dickie Badcock was a wonderful captain. There was no bawling or yelling. He’d just talk to you nice and calm. He was a very quiet man. You could hardly hear him from the bridge on the ice. [SRKB 853]

BAINE JOHNSTON’S

Thorne, Gordon, p. 2

Baine Johnston had the Seal and the Sagona and they used to land their seals at Munn’s old premises in Harbour Grace. But they had no ships after the Seal blew up in 1926. [SRMD 412A]

BARBOUR, CAPTAIN STANLEY

Fleming, James, pp. 7-8

Stan Barbour [Bonavista] was the best captain. He was a wonderful man. He looked after the men. He was good for men. He didn’t even want a man on the ice after dark. In bad weather he used to let them lie down; he put no man out in rough weather. [SRPK 330]

Gillett, William, pp. 4-5

He was better than his father, George Barbour, in one way: he could smell the seals. Once he had us on deck for two and a half hours with our gaffs and ropes waiting to go over the rail. All the big ships, the Nascopie, Imogene, Beothic, and Ungava, were coming southwest, and we were going northeast. We were in the Neptune. We panned 7,000 that day. The captain said, “Don’t report it [via the wireless]. We’ll get another day out of it.” So he reported it the next morning and four ships came back and cut across us. We were in the ice then. But we got 18,000 out of it anyway. [SRPK 351]

Parsons, George, pp. 32-33

If he seen the old seals on the ice, Captain Barbour wouldn’t put you overboard. He’d stop the boat, and I’ve heard him say, “I think we’ll heave her up here for tonight. We won’t go up to disturb them.” The other captains would say, “Get overboard, boys, and we’ll get 200 or 300. Stan Barbour would wait, and at night in the spring of the year, the nights would be sort of calm and the ice would freeze together. He’d say, “It might harden up tonight, so they can’t get down.” In the morning he would say, “If you can bat them, don’t fire a bullet.” Because the noise of the bullet would wake them, and they’d go off the ice. But we used to bat all we could, and you’d bat an awful lot of seals in 20 minutes. [SRKM 508, 509]

BARREL

Bragg, Thomas, p. 26

Captain Dominey would go up every now and then and have a look around, but he wasn’t up as much as the second hand and the barrelmen. We had two barrels on her forward mast. [SRPK 304]

BARRELMAN

Sturge, Stanley, pp. 20, 22

The barrelman didn’t have to go on the ice at all. He’d be up in the barrel spying with a big long glass—see about 40 miles. You’d spy everywhere looking for the seals. Four hours, then the second hand would go up, and you’d come down for four hours. If the men were out, you’d be watching them, which way they’d go. He’s not watching the ship at all. It’s the scunner who got to watch the ship. [SRPK 309A/B]

BARREL OF SEAL

Butt, Cyril, pp. 41-42

A bit of seal or flipper would be a treat for the family. It would be good to get home. You’d get a good wash, get cleaned up. You’d bring in a barrel of pickled seal. Me and my father, we’d bring a barrel each. You’d put it out again[st] the door, take the head out and give every bit away. [SRKM 501]

Carter, Roland, pp. 27-28

You’d have your barrel. The first thing you’d do is go to the cooks and try and get a barrel. When the cook would have an empty barrel, you’d say, “Now, old man, what about a barrel.” A lot of fellows used to carry them out from St. John’s: go to the retail store and buy a barrel and carry it aboard. You’d get the pickle from the galley when they’d be cooking salt meat or pork. You’d get that pot liquor, put the seal and the flippers in the barrel, and heave in the pot liquor. That was salty and helped keep the seal. A lot of fellows would bring home a barrel of seal. That was a treat when you came home in the spring of the year. This fellow or that fellow coming for a meal of seal . . . [SRBH 718]

Flynn, William, pp. 26-27

I remember one spring I got a barrel when I went out. I got three carcasses; I filled the bellies up with ice and put them in the barrel, and I iced them around everywhere so they weren’t touching the barrel anywhere. The first night we were in St. John’s every barrel went off the barrackhead stolen—only mine and another one left. The St. John’s men stole them and stole them to get rum. My friend said, “The best thing you can do with them, if you can’t get them through the train, is get clear of them.” I sold them for 75 cents each—three carcasses. It was a sin. I had them to bring home. [SRKB 815]

Parsons, George, pp. 25, 83

We used to get a barrel of carcass to bring home. You wanted to go to the ice just for that. And we used to salt our seal. We’d take two gallons of salt with us. My father told me how to do it up; a gallon and a half was enough in a barrel. We’d have our pork barrels. I’d lug me pork barrel on me back from up on the north side of St. John’s and down on the Southside and another 20 or 30 going along with me. We used to buy them in the small grocery stores up on Middle Street. We’d pay 50 cents for them. You needed a good hardwood pork barrel. Head up the barrel and get a funnel fit in the bunghole and pour in beef pickle from the cook—the first boiling from the beef. Roll it around every now and again and tip it over on the other head. [SRKM 508, 509]

Porter, Taylor, p. 25

We’d bring back our barrel of flippers and give it all away. No such thing as selling it. The first thing you’d do when you’d come in is to get the barrels off the boat, carry them up to the station, and ship them home to Clarke’s Beach. They’d be up there again[st] the railway station when we’d come home. [SRKB 809, 873]

Winsor, Captain Ches, p. 2

And when they’d get in town, they’d all be taking off for the merchants to get their 200-pound barrels. They’d get their barrel of seal. They thought more of that than the wages they were going to make. They used to corn it. When the cooks would have Jiggs’ dinner, corned beef and cabbage, they’d take the liquor and put that on the seal. Many’s the time we used to take them home in the Winnifred Lee. When they opened the barrels in Wesleyville, the meat was so red and beautiful and really delicious. [SRMD 402A/B]

Woodfine, Thomas, p. 27

I brought home a 55-gallon molasses cask full of carcasses and flippers. Gave it to poor people to eat. [SRKM 511]

BARTLETT, CAPTAIN BOB

Fry, James, pp. 27, 29

Bob Bartlett was out with us one year. He used to bring back seal skeletons to sell in New York somewhere. One Sunday Charlie Fry went dogging with him, and Captain Bob went down in the water to his ass. And Charlie went to haul him up, and he said, “By the big Lord and Saviour, if I can’t get up myself, I’m satisfied to go down. Don’t touch me.” But Charlie had to help him after, because he was bet out. [SRKB 838]

Porter, Taylor, pp. 29-32

We had Captain Bob Bartlett with us one spring. He was the best kind, friendly, couldn’t be better, like his father and his brother Bill. When we were coming along by St. Pierre, he came along to me and wanted me to go north with him. I said, “Captain Bob, how long are you going for?” He said, “Three years.” “Oh God,” I says, “I can’t go for three years, Captain.” He was out taking pictures with his father and his brother that spring. He wanted to get a dog hood, a bitch hood, and a pup. He got the bitch and the pup; he never got the dog. Paddy Fitzpatrick, here in Bay Roberts, sculped them. He sculped the bitch like a cat, took the carcass out through a hole in the stomach. He wanted them to bring to New York to a museum. He put the skeletons in a box and sent them to New York, too. [SRKB 809, 873]

BARTLETT, CAPTAIN WILLIAM

Boone, William, p. 15

Captain Will was a nice man, but you had to be prepared for what he was going to say. If you were walking slow, he’d bawl out, “Walk along faster there, boy. Your grandmother would walk along faster than you.” [SRKB 824]

Dawe, Harvey, pp. 8, 11

He was a good man. He was careful over his men. If there was a snowstorm, he’d be on the bridge right around the clock. But he was sarcastic; he was really sarcastic. You never knew what he was going to say next. He called you an old lady; he called you anything. But I’d rather be with Captain Bartlett any time. [SRKB 804]

Murphy, Mrs. Ruperta (Paddy), pp. 2, 7

[Granddaughter of Captain William Bartlett Sr.] Right after Christmas my mother would start getting ready to go to Brigus to keep her mother company while Captain William Bartlett went to the seal fishery. He’d come over and stay at our house while signing on the crew, which took a couple days. He did all his seal fishing in the Gulf. The majority of men came from Conception Bay. He was a very strict, cold Methodist, and he didn’t agree with a lot of things. Like for instance, there was no drinking on board any ship that he had. And he had church every Sunday. His son William went with him for years, and then one year he had a ship of his own and he went to the Gulf also. Whether his ship was smaller or not, I don’t know, but he was filled before his father. He came around to Rose Blanche and heaved to till his father passed. He wouldn’t come into the harbour before his father. Some of the Bartlett wives just hated the seal fishery. The Bartletts went to Turnavik, Labrador, for the summer cod fishery. So really from the fall until Christmas was the only time they were home. [SRFW 108A]

BEER

Bragg, Fred, p. 41

The firemen brewed molasses beer in a barrel. [SRMD 406]

Bragg, Thomas, pp. 12, 16

Firemen used to always have beer up forward in their quarters. If you were good and chummy with the firemen [they belonged to St. John’s], you’d get a drink of beer. There’d be nobody getting drunk, but the firemen would have a drink of beer. And if you got friends with them, you’d get a bottle of beer—used to have it in bottles. You could get a bottle of beer off them, but that’s all you’d get. You’d bring them aboard a few flippers for that. And a drink of beer would be nice coming off the ice at 6 or 7 o’clock at night, after getting on the ice at 5 o’clock in the morning. [SRPK 340]

Codner, Jesse, pp. 7-8

Jim Young, Will Codner, and myself—we slept together. One time Jim brought out a gallon jar to make homebrew. Will said that he wouldn’t be bothered with it, so we put in a brew down by the steam pipes. We hauled it up to taste it, and it was half gone. I said that it must be leaking, and, as we watched there, Will was going into it before it was brewed. And he said he didn’t like it! [SRPK 355]

Doyle, Robert, pp. 20-21

I often brewed it myself out there. You’d make it out of molasses and yeast cake. One of the firemen used to go and buy hops, and he would brew the beer all the time. We used to have about 10 gallons brewed all the time. That was for the firemen. [SRMJD 507]

Keel, Roy, pp. 7-8

I used to go down and help out the firemen. That’s where I learned how to fire her. And in the coal there was a big keg of beer and a mug hung on it and a tap in the lower part of it. All belonged to St. John’s—most firemen belonged to St. John’s. There was Jack—used to work in the Belmont [tavern], a bouncer. He was good and gave us the mugs, and I was three-parts cut when I’d come up out of that, because I liked beer. [SRPK 327]

Lowe, William, p. 18

I made molasses beer many a time, when I was a fireman, not a sealer, the last 15 or 16 years living down below. You had the best of grub, the very best of grub. But the poor sealers didn’t get it. We’d get two barrels off the bond store, them swish barrels. Buy your own hops, and lots of molasses on board. When we’d be drinking one, we’d put the other on. We’d give the sealers the odd drop—anyone belonged to town—might be two or three hands belonged to town on deck. [SRCJL 902]

Sturge, Richard, pp. 14-15

We made it out of molasses and raisins and yeast. We’d leave it in a week. It was good beer. No one knew. The only captain that knew it one time was Captain Sid Hill. He knew it. We had a birthday party for me, and we asked him to my birthday and gave him a drink of beer. He only laughed at it. He wouldn’t say anything to us Wesleyville fellows. We could do what we liked with him. We used to be down in the room by ourselves. All that was in the room knew, but none of the rest did. If you couldn’t get the stuff from the cook, you’d rob it from him when he was gone. Nobody ever got in any trouble. [SRPK 336]

Wheeler, Ernest, pp. 19-20

We had a fellow belonged to Flatrock. He’d come aboard without a berth, and the captain gave him a chance. He had a big molasses tierce for flippers. Now, when we got jammed in White Bay he went back aft and got so many cakes of yeast—I suppose he stole them from the cook, and so much warm water. He put on a brew. One day the skipper called out for four or five men to go out on the ice. He said, “There might be a few old ones after beating in through the ice.” So he called out the names and up came the men—everyone half-on. They jumped over the rail, and when they got on the ice, they couldn’t make a step. Now, the captain didn’t know what was wrong with them. He never even dreamed they had beer. “Skipper Gus,” he said, “what’s wrong with them? There’s something wrong with them.” He called them back again and they got aboard and he went to see what was going on and there was the big molasses barrel almost half full of beer. “Now,” he said, “you get rid of that.” They were good springs. Hard, but you enjoyed it. [SRBH 722]

BEOTHIC

Bragg, Fred, pp. 18, 40

Bowring’s bought the Beothic off of Job’s in 1934. My father went in the Beothic the first spring when they went up in the Gulf, and all the sheeting came off. The plates were too thin; they were on with rivets, and the heads wore off with the ice. They had to put her on dock somewhere and get the plates welded back on. [SRMD 406]

Butt, Cyril, pp. 29-31

The Beothic was pretty good; she had larger sleeping quarters between decks, and there was no coals down below. They kept the grub down there. It was cleaner than aboard the Eagle. That boat kept the coal right down under you. And the Beothic was warm. They’d hardly ever take the hatches off without they had to take up so much food from the bottom hold. They had to take off so many pound boards to hoist up some food, then put the hatches back on. But aboard the old Eagle it was like a square hold. They’d take off the hatches and the berths were all built around in a square. Perhaps your watch would be off in the night, and when they’d take off the hatches you’d look up and see the sky and the stars and the snow would be coming down. There’d only be an old stove burning coals in the middle of the hold for heat, and it wouldn’t be very warm. But the majority of times you’d sleep in clothes anyway—your pants and stuff. You’d take off your overalls and your top clothes. Sometimes they stowed fat in the sleeping quarters. That’s what they used to call getting “burned out.” They used to have to take off the hatches and stow fat. [SRKM 501]

Keel, Heber, pp. 3-6

I got my berth in the Beothic [with] Captain Stan Barbour [1940]. We sailed down to the Straits and struck the seals around Belle Isle. The Imogene was there, Captain Sid Hill in the Ranger, the Neptune, and the Eagle. And three Norwegians. We had 225 men. We killed 8,000 the first day and 8,000 more the second. We must have made up around 25,000 young seals.

Stanley Barbour was a good man for the old seals, so we came on south. This particular day he was in the barrel in the morning, and he said, “Tell the cooks to get dinner at 12 o’clock. There’s a large patch of old seals ahead.” And he looked around. “I wonder is that the Imogene out there,” he said. He didn’t want to see the Imogene. She was fast. “Oh,” he said, “it’s all right. It’s the Eagle.”

We were steaming for two or three hours. We were about 20 miles off Cape Bonavista. We went into the patch, and they put out the gunners—14 or 15 gunners. I knew two gunners, Jim Fleming from Spillars Cove and Raymond Dyke. We went out, too—Val Short, Will Short, George Parsons, and Billy Rowe. We went where there were seals the gunners never touched and we killed 300 or 400 with the bats and we pelted them. We never had a flag, but we put up Bill Short’s handkerchief. Barbour was a wonderful man for old seals. We killed 5,000 or 6,000 and we went north again into another patch, but the Imogene was there. We got around 1,000.

Then on the last of it, we went down off Cape Bauld. The Ranger was there, but the Imogene and Eagle were gone in. We made to a patch of old seals in the morning but Stanley sent nobody out. We let the seals stay there until the sun got warm. Then he said, “We got 2,000 cartridges. That’s all we got left. I want 1,000 seals.” We went out and we fired them all down to 200 or 300. We got 1,500 seals. Then the ice got slack. He put out a punt and four or five went out in the punt and fired away the rest. So we came on home and got in Sunday morning. We could not get to the wharf, because the Imogene was there. We had 33,000. We were nearly two weeks taking them out.

Now, the flippers were 20 cents a dozen the first day. And the last day, around the 5th of May, I had six or seven dozen. There was an old man there and he said, “Young fellow you got some flippers?” “Yes,” I said. “What’s the price?” “Ten cents.” “Well boy,” he said, “if I had 10 cents to give you I’d have a dozen, but I got no money.” “Well,” I said, “come here. Look here, here’s two dozen for you.” “What for?” “Nothing.” He took the two dozen. “Well,” he said, “the old woman and me gets $12.50 every three months. Fifty dollars a year.” “That’s nothing,” I said. And he shook hands. “God bless you,” he said, “I hope you’ll never be in want. We’ll have something tonight to put on.” And I was never in want. [SRPK 324]

Martin, Edward, p. 8

On the Beothic you never had to go out and eat; you always had the sealers’ mess on the Beothic. You could go up any hour of the night and get a cup of tea and a slice of toast. [SRST 501, 502]

BERTHS

Bragg, Fred, p. 28

There used to be 30 berths in the Imogene for Pouch Cove, because the people there sold all their fish to Grouchy. [SRMD 406]

Butt, Cyril, pp. 2, 22

My father used to get two berths all the time off old Abram Kean, so I decided to go in 1936 [18 years old]. That was Captain Kean’s last spring to the seal fishery in the Beothic. Father was with Captain Kean for years. We had to go to St. John’s on the train. That would take about four or five hours. There wasn’t too many [who] used to go to the seal fishery from this area [Harbour Grace]. So Father had the two berths, and he went to Captain Kean and told him he had a man, and that was all. We signed on in the office, so you wouldn’t see the captain. But I guess he found out who I was before the spring. The captain didn’t have all the berths. The fishing company that supplied you had so many berths from the company to give the fishermen. Anyone who got a berth from the captain was a good man. [SRKM 501]

Butt, Henry, pp. 2-4

I was 20 years old and my father generally got berths from the Crosbie firm over in St. John’s. He had his berth this year, and he was getting up in age, and he decided not to go, so he said, “I’ll give you this berth and let you go to the ice. You can go with Captain Winsor, if he’ll take you.” So I went over and Captain Winsor looked at me—he used to have glasses on—he looked at me and he said, “Boy have you got any experience?” I said, “No, Captain, I got no experience to the ice. If I go, this will be my first year.” He looked up the second time. “Oh,” he said, “I think you’ll be all right. You’ll do.” So, I signed on and went to the ice on the Caribou [1936]. [SRKB 851]

Dawe, Harvey, p. 11

I went to Captain Bartlett [1925]. He didn’t know me. He said, “As long as you come from Port de Grave. All good men down there.” [SRKB 804]

Gill, Heber, pp. 2-3

Captain Richard Hounsell from Pinchard’s Island was a cousin of Captain Peter Carter of Greenspond and he’d send him down five berths for five men to go to the seal fishery [1930]. I got one of these. My two cousins, Frank and Dave Norris, got two of the berths also. [SRPW 703]

Gillett, William, pp. 17, 21; pp. 17-18

I went with Captain Barbour’s son Stanley in the Neptune in 1929. She was 52 years old when I was on her. We had a month on the Front and a month in the Gulf.

My father knew about the seals and where they were to. I carried over a message to him—I was about 10 or 12. It said, “What’s your opinion of seals?” Father wired back, “My opinion, White Bay full of harps, Green Bay quite a few hoods.” The big ships, the Bonaventure, the Bellaventure, the Adventure, and the Nascopie, they all got to White Bay and got into the seals. Father used to get 40 or 50 berths from Bowring’s. He’d give 40 or 50 men a note to take to Captain George Barbour or Billy Winsor. [SRCL 201, SRPK 351]

Gosse, Pat, pp. 2-3

My father used to get berths from Captain Billy Winsor. Mrs. Billy Winsor was one of our customers. We used to sell her eggs and dandelion and pickled cabbage and cream. So my father used to get berths from her husband. My father came home, and when he came home, he was a bit vexed because I had gone out and got the berth ahead of him. I went with Gordon Thorne on the horse and slide. [SRMD 411]

Hoskins, Edgar, pp. 2-3

My dad was sick but he heard that Captain Jacob had the Thetis so he asked for a couple of berths. Dad always knocked around on the boats with Jacob. So two tickets came: one for the father and one for the son. When the time came, my brother took the berth for the son, and I took Dad’s berth. When we got to St. John’s, my brother signed on all right. He had no trouble. Captain Jacob Kean was a tough old guy. So when I went in the cabin, he said, “Where are you going, hey?” I said, “I got a berth to the ice.” He said, “I had that one for your dad, not for you, you young pup.” Now, I came out of the cabin, and he said, “What are you going to do now, you going back home?” “No,” I said, “I’ll stow away.” So that’s all. I just walked out. My uncle was there, Cecil Harding. He said, “That’s all right, Edgar. I’ll go in and see the skipper again.” Uncle Cec went in and talked to him and he told me to come back in again. So I came back in and he signed me on as a cabin boy. I was 16 years old. That was in 1936. [SRBH 723]

Humphries, Maxwell, pp. 8-9

I had to haul two loads of wood out of the woods to pay for my berth to go ice hunting. It was Captain Stan Barbour’s cook who I got the berth from. He said, “Yes, boy, you’ll get the berth if you haul me a couple of loads of wood.” You’d do anything; you’d haul five loads for to get to go out. [SRBH 720]

Kean, Job, p. 10

Captain Charlie Kean gave friends in St. John’s four or five berths. But they gave him good men or they wouldn’t get a berth the next year. If you didn’t do your work, you were blacklisted. You were not going to get a job. You had to pull your weight. Father didn’t have to ask, “Are you any good to work?” That’s a silly question. That’s like asking a fish, “Can you swim?” [SRPK 305A/B]

Keel, Heber, p. 2

The first spring I was to the ice [1939, Terra Nova] I got my berth from J.T. Swyers [merchants, Bonavista]. We went to the Gulf, but we were too late and we got jammed to the Bird Rocks. We were there for three weeks in a solid jam of ice. We only made $4. [SRPK 324]

Kelloway, William, p. 2

The first year I got my berth from Uncle John Kelloway. He was my uncle. He used to get berths. He sailed with Captain Abram Kean for a long, long time, going to the seal fishery for 50 or 60 years or something, with Captain Kean. The next year he gave me a berth again, and the next year I got my own berth from Captain Kean. I wrote to him, and he sent me a berth. That was the end of my going to the seal fishery. Captain Kean came ashore, too old a man to go [1936] anymore. [SRKB 855]

Lowe, William, p. 66

St. John’s men couldn’t get a berth; you couldn’t even buy a berth. There might be two or three St. John’s men in one ship, but that’s all. These skippers had their own men. After the First World War the DVA [Department of Veterans Affairs] used to give them a few berths—and a few others. Like now, Paddy Murphy’s father used to get a berth down to Mr. McNamara’s for him. [SRFW 103A/B]

Maddox, Thomas, p. 2

I got my berth from the merchant, Thomas Devine [1932]. He was living in King’s Cove, and he knew Captain Winsor from Wesleyville. [He always got his berth from Devine.] [SRPK 326]

Moores, William Joseph, p. 32

Berths were got through every means—politics and money and booze and everything. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

O’Flaherty, Gus, pp. 3-4, 11

When I first went to the ice, I was 16 and I had my 17th birthday out there [1925]. There was no age limit. I got a berth off of Edgar Tucker. He used to go to the ice all his lifetime and he used to be a master watch and get berths off the captain. I got a berth to go on the Ranger, but when I got to St. John’s, the captain turned me down. I was too small or too young. I tell you I was in some fix.

I had friends—Will Johnson and a fellow from Gull Island, Dan McCann. His father was a master watch for a good many years and he had a bit of pull so he took me up to see John Crosbie. Crosbie had a little office there where Parker and Monroe is now. I went in and he asked me who I was. It seems my father voted for him, so he asked about my father. I told him he was dead. He never said nothing. He wrote a note and gave it to me. He said, “You go down aboard the Thetis now and see Peter Carter.” I went down and he gave me the ticket, and that was it. I didn’t know a soul aboard her. I got my crop: $9. I got a pair of skin boots but I don’t know what else I got. The sleeping conditions were very good. There was no coal down where we were to and two hands to a bunk. The fellow who was with me belonged to Bay de Verde: Joe Walsh. He was never out before. [SRKM 510]

Oliver, James, pp. 7-8, 12

My first berth was from Leo Johnson in Northern Bay. His father was a merchant. He used to have a few berths every year. He gave me one in the Ranger; the second spring he gave me one in the Beothic. Johnny Wheeler, my uncle, was my master watch the first spring. He was killed in the Viking disaster [1931]. [SRKM 523A/B]

Parsons, George, pp. 4, 9

My father told me how he got his first berth. When the roll was called on the wharf in St. John’s, he jumped down over the wharf on the ice and got on the end of the line to haul the ship out through the Narrows.

Now, my father was still going to the ice, and I couldn’t get a berth [1938]. You had to go to the merchant you sold your fish to. That was the only chance you had to get a berth to go to the ice. I got a letter from W.J. Moores [Carbonear]. And you’d have a letter from them and perhaps you’d have a letter from two different companies. I went in Bowring’s office to look for a berth. A Mr. Lang was there, I think. He said, “What’s again[st] you for getting a berth—now is this is your first spring out?” And I said to him, “Sure, if you don’t take some of the new hands, where are you going to get the rest of them? There was no one born out there.” Anyway, I got the berth. She was supposed to leave at 8 o’clock, but she didn’t leave till later.

I had to run up across the street from Bowring’s to Neyle Soper’s to get a second pair of long rubbers and a Green River knife—and to buy the chisels and sparables. I tapped me boots on the way out. I had the leather with me. [SRKM 508, 509]

Parsons, Mark, pp. 4-5

I went over to St. John’s and I was talking to a man over there—Billy Moss [1940]. He was from St. John’s, but he had a boat sailing from Halifax, the Arctic Sealer. I asked for a berth, and he asked me where I was from, and I told him Carbonear. He said, “Yes, boy, you can have a berth. Are there any more good men over there?” “Yes,” I said, “I’ll get us a few berths over there.” Be God, he gave me five tickets right there and then to bring back and give fellows that was out before. He said he wanted experienced men. I was never out before but I didn’t tell him that. I was with that man 14 springs after that. Every spring he’d [give] me as high as 12 berths to give out to people. Billy Moss was the captain and Shaw was the owner. [SRKM 507]

Porter, Taylor, pp. 2-3

I went to Brigus to Captain Will Bartlett once or twice, but all the berths were filled up. He says to me, “Come in on spec.” I says, “Captain, I’m not able to afford to come in on spec.” Just two or three days before they signed on, Will Morgan, he had a ticket. And when I went up, he called me in. He was sick, and he gave me the ticket. That’s how I got the berth [1926]. [SRKB 809, 873]

Rossiter, James, pp. 2-3

I went over on speculation to try to get a berth [1935]. There was a man there, William Rowe, who had a berth for his son on the Imogene. His son was on the train coming around the bay, but the train was blocked with snow that spring. William Rowe told me I could have his son’s ticket but I would have to give up the ticket if his son got in on time. So I took it and went to the ice in another man’s name. You weren’t supposed to do it. The navigator was Captain Eugene Burden from here in Carbonear and his brother was to the wheel. Captain Burden asked his brother if Jim Rossiter was aboard. He stopped. He knew. And he said, “Yes, he is.” Captain Burden went over the articles. He said, “His name is not on the articles.” “No,” his brother said, “it’s in Billy Rowe’s name.” He said, “When you goes down, tell him to come up I wants him.” When he came down, I went up, and he said, “How long since you became Billy Rowe?” I said, “This morning when we left.” “Well,” he said, “try not to let Captain Blackwood know about it because you’re not suppose to do that.” Captain Blackwood never found out. [SRKB 844]

Russell, Edward (Ned), p. 31

Tom Walsh gave my brother Jack the ticket belonging to Jack Halloran. And he was signed on in Jack Halloran’s name. When the papers came out after the disaster [Southern Cross, 1914], Jack Halloran’s name was printed and my brother’s was not. [SRSR Reel to Reel 4A]

Seymour, James, p. 7

When I asked him [Captain Badcock] for the berth, myself and poor old Bob Richards, the two of us—“Now,” he said, “what are you going to do out there, you two laddies?” “Be gor,” we said, “we don’t know. Suppose we’ll do what every other fellow does.” “Boys,” he said, “you look too small for to go to the ice. It’s not going to be what they say it is.” “Well,” I says, “we can do it.” “Be gor,” he said, “you might be all right.” He gave us the berths, and he didn’t regret it either. [SRKM 502]

Short, Andrew, p. 6

It was a damn good job to get a berth at that time [late 1920s], but when I paid Father O’Brien my dues, I asked him to try to get me a berth to the ice. He said he would, so I didn’t bother him anymore, because everyone was after berths. I had it given up and I was hauling out wood and doing one thing and another. This evening he was going down in his car, coming from St. John’s, and he stopped by the house. I was cutting up some wood when he blew the horn. I went down to the car, and he said, “Andy, what ship do you want to go in?” “Well, Father O’Brien,” I said, “that’s a big question with berths so scarce—what ship do I want to go in? You must have some wonderful pull somewhere.” He said, “I got a few berths.” So he told me what berths he had. He had a couple in the Nascopie, the Terra Nova, and the Thetis. Now, old Captain Abram Kean used to go in the Nascopie at that time, so I said, “I think the Nascopie is the best berth.” He said, “I’ll give you a berth in the Nascopie.” I went to St. John’s and signed on with old Abram Kean. We got a good trip of seals at the Front. When we landed our seals, I got talking to Captain Kean and I asked him about a berth for the next spring. He said, “Who gave you your berth this spring?” I said, “Father O’Brien.” “Oh yes,” he said, “I know Father O’Brien.” “Yes my boy,” he said, “I’ll give you a berth.” And by God, he was a man to his word. When the time came, I wrote him, around January, and he sent me my berth. [SRSR Reel 3A 07-26-86]

Spracklin, William, pp. 2-6

There was a man, Walter, here in Cupids who always used to go to the seal fishery. He knew lots of captains and he had a berth as master watch. He decided to build a new boat, so he said he wouldn’t go out to the seal fishery that year. He said to me, “You take this letter and give it to Mr. So and So. He may get you a berth, no guarantee of that, [but] there’s a chance.” So I went over, but this man was sorry [but] he had no berth open. I couldn’t take Walter’s place because he was a master watch and I was only a green boy and there was no berth left.

So I stayed around St. John’s for a while with a couple more young fellows like myself who were in there on speculation. I went in to old Abram Kean’s—he was living on Old Topsail Road—I knocked on the door, and the old gentleman came out. He was nearly sorry he never had a berth for me. That was the impression he gave me. He had a crew.

I went aboard the Neptune. Captain John Dominey was in the Neptune at the time. I went up on the bridge in the chart-room. I asked him, and, well, he was sorry he had no berth. So I hung around Job’s and Bowring’s, from one place to another, waiting. On the last day there was always a chance for “a period of jump.” If a man didn’t turn up, you might be called up to sign in. I went over to Bowring’s on the north side, where the Beothic was tied up. By and by I decided to walk to Job’s ship on the south side. The boys were hanging around with me, but me and another fellow left, and when I saw them later, they said, “Boy when you just left, five minutes later they sung out for three men.” I put in one night aboard the mail car—I knew the mailman. I put in a night aboard the Sagona with Uncle John Antle from Brigus; he was the oiler. I waited till the ships sailed and then I went out on the train the next day: no berth. I forgot about the seal fishery. [In 1947, I went cook on the Ice Hunter.] [SRKB 806]

Sturge, Stanley, pp. 19-20

I knew Captain Abe Kean, Jr. He used to go with the old man Kean as second hand. One day I was talking to him, and he said, “You should go to the seal fishery.” I said, “I can’t get a berth.” “Well,” he said, “here’s your chance. I’ll give you a berth.” I went over and told poor Mother. She said, “No, that’s what you’re not going.” “Well,” I said, “I am.” “No,” she said, “you’re not.” “Yes,” I said, “I’m going to the seal fishery.” “No,” she said, “you’re too young.” Anyway, Captain Abe came over and just as a joke he said, “Boy are you ready?” I said, “Mother won’t let me go.” He said, “Victoria, he’s going.” “No,” Mother said, “he’s not going. He’s too young.” “Yes,” he said, “he’s going. He’s got two brothers, Bill and Edgar, going out. Why not let him go?” He kept on and persuaded her, and by and by she said, “All right.” I was tickled to death. I had to walk from Brookfield to Gambo—40 miles. You had to take your sleigh with a pack of 70, 75 pounds and drag it through snow to Gambo. It would take two days to get to Gambo. [SRPK 303, 304A]

Sullivan, William, pp. 18, 29

My father was never to the ice. I had him tormented to death to get me a berth to go. He was a friend of Captain Bill Winsor. He got the berth for me. That was in 1928, the year the Ungava came to Newfoundland. Job and Co. owned her. The next two years [1929, 1930] I got the berths myself from the captain. The third spring I was out [1930], I said to hell with it. I gave it up. I never went after. [SRMD 404A/B]

Swain, Thomas, pp. 4, 10

I was working on Bell Island [1935]. Bell Island closed down in 1930 when the Depression came. There was no other place to go. I had no other choice. I got a berth from Skipper Cy Moores, who was our fish merchant, and I went out to the ice. I didn’t go on account of liking it. Skipper Cy Moores used to get his berths from Skipper John Blackwood in Valleyfield. He was the brother of Skipper Al Blackwood, captain of the Imogene. My master watch was John Mullett from Valleyfield and a good man he was, too. I was in his watch three springs [1935, 1936, 1937]. [SRKM 506A/B]

Thorne, Gordon, p. 3

I got the first ones from Baine Johnston because my father was a dealer there. But I went with Captain Winsor all the time after that. I jumped the Ungava. There was a man who didn’t turn up. George Field from Torbay asked Captain Winsor if he could have the berth. I had a couple of pairs of socks in my pocket. The man didn’t turn up, and Billy Winsor hollered out to George, “Where is that man?” George said, “Right here.” I hopped aboard. [SRMD 410A/B]

Tucker, Wilfred, pp. 2-3

There were two men, George Petten and Stephen Morgan, they were going up to Brigus [from Port de Grave] to get a berth to go to the ice. That was in January month or February [1918]. And I was in the road, standing up, and George Petten said to me, “Come up, boy, and get a berth and go to the ice.” I looked at him. I was only 17, and I said, “Hold on, I’ll go up and see the old man, see what he says about it.” So I went up and said to Father, “I’m going to Brigus to see if I can get a berth to the ice.” “You’re going to the ice?” he said. “You’re too young to go to the ice.” I said, “I’m not too young to go to the ice.” “Go on,” he says.

So I went up to Brigus and went in with Captain Will, went in to his house. He knew George Petten and he knew Steve Morgan because they were with him before. He didn’t know who I was, so he said to Steve, “You got a young fellow with you.” He said, “Yes, he’s looking for a berth, too.” And he said, “Can you use a gun?” I says, “Oh yes, I can use a gun. When it comes to a gun, I’m all right.” So he says, “All right, boy, you got the berth.” [SRKB 810]

Tuff, Jabez, pp. 13-14

My father knew the Keans well. They were close. I had no berth, so I went to St. John’s on speculation. I went up and Captain Wes Kean said, “You’re George’s son?” I said, “That’s right.” “Well,” he said, “Jabez, there’s a berth here for you for sure. I couldn’t turn you down for the sake of your father.” So that’s how I got my berth on the Imogene. That was the year after my father died. [SRBH 724]

Tulk, Abi, p. 9

I went to work with Captain Alphaeus Barbour when I was a boy—13 years old. I worked for my grub bringing wood and coal. For two winters I never got a cent. For the next two winters he gave me $20 each winter, and I went to the ice with him when I was 17 years old. I went with Captain Alphaeus Barbour five springs, I think. I went two springs as cook and steward. [C809/70-4 (Mel Firestone)]

Warford, Henry, pp. 2-3

You had to be a customer of Ches Fillier [South River, 1930s] for to get a berth. He gave out 40 berths. He’d figure out how much money you spent, and he’d keep account of it, and I think whoever spent the most money would get the first choices. The big choices would be in the Imogene and the lowest money would be in the Ranger. It was all a barter system. We’d make hoops and drums and get food from Fillier’s, no money at all involved. We lived on barter. [SRKB 863]

Way, William, pp. 15-16

The last spring I was out I went up on speculation. I had no berth at all. Got ready and went on with Bobby Hobbs and Joe Martin. They were going. I lined up with them to sign on. I was with Stan Barbour before. When I went in, he said, “Hello Bill. Back again?” “Yes, sir,” I said, “but I haven’t got either berth. I’m up on speculation.” “That’s all right,” he said. He wrote down my name and gave me my ticket. That was the end of my ice hunting. I wasn’t out after. I went into Gander working. [SRPK 331]

Winsor, George, p. 2

I got my berth from the captain’s wife, Mrs. Blackwood [wife of Al Blackwood, Imogene]. She’d have so many berths from the captain. [SRKB 807]

BLACKWOOD, CAPTAIN AL

Gosse, Pat, pp. 5, 8-9

We came in, and when we came to Sugar Loaf, here the seals were numerous. Al Blackwood told us to get out. He said, “Me darlin’ men, you’ll never see the like of this again.” We got out and killed 1,000 seals. We took the carcasses and we took the flippers. We had no barrels to put our flippers in. So he told the master watch to take the big pork and corned beef barrels and “knock the heads out of them.” They threw the corned beef overboard and gave us the barrels to put our carcasses and flippers in. So we came in with all flags flying. The most flippers in number [over 55,000]. The captain got us up on the deck and he wired Captain Abram Kean; he said, “I’m after beating your record.” Well that was some charm [noise]. That was the spring [my friend] Gordon Thorne with Peter Carter brought in the heaviest trip [1933].

He was the nicest man and the best that ever went to the seal fishery, but he was finished, and when we went to the ice the next spring [1938], we went in the Imogene again with Westbury Kean. And when we were going down off Bonavista, the flags were flying and the guns were firing because Al Blackwood was dead. He [Kean] stopped the ship. There weren’t many Roman Catholics in her, but we went up front by No. 1 hatch and said the rosary. Then all the Church of England and Wesleyans went down in the back below and said their prayers.

We had a little young fellow to say the rosary up in the firemen’s forecastle. He said, “Now, next Sunday night we are going to say the rosary in No. 1 hold, and when we say the rosary, that’s going to be full of seals.” We said the rosary [the next Sunday] and No. 1 hold was blocked off [with pelts]. He said, “Now, next Sunday we’re going to say the rosary in No. 2 and that’s going to be full, too.” Full it was. “Now,” he said, “next Sunday night we’re going to be on No. 3 and say the rosary. And when we say the rosary, that’s going to be full.” Sure enough. “Now,” he said, “next Sunday night you’re going to say the rosary at home.” And it was like that: when we got home, it was Easter Sunday. We took off our clothes and went to Mass and went to prayers and said the rosary Sunday evening. Well boy, you wouldn’t believe the faith. [SRMD 411]

Moores, William Joseph, pp. 40, 41

Blackwood was a very fine man. The only time you’d hear him cursing an oath was if a fellow was getting aboard in a hurry. You take 70 or 80 men in one bunch and every fellow wanted to get aboard the one time. Scattered fellow would go in the water. “Now,” he’d say, “me darlin’ fellows, look here. I’m not going to leave up. Take your time, take your time. There’s lots of grub in the galley.”

I never see Al Blackwood in the barrel. He never went in her barrel, that’s the top barrel. The scunner had an under-barrel. But old Captain Abram Kean was up in his 70s—76 or 77—and I suppose the Nascopie’s barrel was 80 or 100 feet from her deck. He’d go right to the top to that barrel. He’d be there for the whole day, and if he wanted a mug of coffee, someone had to carry it up. Now, he was a different man altogether. I never went with him, but they say he abused fellows. Captain Blackwood wasn’t like that: finest kind of a man. And when the dark come, he’d go below. He died a young man in his early 60s [54]. High blood pressure. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

BOOTS

Horwood, Warrick, pp. 14-18

Boots: chiselled and sparabled. Five chisels in the heel. Abram Kean wouldn’t allow a man to go on the ice if his boots weren’t chiselled. Every man had to have chiselled boots, but it petered out after a bit. The men started to get wise. They’d take up their crop for the fishery. They’d have new hip rubbers for the summer and keep them in their box or their clothes bag. They’d use a pair of old rubber boots with a bit of leather on the heels and stick a few sparables in the heel. They couldn’t jump on the sidesticks; they couldn’t jump on a pan of ice. In the Caribou Jack Barrett and I used to jump out on the ice picking up seals. Captain Winsor swore and said, “How in the hell is it that you two fellows are always down strapping on seals and the other fellows are on the side of the ship and can’t get off?” I said, “They got their boots in their clothes bags. They got on long rubbers, and they can’t jump. There’s nothing wrong with the men. It’s what they got on their feet.” I opened his eyes. We fellows had rigged our boots out for the ice. That was drilled into us. You had to have boots with old man Kean. But Billy Winsor’s crowd, the Wesleyville crowd, had long rubbers [1935]. Not a man aboard had chiselled boots. [C865/71-3 (L.G. Small)]

Moores, William Joseph, p. 25

Some old fellows had the pure leather boot. I had a pair one time. They said it was pigskin, tanned pigskin. But them old fellows had the cap knee boots. They came up to above the knee and then there was a cap around the knee cap. Tap [sole] on them about three-quarters of an inch thick. And they were pegged. And them boots were tight. A lot of people used the sealskin boot. The sealskin boot was very light for travelling and all that, but if you only touched them with the chisel in the other one, it was leaky right away. And it was hard, very hard, to tighten a skin boot. You’d see fellows going around sometimes with their boots ripped in one day. A scattered fellow would have a skin boot, a pair of skin boots, looking for someone to sew them. There was only one or two aboard the Imogene. Andrew Ford from Wesleyville used to sew them. A fellow out on the ice all day wouldn’t be interested in your boots in the night. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

Parsons, Mark, p. 6

You’d have good long rubbers and you’d tap them with leather on a last [a thing for putting a boot on]. Then you’d put chisels in them. They’d be sticking out about a half-inch. Also you’d sew tops on them around the legs and you’d tie a piece of yarn around it so the snow and the water wouldn’t get in. I often fell in the water and got out quick and never got wet. The grease on the overalls and the top around the boots would save the water from going through. [SRKM 507]

BO’SUN

French, Lionel, pp. 26-27

The bo’sun would look after all the stores, gaffs, and ropes. He more or less looked after the ship, not the working of the ship but everything we’d have on the ship to use: the ropes, the explosives, sails, riggings, and all the ship’s gear. He give us our rope, our seal rope. He’d have a coil of rope and you’d take it along and he’d measure it and chop it off. He’d allow about 3 fathoms—18 feet. Then you’d splice an eye in one end so you could hook your gaff in it if someone threw a rope to you on a pan of ice. You’d seize a nail in the other end. [SRKB 812]

Gillett, William, p. 24

The first day out you’re to go the bo’sun. He would give you so much rope to make your hauling rope for lacing up your seals. And your gaff and some spun yarn to put on your gaff handle. [SRCL 201]

Parsons, Allan, pp. 29-30

My father and I were great friends with Uncle Tom Carroll [bo’sun]. I was with the bo’sun putting powder cans on the sticks. Father said, “Now, this is the time to get some powder.” I said, “Uncle Tom, would you like to have a drink?” “Yes,” he said, “I would give the spar of this one if I had one now.” I had a bottle of Screech and I filled up a square pickle bottle and brought it up to him. He took the bottle and never stopped until it all runned down his throat. “Now,” he said, “there must be some more where that come from.” I went down and got another pickle bottle and he drinked that. He said, “What do you want?” I said, “I wants a bit of powder.” So when I come in to St. John’s he gave me seven tins of powder, three pounds six ounces, and a small coil of rope. Uncle Tom Carroll was a sailor. He had a red top on his nose, like a cherry. Most everyone liked him. His daughter came down to see him. She said, “Pop, I believe you’re drunk.” He said, “You make a line there. I can walk it as straight as any man in St. John’s, but I’m blind. I can’t see nothing.” [SRKB 867]

Warford, Henry, p. 15

He [Tom Carroll, bo’sun] was a hard case. He was bo’sun. When you’d get your sea rope, you’d take the end and walk with it, and he’d take the axe and chop it off. You’d always take a couple of doubles around your arm on the sly, that would give you a longer rope. Then he’d catch you and the oaths [would come] out of him then. But he’d let you go. That was your tow rope; you were allowed so much rope. It was good rope, steam-tarred rope, and you’d take that home. You’d leave your gaff, but a lot of fellows used to take them out of the handle and take them. That was where half the fishermen’s boathooks came from. [SRKB 863]

Whitten, Stephen, p. 14

Tom Carroll was bo’sun on the Eagle. He was in his late 70s when he made his last voyage out to the seal fishery. He was down to Antarctica and the Falkland Islands in the Eagle. I believe they called a small mountain in Antarctica after him—Mount Carroll. [SRPK 308A/B]

BOWRING’S

Bragg, Fred, p. 28

Written up at the building at Bowring’s: “Spend your money with the firm who gave you a chance to earn it.” [SRMD 406]

Whitten, Stephen, pp. 2, 14; pp. 24, 32

I was born on the Southside, St. John’s, and I went to work at Bowring’s on Water Street on the 26th of March 1941 as a 16-year-old boy, as an office clerk. In the spring, 1942, I helped sign on the sealers, and then I called the roll. We had three steamers in 1942: the Terra Nova was under Captain Stanley Barbour, the Ranger was under Captain Lewellyn Kean from Wesleyville, and the Eagle was under Captain Sidney Hill. I was paid $5 a week.

At 7 or 7:30 in the morning the captain blew the whistle and everyone except the captain and a couple of officers had to go ashore. The few officers left on board searched the ship for stowaways. Now, we stood up and had to sing out each man’s name and he had to answer to the roll call and he went on board. When we were sure that all the people were on board, we gave a copy of the articles to the captain. Then all the sirens started to blow and flags were all flying and away went the steamers to the seal fishery.

Bowring’s skins and furs went to England. They were made into furs and leather items like wallets, purses, boots. Oil under 2 per cent free fatty acids was edible and went into margarine, Crisco, etc. Number 2 oil was mostly used in the leather-tanning industry. [SRPK 308A/B; 313, 314]

BRIDGEMASTER

Gillett, William, p. 11

The bridgemaster took the instructions from the scunner or the barrelman and passed them on to the wheelsman. [SRPK 351]

BUNKS

Carter, Roland, p. 2

When we got to St. John’s, the first thing we would do was go down aboard the ship and pick the best bunk. The best bunks would be up forward. In the after part of the ship the seals used to go down and the hatch used to be open. [SRBH 718]

Fitzgerald, Edward, pp. 7-8

There was a man belonged to Clarke’s Beach—Fred Mugford was his name. He was a middle-aged man and a very clean man, and me and him slept together. There were three men from Torbay under us. When we left St. John’s, the master watches came around to see who was going in the different watches. I said to this master watch, “I’ll haul one seal extra if you leave the two of us in the bunk. Don’t put the third fellow in because our bunk is a bit narrow.” According as you went forward, the ship was cutting in. The top bunks would get narrow. They wouldn’t be as wide. Our bunk was probably a foot narrower than it would be along the straight side of the ship. [SRKB 803]

Seymour, James, p. 7

We’d have a mattress, which was a bag of shavings or a bag of old kelp—we’d say “store kelp” because we used to dry it. [SRKM 502]

BURNT OUT

Gillett, William, p. 7

One spring in the Neptune we filled the lower pounds and we had to use the ’tween decks for pelts. I had to move. I slept with someone else in another bunk. That’s the only time I was “burnt out.” [SRPK 351]

Humphries, Maxwell, p. 5

All the bunks were full of seals, and we had to shift out into a little place and lie on the floor. When you got broke up [burnt out], that was rough. [SRBH 720]

CAPTAINS

Keel, Roy, pp. 9-10

Job Kean was a good man. Peter Carter was a good man. John Dominey was a good man, and he liked to drink. Abram Kean was the worst. He had no mercy on anyone. If I had my way, I would have shot him the first time I was with him. [SRPK 327]

Lowe, William, pp. 47, 57

Captain Arthur Jackman was the only captain from around here [St. John’s]. He used to be president of the Star of the Sea. [He died in 1907.]

I was in the old Viking one spring with Captain George Whiteley. He was crazy, I think. Butting the ice, he used to get up in the barrel and say, “Go to it, old Viking.” [SRFW 103A/B]

Rossiter, James, pp. 6-7

He [Dominey] was a great man, a fine man, a nice man. They were all fine men. All of them [Dominey, Hill, Blackwood] were quiet men. No bawling or swearing. Captain Dominey was also a navigator. He used to make foreign voyages. Captain Blackwood and Captain Hill had navigators. [SRKB 844]

Sturge, Richard, p. 18

Captain Peter Carter and Captain Sid Hill looked to their men on the ice. And they used to stop the ship for people to get out. Some wouldn’t stop the ship for a man to jump out. They wouldn’t worry if he broke his leg or if he didn’t. Old Captain Bill Winsor would get on the bridge and swear, “Jump, you sons of . . . Jump and go.” [SRPK 336]

CARBONEAR

Oliver, James, p. 5

There were two Olivers and a Doyle fellow. We’d go to Carbonear by horse and slide from here in Gull Island. There’d be three of us. That would be enough for the one horse. You’d carry some kind of mattress, a couple of quilts, a pillow, and a pair of boots, rubber boots for scuffing around the deck. We’d get skin boots in St. John’s on our crop. [SRKM 523A/B]

Woodfine, Thomas, pp. 4-5

There weren’t many men from Northern Bay—most from Burnt Point and Gull Island, and a lot from Carbonear and Upper Island Cove. [SRKM 511]

CARIBOU

Bragg, Fred, p. 3

The Caribou was out one spring. She was 16 knots, two knots higher than the Imogene. I was in the Caribou with Billy Winsor. The Ungava, Beothic, and Imogene had one bulkhead with a doorway to the coal pound. The coal would fall right out where the firemen were. The Caribou only had two side pockets. She only had coal enough to take her across the Gulf. But out to the seal fishery she had to have coal enough for the whole spring. You had to have two watches on at a time. We were all the time moving coal. [SRMD 406]

Butt, Henry, pp. 4-6

The Caribou had a big galley and tables just like a motel—a big dining room with big long tables for 270 men. The food was really good, the best going at that time, the best that you could get out to the ice. In the morning there’d be a big boiler of soup or scouse, enough for two or three bowls or whatever a person would want. Good soup, the best kind. And plenty of soft bread in its turn. She had a big oven and good facilities and they used to bake a fair lot of bread, but there were times when you did have to eat a bit of hard bread. We slept down in the passenger saloon below deck and there was good accommodation, steel bunks and everything just so. And it was kept clean because she was a great boat and we all respected the boat. [SRKB 851]

Maddox, Thomas, p. 10

We were out in the Caribou one spring [1935]. She used to take all her seals down aft and that would be a job for Sunday. Whatever you got in the week every man had to come down on one side and take his turn of seals and go up on the other side and bring them up forward and put them in the forward hold. I don’t know what they used to do that for. They could have easily taken them aboard up forward. [SRPK 326]

Thorne, Gordon, p. 19

Although Bowring’s Imogene was built especially for the seal fishery, she had to take her place behind the Caribou crossing Bonavista Bay [1935]. The Imogene was faster in pan ice; she could turn around and all that stuff. Billy Winsor, that spring in the Caribou, as long as he could beat the Imogene, and he did. [SRMD 410A/B]

CARPENTER

Vincent, Wilfred, p. 34

I was the ship’s carpenter. I did anything that had to be done with a saw and hammer. Anything that had to be done, I did it. Sometimes the cook would want a shelf put up. [SRPW 701]

CARTER, CAPTAIN PETER

Fowler, Don, p. 19

He was a fine old man. He used to have a saying. He’d say, “Sweet Saturday night but bitter Monday morning.” [SRKB 840]

Rideout, Arthur, pp. 17-18

He was an all-right old lad. He drank a lot. He drank a lot. I suppose it’s one chance to get liquor, because the captains had charge of it. He was second hand with Captain Bill Winsor, and he got the ship give to him because he had the trade all learned from old Billy Winsor. [SRPK 352]

CATS

Gillett, William, p. 8

We had one fellow, he was a character: Skipper George Osborne from Wesleyville. He would swipe every cat that was around. [Cats were stillborn pups and they did not lose their hair. They were skinned by making a hole and removing the insides.] I had mine. I lost every one of them. I said, “George, what about skinning my cats?” “Yes, boy,” he said. And when I came to get them, I never found them after. I lost them all. George came in to St. John’s. He was selling cats for a week. He was a character. [SRPK 351]

Oliver, James, p. 26

I got one cat. He wasn’t a small one. He was a big one. I got a fellow to skin him for me. There was a fellow on board the ship told me he’d give me $5 for it. He said, “When I goes ashore, you keep that cat for me, and I’ll give you $5.” But when the Chinamen came aboard, one said, “How much are you selling that cat for?” I said, “Eight dollars.” He put his hand in his pocket and handed me the $8 right away. I couldn’t meet buddy for two or three days after. [SRKM 523A/B]

Power, Robert, p. 38

I got one, one spring. I sold it to Charlie Martin, who owned a business in Carbonear. Got $10 for it. I had it salted in a bag. Someone skinned it for me. We were first in St. John’s and he came down looking for cats. On board you’d have to hide it away. I kept mine in the clothes bag under lock all spring. [SRKM 517]

Swain, Thomas, pp. 19-20

I had three, one each spring [1935, 1936, 1937]. I didn’t sell them. I gave one to Captain John Blackwood, the man who gave me the berth, and I gave one to a friend, and I gave one to my brother’s son. [SRKM 506A/B]

CHANGES

Butt, Cyril, p. 43

The big change in conditions. The difference [between 1936 and 1950] was better and cleaner boats, better place to sleep, better food. The last spring I was out in the Arctic Prowler she was like a hotel. My God! They had eggs and bacon in the morning. Always a pan of oranges or something in the morning. In the evening we’d have chicken and everything. The last spring was a good spring. There was lots of seals and we were only gone a month. [SRKM 501]

Gosse, Doug, pp. 7, 12, 14

From the day you’d leave until the day you’d come back, you’d be shovelling coal on your watch. In later years it was all oil. They were diesel. There was no coal at all, so that made a lot of difference to me. With diesel oil you did not have that much work to do with the ship. She was easily run and easily maintained. The older ships were real hard ships to work on, but in later years you only had to work at the seals.

It was no trouble to know a sealer at that time [early 1940s] because you were full of coal dust and you were full of grease. But in later years you were clean. You washed your clothes out to the ice and no one would know where you came from. But in the old days you’d be filthy rotten dirty. There was so much grease on you and then the coal dust would stick into that so you’d be black.

The old-timers were hard and rough. Captain Bill Winsor was one of them. They were all rough; they’d curse and swear, and they were going crazy all the time. In later years it was nothing like that. [SRPK 317]

CHINESE

Brazil, John Will, pp. 20, 22

The cooks would save whatever pork fat they were using, the old fat from cooking seals in the big frying pan. They’d scrape it all into a tub and it would get hard. The old Chinamen would be down on the wharf to buy it to use in their restaurants. The Chinese would have enough for the summer. [SRMC 801]

CLOTHING

Bowe, Eddie, p. 13

You had your shift of clothes, spare clothes. You’d only have one pair of skin boots, made out of sealskin. You’d buy them from Bowring’s with your crop. [SRPK 301]

Bragg, Fred, pp. 2, 32, 64

Take plenty of clothes with you in case you fell in the water. You’d have some clothes to change. But if you didn’t, you’d keep the same clothes on and you’d sleep in the same clothes every night until you came home after two months.

You’d get a suit of oilskins because [with] rubber clothes [on] walking on the ice in the frost you wouldn’t be able to get two steps.

I wore skin boots for a while. I’d only use them out to the seal fishery. You’d get soles put on them. We used to use the long rubbers and put a tap on them. Rubber is colder on the feet than leather. [SRMD 406]

Brazil, John Will, p. 6

Half the people would come home and their clothes would be so dirty and so full of lice that they used to burn them. There were other people who couldn’t afford to do that. They’d be all the summer trying to wash the old seal fat off their clothes. [SRMC 801]

Burry, Stephen, pp. 12-13, 23

It used to be real cold down there off the Labrador coast—real cold weather. I came aboard and couldn’t get off my rubber boots—the stockings were froze to the boots inside. Now, you had to get down below around the potbelly stove with about 50 other men. And you’d have to wait until your boots were warm before you could get them off. Now, of course you’d be soaking wet and you had to get them dry for the next morning.

I used to wear the long johns. And Marjorie used to line them inside with this flannelette. There used to be no wind [that would] go through that. And you would want it, too, on that ice. [SRPK 341]

Carter, Roland, p. 30

They’d palm your mitts for you. They’d take a bit of cloth and cut it out the shape of your palm and sew it on your mitts. This was so you wouldn’t wear your mitts through when you were hauling the rope or hauling on the cable. Used to call it, “palm your mitts.” [SRBH 718]

Codner, William, pp. 15-16

You’d never take off no clothes to go to sleep in the night. You’d take off your boots and overalls but leave pants and stockings on. We had a sort of white canvas jumper, overalls, and sweater. You wouldn’t feel cold on the ice. You’d be at the seals. You’d have skin boots. Some used to wear long rubbers in the latter end of it, but I always had the skin boot. They were nice warm boots with a good heavy sole. They had sparables in them. [SRPK 316A]

Doyle, Robert, pp. 51-53

We were in a place called Salmon Bight in the Labrador. There were a lot of seals around but we were jammed up solid, so myself and the second engineer went out killing seals. I had on a boiler suit and a grey coat inside my boiler suit. It got kind of warm, so I took off the coat and hung it on a pinnacle of ice.

We heard the ice starting to crack. I said to the second, “Come on back aboard the ship in case the old man wants to get the engine under way to pick up the fat.” We walked back aboard and got the engines ready and started to move. I said to the boys, “If you comes across a pan of fat with a grey coat on it, pick it up.” A good three weeks later we were tied up to Bowring’s, Southside, St. John’s. A couple of Portuguese fishing trawlers, the White Fleet, were tied up ahead of us.

The second engineer came up and said, “Chief, you know your coat?” I said, “Yes.” “It just passed the Algerine in the harbour,” he said. I said, “Go on, you bloody liar.” “No,” he said, “that’s true.” I went up on deck and, sure enough, there was my coat. It came in the harbour on the pan of ice and went up around the harbour and went out again. [SRMJD 507]

Fleming, James, pp. 11-12

We went into Trinity one time with a full load with old Captain Barbour. The captain said, “We got to wait; there’s two steamers ahead of us. Do you want any money? There’s a big time [spree] in the school tonight.” Some fellows washed and put on their old clothes, their old greasy clothes and dodged up. They rapped, and out came a girl. “Oh,” she said, “we can’t let you in you’re sealers. I can smell the grease on you.” They came back, and they swore because they couldn’t get in. [SRPK 330]

Gifford, William, p. 6

Old people used to make oilclothes out of flour bags, canvas, calico. My mother made them out of flour sacks. She’d sew it up and wring it out in linseed oil. [SRKB 818]

Gillett, William, p. 22

We had skin boots, good for 3 or 4 years. I had 3 pair of extra mitts. I’d come home and I’d have it all give away. Poor fellows out there with their fingers out. [SRCL 201]

Hayden, Thomas, p. 5

Skin boots. You’d get them to the firm in St. John’s. They had a leather sole and heel. Then you drove in the sparables. They were very light; that was the beauty of them. You’d hardly know you had them on your feet. [SRKM 513]

Leaman, William John, pp. 22-23

You’d have your rope and gaff and your lunch on your back [on the ice]. All you’d want then is to watch it [be careful]. Now, I never used to wear a cuff. I often used to give fellows cuffs. I never wore a cuff, nor my brother George, nor my father. But, Herm and Soloman, if they wanted to go down to have a leak, they’d have their cuffs on. I’d go out and I’d sculp the seals, hands full of blood. I’d shove them down in the water and then in the snow and rub them together. When I was going on the ice, I had a pair of cuffs in my back pocket. Miss Mary used to knit them and put them in the back pocket of my overalls, afraid I’d get caught out a real stormy night. I had a pair of cotton gloves, so a fellow wouldn’t stick the gaff in my hand getting down over the side. [SRPK 307A/B]

Nugent, Mrs. Alice, pp. 4, 6

[Mrs. Nugent ran a store on New Gower Street in St. John’s.] Before they went out sealers bought raisins, peppermint knobs, rolled oats, prunes. They weren’t dressed warm, not enough for the seal fishery. They had rolled-top neck sweaters, home knit, mostly grey, and grey knit one-finger gloves. They had grey knit caps, too. Sometimes there’d be a bib on them. Some of them would bring us flippers. They bought candy (sweets, they called them) to bring home to their children. [SRCL 203]

Parsons, George, pp. 10, 21, 22

Single oilclothes, light for handling and it would do you for a month. It was no good after. Full of grease and the oil was chafed off. You had that with you every day. You had it rolled up. I wouldn’t go overboard without them. I was in the Gulf when glitter fell and a storm of wind and the ship blowing the whistle for us to come on. There were fellows there who had no oilclothes. They said it was too heavy to carry and they had left it aboard. “Well,” I said, “I’m not leaving mine aboard.”

We used to have a canvas suit, No. 6 canvas. We’d bring it up to the Goff Brothers, Jack and Ned [Carbonear], they were clothes makers, tailors. We’d go up there and get the suit cut out, and Mother would sew it on the machine. I had a canvas suit, pants and jacket. [SRKM 508, 509]

Power, Robert, p. 11

There were no parkas on the go at that time. We used to bring a piece of canvas to Mr. Ned Goff, the tailor, and he’d cut the coat out, and we’d bring it home and someone would sew it together for you. When that got good and oily and dirty, that was as good as a suit of oilclothes. Warm, too, the wind wouldn’t go through it. I’d have a knitted cap and always a second pair of socks in my bag in case I fell in the water. [SRKM 517]

Sturge, Christopher, p. 38

[Interview included Reuben Stokes] RS: My grandfather got a berth one evening at 4 o’clock. Poor old Grandmother had to knit him a pair of socks and a pair of mitts before 4 o’clock the next morning before he went away. [SRBH 719]

COAKER

Sturge, Stanley, pp. 30-31

No soft bread at all [in his father’s day]. Only hard bread and a “noggin” of pork [small half cask]. Coaker’s Union, that’s who you can thank for the bit of good grub they did get on the steamers after that. He went out one time with Captain George Barbour in the Nascopie, I think it was, and he saw what the men had to go through. That was nothing compared with after Confederation. [SRPK 309A/B]

COAL

Burry, George, p. 2

So I took a berth [1941 or 1942] and the first trip was in the Gulf on the Sable Island. She was renamed the Blue Seal afterwards. She had a full load of coal when we left St. John’s, about 500 tons, and every day after we got into the ice up in the Gulf we had to shovel. Your watch, four hours, shovel coal, pass it along in baskets, wheel it along the deck, drop it down in the bunkers. You had to keep the coal to her. We got about 12,000 young seals. We burned all our coal and went to Corner Brook, took on more coal, and went on again to look for old seals. But the old seals being scarce we had to abandon the voyage. But we made about $150. [SRPK 337]

Hussey, William, p. 32

The little ships—the Eagle, the Neptune, and the Terra Nova. They would heave away coal to make room for pelts. But the big ones like the Ungava had plenty of room for coal and seal pelts. [SRKB 805, 870]

Lowe, William, p. 20

The small boats would carry around 500 tons of coal; the Beothic carried 2,000. [SRCJL 902]

COLD

Hussey, William, p. 6

If our feet got cold when we were in the swiles, we’d rip open a seal and put our foot down in the hot blood in the carcass. [SRKB 805, 870]

COMING HOME

Kean, Job, p. 16

The Winnifred Lee used to bring home the sealers from St. John’s to Brookfield sometimes and their barrels of flippers. [SRPK 305A/B]

Vincent, Wilfred, pp. 28, 31

When you’d get paid off, you’d try to get passage on a freighter carrying freight north. Probably you’d hire on among the crew. We wouldn’t go on train because it was hard to get home then. Most of the route from home to Gambo was across ponds and bays and ice. You couldn’t walk across the ponds then in April and May. There’d be 30 or 40 of us come home on a boat the one time. [SRPW 701]

COMPASS

Burry, George, p. 8

I always carried my own compass. I never trusted a master watch. Lots of times they’d forget in the scravel [dash]. The skipper would sing out, “All hands out!” You’d go. The next thing you’d know he never had one in his knapsack. But I always had one. I always had a small one pinned in my overalls—put down in the overall pockets and a big safety pin through it. If I put my overalls on, I had my compass. If you got caught, you could sight your ship. My father used to tell me, “Make sure you always have it.” I carried it with me every time I went. People were a little bit too careless, and sometimes this caused disasters out there. [SRPK 337]

Sturge, Christopher, p. 20

I was out one time, brother, with the two master watches. Night came on. It wasn’t dirty; it was a fine beautiful night. And, by Jesus, nar one of them had a compass. We had to wait till the ship came alongside. [SRBH 719]

Tucker, Wilfred, pp. 17-18

You had a pair of goggles in your bag and you had a compass. You had your pocket compass and, on dirty days, you would be sighting the ship every now and then. Most everybody had a compass. I had one in my bag all the time. [SRKB 810]

COMPETITION

Sturge, Stanley, pp. 11-12

One day the Imogene was coming in. We were going for a patch of seals and the Imogene was going for the same patch, and she could plow through the ice, too. Art Best said, “There she is coming behind us.” We didn’t shoot at the seals but over them to drive them off so the Imogene wouldn’t get them. When we got on board, Captain Kean wired to Captain Blackwood, “The seals are wild, Captain.” Captain Blackwood wired back, “I think your men are a damned sight wilder.” [SRPK 303, 304A]

CONFLICT

Clarke, Allan, pp. 23-24

There was a fellow out from Trinity or somewhere, and when he went out and saw them killing the seals, he wouldn’t go out anymore. He came aboard and stayed aboard all spring. But when we were coming in, he became a brave fellow and he started to pick on me because I was the smallest one there. He said, “You’re no good, Clarke, you’re no good.” I said, “That’s all right.” And there was an old fellow belonged to the Goulds. He was a big man and he had big hands on him. He picked me up and he said, “Now, Clarke, punch him or I’m punching you.” I didn’t know what to do, so I wheeled off and I let him have it. And he said, “Don’t hit me no more.” And the old fellow said, “Look now, Clarke, you’re a better man than he is.” [SRKB 858]

Spurrell, Cecil, pp. 10-12

We all left the ship, and the weather was bad—it was snowing. I took out my compass to make sure of what I was doing. By and by I said to Skipper Pat, the second master watch, “Pat, you think we’re gone far enough or what?” He said, “I don’t know, boy, there’s a scattered seal around.” “Yes, I know,” I said, “but that’s not we. If we goes astray, we’s not around, is us?” He wouldn’t talk to me. He got contrary. “All right,” I said. I looked around to the men who were my friends. I said, “Who do you want to follow boys, Pat Tobin or Cec?” And they all spoke up, “We want to follow you. Wherever you go, we want to go.” Skipper Pat didn’t like it. He said, “Who give you orders to take charge like this?” “I got it in my pocket,” I said, “where’s yours?” He said, “What do you mean?” I said, “Where’s your compass?” “I got no compass,” he said. Here he was, leading a crowd of men with no compass. I said, “You wouldn’t strike the ship.” He said, “I wouldn’t need it, allowing for the wind and one thing and another.” I said, “The wind could shift unknown to we; we’re blindfolded.”

“All right,” I said, “whoever’s for me, come, and we’ll have no more fooling with this.” I took my compass and took my course, opposite to the one that brought us out. We were gone an hour’s walk, going towards her. By and by we heard the whistle blow, loud and clear. When we got up alongside, the old man, Captain Wes, was some proud of me. Tobin didn’t like it, but I said, “I wouldn’t come here with any man without a compass. I always carry my own and that’s it.” What else have you got to go by if you haven’t got a compass? You’d never find the ship if you were any distance from her. How are you going to find her? The winds could shift; the winds could change. I was the only one who had a compass. Edgar Roberts was our master watch. He told me I had done right. [SRBH 716]

Sturge, Stanley, pp. 36, 37

Sometimes there would be ructions. The St. John’s men would come aboard and break into our barrels for flippers. There were several fights when we used to be down on Bowring’s wharf. One fellow, Jesse Howell, belonged to home. He struck a fellow once and put him over a pile of scruncheons 9 feet high.

I was master watch with Captain Charlie Kean in the Eagle, and Paddy Ring was the fireman, and his unmarried son was out with us, too, that spring. We were taking out fat and he came aboard all dressed up and wanted his flippers. I suppose he must have been drinking. Now, you weren’t supposed to share the flippers before you finished in the evening. You’d put the hatches on and then I’d get my book and I’d call their names. Take your flippers and go, do what you want them then; sell them, heave them overboard, or give them away.

So he came aboard at 2 o’clock in the day and wanted his flippers. “No, boy,” I said, “I can’t give them to you. I’m not supposed to do it, not before she’s finished. Hatches on, battened down, call the roll, and give you your flippers.” He was dressed up in a nice suit of clothes and he made the jump and jumped right down in the pound of seal pelts. He landed in the seals, but he could’ve landed on the planks around the pounds and killed himself. I went to Paddy and Paddy came and hauled him up. Oh what a state his clothes were in! Paddy drove him home. Never seen him afterwards. I gave Paddy his flippers. [SRPK 303, 304A]

Wilson, George, pp. 2-3

We went to White Bay in the Ranger with Captain Badcock. We burnt down in a big patch of seals. We weren’t allowed to kill on Sunday, so we were going to kill on Monday. On Sunday evening about 4 o’clock we saw the Beothic coming, with Captain Abram Kean in charge. The Beothic circled around and around and around and around and beat up every bit of ice so there was hardly a bit there big enough to get on, and he drove all the seals off into the water. We had gunners from Bay Roberts—Dickie Bradbury (Dickie Cherry, they used to call him), Al Parsons, Al Mercer, and Ikie Mercer. The gunners got that mad that they got their rifles and, unknown to the captain, the next thing we knew bullets were popping off the old Beothic. Captain Badcock told Captain Kean to move off out of danger because his men were upset. When the ice was all cut up, he took off. [SRKH 411]

COPYING

Parsons, Andrew, pp. 16-17

Sometimes you’d have to jump across a lake of water. You’d put the tows of fat in the water, say three or four seals in each tow, and you’d just step on them like stepping stones. Then when you got over on the other side, you’d tow them out. [SRKB 843]

Power, James, p. 8

I often seen the five or six of us have to line up the seals, and run on the seals; land on the seals in the water. The other fellow would haul this end and you’d leave yours there for him to come on. [SRKM 512A/B]

CROP

Bragg, Thomas, p. 10

You’d get a $9 crop, but you had to pay $12. See, one time you used to have to pay $3 for your berth. Then they got a union and they said they took off the $3. But what they did was give you a $9 crop and you used to have to pay $12. You were still paying $3 for your berth [1902]. [SRPK 340]

Butt, Cyril, p. 40

They’d give us $6 worth of crop—$6 wouldn’t buy much, perhaps a knife. When you came in and got paid off, you were charged $9. Some said it was for your berth. Well, it wasn’t for your berth; they had to have men. It was a little bit of roguery, robbery, like all the fishery was one time. [SRKM 501]

Gosse, Doug, p. 16

We always took a crop. You’d be given a slip so you could go in the store and take up your crop. You could take up to $9. And you paid $12. Some fellows wouldn’t take a crop if they thought they were lucky. Then if you got no seals, you’d be that much out. [SRPK 317]

Gosse, Pat, p. 3

I took up a pair of long boots, sealskin boots, and I got three pounds of tobacco. And that took up my crop. [SRMD 411]

Menchions, Wallace, pp. 2-3

Things weren’t too good. There wasn’t too much money. Father got sick and had to go to the hospital. I got a berth from Captain Badcock in the Ranger—he was my uncle. I got my crop, $9, and I sent home a barrel of flour. [SRKB 856]

Porter, Taylor, p. 35

What made up my mind to go to the ice was there was neither cent to be had and I was starting to rear a family. If I’d get to the ice, I’d get a barrel of flour, and I’d get my grub. You were allowed a crop of $10 [$9]—the price of a barrel of flour. [SRKB 809, 873]

Sturge, Stanley, p. 22

The old-timers had a strike [1902]. The men had to pay for their berths, and they thought it wasn’t fair. In fact, they were going to haul the Neptune up into the street. They had the lines on her. The companies started the crop instead. They said we’ll give you $9 on credit and you repay $12 at the end of the voyage if you make enough. If not, you don’t owe us any money. [SRPK 303, 304A]

DANGER

Parsons, George, pp. 28, 50-52

My father always told us if a seal was lying on the ice when you went up to it in the morning, hit it across the throat to see if there’s any life in it before you put the knife in it; even if he was shot the day before or two days before. Because when you cut a seal, if there’s any life in him you’ll bring him to. He could tear your hands up. I saw one man with his hand cut so bad he never got overboard after. The old seal came to and got him with his teeth. Either he didn’t have him killed enough or perhaps it was one left there with life still left in him, like my father used to talk about.

The worst danger I seen was the sticks on her sides with ropes. The bottom stick could strike the ice and bring up. There was a man got killed; the sidestick came up and killed him while he was looking over her side. You had to watch for a good time and run for her side. Sometimes she wouldn’t stop for you. That was a risk and a danger. You’d get up that ladder-piece as quick as you could. The Beothic had a checkerboard ladder about 6 or 7 foot. I would stick my gaff in the wooden rail and hold on to it while I got up. The Beothic and them, they were high ones, but the wooden ones, it was only a hop, step, and you’re up. [SRKM 508, 509]

Sheppard, Lewis, p. 13

They had good rules; they had good signals. If something happened to some men, all they had to do was put three flags up, one on top of the other, and all hands were supposed to leave whatever they were doing and walk to that. [SRKB 850]

Sturge, Stanley, p. 10

The slob was frozen so the old man told Ken Burry and me to get out—we were gunner and dog. So we killed 75 families of hoods, and the batsmen were coming out to pelt them. We came aboard and went into the top house to get a cup of tea. I never had my mug in my hand when I heard a shout. I ran on the deck to look around, and there was not a pan of ice anywhere. The slob was frozen and a big swell hove everything in pieces. With the cartridges and gun I’d have gone right down. We had to heave out the punt to pick up the seals. [SRPK 309A/B]

Thorne, Gordon, p. 2

It was a tough spring [White Bay, 1921?] according to the older people that knew more than I did. We used to have to chop ice and throw it down by the side of her [to cushion her against the hard ice] when she’d go back to the swell. The next day she couldn’t turn over the propeller, she was lifted up on the ice that much. It was the force of the wind and big swell in the ice. But I never saw another spring like that. It was never as bad as that again. I didn’t know the difference but there were middle-aged men who were so scared that night that they couldn’t eat. There were no ships near us and if we lost her it would be a bad night on the ice. We had a full load of young seals and we didn’t get into Harbour Grace until the 24th of April. [SRMD 410A/B]

Tuff, Jabez, pp. 10-11, 21

I used to jump from the bow of the Imogene, up 15 or 16 feet. The other guys would be down on the sidesticks waiting and I would go up on the bow. When the captain or master watch sang out “jump,” I would go right from her bow down on the ice. Sometimes as I hit the pan of ice she hit it and split it. One time I jumped from the quarter and that’s when the captain, Wes Kean, called me on deck. He said, “Jabez, you got a lot of your father’s ways about you. You’re just like him.” Well, my father [George] was out in the Newfoundland disaster with him; he was with him every spring. “But,” he said, “I never saw your father do anything like that. He had too much sense for that. And don’t you ever let me see you do that again. You know you could get chopped up by those blades. I’m telling you don’t ever do that again and don’t jump from the bow. You go down on the sidesticks. The same thing could happen and, besides, you could break your leg if you don’t land just right.”

When ice is all packed together, sometimes there isn’t anything bigger than an apple there. The minute the pressure slackens, there is nothing underneath only water, and down you go. [SRBH 724]

DEATH

Keel, Heber, p. 7

We didn’t do so good the next year [1941, Terra Nova]. We got around 10,000. We had two men die that same year, two older men. One man, a sealer, from Dunfield, Trinity Bay. His name was Billy Fleet; he didn’t bunk too far from me—I was on the port side and he was on the starboard side. The other man, Bishop, belonged to Wesleyville. He was the food controller. The first man had meningitis, but the food controller died from food poisoning from salmon. It’s a poor place to die. We salted those men and brought them into St. John’s salted in. [SRPK 324]

Morgan, Fred, p. 10

One fellow died one spring in the Thetis [1929 or 1930]. He wasn’t sick very long. They salted him and he was aboard all spring. [SRKB 859]

Parsons, John, pp. 3, 9

They got this flu; some said it was bad meat. We all had the same complaint, but those two men died of it. Everybody was sick; we couldn’t get on the ice we were that sick. The next morning one fellow died in the hospital, and the following day the other fellow died. Then half the men went on strike to come in. The two men who died—that’s why they wanted to come in—and they wanted to come in and go to work on the Argentia Naval Base. So we made two boxes, tight boxes, and pitched them, and put them in water to make sure they were tight. Then we salted the bodies in. Some claim that canned meat did it—food poisoning: the meat was green and we were in the dark and didn’t know what we were eating. When we got sick, we told the food controller and he cut it off.

Captain Barbour talked to us and told us it was only another three weeks or a month. Then we struck the old seals: they were numerous. We all went out on the ice and got around 10,000. When we came in, we had to go on the quarantine ground. We had to anchor off in the stream. Then the Public Health came aboard. They didn’t know what kind of disease we had, but then they said the bad meat was the cause. [SRKB 852]

Parsons, Mark, p. 15

We were up in the Gulf. Was it ever cold! The coldest morning I ever felt in my life. Fellows going aboard every now and then with hands froze. She was a bad morning. A fellow roamed off by himself and fell in the water. There were two Newfoundland fellows there who were on a Norwegian boat from Halifax. They hauled him out of the water and came aboard, and we came out with a stretcher to get him. It wasn’t long, no more than an hour, and he was froze stiff—dead. [SRKM 507]

Porter, Taylor, pp. 22-23

One man belonged to Trinity Bay got sick and died. When I turned in, his head was against my feet, only a bit of board between us. He died first when we went out. He was a big man, an able man, but he went terrible sudden. When I came off the ice, I went in the hospital to see him, and I knowed he was dying. When I came out, I told the boys, “Boys, we’ll have a corpse afore daylight.” He died that night. Uncle Bill Bussey was our carpenter. He made a coffin for him and we full it full of salt. We put it up on the gallow sprits and that’s where he was to, all the spring, poor man. [SRKB 809, 873]

Rossiter, James, pp. 10-11

One man died that first spring on the Imogene. He was out one day too late and I think he got a cold and he got the yellow jaundice. They put him in a box and salted him down and put him on the boat deck. They just stopped the winches for a few minutes while they were reading the Burial of the Dead. Then, away to go again. [SRKB 844]

Sturge, Christopher, p. 29

One poor fellow eat his dinner and went and looked out over the side. A sidestick struck a clump of ice and came up and struck him and killed him. [SRBH 719]

Tucker, Wilfred, pp. 7-9

We were with Abram Kean in the Terra Nova [1924]. We went out through the Narrows and the Narrows was all blocked with ice, and St. John’s bay was blocked with ice. All the ships, a big sealing fleet, were going out. And we were stuck there just outside the Narrows. And the captain, he sung out for us to get a line and put to her quarter and try to twist her head out of the bay; her head was heading in the bay and he wanted to get her head turned out. So all the crew got on the line and down went 10 or 15 men in a hole together. Most of them held on to the line, and them men on the outside pulling, pulled them out, but some of them let go and three were lost. I know my buddy, Fred Andrews, went in the water, but we got him out. We all came on board and we called the roll and there was three men missing. We stayed around and couldn’t find nothing, and then went on. [SRKB 810]

Wheeler, Ernest, pp. 2-3

The Ranger went into the Gulf [1939] and sprang a leak and came back to St. John’s. Some of her crew left her and Captain Lew Kean took 27 of us from Greenspond. We went out to the Front and got a few old seals and young seals. That was a sad, sad spring for me. My brother Edgar was on the Neptune. They came in and took out their seals and left St. John’s to go to Greenspond on a passenger boat. He fell overboard. He was drowned. We were out on the ice shooting the old seals and the boat came up and the captain called me aboard. I went up on the bridge and he said, “Wheeler, do you have a brother named Edgar?” I said, “Yes, sir.” He said, “Sorry to tell you, my son, he was drowned on his way home.” Then for me to come home and my brother not to come—it was pretty hard on my mother. [SRBH 722]

DECK ROUTER

Humphries, Maxwell, p. 14

The master watch would have a man under him called the “stow boss.” In the nighttime this fellow would take over stowing the seals. [He would sometimes be referred to as the “deck router” and on some ships he was referred to as the assistant master watch or second master watch; sometimes he was the scunner.] [SRBH 720]

Tulk, Abi, p. 5

[The] deck router looked after the men who were working shovelling coal out of the hold. [C809/70-4 (Mel Firestone)]

Vincent, Wilfred, p. 20

I went from bridgemaster to barrelman and from that to second master watch—what they called the deck router. That was to keep the men busy stowing seals and taking in ice for water. [SRPW 701]

Wilson, George, pp. 26-27

He was also referred to as the coalmaster. Master watch and two deck routers in each watch. There were three master watches on the Ranger. [SRKH 411]

DECK SHEATHING

Sheppard, Lewis, p. 20

The iron ships would be all boarded over on the decks with 1-inch lumber. You’d have chisels in your boots and you could break up your chisels on the iron. [SRKB 850]

DEMOGRAPHICS

Lowe, William, p. 8; pp. 22-23

The Thetis was supposed to go up in the Gulf [1931] and all the people that had berths on her belonged to Bonavista Bay and Greenspond. They didn’t like going up in the Gulf; it was too long a run. When they heard the Thetis was going up in the Gulf, they all gave up their berths. And now the company took 80 St. John’s men. That’s the only time I seen St. John’s men going out to the ice.

There weren’t too many St. John’s men used to go to the seal fishery. A lot of Torbay men used to go and from up around the Southern Shore [and Conception Bay]. I come to get it by stowing away and then every spring the captain would give me a berth. Most St. John’s men couldn’t get a berth. The firemen, what we called the black gang, would be from St. John’s. In my time the captains were all northern skippers and had their own men. [SRCJL 902, SRFW 103A/B]

DISASTERS

Kean, Job, p. 6

Most of the men went to the seal hunt, but a few families didn’t go. I think a lot of them [women] got turned off with the disasters. They wouldn’t let their sons and husbands go. [SRPK 305A/B]

Winsor, Allan, pp. 19-21

She [Norwegian Ora, 1938] was wooden-built and she came into the ice and got nipped. They took everything off the ship and put it on the biggest pan they could get. And they built a big square house out of their long wooden hatches and they had their tarpaulins over the top. We were going south and we got a message and we turned to go back to them. When we got there, the Ora was gone, but we picked up the crew and their belongings off the ice. We hardly had the Norwegians aboard our ship when a big swell came in on the ice. If we didn’t get to them when we did, they would’ve been gone. Everything was churning and we just got to them [52 men]. [SRST 503]

DOCTORS

Crawford, John, pp. 17-18

A nurse over to the General Hospital asked for a holiday [1916?]. She asked the head doctor in the hospital for a holiday. “Well,” he said, “what a time of the year you’re asking me to give you a holiday, in the heart of the winter.” She said, “That’s the very time I want it. I want to go out to the ice and see what it is like out there.” He said, “All right. I’ll see what I can do for you.” Now, he had to get a berth for her and she had to sign on, one of Job’s vessels. The Neptune, I think she was in. She had to be the doctor. She signed on. They left that morning. When they got out, someone came down off the deck and said, “There’s a woman in this one.” A man said to him, “You damn fool, go away. Are you crazy? A woman out here on one of those!” He said, “I’m telling you the truth.”

So, the captain called all hands on deck; all men—sealers, engineers, cooks, stewards, and everyone. “Now,” he told them, “this young woman is your doctor this spring. She came out here for a holiday. Now, I want every man to be a gentleman.” When they came in, they all gave her a donation. They made $90 that spring and she got her share of the cargo and they gave her another $100. [SRKB 822]

Harris, Mrs. Pauline, pp. 2-3

[Widow of Ralph Harris, pharmacist] He was always fascinated with the seal fishery and it was always in the back of his mind that he’d like to go at least one year. So when he became a pharmacist in 1940, he put in an application to be accepted as a ship’s doctor. He went out in March 1941 in the Eagle. He really enjoyed it. One man had a desperate toothache. He didn’t want to pull it because he had never pulled a tooth before. But he did have the instruments there to do it.

So anyhow, the third day he took pity on the man and called him in. He gave him the largest dosage of novocaine that he could give and pulled the tooth. The man went down below and told everyone that he was the greatest doctor he ever went to. Then he had a constant lineup to pull teeth and he did. He also lanced a big carbuncle on a man’s neck. He was called to the Terra Nova; everybody had dysentery and vomiting, [and] some died. The cook had used a new galvanized bucket to cook some corned beef and cabbage. He thought that was the source of the sickness. [SRPK 345]

Sturge, Stanley, p. 23

Aboard the Beothic and Nascopie we had the best kind of doctors—American doctors [1930]. But in the old Terra Nova and the old Eagle that wasn’t the case. The Imogene had a good doctor. One spring we were in the Sagona with Captain Charlie Blackwood. Captain Charlie hove us out in the morning at daylight to pick up a few seals. I heard one man bawling for the Sagona, and she came back and picked us up. The next thing we knew Thomas Hynes from Kelligrews was in the hospital—the little room for sick people.

In the evening Captain Charlie wired his brother Al in the Imogene and told him to bring the doctor alongside, he had a sick man aboard. Sure enough, 4 o’clock the Imogene came roaring up alongside of us with the doctor. He examined the man. Captain Charlie said, “I want to know what’s the matter. If he’s sick, I’ll send him in.” The doctor said, “He’s a sick man, Captain, but I think he’ll last the voyage.” So he went on board the Imogene and she took off.

So anyhow, I was scunner, and after my watch came, off I went down in the saloon to get something to eat. I got something to eat and I went along talking to Tom Hynes. I said, “How are you feeling, old man?” He said, “Boy, I’m very good now, but I want a drink.” I said, “Yes, sir, I’ll give you a drink. What do you want, a drink of tea or a drink of cold water?” He said, “I want a drink of cold water.” I said, “Cold water you’ll have.” So I went and got a drink of cold water. He drank it down.

So I went down and turned in. I was just going to sleep when Art, Captain Charlie’s son, came in and grabbed hold of me, and said, “Stan! Stan! Get up. Tom Hynes is dead.” I said, “What are you talking about, Art? Tom Hynes is dead! Sure I gave him a drink before I came down.” He said, “He’s dead.” I jumped out, hauled on my long rubbers, and went up. Looked at him and said, “Yes, boy, he’s dead.” Art went up and called his father, Captain Charlie. He came down and started asking questions, who was the last on, one thing and another, and I told him. At daylight they called the old bo’sun. He made a box and they buried him in salt. We caulked and pitched the box and that night the Eagle with Captain Wes Kean came alongside and took him aboard and brought him in. Poor fellow. How quick he went. [SRPK 309A/B]

DOG

Power, Robert, p. 25

Being a dog was hard work. You had to keep up with the gunner and, if he shot a seal, you hauled your knife down [paunched it] and rubbed the blood on a high pinnacle so it was be easy to spot [by the sculpers coming behind] and cut the tail off the seal to keep count. The cartridges were heavy. When you’d get tired, you’d dump them. I dumped a good many. I was dog for Bill Ledrew. He was a war vet who got killed in an accident later. [SRKM 517]

DOMINEY, CAPTAIN JOHN

Bragg, Thomas, pp. 7-8

I always went with Captain Dominey. He was from Greenspond and he was good, couldn’t be any better. He’d want his work done, of course, but he was a good man. [Dominey was out in the Thetis in 1934 and 1935 and the Neptune in 1936-40.] He was lost in the Second World War. A ship came into St. John’s after being torpedoed and they fixed her up. He was taking her up to Halifax, and she broke in two around the Southern Shore somewhere. He was a fine man, Captain Dominey. He was a quiet man; he never used to bawl or anything like that. He knew us all because we all belonged here [Greenspond], but at that time he was living in St. John’s. [SRPK 340]

Keel, Roy, p. 4

So I went aboard of John Dominey’s boat. He was drunk—loaded. I said, “What about a berth Captain?” “A berth,” he says. “Ticket,” he said, “take one.” Now, he was that drunk he couldn’t sign his name on the ticket plain. I had to take his hand. Mark “x.” I signed it. [SRPK 327]

DONKEY MEN

Doyle, Robert, p. 35

He is on watch with the chief engineer. While you would be in port changing your cargo, the donkey man used to have to look after the boilers, keep steam on the boilers, and have everything all ready. [SRMJD 507]

DORY

French, Lionel, p. 12

Another time Guy Menchions and other fellows were out on the ice, and the ice moved off. We had a dory with a runner on it like a slide with a shoe. You could go in the water but it could go over the ice, too. We had to get the dory and go across the lake and get them. [SRKB 812]

DUTIES

Bowe, Eddie, p. 12

Certain hours you’d be called to go on watch. I spent two trips to the wheel and a good many trips at the bow watching. You had to get your rope and see to it that there was a loop eye on it. You had to trim up your gaff and bind the hook and spear on it. People were talking about working hard, but I couldn’t see where all the work was. [SRPK 301]

Bragg, Thomas, pp. 6-7

The last couple of springs I was out [late 1930s] I was steward. I was back aft looking after the skipper, the second hand, the master watches, and the barrelman. I still used to go on the ice when we used to get into the seals. All hands had to go on the ice whenever they could spare us. But we had a better living back aft. It was pretty good food back there. You had a nice cabin with a long table and all that. [SRPK 340]

EAGLE

Keel, Heber, p. 9

I was out in the old Eagle in 1944. It was the only boat out. Captain Sid Hill: he had a job to get a crew. I suppose there was lots of work and people weren’t interested. We got around 130 men; she used to carry 150. He was a good man, Captain Sid Hill. We got around 8 to 10,000 pelts. We made $48. But the flippers were better; they were $4 a dozen. [SRPK 324]

Lowe, William, p. 7

Years ago they used to call the Eagle a “cheque on the bank.” She was supposed to be the best little thing out there. She was lucky. She was good in the ice and she was a good little icebreaker. [SRCJL 902]

Squires, Harold, pp. 3, 8

The Eagle was the only ship with wireless. The other ships were smaller and had radio telephones which were not good enough to contact St. John’s. So Bowring Brothers agreed that all those smaller ships would contact me at a certain time of the day or night and send their traffic through me. Their reports were all in code. I [radio operator, 1947] would gather all the messages and send them to St. John’s, Cabot Tower, using the key and the CW [continuous wave] method. I would get $60 per month, plus a share of seals and a share of flippers. [SRJP 302]

Whitten, Stephen, pp. 17-18

Her last trip to the seal fishery, I believe, was in 1949. They decided to condemn her. It wouldn’t be worth the money to do her up to pass Canadian steamship inspection. They made quite a party of it. The Maggie Blackwood, under Captain Sam Blackwood, took a crowd out in 1950 to watch the Eagle sink. The tug Glenmont towed her out, off Torbay, off Sugarloaf Head, or Torbay Head, on a Sunday. [SRPK 308A/B]

ENGINEER

Lowe, William, p. 37

The engineer got all the control of the engine. Out to the seal fishery it was all go ahead and stop, go astern, slow ahead, half astern, quarter astern, and everything like that—always moving the ship, always picking up seals. I was a sealer, a fireman, and an engineer; engineer was the best job. [SRCJL 902]

Rideout, Arthur, pp. 6, 20

I spent 41 years altogether out in the engine room. First two years out as a sealer. First when I went to sea in the engine room there were only two engineers and no oilers. We had to go on every four hours. And you had to have your dinner and your supper and your breakfast out of that. If you were going on at 8 o’clock in the morning, well, you had to get up at 7 o’clock, get dressed, and go have your breakfast. Then it became eight hours out of 24, four on and eight off. [SRPK 352]

EQUIPMENT

Bowe, Eddie, p. 7

After you got clear of the Narrows, you’d be issued your equipment, which would be a gaff and a tow rope about 20 feet long. You’d coil the rope up and have it on your shoulder. The gaff was a stick about 7 feet long [with] a hook and a spear on the end of it. It was a very useful item—that gaff—because you would use it as a walking stick to keep you from slipping, and if you were jumping from pan to pan, that would help you. [SRPK 301]

Kelly, Jack, pp. 15-16

[Landsman] You’d get a nice suitable stick like a picket and clean it down nicely and go to the smith and tell him what kind of gaff you wanted. He’d make it big or small and the shape you wanted. And you’d come home and seize in your gaff [tie it firmly to the handle]. Now, money was scarce, and knives were expensive. Usually we’d get an old crosscut saw—some called them simon saws—and we’d get a cold chisel and a hammer and mark out the kind of knife we’d want. Then we’d cut the knife out with the cold chisel and hammer and drill holes in it for the handle and then grind it. It was almost impossible to buy a knife that could cut as well as some of those knives could cut. [SRKH 408, 409]

EWING FURS

Escott, Mrs. Philip, pp. 2, 10, 11, 19

Father was a taxidermist. On the door of our house on Pleasant Street there was a pane of glass with a golden-coloured seal. He taught himself. He came across a book on taxidermy. He made sealskin coats, men’s hats. Some sealers would keep one seal and bring it up to Father and have it mounted. In case they never got to the seal fishery again, they’d have a nice souvenir. Every coat that we made we had a sale for it here [W.H. Ewing and Sons, founded in 1896]. [SRFW 101]

EXPLOSION

Carter, Roland, pp. 3-7

We got up in the morning. That was the 13th day of March, and we were jammed [Neptune, 1934]. We had a can that could hold five pounds of powder. We filled it and put it on a long pole and cut a hole in the ice. Somebody called out, “Come on with the poker.” Now, this was to light the fuse. But the man who was doing this said that the fuse wasn’t lighted. My buddy, Jimmy, was holding the poles in his hands. Somebody said, “Shove it under the ice.”

And before he got a chance to shove it under the ice, the blast went off. It knocked him back on the ice. There was another fellow there, Stanley Dyke from Poole’s Island. The powder hit him in the eyes and blinded him. They thought they were killed, but it never killed any of them. So this Stan Dyke, they took him to the side of the ship and carried him to the cabin. Then they brought Harry Melendy in. He was only a small man, and his face was disfigured and swollen. He was saying, “God have mercy on me.” We carried him down to the after cabin and cut the clothes off him.

I volunteered to stay with him because there was no doctor, just a man from a pharmacy. I went in that cabin the 13th day of March and I looked after that man. I used to do his face over with some kind of liquid every morning and every evening. A piece was cut out of his cheek and his lips were so sore that we had to put pegs in the corners of his mouth so they wouldn’t grow together. I fed him for a full week on liquid. I’d dissolve an Oxo every morning and I poured it in his mouth with a little teaspoon. After the first week I gave him heavier food like soup with vegetables. He started to get better and, anyhow, I nursed that man until the 13th day of April. When we got to St. John’s, the ambulance was there and carried him to hospital. He got better, and he and I became shipmates together fishing. But they had to take one of his eyes out. [SRBH 718]

FALLING IN

Bowe, Eddie, p. 15

People falls in the water. They’d jump when the ice was parting. Never jump until the ice starts coming together. [SRPK 301]

Bragg, Thomas, p. 19

One time I fell in right to my armpits, right out in the blue drink. I got out and took off my clothes and some of the crew gave me a pair of overalls. I had on a couple of pair of overalls and no underwear, and I had dry socks. It was a very fine day and I took my hauling rope and hung it on my gaff and I hung my clothes out. And that evening I put my clothes on and wore it on board again, right dry. We always used to wear two-piece underwear so if we fell in just so far that’s all we’d have to haul off, our pants and drawers. I dipped in a good many times. You couldn’t help it. [SRPK 340]

Burry, Stephen, pp. 13-15

I fell in. I went to cross this slob and down I goes. I was a dog, and I had a bag of bullets on my shoulder hanging down by my side. When I fell through, I knew what I had to do because you couldn’t hold on to the cartridges or else they’d take you under. They’d take you down. So I just put up me thumb and slipped them off my shoulder. I managed to get out on my own. Took off my boots and wrung out my stockings and got them back on again. It was late April and the weather was beginning to get warmer and milder. I had to stay out until I got aboard. [SRPK 341]

Cobb, Norman, p. 9

[Landsman] I took my gaff and made a jump across where I thought it was a solid pan. I jumped and it was all snow and I went [up] to the two armpits in the water. John Keats reached his gaff and I reached mine and the two gaffs hooked together and we rolled handles and he hauled me out. [SRKH 402]

Collins, Ernest, pp. 4-6

[Landsman] I was about 14 years old and my father and I left around 11 o’clock in the morning to get some seals. We had a report that the seals were about 4 miles off Durrell’s, the southerly part of Twillingate. We were warmly dressed, and it was a nice fine day. But walking out I fell in. I stepped on some rubble between the pans and it wasn’t strong enough to hold me. If there is enough pressure on it, you can walk on this rubble, but I just happened to be unfortunate and fell down through.

I changed my socks and went on, and we found the seals and killed some. Coming back it started to rain, freezing rain, and I got very wet and cold and became unconscious. My father had to bring me ashore on his back, and I remained unconscious for about eight hours. When I came to, I was wrapped in blankets and hot water bottles. At the same time another young man from Twillingate, an Anstey, went through the same difficulty that I had encountered, and while his friends were able to get him back to shore, he died. We had one seal each, my father and I, but I didn’t get mine all the way back to shore. My father had to go back after it and drag it in. I got $3.58 for the pelt, and we had the carcass for meat. [SRCJL 903]

Dawe, Harvey, p. 7

One time I fell in the water when I was with the Viking [c.1928]. I floated the cap off my head and it was frosty and we had the ship “walked down.” We could just see her spars sticking up—that’s what we meant by “walked down”; we couldn’t see the ship. Someone was supposed to go aboard with me, but I went aboard myself, and Captain William Bartlett was watching from the bridge. He gave me a going-over when I got aboard because I had come alone. He wanted to know who was with me, but I never told him because, if he knew, he’d be after those fellows. [SRKB 804]

Flynn, William, pp. 16-19, 20-21

It was a foggy morning [in 1929], and there were five of us together. We used to walk on one night’s frost between the pans. Salt water was tough; it would bend, but you wouldn’t go through it. It was misty rain and we had our oilclothes on and tied down over our boots. We had made up our minds not to go clear of one another because it was as foggy as pitch. I saw five seals out on a pan of ice—all slob, froze over that night, and I started to go alone. When I got about halfways, I went down to my two arms. I had the rope in one hand and the gaff in the other and that kind of kept me up.

I sang out to the boys, but I never heard a sound; I suppose I must have been too low in the fog. I started to think. I said, “It’s not going to be very long now. The heat of my arms is going to melt the snow and I’m going to go on down.” Because I didn’t have much support, down in the water with my two arms laid out, right in the middle of St. George’s Bay. I said, “It’s between me and you, Almighty God, I got to go out or in. I can’t stay here because I’m going to go down anyway.” I moved one arm and put it on the gaff and then the other. I came up as far as I could and straightened out on the rope and gaff and got one leg out of the hole and then the two of them. I left everything there and I rolled.

I rolled right back to the main pan. When I got back to the main pan, the four of them were there. I said, “Boys, you were going to let me drown.” They said, “We never heard you; we didn’t know where you were.” I said, “Now, I’ll tell you what. Take one of you and we’ll put two or three ropes on you and we’ll see how far out you get.” We put the rope around Pat Delaney and he got about halfways, when away he goes. We had to pull him back. The sun came out and the ice melted in that length of time.

There was a fellow—Bill Ryan from Riverhead, Harbour Grace—and he had on a pair of khaki pants under his other ones. He took them off and I pulled off my heavy fleece-lined underwear, because if you got wet, you couldn’t walk with that, you’d chafe. So I put on his khaki pants and put my underwear over that and we went aboard the boat.

We had a fellow Phil from St. John’s. He was good friends with policemen over there and he had some of these policemen’s clothes, warm clothes and a big fur cap. I think he used to go down in every bobbing hole. On dirty days all you’d see was the cap, bobbing. I see Gussie Fitzpatrick one time out in the wake. We were butting ice, all hands were overboard, and on the way in he fell, and the boat was twisting around and the propeller drove him back. They had a job to get him, Gus was a heavy man, but they got him with the rope. [SRKB 815]

Gosse, Pat, pp. 11-12

If anyone fell in, you’d take off everything and sit down on a warm seal. You’d give them your warm drawers and then they’d have their drink of moonshine and Redways. That would keep them warm. You’d fall in at 7 or 8 or 9 in the morning and from that until 6 in the evening you had to keep walking to keep your clothes from freezing. Someone would sculp your seals for you. [SRMD 411]

Keel, Heber, pp. 3-5

This day was not a good day on the ice. There was sleet and we had to put on our oilclothes. After we cleaned the patch up, we were coming aboard; everyone was coming aboard. I saw this fellow not quite near us. He had a string of flippers around his middle and a string in each hand. I said to one of the men, “That young fellow is going to be drowned. I got to save that man.”

I said to him, “Throw that away. You’re going to be drowned.” “Oh no,” he said. “Well,” I said, “boy, you’re going to be drowned. That’s bad ice.” It was his first spring out. I said, “I can’t do anything for you if you go in the water with those flippers.” He wouldn’t throw them away. Anyway, I went across a pan, and the pan broke. I just got clear. Away he went. I had my gaff and I put it out and I held him by the gaff and hauled him to a pan. I said, “Let them go.” And he let the flippers go. I took my knife out and I cut the flippers from his belt and let them go. The men were all gone aboard and I had some job getting that man out by myself.

I said, “Boy, hold on, whatever you do.” So I tried and I tried. “Now,” I said, “this time I’ll make it a good one. And you try to get out, too.” So I pulled him out on the ice. I said, “Take off your boots and empty the water out. You can’t take off your clothes.” That’s what he did. He said, “Don’t tell anybody what happened.” “I won’t tell,” I said. “And if anyone asks you, you say you fell in. Whatever you do, don’t say you were nearly drowned. So it took us an hour before we got aboard. I told him to take off his clothes and put on fresh clothes and he’d be all right. So that’s what he did. I never heard nothing else from that young man, and he bunked not too far from me. I never told anyone.

When we got our seals out in St. John’s and were getting paid off on the wharf, he came along. He said, “I want to see you.” “What for?” I said. “Look here,” he said, “I’d never see this wharf, I’d never see home, only for you. You saved my life. What is it worth?” “Nothing,” I said, “my saving your life.” “Well,” he said, “I told Father all about it and Father told me, ‘Do whatever you can do for that man.’” “Well,” I said, “boy, I forgot about it. That was not in my mind.” “It was in my mind all spring,” he said, “and I had to tell Father. God bless you, I’ll never, never forget you. You saved my life, and you a stranger.” [SRPK 328]

Mifflin, Sam, p. 19

Yes, I fell in. I was loungie, fat—went down through. It was a cold day, the 17th of March, 4 o’clock in the evening when I went down in the water. And there was a fellow working away to my right, belonged to Random Island. And I went down out of sight and couldn’t see him. “My God,” I said to myself, “Willis must be gone in, too.” Then I could hear his feet clicking on the ice. “By God,” I said, “he’s coming.”

Up he come and drove the gaff down through my shoulder, right through the shirts, sweater, jacket and everything. He plucked me right out against his feet. “Jesus,” he said, “you’re drowned.” “No, I didn’t drown,” I said. “You damn fool, you got me crippled.” “That’s nothing,” he said, “you’ll get over that.”

It was some cold. The clothes were frozen like iron. We pried it off. He caught hold of one end and I the other and twisted the water out of it. That was a hard evening. “Now we’ll go aboard,” he said. And Bob Winsor was in the bridge. “What’s the matter, boys?” he said. “Got wet,” I said. “What, did you fall in?” “Yes, right down through, no bottom there.” “All right, come aboard and come up first and then get a good drink.” I went up and got a tumbler, three-parts full of black rum and I flipped it down. “That’s a good drink,” I said. “Yes,” he said, “that’s a good one.” And there were no sealers aboard, only two or three fellows blind. [SRBH 714]

Street, Arthur, p. 14

I knew the way to cut down a seal but I didn’t know the way to take the pelt off around the head. I said to this middle-aged man: “Skipper, I know the way to get it down but I don’t know the way to get it off around the head.” He said, “I haven’t got time to show you.” I used to take the big carcass up in my arms and skin it out. I saw this man and I went down and told him. “Come down here,” he said, “and I’ll show you what to do.” He showed me.

Next spring I went out in the Nascopie. This man went, too. It came to quintering. Old Kean said, “Three men jump out and get those three.” I jumped, this man jumped, and my first cousin jumped. This man was in the middle. He fell in up to his throat and sang out to me to haul him out. I never heeded him but went on and killed my seal. My first cousin hauled him out. When I came back, he said, “My son, that was a bad thing you did.” “Look here,” I said, “Skipper, I was going to haul you out when I came back, because I never had time when I was going out to kill my seal. You never had time last spring to show me the way to take off a pelt.” [SRBH 712A/B]

Winsor, George, pp. 7-8

On my first day I went on the ice. We left in the morning at daylight. There were lots of seals and I suppose the water was froze that night and the seals were making holes. We were walking along behind the master watch and all of a sudden I knowed nothing till I was right down to my neck in water. It was cold, below zero. Someone next to me hooked me out with the gaff, hauled me by my back up on the ice. They put the flags up then, three flags for the boat to come back to pick me up. But she didn’t see us and she went on. I stayed on the ice all day till dark. I froze rock solid. I couldn’t bend. I went aboard at dark and I was laid up for about a month with pneumonia, in the hospital on board. [SRKB 807]

FAMILY HISTORY

Keel, Heber, pp. 13-14

My grandfather was born in 1842, March 19th. His grandfather must be the first man to come here in 1787. So my grandfather was 13 years old in 1855, and he and his grandfather went off Cape Bonavista. When they got so far off the Cape on the ice, they saw a boat in the seals off Spillars Cove. His grandfather was old and, when they were trying to get to that boat, he said to his grandson, “Save yourself. Never mind me. If I’m drowned, boy, that’s all you can do.”

They went on, he fell in, and got himself out, and his grandfather couldn’t keep up. At last he reached the boat. At that time there were schooners, no engines, only sails. The captain said, “Where did you come from?” “Come from Bonavista,” he said. “What? A boy,” he said, “like you? Come from Bonavista on the ice?” “Yes,” he said. “Do you see my grandfather?” he asked the man in the barrel. “Well,” he said, “a few minutes before, I saw your grandfather, but he’s drowned now. There’s no sign of him. Your grandfather is drowned, my son.”

The captain said, “We got no bunks, but you come down in the cabin with me, and we’ll get a bunk there for you.” He said, “Would you go on the ice?” “Oh yes,” he said, “I’ll go on the ice.” “What about a half share?” he said. “Oh yes, I’ll go for a half share.” So he was on the ice every day, never missed a day. Only 13, but never missed a day. At last they loaded the schooner.

The schooner [the Mayflower] belonged to Carbonear. Captain Pike was captain and that’s where he discharged, Carbonear. He was paid off in pounds, shillings, and pence. He left Carbonear by himself and began to walk. No roads, only paths and a few houses. He came right down around the shore to Clarenville. When he got to Bonavista, they were amazed to see him. They thought he was drowned. [SRPK 324]

FIGHTS

Smith, Cyril, pp. 15-16

There would be fights between the St. John’s men and the baymen when the ships returned from the ice. When they’d [St. John’s men] come aboard, they’d all heave off their jackets and go to it. [SRKB 864]

FIREMEN

Boone, William, pp. 20-21

Oh, my boy, they could drink. Every now and then you’d look and they’d be all drunk. It’s a wonder they kept the coal in her sometimes. We went in the Gulf in the old Thetis and there wasn’t much steam the first night. [SRKB 824]

Bragg, Thomas, p. 15

Nearly all the firemen came from St. John’s. There weren’t too many firemen that belonged out around the bays at them times. But then a few fellows from the bays got on the ships and went trimming first and then they started to go firemen. After that you could pick up firemen out around the bays. [SRPK 340]

Codner, Jesse, pp. 11-12

When we were going out through the Narrows, the firemen were all St. John’s men and they’d be drunk. My God Almighty, sometimes they’d just get us out through the Narrows. And they used to brew their beer in a keg in the forecastle where they slept, and then they’d bring it down in the fire room in a gallon bottle. [SRPK 355]

Doyle, Robert, pp. 23-24

Two firemen would come off at 8 o’clock in the night. They’d get the “black-pan”—that was leftover supper all hashed together with a couple of tins of fruit. They’d eat and they’d have a couple of glasses of beer. I think the name “black-pan” comes from having being down in the hold—coal-black. [SRMJD 507]

Lowe, William, pp. 12, 19, 36-37, 56, 79; p. 37

I was on deck as a sealer 15 or 16 springs. Then I went down below as a fireman. Down below is a little bit of comfort. You get a mattress and bed linen and the best of grub. I was 18 or 20 springs as fireman and I was third engineer on my last voyage.

On some boats there’d be one fireman per watch. Three watches: 8 to 12, 12 to 4, 4 to 8. It was all according to how many fires you had. If she was a three-fire job, you had three firemen.

If you were firing or oiling, you only just put your shift in—eight hours. Say I was on the 8 to 12 watch; I’d go on at 8 o’clock in the morning and I’d go off at 12 o’clock that day and I wouldn’t go back until 8 o’clock that night. Then 8 to 12 at night. That was a good watch. Now, you could be 12 to 4 and 4 to 8. Now, 12 to 4 was the graveyard watch. That’s a lonely watch. That’s the robbin’ watch: you’d go in the galley and rob what you wanted to eat. “When the 8 to 12 sleeps, the 12 to 4 creeps”—that’s what they say.

I done a lot of firing before I ever got a job out of St. John’s—England, the States, Montreal. Now, a fireman never turned up on the Beothic. Mickey Holden, one of the oilers, said, “There’s a fireman on the deck of this boat.” So Mickey said to me, “Taps, the chief engineer, wants to see you. There’s a job firing.”

Fireman was a hard job. You burnt coal; the Imogene probably burnt 50 tons a day. You’d shovel coal, but that’s not all a fireman did. We had to clean the fires, move the fire over to one side, and clean the empty side; then move it back and clean the other. [SRFW 103A/B, SRCJL 902]

Street, Arthur, p. 20

The spring I was with old Kean, Wes Kean had the Eagle. My brother was in the Eagle, his first spring out. About 12 o’clock in the night Wes called his father; the master watch came and told him. He said, “Wes’s up off St. John’s now and all the firemen are drunk. He’s got two old men, sealers, firing her.” [SRBH 712A/B]

FIRST ARRIVAL

Gillett, William, p. 35

The Neptune was the first one in one spring [1929]. Them days the first ship in would get two plugs of tobacco and a pipe [for every man]. But I didn’t smoke. I never smoked. I’d give mine away. [SRCL 201]

Lowe, William, p. 15

I was up in the Gulf in the Thetis in 1931. We were the first home that spring and we got the pipe and tobacco. The tobacco factory gave you a pound of tobacco and a pipe. We had 13,000 seals. [SRFW 103A/B]

FIRST TRIP

Bowe, Eddie, pp. 1-9

What made me go to the ice was foolishness and curiosity [1927?]. I left the Goulds and I had a box on two flour-barrel staves. Me and Sam Blackler from Mobile left the Goulds about 4 o’clock in the morning because we had to be out to St. John’s by 7 o’clock to get aboard the boat. We were out 29 days and we got paid the second best bill that year—$79. [SRPK 301]

Clarke, Allan, pp. 2-8, 21-23

My brother was a policeman in Clarke’s Beach and he got a berth on the Terra Nova for me from Percy Crosbie, John Crosbie’s father [1938]. I made a box about 3 feet long by 2 square and I went into St. John’s. Bob Woodridge from Trinity and I bunked together in a little bunk. We had to crawl in through a hole and we hung up a brin bag to keep the coal dust out. My mother gave me a little white pan to get my meals in and I never washed it out for five weeks, and I had a mug and I never washed that out. I made $110 and I sold $20 worth of flippers. I came home a rich man.

I had no experience, so when I got on the ice an old man, belonged to St. John’s—Jackie Barrett—he said, “Come on with me, young fellow. Did you ever go out on the ice before?” I said, “No, I don’t know nothing about it.” He said, “Give me your knife. Now, I’ll sharpen your knife for you first thing.” And he sharpened my knife, and he said, “I’ll show you how to sculp them now. Kill four or five and bring them over together on the pan.” So I went and killed them, brought them over, and he showed my how to sculp two. That day I sculped 50 and the next day I went with Jackie again and I sculped 95.

When my brother in Clarke’s Beach got me the berth, I promised him a bottle of rum if I made any money. So I went to the Controllers in the west end and said, “I want a bottle of rum.” “You can’t have a bottle of rum,” he said, “unless you have a book.” And I went over and asked the man for a book and he gave me the book, and he said, “How old are you?” I said, “I’ll be 20 on my birthday.” “You can’t buy rum,” he said, “until you’re 21.”

He looked at me and he said, “Where did you come from?” I said, “I just came in from the ice, sir.” He said, “You were out to the ice? How much money did you make?” I said, “I made $110.” He said, “Boy, if you was out to the ice, you can buy a bottle of rum. What kind do you want?” I pointed at a bottle and he brought it to me and he said, “That’s $1.70.” And when I got to Clarke’s Beach, my brother came to the train and took the bottle of rum. [SRKB 858]

Dodd, Jack, p. 6

This young fellow and I got together and we had to start sculping. He said, “How do you sculp a seal?” I said, “I don’t know. I saw my father one time with one he got in a net.” “So,” I said, “you start at the head and you rip him down to the tail.” So I split open the seal and he stood watching me. Anyhow, we sculped three apiece, and we got them on our rope and started to haul them.

They were all we could haul, and I think we had them wrong because there was a big man from Bay Roberts, Fitzpatrick, and he had 5 seals strung on his rope, and he passed us by, and said, “Young fellow, hook on and get on yourself.” You had to bring three because the captain would be on the bridge. Anyhow, we finally got [to] the side of the Diana, and the captain and the master watch were looking down at us.

He spoke to the master watch and the master watch came to the rail of the bridge. He said, “Who ever told you fellows you were seal hunters?” This young fellow up and said, “Sir, no one told us.” “Well,” he said, “I’m going to tell you, you’re not.” I said to the young fellow, “That was an awful thing to say to us, and we trying to do the best we can.” So we asked Fitzpatrick why the master watch talked like that. He said, “You’re supposed to leave the tails on the pelts. You fellows cut them off. You spoiled them.” We said, “That’s easy. All we got to do is leave the tails on.” [C2827/75-189 (Patricia Penney)]

Fitzgerald, Edward, pp. 2-6

I was young and, in fact, when I left home, I was 15 [1938]. I had my 16th birthday at the ice. I got the berth from Chesley A. Fillier for the Ranger with Captain Badcock in the Gulf. The icebreaker Moncalm helped us get our pelts, and we arrived back in St. John’s after 29 days. We made $84 and were a happy crew, because that was a lot of money. I think that was one of the happiest events in my lifetime, because this was right in the depths of the Depression.

We were tickled to death. Rum was cheap and we liked a drop. You could buy a good bottle of rum for $1.50. And the best meal on Water Street was only 35 cents. That was my first trip, and I’ll never forget it. It was an adventure I’ll never forget. If you didn’t spend your dollars with Mr. Fillier, you got no berth. That’s the whole sum and substance of it. And when you came back, he expected to get a few of those dollars, too. [SRKB 814]

Flynn, Frank, pp. 2-4

My first trip to the seal fishery was in 1940. Captain John Parsons gave me a letter to take to Captain Richard Badcock in Bay Roberts. Captain Badcock gave me a berth in the Terra Nova. We sailed from St. John’s to the Gulf around the 1st of March. We got jammed in heavy ice and were blocked solid till the 22nd of March. Finally, we ran into the seals and got 18,000 or 19,000. But the ship was still jammed, and we had to walk all day. You talk about walking: we used to walk till the ship’s spars looked like sucker sticks. We killed all day and just before dark we came aboard with a tow, three seals in a tow. Anyhow, we killed a load and the ship never got clear, they were all pretty well towed aboard, two tows a day, that’s how far we were from the ship. [SRKB 802]

Flynn, William, pp. 2-7, 12, 14

I got the berth through Mr. Abraham Sheppard; he lived up there on the road [Spaniard’s Bay, 1929?]. He was a fisherman, and he used to be supplied by Captain John Parsons. We had it rough going. The fellows below deck, the firemen, were drunk, and they let one of the fires go out and she got broadsides to the storm. Oh, it was a fierce night, a fierce night, a fierce night. The sea used to come right in over and smack up against the bridge; we were under water all night.

There were fellows who were scared. Elijah Badcock, here in Bay Roberts, was master watch. I was in his watch. Elijah came to the gangway and he sang out, “Boys, the hatches are not battened, and we’re filling up with water. You’ll have to come up and batten the hatches.” The bridge was right across her from side to side and when the sea used to come in, she used to fill up between the barrackhead and the bridge. We were there in our oilclothes up to our armpits, and I wanted to go to the toilet.

I said, “I got to go. I can’t stay no longer.” I was about halfway up the ladder when they seen me going, and sung out from the bridge. They said, “Don’t go up there. Hold on.” And when she shook herself, the two toilets were about a gunshot behind her. I’d have gone with them. When I came down on deck, and she lifted up, the two of them were about a gunshot behind us.

We lost everything that night. We lost the two dories we had; we lost all the bats and the prises [levers]. The outdoor toilets were up on the barrackhead, and they washed away. We got into Trepassey with one fire going. We got straightened up there and got more gaffs and we went up in the Gulf and we loaded. We struck a spot of fat and we loaded and got stuck for two weeks.

So they got word to the icebreaker the Baccalieu. She came down and made a few circles around us and cut us out. Captain Hearn from Riverhead, Harbour Grace, was on her. He was tickled to death to see us. He came aboard and got half a bag of hard bread. He said, “I want a meal of Newfoundland brewis.” Next morning we got out in the water and straightened her out for home.

Then just as we made it to the edge of the ice in the Gulf, coming down we struck a southeast gale. We drove 40 miles that night back in the ice, back to the Bird Rocks. There was a big shoal on the eastern end of the Bird Rocks and they had a lighthouse there. The ballicatter [ice formed on the shoreline by frozen ocean spray] was built up around the rock, and we sent out an SOS to the cutter again that we were in trouble.

She was up in Quebec taking on fresh water. Anyway, we drove in and shot around the western end of the island; if we’d gone around the eastern end, we’d have gone on the reef. We shot around the western end and we saw the cutter coming. Captain Hearn said, “Are you safe?” Skipper said, “Yes, by God.” Captain Hearn said, “I was taking 21 knots out of her when I got your signal that you were all right. You wouldn’t have been a wrecked crew for very long.” It was a rough one for my first spring, I’ll tell you. [SRKB 815]

Kane, Thomas, pp. 2, 5

We left Renews at 1 o’clock in the morning [1914], Monday morning, and at 6 o’clock that evening we were in Tors Cove. We stayed to a boarding house—Mrs. Nagle was her name. We left the next morning; at 6 o’clock we got to Witless Bay. There was a man going out to town and he took one of us and we followed on to Bay Bulls. Another fellow picked us up and brought us to the Goulds. We walked on from that to St. John’s. The next day we signed on the Eagle. We made $133 in three weeks. [In 1916, Eagle’s crew made $133.78 each.] [SRMC 803]

Maddox, Thomas, p. 2

I’ll never forget it. We had a hard time. We had to take a bag on our backs and a suitcase and walk from King’s Cove to the train in Princeton, over 20 miles. We left here 7 o’clock in the morning, and we got to the train at 12 o’clock in the night. Then we went on and the train went off the track in Holyrood [?]. We were three days from the time we left King’s Cove till we got to the steamers in St. John’s. [SRPK 326]

Mifflin, Sam, p. 23

Mother kicked up old hell my first trip—wouldn’t give me no stockings or anything. I had to go to the shop and buy stockings. And she didn’t hardly speak to me. I was 16 [1924]. I left school and went with old Georgie Barbour. [SRBH 714]

Parsons, Andrew, pp. 2-5

I went to St. John’s on speculation [1934]. So I went down on the wharf as the Ranger was sailing the next morning. I went down on the wharf about 3 o’clock in the evening. Talking to Phil Snow from Bay Roberts, I said, “I’m looking for a berth.” “Now,” he said, “hold on. I may get you one.” So he went down to see the captain, and that’s how I got my berth—my first berth to the ice. And I had to jump her, get aboard, and go on.

I was all ready. I had my boots and everything. The old fellow there, the teamster [driver and horse and slide], he went up to the station and brought down my box and bag and I went to Bowring’s and I got my crop. I took a suit of single oilclothes but I made only about $15. I got to know Captain Badcock and he always sent me a berth after Christmas. I had no trouble getting my berth after that. [SRKB 843]

Sheppard, Lewis, pp. 2, 5

There was a fellow from Spaniard’s Bay [on the Imogene] and he showed me how to sculp. The next day I went on with the master watch and some time in the day he said, “Lew, what one was you on last year?” I said the Ranger because all the southern fellows used to go in the old Ranger because Dickie Badcock from Bay Roberts used to have the old Ranger. You had to be a northern man to get a berth in the Imogene, clear of the few berths that were given out by the merchants. [SRKB 850]

Smith, John A., pp. 2, 8

I was forced into the seal fishery [in 1939]. I had nothing else to do, and that’s why I had to go. I was young, 18 or 19 or 20, and it was a job to get a berth then. Now, my father worked on Bell Island in the mines and the man they used to buy their food from, Martin Rose, he got a berth from Bowring’s and Father got the berth from him.

Out of the crop I sent home some oats for the horse. Another fellow sent home a sack of flour. A sack of flour was $1.90. We went in the Gulf on the Terra Nova under Stan Barbour and we got jammed in the ice and used all our powder. We came in with 1,200 pelts. We had to come home on a government ticket. We had no money.

In 1940 I had a choice: I could stay with the ship or stay with the captain. Everyone that was on the Terra Nova in 1939 could go with Stan Barbour; he was in the Beothic. Dickie Badcock took the Terra Nova. I stayed with the ship and I got in contact with the southern men. We went in the Gulf again and we were the third ship in with a load. Captain Badcock knew all about the Gulf. [SRKB 849]

Smith, William, pp. 10, 15

It was my first spring. I saw Captain John Parsons in the shop. “Hello,” he said. “Will, where are you going, boy?” I said, joking, “I’m looking for a berth to the ice now.” “A damn fine time for you to come,” he said. “Sure, if I had a thousand berths, they’d all be gone now.” I said, “I know that, Captain. I’m not looking for that, sir. I came over to get a barrel of flour and two or three things that I wanted.”

Skipper Eric was going barrelman or scunner with him that spring. He said, “Will, you weren’t joking about that berth, were you?” I said, “Yes, sir, I know Captain Parsons got neither berth.” “Don’t you believe him,” he said. So I said, “Captain Parsons, if you have either man back off between now and your sailing, what about giving me the ticket?” [He got the ticket.] [C1273/72-92 (John Barrett)]

Sturge, Stanley, pp. 2-5

I’ll tell you the first spring I started to the seal fishery with Captain Kean [1924]. We came up here to go to the seal fishery and when we got up here the old Terra Nova had gone out to tow a steamer with the bows beat out of her—the Kentucky. We went aboard the old Ranger and stayed until the Terra Nova came in. The Ranger sailed in the morning and about 2 o’clock the Terra Nova came in, and the next morning we sailed. We steamed on and got in the ice.

First the ice started to nip, then we got jammed. Old man Kean sung out to my brother, who was a master watch, and Phil Spurrell. “Billy,” he said, “you take a walk about 3 or 4 miles out and see if you can see either seal or if you can hear one.” They walked out 3 or 4 miles, and they stopped and listened, and they heard a human cry like a crowd of children coming out of school. Nothing only the roar and bawl. So they came aboard and told the old man. We got up steam again and we punched and butted through and the next morning we got into them.

They were in their prime then, 40 or 45 pounds, thick in the ice. He said, “Get out! All hands out.” We started panning and we panned until dark. The next morning we got out again and cleaned up the patch. Then we saw the flag go up on the foremast, which meant, “Come aboard.” When we all got aboard, there were more seals over on the port side. He said, “Come on, me darlin’ fellows. Get your dinner and over the side again.”

We went over the port side and we started panning again. We had 17,000 killed then. So next morning it rained. When it rains, they go off the ice and into the water. They are beaters then. So we picked up our pans. But the Eagle came out and they took about 3,000 of our pelts. We got 14,000 out of it. Then we came south and met the rusties [rusty jackets or raggedy jackets] and the bedlamers and loaded her right down. I’ll never forget the last day we were out.

He blowed the whistle. “Come aboard, me darlin’ fellows,” he said, “I’m finished with you. We got enough.” So we did. We had two pounds in her forward and two pounds across her waist and down in the lobby where the cooks stayed, we had that filled up. We got the seals aboard, and we left the next morning. She was some deep. Next morning we were about 10 miles from Baccalieu when we took the wind from the southwest. She started to roll. The first dart she made she took the two outside toilets off her sides. The next dart smashed up the dories. We hove to. Down in the hold they were sick.

Captain Kean was on the bridge. He wouldn’t heave seals overboard. Skipper John Calloway [Galloway?], a master watch, said, “We’ll heave the seals overboard.” “No,” he said, “dump flour, pork, beef, and all the seal barrels.” So we went up and cut seal barrels and everything and it all went over the side. About 2 o’clock the captain was on the bridge, and the wind started to drop. He said to Uncle Abram Best, another master watch, “Go down and tell the engineers to give her a couple more revolutions.”

Next morning at 9 o’clock we got in here and tied up to the wharf. We got ready to take out seals and, when the men jumped down into the pound, they jumped right down in the water. The main beam was cracked. Another hour in the storm and she’d have gone. Once the main beam broke, the seals began to move around. That’s what happened to the Southern Cross, a pound broke and the seal pelts moved. [SRPK 303, 304A]

FLAGS

Lowe, William, p. 68

If you were getting plenty of seals, and you got short of flags, you would make a “bloody pinnacle.” You’d take a carcass, full of blood, and put it up on a high pinnacle of ice where the ship would be able to see it. [SRFW 103A/B]

FLIPPERS

Bragg, Thomas, p. 20

The men got along pretty good, but when you’d get in sharing the flippers, there’d be a scattered racket. Fellows would steal a few flippers and go away and sell them and get a bottle of rum, and they’d get caught. Then the racket would start. [SRPK 340]

Fitzgerald, Edward, pp. 3-4

The flippers were supposed to be shared among the men equally—that was the rule—but they usen’t to do it. Mr. Bowring would send over for 50 or 60 dozen flippers, and we never heard tell of any money. Next day there’d be another 50 or 60 dozen go to Mr. Bowring. The value of those flippers was supposed to be shared up among the sealers, but there was nothing you could say about it. If you opened your mouth to anyone, next spring you’d never get a berth. [SRKB 814]

Hayes, Sylvester, p. 28

We never used to sell flippers. We always gave them away. You always knew someone to give three or six to. The townies never sold flippers. I never knew a townie yet to sell flippers when he came in. He always gave them away. [The outport fellows] knew no one to give them to. [SRPK 302A/B]

Keel, Roy, p. 14

Selling your flippers at 60 cents a dozen. And you were lucky to get 60 cents. Now, perhaps you sold these twice. If you sold them to a minister or a big shot, he’d tell you to carry them to his house. Now, perhaps you’d meet another fellow. The first fellow was gone out of sight, so you’d sell them again. Get $1.20 for them. That’s time, I’ve done that [sold them twice]. [SRPK 327]

Kelloway, William, p. 26

I was working in the hold unloading. I was trying to sneak a dozen flippers to get a bottle of rum. I was all day at it. And this time I put a dozen flippers down in my oil pants and tied them over and I called to my cousin, Howard Kelloway, who was on the winch. I said, “Send down the whip now, Howard, and hoist me up.” He sent the whip down and I put the strap around me and put the hook in for him to hoist me up on the coams of the hatch.

Instead of that he went right up on the jib block with me. I went up and up, and it was hauling the legs I had tied up out of the rubber boots, and there were the flippers coming down on deck one by one, flapping right down. I was ashamed of my life but they had a wonderful laugh. Uncle John came out. He said, “Proper way to serve you. I knew what you were up to. Getting flippers to get rum.” [SRKB 855]

Lowe, William, pp. 46-47

If you belonged to town, you could never sell a flipper; you’d be the worst in the world. We would share the flippers every evening. We’d knock off landing seals about 5:30 every evening and the master watch would have a list with everyone’s name on it who was working that day. It might come to four or five dozen a man. Now, probably there would be ten hands waiting for me. I often had to buy a couple of flippers for my own mom, and I out to the ice. The baymen had no friends in St. John’s. Now, if the master watch sold the flippers, he shared out the money. That’s the only time I ever got anything for flippers. [SRCJL 902]

Parsons, Andrew, pp. 12-13

We got in late, and our flippers were spoiled. The fat ran, and they were rotten. Only what we had in our barrel. [SRKB 843]

Short, William, p. 10

I never got money from flippers. When a poor man came along in St. John’s and said, “Any chance to get a flipper,” I give him half a dozen. Then I’d carry a dozen and a half to my sister. Then I had my sister’s son in there. I brought a barrel of seal home one time and I took the head out of it on Monday and then Monday evening it was all give away. I had to go and ask Albert for a bit of seal. [SRBH 703A]

Street, Arthur, p. 12

Some fellows would bring aboard the carcass to bring home. We were on the ice one day and four fellows strapped on the pelts to hoist them aboard and then hooked on a carcass. Billy Winsor was watching them; he had the glass. When the carcass came on board on the deck, he ran down out of the bridge and caught hold of the carcass and hove it overboard. Tom Fleming and I were watching them.

Now, I had a few flippers tied up, and I said to Tom, “I’m not going to hook on these flippers. Look what he just did.” The whip line came out and we strung on the pelts. I didn’t hook on the flippers. Winsor looked down, he said, “Tom, who owns those flippers there?” Tom said, “This young fellow. He doesn’t care much about hooking them on.” “Hook them on, my son,” Winsor said, “hook them on. You weren’t fooling like those fellows. I was watching them. I hove away the carcass. Hook them on. You’re not trying to hang the dog. You’re working.” [SRBH 712A/B]

Sullivan, William, p. 28

The first ship in, they made a fortune off the flippers. They’d get $1 a dozen. We’d be the last; we’d always be the last with Captain Bill Winsor. He’d stay out until the last minute. When we got in, you couldn’t get 50 cents for them. You’d have a job to give them away. [SRMD 404A/B]

FOOD

Boone, Robert, pp. 13-16

The galley was kept open at night. The only trouble was getting a piece of pork and few onions. I can tell you I swiped a piece of pork and onions more than once. When I’d find the pork, I used to swipe enough to cook two or three meals. But if you got good friends with the cooks, you’d bring them aboard a couple of dozen flippers or a couple of carcasses and they’d look after you with pork and onions.

I’d put a dozen flippers in a pan. They wouldn’t be big. Then I’d cover them with long strips of pork and put five or six onions on top of that and shove it in the oven to bake. When they were cooked, I’d get a bit of flour and make a drop of gravy. My God, it was some good. Our bunk crew, the top and bottom, five or six hands would sit around and eat it. [SRKB 831]

Bowe, Eddie, pp. 6, 8-9, 18, 21

Now, you had to bring out sweetened milk, because you’d get no milk out there. I had two tins. You’d get butter once a week, no sugar, but you could go up to the galley [where] there was a tierce of molasses and a bin of hard bread. You’d get your bit of fatback [pork]. You’d get your lunch in the bunk where you were all to. You might recognize the cup; it was useless to wash it. You’d spit on your finger and the little bit of the cup that goes in your mouth, you’d rub that white.

Everybody would be making brewis out there. They’d get a half clean board and they’d use something to break up the hard bread. But those two fellows sat down face to face with a three-gallon tin boiler or boat’s kettle between them. They’d chew up the hard bread and it would drop down in the boiler. They had to get out of the hold because they turned everybody’s stomach.

I can tell you if you can eat that duff you had something in your stomach for a while. It was like Indian rubber. The lovely salt beef. You could never do nothing with it. It was down in the water [but] it wasn’t cooked. There was lots of fresh beef up in the rigging for the elite. A couple of times we done all right by getting up in the rigging [to get some].

The crew was charged for three months’ supply of food. [SRPK 301]

Bragg, Fred, pp. 9-10, 48

For breakfast we would have different things—lopscouse, just like a stew. Sometimes you’d have fish with water, but that would be Labrador slop. That would be salty. I wouldn’t touch that because you’d get no drink of water on the ice. The only ice you’d get for water was high pinnacle ice. It would take five boatloads to make a barrel of water.

A boat’s kettle, that’s like a small boiler, a couple of gallons or a gallon and a half. Go up on deck, fill it up for two or three men—potatoes, turnips, meat. If it was soup, you’d take almost three-parts full. You’d bring it down below and sit down on your box. Everybody would have a tin pan, fork and knife and spoon, and an earthenware mug, about a half-inch thick. It would only hold as much as a teacup, but it was three times as big. You’d buy it up to Neyle Soper’s. [SRMD 406]

Bragg, Thomas, pp. 3-4, 6, 16-17, 22

Our diet was mostly pork and duff, and we’d get beans for breakfast. We’d get a loaf of bread a day and a pound of butter a week. You’d get a little container of tea and a mug or two of sugar a week. That would be rationed out to you. You had to make that do. You’d have three or four men in your mess. Well, you’d take a pan and go up to the galley and get it all in that pan [boat’s kettle]. You’d get your duff and your pork and you’d heave the molasses in over everything and come on down in the hold and share it out with your mess.

When we’d get the seals, we’d be cooking and eating flippers all night long. You’d always have a fry of flippers when you came aboard. You’d watch your chance and you’d steal an onion; many’s the one I stole. There used to be a bit of fresh meat tied up in the riggings and some nights you’d get up and cut off some of that and have a fry, too—lots and lots of nights.

You’d have a gunny or a nunny bag and you’d have raisins and rolled oats and sugar. You’d always have a round tin of molasses on your belt. Sometime in the day you’d dig a little hole in the ice pouring molasses into it. That would melt the ice a little bit and make a kind of drink for you. So you’d eat your raisins and rolled oats and you’d get down then and drink up this molasses. That would be good, too, I’ll tell you.

Stealing out there was the name of the game. They’d always have fresh meat back in the after galley and, if the cook turned his back, it was gone. And they’d cook big hams for Sunday back in the after galley and, of course, you always tried to get a few scraps off that. [SRPK 340]

Doyle, Robert, pp. 42-43

One nice sunny day of a Sunday they had the hatches off and were hoisting in a pan of old fat. One real old sealer was sitting down eating his dinner [of] salt meat and steam pudding. They passed the fat over the hold where he sat on his box. I happened to say to him, “What are you doing, skipper?” “Oh,” he said, “getting something to eat, fireman. If I had a drop of gravy now on the pudding, it would be all right.” Over came the sling and down dropped the blood right on the pudding. He says, “I got the gravy now.” [SRMJD 507]

Fitzgerald, Edward, p. 10

I used to boil the flippers with salt in the nighttime and take them on the ice the next day. We’d have 2 or 3 or a half-dozen for a couple of hands. [SRKB 814]

French, Lionel, pp. 7-8

I was a steward in 1940, the last year I was out. I looked after the master watches and scunners, and the firemen and oilers. I’d have to bring the food from the after galley and put it on the plates. There were three galleys. There was the after galley—that was for the captain and the master watches and the cooks and the scunners and all the officers. There was galley for the crew, and there was a baker’s galley, where they used to bake the bread. I used to bring the food from aft to forward; they were up forward in the forecastle. And the after galley was aft under the stern, well back. I’d bring the food in a pan and they’d take it out themselves. [SRKB 812]

Gill, Heber, pp. 12-13

I was only on the Imogene a few days before I got a different berth on her. The food controller came down in the hold one day, and he said, “Gill, I’ve got a job for you.” He said, “Now, the two bakers can’t keep enough bread baked for 250 men, and I hears you were a cook for Captain Fred Greene.” I said, “Yes, and I’m going aboard of her again now as soon as I gets in off this one.” “Well,” he said, “the bakers can’t keep enough bread baked, and I want you to take over the job now as another baker. Get that dirty clothes off and put on clean clothes and get a shave and I’ll give you the key to the hospital. Now, there’s nobody there, nobody sick aboard, and you’ve got everything to your comfort in the hospital and there’s nobody allowed in while you’re there, except if the doctor comes up with somebody.” I said, “Fine, sir.”

So I had a lovely spring after that. The two bakers worked daytime and I worked night shift but I didn’t get much sleep because I’m no good to sleep daytime. The other two bakers were Mr. Critchley from Greenspond or Badger’s Quay and Ted Moody from Twillingate. There was no shortage of bread afterwards. We used to bake a barrel and a quarter of flour a day (196-pound barrels). They’d mix it all and bake daytime. They’d mix it in a great big tub. In the evening, they’d mix up two big tins full. In the nighttime I used all our stoves in the galley and the cook’s stoves down in the hold. I kept up baking all night until they’d take over in the morning. [SRPW 703]

Gillett, William, p. 33

Take a bag of potatoes. They had boilers about 4 feet high. A fellow would hold on the bag and a fellow would cut the string. The potatoes would go down in the pot, rocks, and dirt and everything. We’d have a little dip net on a 2-foot handle to take up the potatoes. I couldn’t eat the salt pork or beef. The only thing that was good was the beans. [SRCL 201]

Gosse, Pat, pp. 11, 23

The food was the worst kind. You’d get a bit of ham-butt pork in the morning and turnips cut up. They called that [lop-]scouse. No one wanted it. Them people down north, oh my sonny man, four or five big bowls of that they could eat. But we’d have our bit [of breakfast] cooked [ourselves]. We’d get the seal livers and a bit of fatback from the cook and a bit of flour and make gravy. Then put a paste [pastry] over it. We cooked that the night before on the stove. We’d get flippers for the firemen and give a steam pudding in return. That was some good. It would melt in your mouth. We’d put that in our grub bag to go out on the ice.

You’d get a mug of rolled oats every Saturday night, and then we’d get rice and prunes Sunday morning. That was some good. There was a fellow who was up in the lumber woods and he was a cook. And he used to cook the baked beans for himself. They were delicious, and he used to go on the ice. When he cooked them one time, the captain came down and got some. And when he got the baked beans he said, “No more ice for you. You’re going cook.” Sometimes we’d get a bit of liver and make a drop of gravy and have our beans in gravy. We’d take them in a mug with us in the ice. They wouldn’t freeze, because there was molasses in them. But them poor people from down north, they were starved to death. [SRMD 411]

Hayward, Charlie, pp. 5-6

We had hard bread and then the cook used to come around with the loaves [1912-1914]. I think it was three times a week. Before then my poor father used to go out and he used to get no bread, only the hard bread. I likes the hard bread, but I can’t chew it now. [SRBH 711]

Keel, Heber, pp. 32, 39

I remember Georgie Keel. Every night he’d have something on cooking. He used to get up in the mast and cut off fresh beef, steal potatoes, and cook a feed.

Jack Sturge was cook. We’d have fresh beef on Sunday. I’d go up to the galley and say “two” [for two men]. Gus would go up and say “two” also. The same thing over again. Jack would never say anything. [SRPK 324]

Lowe, William, pp. 24, 26

Sometimes we’d go to the “dungeon” for a bit of sugar and then we’d go to the “goat’s house” for a bun of bread. We had names on everything where we went, like that. [SRFW 103A/B]

Mouland, Cecil, p. 8

They used to make duff. Duff day was three times a week. They’d dump half a barrel of flour into a big tub. One man on each side would stir the flour, while another man would be throwing the water in. No baking powder, no bread soda, only a little drop of molasses. Then they mixed it up and put it in bags and tied them and threw them in the big boiler. In another boiler they’d be cooking fat pork, what they called ham butt, and it was really good. That’s what we used to get. Half a duff. My cousin would take the other half, so much fat pork and molasses on that. No potatoes. Fat pork and dumpling and you had to eat that dumpling while it was hot. Otherwise it would set like cement when it got cold. [C1488/73-78]

Mullins, Stephen, pp. 2-3

Hardtack, pork and duff day, fat pork and potato, three times a week, Sundays, Tuesdays, and Thursdays, pea soup on Saturdays. You had no soft bread until the Fishermen’s Union rose up. A man by the name of Mr. Coaker got in power so strong the merchants had to make things better for the sealers. So they put bakers on the sealing ships. [SRPK 333]

Pearce, Israel, p. 9

There’d be a big case of hard bread: take all you want. We’d full up our sealing boxes when we were coming home. We’d have hard bread for the summer and we’d have a tub of butter. [SRBH 710]

Power, Robert, p. 19

Sundays we used to call it whack. Sundays you’d go down to the cook and get a little bit of jam in a mug and a block and a half of butter. It would be, “Come on, boys, for your whack.” [SRKM 517]

Short, Andrew, pp. 74-75

There was no shortage of grub—the roughest kind. They’d boil duffs three times a week: Tuesdays, Thursdays, and Sundays. You’d get soft bread twice a week, two buns a man. If you got it on Sunday evening, that had to stand you till Wednesday. Then you’d go and get another two buns. There were two bakers besides the cooks and they’d bake probably three or four barrels of flour at one time.

One thing you had to do was try to keep on the good side of the baker. There was a man by the name of Billy Webber from Brigus. He used to be a baker on the Viking when I was on her. He was a quiet man. I’d come aboard and I’d say, “Uncle Billy, I want a bit of bread.” He’d say, “Did you bring me a flipper, my son?” I’d say, “No, sir, but I’m going out again now as soon as I get a mug of tea and I’ll get you a flipper.” I’d bring him aboard a couple or three flippers. [SRSR Reel 3B 14-08-73]

Sturge, Stanley, pp. 13-14

I was master watch, and when I’d come aboard I’d have fresh meat or something like that, but the men down in the hold wouldn’t. Only the officers used to get it. That’s what used to get me. So I’d call my crowd together whenever the watch came on, if it was 8 o’clock or 12 o’clock, every four hours. Whether we’d be stowing seals or hoisting coal. I’d say to one or two of them, “Go and get the livers and hearts, boys, and crack on.” So they’d get a big pan from the galley, fill it up, and fry it. When our watch would be over, we’d go down in the saloon, and we used to have some feed. [SRPK 309A/B]

Wheeler, Ernest, p. 7

You’d go back to the galley and the cook would give you a week’s supply of food—rations. A block of butter and so much sugar and tea, and this had to last you a week. Probably the block of butter might last you two weeks, and you’d put the other one away to bring home. In the Depression times the dollar was scarce and you had to have a half-dozen blocks of butter and a bit of sugar to bring home. [SRBH 722]

FOOD CONTROLLER

Butt, Cyril, p. 43

Even in the old times they had a food controller. He would see to the food. He had to allowance it out if it was getting scarce. [SRKM 501]

Maloney, Cyril, p. 12

I got a share of the fat. I got the same wages as the crew and $15 more for being food controller. [SRJM 205]

Whitten, Stephen, p. 9

There was also a food inspector. I think he was hired and approved by the Health Department. John French from Coley’s Point was in the Eagle for several years. [SRPK 308A/B]

FRESH WATER

Bowe, Eddie, p. 5

The first two or three men would be digging up the ice while the rest of the men would be passing the ice from one to the other. You had a pair of dirty mitts on your hands. Well, now, what was that ice like after it went through 30 or 35 men and put into a bin for you to drink. [SRPK 301]

Gosse, Doug, p. 8

When you went on watch, you had to go shovel coal and take in ice for the cooks. Those ships did not carry a lot of water, so you had to melt ice to get it. We’d go for the white ice high up on the piece of ice or iceberg. White ice would make better fresh water because the salt had drained from it. If it was blue, the salt would be in it, so you wouldn’t cut blue ice. [SRPK 317]

Hoskins, Edgar, p. 16

I remember once, myself and me buddy, we fired [threw] our two pelts into the water tank. The water was greasy enough then for a while, I’ll tell you. [SRBH 723]

Winsor, George, p. 22

Most times we’d bring bones from home. We’d get the bones out of the gulls’ wings, clean them, wash them, and carry them to the ice. If you couldn’t get a drink of water, sometimes you’d see a drop under a pinnacle, which you couldn’t get at. You’d just put the bone in through the ice and get a drink of water, like a straw. These bones are 8 to 10 inches long. [SRKB 807]

FRISSELL, VARICK

Gillett, William, pp. 13-14

In 1927 Frissell was out making movie pictures. One day, there was not much going on; we were picking up a few seals, so we went on the ice. I took his camera and some other stuff and we were gone four or five hours. Another time he went on the ice with us, and he fell in. We came to a swatch of water about 100 feet long and about 12 feet wide. We had to walk around it.

Frissell was a tall man, nearly 7 feet tall. He said, “I’m not going to walk around that. I’m going to jump it.” He took off his rope, he had three seals like we all had—we were doubling up our pans. When he jumped, his toes just touched the edge of the other side and he fell back in the water. He said, “I’d sooner do that than walk around.” He was a nice man—always mixed with everybody. [SRPK 351]

Hayden, Thomas, p. 24

They had ever so much artificial snow [1930]. And they had a big wooden fan higher than this ceiling. I was watching them this day. One of their men was rigged like a sealer. He was on this pan with a flag and he was holding on to this flagpole: “Wait for me! Wait for me! I’m blind” [part of the film’s dialogue]. And on the deck of the ship they had this fan going and two or three men with square-top shovels firing [throwing] this artificial snow. Out where this fellow was you wouldn’t know but it was a real snowstorm. [Mrs. Hayden: “My father was 42 springs out to the ice” (p. 26).] [SRKM 513]

FROSTERS (CHISELS AND SPARABLES)

Coady, William, pp. 2-10

Every sealer aboard would be coming looking for frosters—some call them sparables, more call them chisels. They were made out of special steel, like discarded files. If you had files that were wore out, you would put them aside until the time was getting handy to the seal fishery; you’d be stockpiling them for those chisels. They were 5 cents a dozen, and if the sealers didn’t have the money, they’d give you hard bread in place of it. They always had lots of hard bread. When I started working with my father in 1929, I was 13 years old. Every chance I’d get I’d be making up chisels and, in the evenings, we’d go back and make more. We were learning our trade [blacksmithing], getting experience, and that would be our own money. I’d have 1,500, 2,000 dozen some times. [SRJM 203]

Coles, Job, p. 14

I had skin boots from Labrador. There was a man over here [Bonavista] by the name of William Hobbs who used to do the boots—“vamp” them. He put chisels in the heels; they were heavier and stronger. And he put sparables in the sole, in the tap. They [the sparables] were smaller—just drive them into the leather like you put studs in a tire. [SRBH 704]

Power, James, pp. 7-8

You’d have a bit of leather tap for putting sparables in, and you’d have chisels made up to the blacksmiths for shoving up in the heels. Not too many had skin boots. Some did, but I would never prefer them. Half the time they’d be wet and wrinkled. There was nothing like the rubber boot. And I done some travelling to the ice. When I got attached to the ice, I was rearing to go. I put nothing in my boots only 2½ [inch] nails. Just drove them in through the side and turned them down. When they got worn, I’d twist them and put in another set. [SRKM 512A/B]

GAFF HANDLES AND BROOMS

Codner, Jesse, pp. 2-4

The men from Torbay, Flatrock, [and] Pouch Cove would go in the woods coming on sealing time and chop long sticks for flagpoles, gaff handles, and birch for birch brooms. They would haul these to St. John’s, especially to Job’s, Bowring’s, and Baird’s, and sell them for the seal fishery. The brooms were used to sweep the deck, and they were mostly made out of birch, but the handles were often made of withe-rod. To make the broom stiffer, we often soaked them in pickle. [SRPK 355]

Walsh, Barth, p. 13

We used to make our own gaff at home. I used to make it out of hardwood, red spruce. Sometimes the company would provide it, but if you had your own, you wouldn’t bother. [SRCJL 904]

GALLEY

Kelloway, Arthur, pp. 2-5

I was only a youngster on the Beothic with Captain Kean. I was in the galley—that’s where my grandfather put me. I used to go out on the ice with the lamps, lighted lamps, and put them where the pans of seals were at, so she could pick them up nighttime. Captain Kean used to give my grandfather about 25 berths, I guess. He spent 50 years with Captain Kean.

I was cookee, tending on the men, carrying out their dinners, cut[ting] up their bread, draw[ing] off the molasses. This was for the sealers. There was a big mess hall on the Beothic. When I was cleared away from supper, I’d go out on the ice with seven or eight lamps on my back. Every pan of seals you’d put a light there: you’d light it and let it bide there. [SRKB 854]

GAMBO

Bragg, Thomas, p. 14

Boy, that used to be hard going, walking to Gambo, going to the seal fishery [from Greenspond]. That was the hardest. I left here one spring, three or four of us, and got to Gambo that night. We walked straight up the bay on the ice. But it was a cold winter. [SRPK 340]

Carter, Roland, pp. 16-18

One year [1934 or 1935] the Beothic was supposed to come down to Wesleyville and pick up the sealers. Then we got word that she wasn’t coming. We had our hopes built up that the big ship was coming to take us and we only had to go up and get aboard of her. But we got the news that something happened to her; she couldn’t come. You could see an army of men going up Indian Bay because the bay was frozen over.

All the sealers with their slides and the ropes on their backs and their suitcases and bags tied on the slides. When you’d get to Gambo with those little slides, the boys and girls would be calling, “Mister, mister, going to give me your slide? Give me your slide.” Once, I got up to Middle Brook and found out that the train wasn’t going until the next morning. It was no use to go on to Gambo because we wouldn’t get anywhere to lie down. You wouldn’t even get into the waiting room of the station—it would be full.

So we stayed in a house with Mrs. Critchett. She was an old lady and she only had a daughter with her. She took us in for the night. I gave her my slide. She wanted it for going to the store to drag home her bit of stuff. I took an old slide she had there made out of pork-barrel staves, put my clothes bag on it. And from Middle Brook I carried on to Gambo. [SRBH 718]

Ford, Andrew, pp. 1-4

After you get your berth [in Wesleyville], you started getting ready. You’d make a sleigh for going to Gambo. You’d have 50 miles to travel and you’d have from 40 to 60 pounds on your sleigh, your food and clothing included. It’d take two days to go to Gambo, and there were only a few houses along the shore and they’d be crowded every night. Probably there’d be 15 or 20 men in the house when you’d get there, where you’d put up for the night.

You’d sit down on the floor and boil your kettle whenever you got a chance. You’d just have a few sweet buns, because that’s the only thing that wouldn’t freeze up, and you’d boil the kettle going along, and whenever you’d get a chance, in the house. There’d be no food in the houses; people wouldn’t be able to feed all those travellers.

You’d get a cup of tea and start off when it got daylight again. When you got to Gambo, there’d be some houses with rabbit soup cooked, all ready, and you’d manage to get in there and get a bowl of soup. Probably the train wouldn’t be going before the next morning and you had to wait around and lie on somebody’s floor all night. You’d get aboard the train and you’d be 10 or 12 hours getting to St. John’s.

When you’d get in St. John’s, one man out of every three or four would leave and run for the steamer to pick out a place to sleep. Put an old brin bag or your coat and it was yours. The other men would wait and get the bags, which were in the luggage car. When you marked your bunk and the other fellows got down, you’d go the matchers [sic?] and the plainers and get some shavings and fill up a brin bag, two brin bags sewed together. That would be your mattress. And there was no food aboard the steamers before you signed on, the day before you sailed. And you’d go to the stores and take up your crop. [C1114/72-44 (P. Ford)]

GOAT’S HOUSE

Lowe, William, p. 52

The “goat’s house” was where they used to keep food. You’d go down and they’d give you your whack [allowance]. Like every Saturday night he’d give you a pound of butter for the week and a mug of sugar. [SRCJL 902]

GREENLAND DISASTER

Parrot, N., pp. 14-20

[Alf Burge, born 1876, speaking] I was in the Terra Nova with Arthur Jackman. We went down on the outside and the other ships went down on the inside. When we got in, they had them all cut. We got 4,000 or 5,000. Then we started for the hoods and struck them the morning the gale came on.

Captain Jackman got on the bridge. He was a rough, rough man. He said to the master watches: “Now, we’re going to have a goddamn big gale of wind before dark; the glass is going right down. Now, the first sign of snow you see, you come for the ship.”

We went on and we had a long ways to walk because the ship was jammed and you could only see the seals from the barrel. There was another fellow there by the name of Calvert; he and I were buddies.

We separated out and we were killing seals all day and by 12 o’clock the weather was coming on. You’d take an old hood and the other fellow would take the young hood. After a while we would change over. When it got time to leave for the ship, the master watch said, “You two fellows can go and see if you can get another tow. Then,” he said, “we’ll all go aboard.”

So, we went to another pan. We walked a long piece and when we were coming back we saw this big island of ice [iceberg] that was cutting through the ice nearly as fast as a steamer could go. We walked across the island and walked on. I was ahead with the old one and the other fellow was coming behind with the young one. There was snow everywhere and you couldn’t see anything. By and by I went into the slob, but I never got very wet—mostly snow. Cyril hauled me out, and I got up and scraped the ice off and went on again.

We never walked very far before I went down again, only this time to my throat in water. The other fellow hauled me out and we walked up on the right-hand side and got clear of it [the island of ice]. We found our pan and there was no one there; they were all gone. It had come on so bad that they had left us there.

We built a shelter with pans of ice and I took off my clothes and wrung it. Cyril took off some of his dry clothes and gave them to me. He gave me his pants. He kept his inside clothes and his overalls. It wasn’t very warm when I hauled off my clothes. I had to strip and then wipe the snow off my back and put my shirt back on. We had our compass and we knew the course where the ship was jammed. So after we got straightened out, we took a course and left for the ship.

By and by we ran up against a lake of water. We walked so far but we couldn’t see any place to get across so we came back to our tracks again and drawed off a pan. It was a big pan. We chiselled it off with our gaffs and got it clear of the other ones. We had to go right across the lake, which was about 100 yards across. There was so much wind in that lake that the water was over our skin boots on this big pan. Anyway, we got across to the other side and we went on, and just at dark we found the ship.

When we got to her side, we were able to sit down on the end of her forward guard where she was hove up that much on the ice. She was empty: she had only 4,000 or 5,000 seals in her.

When I went aboard, I had no skin left on my legs down to my ankles. It was rubbed off with the hard wet clothes.

There was no other ship handy to us and we never heard anything more before we heard that George Barbour had lost so many men, drowned, and killed, and frozen, 47 [48], I think that time. We got a load of hoods after that, and we drove up in White Bay and got jammed, and were there until the first of May.

We got in St. John’s the 5th of May; we had nothing only a load of oil. We made $19.50. Now, I had taken $12 grub and I was charged $16, and you had to pay for your berth then, $3 for the outfit. Sixteen dollars and the $3 for the berth; I had 50 cents left, and that is here yet, my 50 cents. [C23/64-8 (JDAW/H. Halpert)]

GULF

Fry, James, pp. 23-24

I was in the Gulf in the Viking [1918 or 1919], when she hove right up on the ice. You had to send a ship there once every year, a sealing ship, to claim the waters in the Gulf. I often heard old people talking about it. That’s what she was sent up there for, and the Viking was the one used, because you couldn’t hurt her. She had bows 6 or 7 feet thick. [SRKB 838]

O’Neill, Arthur, pp. 35, 41

Hard to walk when you get a swell in the ice on the Front. Up in the Gulf around the Magdalen Islands and the Grindstone Islands, north of PEI, it’s different. You’d walk all day and it would be just like a pond. The Gulf ice was best, and the seals were heavier—10 or 12 or 14 pounds heavier.

It’s a different breed of seals, or maybe they breed earlier than they do on the Front. You’d get a seal that’s a week old in the Gulf and the pelt will reach 40 or 45 or 50 pounds. On the Front it’s a good seal if it goes 20 or 25 [pounds]. And you’re getting paid by the weight; you’re not getting paid by the count. [SRKM 516]

GUNNERS

Burry, George, pp. 2, 13

I was a very good hand at shooting birds and, at that time, the businessman in the harbour here [Greenspond] had five berths from Captain Billy Winsor. He was looking for five gunners for shooting old seals. I thought I was worthy of one of them berths, so I went and saw this merchant. He said, “Yes boy, you’re the right man.” I was 17 years old.

When the time came for shooting seals, I always had the gun. That was in the family. Father was a gunner—two uncles, grandfather, the same thing. It was passed along, one to the other. [SRPK 337]

Fleming, James, pp. 17, 25

Five cents charge if you hit the flipper, in the stomach or in the back, or anywhere like that. But if you hit them in the head, you had to pay nothing. You have to get them in the head and you had to kill every one you shot at or you’d scare them. Perhaps there’d be 9 or 10 of them on a pan. You’d shoot one, he’d drop his head. Another one would look up and you’d shoot him and he’d drop his head. But if you shot and nicked one and made him bawl, there’d be water going everywhere.

I used 1,400 cartridges one day. The gun was that hot that when you hove it on the ice it sunk in the pan. I got out at 7 o’clock in the morning and I shot 700 by 12 o’clock. We sat on old seals and the boat came up and two men brought us more bullets, 700 more. I didn’t shoot all that 700 because I hove two packs down through the ice to get clear of them. [SRPK 330]

Gosse, Pat, pp. 26-27

They’d shoot them in the head. If you used two bullets [in the one seal], you had to pay 10 cents. That’s why you had to be a good gunner. We had to pay it between us. That was because of spoiling the seal [skin]. [SRMD 411]

Hounsell, Captain Thomas, p. 5

My brother, Sandy, he shot 1,300 seals one day. He was with Captain Blackwood in the Imogene. It was never done before. [SRCL 206A]

O’Neill, Arthur, pp. 42, 45

The chief steward had all to do with the guns and the bullets. He’d try you first before he’d give you a gun. The ship would be stopped and they’d go behind the ship and set up a mark. When you did get the gun, she was in your safety till it was all over. If you didn’t return that gun, she was charged to you. And you returned whatever bullets you had left.

Now, if I got a gun to go on the ice, I was given two men: a dog to carry my bullets and another fellow called the pancher [pauncher] for panching the seals, ripping them open, and slobbering the ice with blood so the sculpers would find them. The dog would cut the tip off the tails and carry them to the captain or the second hand. If you had no tails, you wouldn’t have that gun the next day. You’d always fire straight ahead. You had to hit above the flipper, forward of the flipper. If it was after the flipper, they’d charge you 10 cents for every hole. The old seals weren’t worth that much. [SRKM 516]

Parsons, George, p. 37

There was a fellow from Bonavista who never missed a seal: 500 shells, and he had 499 seals. [SRKM 508, 509]

Thorne, Gordon, pp. 10-12; pp. 26-29

We had three dogs usually, but the spring in the Caribou we had four because the ice was bad and you couldn’t get over it. Captain Winsor decided the four dogs would take a piece of scantling [board] each about 1 by 5 inches, 10 or 12 feet long, and place these across the rotten ice and snow. It was a great idea. When you’d get up close, you could do some good shooting. Get all the males first. If you shoot the males, the females will stay. But if a male reared around, they’d all go off the ice. If you made a good shot, their heads would just drop. They’d raise their heads and look around, but they’d stay there with the dead seals.

The batsmen all had a piece of scantling with them, too. We were different; we were young and could get around, but middle-aged men used to hate to get overboard on that kind of ice. Hate it. Old Jake Barbour from St. John’s was with us. You’d laugh at him. He wasn’t getting on that ice. “Always have your mug in your hand,” he said. “Always let on that you were just coming aboard and were just getting a little break in between.”

In the Caribou coming in that spring [1935] we ran into a little patch of bedlamers. Ralph King, Jack Tulk, and Jack Howell were blind—three of our leading gunners. Billy Winsor said to me, “When I blow the whistle, come back, because we’re supposed to be tied up tomorrow evening in St. John’s.” Our charter was up. But Billy Winsor, when he saw the seals, instead of blowing the whistle he sent out three men with more bullets. God, I couldn’t miss them. The gun used to get so hot I’d have to put her down on the ice and pour snow over her. You wouldn’t be able to hold her. When we got them aboard, we had 4,600 seals. Captain Winsor said, “It’s the best I ever saw since I’ve been coming out here.” It was great fun. [SRMD 410A/B, 412A]

HARD BREAD

Parsons, George, pp. 70-71

Flour was scarce. The ship wanted to stay out longer. Lots of hard bread. Every night I soaked seven or eight cakes in water to eat the next day. I wasn’t going to lose my teeth. I sized up another fellow and I said, “You got your false teeth gone.” “Yes,” he said, “I haven’t got one in my head, but I got some plate there now for cutting on, some teeth.” And he took the cake of hard bread out and put it in his mouth and brought them together. He had the bottom teeth there but he had the top plate there with not one left, he had them all beat out. And I said, “Where’s your teeth?” “I don’t know where, George. I don’t know where the teeth is.” He had all the teeth out and here was the plate. He said, “I got some set of teeth now for cutting on. I can cut the hard bread now.” I had three or four teeth in a plate and I didn’t want to lose them. I soaked me hard bread. [SRKM 508, 509]

HARP SEALS

Moores, William Joseph, p. 51

Only once did I ever see a harp seal attack a man. That was in the Ungava, I think the last spring I was out. We were up in the Straits, and there was a big swell. There was a big patch of seals there. I think we got 37,000 of them. An old fellow from Salmon Cove, Rube Wareham, killed three or four on a pan. He was hauling the knife through one when he heard a growl and he looked around and here she was coming. She grabbed him by the rubber boot and she dragged him on the ice to the edge of the pan. He gave a screech and his buddy looked and saw him and he snocked the seal on the head. She tore the side out of the boot—a brand new boot. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

HILL, CAPTAIN SID

Keel, Heber, p. 26

The two best captains I went with were Captain Stan Barbour and Captain Sid Hill. They were best for seals, old seals and young seals, especially Sid Hill for young seals. When Stan Barbour never got his share of young seals, he sure loaded with old seals. [SRPK 324]

Lane, Watson, p. 14

As far as I’m concerned, the man above couldn’t make no better than Captain Sid Hill. I loved him. He was really a gentleman. [SRPK 325]

HOME

Bragg, Thomas, pp. 13-14

The company would pay you home if you had a bad year. That was all in the game. And you didn’t have to pay for your crop, either. The sealer’s ticket was only $3.25 to get down to Gambo, and then we walked the rest of the way to Greenspond. [SRPK 340]

HOOD SEALS

Bowe, Eddie, pp. 14-15

The nicest swile I seen out there was the old hood. Black with white spots. Oh, what a lovely thing to look at. I had one of them little hoods that was aborted. Somebody fell in love with it, and I lost it. I had it under my pillow in a pickle bottle. My buddy told me, “Not for long you’ll get him.” We went out and got salt and put it in the pickle bottle. I got the pickle bottle from one of the cooks, and I would say it was one of them took it because he said to me, “I know you got one,” and I said, “Yes, it’s just as well for me to tell you, you know what I want the bottle for.” [SRPK 301]

Bragg, Fred, pp. 16, 18

All you had to do was strike him [dog hood] on the side of the face when he was turned away from you, towards your buddy. Then you’d put the whole length of the gaff down his mouth so it couldn’t turn its neck to bite you [in case it wasn’t dead]. Then instead of stopping there to pelt him, put out a strap, hook it on to the winch, and hoist it aboard while the boat was going along. [SRMD 406]

Codner, Jesse, p. 25

They shot a dog hood, strapped him in, and hoisted him on to the deck. Two fellows began to sculp him. One fellow turned back on and the dog hood reached up and grabbed him and pinched the whole side of his leg off. What a mess. The whole seat of his backside. They got him cleaned up. A wonder he didn’t die. They should have shoved the stick down his mouth first. [SRPK 315]

Fry, James, pp. 25-26, 31-32

Few seals. Almost the last of April [1918] we got some old seals. We were bloodthirsty to get some seals, and we had some job killing the old ones. Old dog hoods and bedlamers and all piled together as high as a house. They got on top of one another trying to break the ice down. But they couldn’t get down through the ice. We killed them all in the one place.

I cut open a dog hood and he had nine codfish in him—nine fish, 18 to 20 inches long. [SRKB 838]

Gillett, William, pp. 17-18

I killed the first family of hoods on the Beothic that spring. Captain Barbour sent for somebody to go. I was the first to jump. Nobody would jump behind me. I thought I was going to be shot because there were about 40 gunners up on the bow trying to kill the seals. There were times bullets weren’t a foot from my head. They would whiz along. When I got in about 6 feet from the dog hood, I said, “This is it, boy, you or me is going to die.” I knew what I had to do.

My father told me you wants two men to kill a dog. I had to take him on the bridge of the nose. Just the top of the nose. I gave him two cracks. The first crack he fell down, and the next he rolled over on his back. I killed the bitch and the young one. It wasn’t long then before you see the men coming. When I got aboard, another sealer said, “Are you the little fellow that jumped down and killed that seal?” He said, “I wouldn’t have went for $3,000.” Somebody had to go; the captain was singing out. Anyway, the captain called me up. He said, “I didn’t mean for you to go alone. I thought somebody was going with you.” My brother was up on deck; he couldn’t get down. There were too many men on the sidesticks. [SRCL 201]

Gosse, Eric, p. 9

We got the three hoods aboard—and the old bull. I don’t know how many bullets they put in him, but when they pulled him aboard, it was quite evident that he was dead, too. But my father told me, “If you ever come across a hood, I don’t care how many bullets you put in him, before you start to pelt him you must ram your gaff in his mouth.” Well, I remembered that, and so I rammed the gaff in his mouth, although he was dead. When they started to pelt him, when they cut through the flipper, he reamed up and knocked me across the coaming of the hatch and numbed my fingers. That’s how powerful he was, but that was his last effort: he died. [SRKB 825]

Gosse, Pat, p. 25

Whiskers on the dog hood, the big long stiff hairs—the doctors used to buy them for stitching anyone who got cut—10 cents each. You might get four off a seal. [SRMD 411]

Hayden, Thomas, p. 19

I wouldn’t go handy to them. One time on the Ungava they fired at the dog hood and wounded him. Well, that was a game for the sealers. Have a crack at him with your gaff and another fellow on the other side would have a crack at him. But it didn’t suit the captain. He was roaring, “Kill that seal. Kill that seal.” And the master watch, I suppose to show off, jumped out and ran with his gaff to kill the seal. And just as he got to the seal, he slipped. When he turned over to get up, the dog hood caught him by the rear of his britches and went away with him for the water. The clothing gave out and the seal kept on going. [SRKM 513]

Hynes, Frank, p. 10

The old man, one time, hit an old dog hood across the nose, and he grabbed the gaff in this mouth and tore it away from the old man. Now the old man had lost his gaff. He was trying to get it but couldn’t get handy to it. He didn’t know what to do; he didn’t have any education about what to do in a case like that. Anyhow, he took off one his swanskin cuffs and hove it towards the hood. The hood let go the gaff and snapped at the cuff. The old man got his gaff. [C168/65-17 (JDAW/Fred Earle)]

Maloney, Cyril, pp. 27, 28

There was always two men would tackle the dog hood. One fellow would get behind him and touch him on the tail; the dog hood would turn and the other fellow would hit him under the jaw and kill him. But this fellow, Phil Benson, missed and he fell against him. Oh my God, the dog hood could bite you in two. The dog hood made a snap and he felt the warm breath on the side of his face and neck and he rolled over and got clear. He was the closest ever, but he escaped. It took two of us to tow the pelt aboard.

I saw the gunner shoot the bitch hood. The dog hood went over the slack ice, and he came up to the bitch and he smelled her. I suppose she was 400 or 500 pounds. He caught her by the back of the neck and he stood up and he gave her a great big sling and he put her right off the pan into the water. [SRJM 205]

Mason, James, p. 9

We jumped overboard for the bitch. We got the young one and the bitch. The old dog jumped out of the water and he came for me. I made a smack with my gaff and he grabbed it in his mouth and cracked it off. And Randy, my friend, struck it and killed it. I was up to my middle in snow myself. He had a spell laughing at me at first, but when he saw it was serious, he killed it. [SRPK 329A]

Mifflin, Sam, pp. 2-3

I was in the Caribou [1935] with Captain Billy Winsor. We were steaming through the ice picking up a scattered seal. I got down on the ladder. I saw one, and I ran. Billy Gosling was watching me. “Hurry up,” the captain said, “and get the old one, too.” I carved the young one first and when I carved the young one, the old one caught me behind the leg and took the clothes right down to where the boot was tied and knocked me down near the edge of the pan. I was on my hands and knees on this little edge of ice and couldn’t get up. Billy Gosling saw me and ran from the ship. I could hear him coming but I couldn’t get a chance to look.

The seal’s mouth was open. “Christ,” I said, “I’m going to be finished.” I could hear Billy’s feet coming on the ice and I knew nothing before he wapped her. He laid her out stiffo. “That’s a damn good job, Billy,” I said. “Are you bit?” he said. “No, I’m not bit,” I said, “you made a good job. That was damn handy.” “The handiest one I ever saw,” he said. “I was watching you,” he said, “you killed the little one first. That was the mistake.” We got aboard and we had a big laugh. I sewed up the tear and fixed it all up. That was the year Crosby and Co. sent out the Caribou. [C1228/72-184 (Robert Mifflin)]

Parsons, Allan, p. 9

We rowed up to a pan and there was a bitch hood and a dog hood and a pup. My father fired at the bitch and killed her. Then I went in and batted the pup. The captain sang out to me, “Look at the dog.” The old dog was very close and Father put up the gun and fired, and the bullet went through, and two squirts of blood came out of him, and he went down. And when he come up, he come right in on the pan where we was to—I and a fellow Wass Menchions. He blowed up his hood and we were swiping with our gaffs and couldn’t get him. But the gun got him. [SRKB 867]

Sturge, Stanley, p. 12

Noseworthy, from Torbay, on the Terra Nova, got out and went after the old dog hood. He slipped, and the old hood came after him. Captain Kean sung out to my cousin, Skipper Joe Sturge, “Give it to him, Joe. Give it to him.” Joe shot the hood, and when he fell, his head fell alongside Noseworthy’s heels. Joe was a good hand on the gun. [SRPK 309A/B]

Thorne, Gordon, p. 6

I heard my father say that one spring out there they couldn’t find the whitecoats and they ran into the hoods. All the ships had just about panned almost a load of hoods each. But harps were a better price. So when the ships got into the harp seals, and the news spread around among them, they all left their hood seals on the ice and went and loaded up on the harps. I often heard my father tell that. He said there was never any hoods worthwhile after that. [SRMD 412A]

HORSES

French, Lionel, p. 13

The horses in St. John’s were as thick as the sand on the seashore, small little horses, and the streets used to be covered with manure [1939]. Manure would be everywhere and the men and the horses would be up to the station waiting to haul your box down aboard the boat. [SRKB 812]

Parsons, George, p. 26

Sometimes you lugged your box down to the boat, but when you’d have the money, you’d pay one of the cornermen to take your box down to Bowring’s wharf. He’d take 10 or 12 boxes on the horse and slide for 20 or 25 cents each. [SRKM 508, 509]

ICE-BLINDNESS

Butt, Cyril, p. 19

They’d use onions, tea leaves, something to make the water run out. [SRKM 501]

Butt, Henry, pp. 11-13

You’d have to stay in the bunk, and there were a few of them. Uncle Joe Wareham was attending to this fellow who got snow-blind and he was looking after him pretty good, bringing him food and drinks and everything. But Uncle Joe was getting a bit fed up because he was there so long. Now, Uncle Joe went to the ice all his life; I heard him say 35 years, and he was getting up there then. He was a fairly old man, and he used to swear quite a bit.

He came in this evening and said, “How are you getting on this evening, boy?” calling him by name. “Ok,” he said, “pretty good. I think I’ll be all right after a while.” “Uncle Joe,” he said, “I think this evening I’d like to have something sharp.” Uncle Joe said, “By the Lord Jesus, I’ll give you something sharp.” And he drew the big knife. He said, “I’ll give you something sharp.” He was all right the next day. [SRKB 851]

Carter, Roland, pp. 33-34

We used to use potatoes: slice up potatoes and put them on the eyes. And they would use tea leaves out of the teapot. Something cold, because your eyes would be smarting and burning raw. Ice-blind was worse than snow-blind. That was bad. Some poor fellows would go moaning and groaning with their eyes. If it was your buddy, you’d bring him down everything, his dinner and supper, and whatever he wanted. I was snow-blind a couple of times, but I was never ice-blind. [SRBH 718]

Codner, Jesse, p. 27

I always used to blacken my two eyes with blood, underneath the eyes. [SRPK 315]

Gosse, Doug, pp. 9-10

There was a lot of us brothers. We never got ice-blind and none of us got seal finger. We were a lucky crowd. I’ve seen lots of fellows in the bunk, ice-blind and with seal fingers, but we were lucky. Ice-blind is a terrible thing for the eyes. It is something that happens to people with weak eyes or something. They fall around the ice. I happened to spell [carry] a fellow aboard one day that was ice-blind and couldn’t get aboard. I got his arm around my neck and I got him aboard somehow, but it was a terrible job. [SRPK 317]

Gosse, Pat, pp. 14-15

That was a shocking thing. We put blood on our faces around our eyes. We had one man from Torbay and he got blind. Now, if you got blind or missed a day, you’d lose your berth [for the next year]. You wouldn’t get that berth again. When all hands would go on the ice, the food controller would come down and go right through the ship to see who was there. And he’d mark it down. It made no odds if you were blind or whatever was wrong with you.

The food controller belonged to Bowring’s; the man that owned the ship owned him. And then you were cut off, no more berths for you. That was the rule because people would stay in. You’d get your breakfast at 4 in the morning and you wouldn’t get to bed until 12 in the night. They [the sealing companies] had to do that or all hands would stay in.

We had a man from Torbay and he was that determined that he got on the ice with us and we didn’t know he was blind. We were picking our lead and he was picking his lead and we didn’t go from here to the church when he fell in. That was Jimmy Codner. He fell in, God bless us, and we were a nice ways from him. Someone looked and missed him and we had to go back and haul him out. He didn’t want to go aboard.

The ship was no ways from us, and the captain came up and he said, “Come aboard, me darlin’ man, you can’t go on the ice.” He said, “You had no right to go.” He said, “I’ll lose my berth.” The captain said, “I’m telling you that you’ll never lose a berth. When I’m going to the seal fishery, if you want a berth I’ll give you a berth. Come aboard.” And he gave him a drink of rum and filled his goggles full of onions for his eyes. The next day he was out on the ice. [SRMD 411]

Hayden, Thomas, p. 21

They’d wear dark goggles, but they’re not much good because they’d steam over and you wouldn’t see where you were going. The sin of it, even though you were blind, nobody would believe it because there would be a scattered fellow afraid to go on the ice. You’d hear the remark passed, “There’s another dead share there.” [SRKM 513]

Keefe, Tom, pp. 13-15

An oldish man, Fowler, from Roache’s Line, he was 20 or so springs to the ice and never got ice-blind before. He got ice-blind and couldn’t go out. He was feeling bad. “My son,” he said, “it’s the first time in my life I never got out with the crowd. I can’t see.” Then I did an awful thing. I said, “That’s nothing. I can cure that.”

I had a bottle of Minard’s Liniment. I went over to a bunk and I said to a fellow, “You hold on to him now.” He was up in the top bunk. They held him down and I took it on my finger and gouged it into his eyes, just like that. He went mad. He went mad. They kept him up in the bunk or he’d have killed himself. He went mad. The pain was cutting some. After a bit it cooled down and they got the doctor, the first-aid fellow. He couldn’t do nothing.

In the morning Fowler was up bright and early going on the ice. He said, “I’ve been out to the ice many springs and no one knowed anything.” He said, “That young boy cured me. He had the cure for ice-blindness.” He said, “All my years and no one ever knowed the cure. But you could do it just like a first-aid doctor.” I was sorry after. I could have blinded him. But he didn’t believe that. He said, “You knowed. Someone told you about it.” I don’t know why I done it! [SRKB 811]

Moores, William Joseph, pp. 52-53

Just like someone poking little sticks in your eyes. I’ve got as blind they’d have to lead me aboard. I had a fashion: I used to flip the goggles up. You should never do that, never rise your goggles. Some fellows would rub blood around the eyes. Some fellows would put tea leaves and scraped potatoes and stuff like that. I was six months before I really got clear of it. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

Thorne, Gordon, p. 24

We batted those seals. They couldn’t get down, the ice was jammed tight [1933]. We batted 18,000. I said to a couple of fellows from Torbay and Petty Harbour who weren’t wearing glasses, “You better wear your glasses before those seals are aboard or you’ll be ice-blind.” They all got ice-blind. I never wore goggles; all I ever wore were sunglasses. Goggles are inclined to hold the heat. When we finished, there were only nine men on the deck of the Ungava who weren’t ice-blind. [SRMD 410A/B]

IMOGENE

Blackwood, Captain Samuel, p. 2

The Imogene was an excellent boat. She was one of the best at the seal fishery. The Caribou was a little better in loose pan ice, but in pack ice or sheet ice the Imogene was better. [SRMJD 502]

Bragg, Thomas, p. 9

The Imogene was the best ship when I was at it. Now, they had the Caribou one spring. She was as good as the Imogene; they said she could butt better in the ice than the Imogene. But the Imogene! She’d plow through land, I think. She was a wonderful boat. [SRPK 340]

Burry, Stephen, pp. 2-3

One night we were out until 2 o’clock in the morning. A big lake broke between us and the ship. I suppose there were 50 men of us on this big pan, and the ship was jammed on the other side of the lake. The captain had to wire the Imogene to come and pick us up. It was 2 o’clock in the morning and cold; we were dancing and running around. By and by we saw her lights coming, saw her lights coming, and you could hear the ice scrunching. She came and picked us up and carried us to the other side of the lake where our ship was. [SRPK 341]

Gosse, Eric, p. 17

She [Imogene] could steam maybe 14 or 15 knots. You’d go astern and run her straight upon the ice, and finally she would break it down. If she couldn’t break it down, she would hang there. Some of these prize swilers, they’d be out on the ice in jig time, have holes bored, put the dynamite down, and give her a blast. You’d feel her sort of tremble and fall back. You’d get aboard again and go on. You’d be at that all day long. She was a great ship: the queen of the fleet. [SRKB 825]

Kelloway, William, pp. 7-8

The Ungava and the Beothic were jammed. We were on the Beothic and Captain Kean sent a message to Captain Al Blackwood. He was in the Imogene. By and by we saw the smoke coming. This was the Imogene and she was nearly loaded. She came up around and in no time put us in the water. She used to run right up on the ice and go down. Boy, what a beautiful ship. It’s a pity that [she] was ever lost. There was no ship to the ice could beat her. I never heard tell of her jammed. She’d run right up on the ice. You’d see half her bottom. [SRKB 855]

Moores, William Joseph, pp. 19, 67

We were coming in the 10th or 11th of April [1933], coming down out of Trinity Bay, a beautiful evening. The seals were there by the thousands, most all bedlamers. Now, the bedlamer separates from the rest and gets on their own to mate for the next year. And they were there by the thousands. Just level ice coming out of Trinity Bay. The sun was setting and we saw that it was going to be a cold night, so we hove up. The Ungava was there.

At dawn, the grey of dawn, you could just see. Now, the captain said, “Ye go on the starboard bow, nor’west, and the gunners will go on the other bow.” And he said, “If ye can, bat them without [their] breaking through the ice; if the ice is frozen enough that they can’t get down through, I’ll call the gunners back. But don’t cross the gunners off.” We were in sight of Cape St. Francis off Green Island about 10 or 12 miles.

The young fellows right excited, killing, slaughter and go, giving them a snock and go, just give them a smack, they wouldn’t do nothing. The seals used to jump to try to get down through the ice. We killed about 15,000. Now we had 56,000 [55,636]. And Peter Carter in the Ungava, he had, I think, 47,000 [49,825], but he had the heaviest trip because he had more old seals. We were 11 days throwing off fat in St. John’s, discharging fat.

She didn’t pay freighting. She used to burn too much coal. A full head of steam and she’d burn 50 tons in 24 hours. That was a lot of coal. She had to carry 200 pounds pressure. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

JAMMED

Flynn, Frank, p. 10

We were jammed for 8 or 10 days off the Horse Islands, about 15 or 20 miles offshore, and people from La Scie and Brent Cove walked out and came out on dogsleds. Some of the crew gave them blocks of butter and knives and belts for tobacco and cigarettes. [SRKB 802]

Healey, Paul, p. 9

We were there for 31 days [in 1933], and nothing around us [in White Bay]. The most plentiful thing we had on board was lots of Labrador fish. They used to call it Labrador slop. The big heavy fish from Labrador was good fish. It was lovely and we had lots of fatback pork, up to a point, we’ll say up to the last week we were there. We were really hungry and around the 25th of April they sent down the Kyle with food for us. We had lots of everything and we put on a big scoff that night. [SRPK 306A/B]

Lowe, William, pp. 23-24

You might carry two tons of dynamite for blasting the ice. You get the ship jammed, you put a can full of powder on a long pole and put it under the ice. You’d light it with a poker. The cook would have pokers in the galley and he’d have them red hot. When you were ready with the blast, you’d sing out for the poker. We used to carry what we called a “powder man.” There was an old man used to live on New Gower Street, Steve Fitzpatrick. He was out with the old Ranger five or six springs or more, just doing that, only blasting—that was his job. [SRCJL 902]

Menchions, Wallace, pp. 23-24

One time we were out chasing old seals. The captain put us out with guns and said he would come back and pick us up. But he steamed west, throwed out his gunners, and when he tried to get back he got jammed. And the fog closed down. Just before night we heard this noise and the Imogene broke out of the fog and throwed out the straps. We had so many old seals on the pan. Well, we said we didn’t want his straps. We said we belonged to the Ranger. “Well,” the captain said, “if you belong to the Ranger, you better come aboard because she’s jammed so many miles to the west.” And he said he had so many men out, too. So that’s what he did. He had the wireless and he wired Captain Badcock that he had picked up his men. He took the seals, too. [SRKB 856]

Moores, William Joseph, p. 57

One spring we burned down in the Beothic. We were jammed somewhere off the Funks, and it was foggy. Our blades were beat off to just the stubs. We had no power, and while they were saying prayers Sunday night, she gave some lurch. The firemen said everything in the stokehole went bottom up. There was no wind and it was smooth and only a little swell. When we came out of the big mess room, there were lumps of ice on the deck. How it got there we didn’t know, but it was there. In the morning we chopped it up and heaved it overboard.

When the fog lightened, we were right off Wesleyville. Somewhere we hove over them shoals and she never hooked. And here we were right into that ice and we couldn’t get out. There was running ice coming out of the bay, but we could not get in that running ice. We couldn’t get ahead of her to haul her because she was too close to the running ice. What we were afraid of if we got her head into it and her stern in fixed ice one part could go one way. But we blasted her, and on the last we got her moving and got out. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

Parsons, Mark, pp. 35-36

We were going down to the Labrador one time, and there was no ice, not a pan. It was a Sunday, a beautiful calm day. The barrelman saw the ice and said, “Boys, here she’s coming.” That was Sunday, just before sunset, and the ice came up and we got into it. And a gale of northeast wind. We never got clear until we got up off Corner Brook. Ice and seals, rending and crackling, and seals crying and bawling. [SRKM 507]

Sullivan, Herbert, pp. 13-14

We’d have concerts. We had one when the crowd from the Beothic and the Nascopie came aboard [1915, ships jammed]. We’d pick out the choice people who could sing songs and [do] recitations and tell stories. We’d have a chairman and he’d have the program written up with each man’s name and what he was going to sing. We’d open with some kind of ode and we’d close with the national anthem.

We’d have shooting contests. We’d set up two poles with a line of bottles and the three best gunners in the three ships would shoot at them. There were 12 bottles. Bobby Noseworthy from Pouch Cove, master watch on the Florizel, broke 11 out of the 12, with 12 shots. He won the contest and the Hon. R.B. Job was out that spring in the Nascopie and they gave him a prize. [C1009/71-57 (George Casey)]

KEAN, CAPTAIN ABRAM

Boone, Jack, pp. 9-10

Kean was a bad man, old Abram Kean. A man was no more than a dog. He done everything. He runned over and cut men up in the Narrows going out. They were out on the line hauling her. They bust through and he steamed on over them. [SRKB 827]

Boone, Robert, pp. 3-4

Old man Kean was pretty particular. He liked to have men who went out before. I had been in St. John’s when old man Kean was signing on men. He asked them before he signed them on: “Have you been out before?” “No.” “Well, I can’t give you a berth.” “Well,” the sealer said, “I got to go. If I don’t go, how am I going to get my first spring?” “Well,” the captain said, “try someone else.” He tried someone else and by gar he came back again and he finally consented to give him a berth. [SRKB 831]

Boone, William, pp. 6, 11

I held the seal on for him by the hind daddle to get his picture taken. The millionth seal. I wasn’t in the picture; all that was in the picture was my two hands and my mitts. I got along very well with him. I was bridgemaster with him for six springs. [SRKB 824]

Burry, Stephen, pp. 7-9, 18

He was a tough old man, old Abram Kean. He’d come down in the hold [on] Sunday mornings. You’d be having a spell. He’d come down in the hatchway with his big fur coat on. “All hands out! All hands overboard doubling pans!” He’d say, “All hands out,” but he knew that all hands weren’t going to be out owing to their religion. A hard old ticket, boy. He’d be on the bridge and perhaps the ice was slatchy [water containing loose ice] as you were coming aboard. “Oh, you can make it there, my son, you can make it there.” He was a tough old man. [SRPK 341]

Butt, Cyril, pp. 11-13, 20

You’d get up in the morning, 4 o’clock, to have your breakfast and, if you happened to strike your tin pan on the rail and made a noise, he’d be in the bridge and he’d say, “What fool is that? What fool is that making a noise?” Afraid you were going to frighten the seals. I suppose he was getting a bit childish at that time because he was an old man then. That was his last spring out [1936]. He had the spyglass all the time when he was in the bridge, and you had to work for him. He’d know what every man was doing.

My father’d stick up to him. One time we shot seals, that was late in the spring when you’d get at the old seals, and it came on dark, and we never had time to sculp them. The next morning Captain Kean gave my father 30 or 40 men and told us to go and sculp them seals. He took the remainder of the men on the ship and carried them to another patch of seals to kill. We went from the ship awfully fast. My father used to turn around and say, “We’re going away awfully fast, we’re on running ice.” Up there in the Straits there’s lots of tides, and the ice used to move fast. So we walked and we never saw the seals. Finally, we could just see the tops of the spars of the ships.

My father said, “We’re going back. Them seals are on running ice and they’re gone up the Straits; we won’t get them.” So we left to walk back and you couldn’t see the spars coming any closer. We were just passing the ice under our feet and we walked for eight hours. The captain knew we were on running ice because he could see us from the bridge. He figured we wasn’t going to do anything that day, so he let us walk. And we walked and walked and we didn’t get to her, and finally in the evening he came down and picked us up. When we got on her deck, my father and Skipper Ben Evely told him off. He never said anything; he just walked away. He was tough like that. He thought more about a seal than he did a man.

It would be a bit dangerous sometimes leaving the ship or trying to get aboard. She’d be steaming. He’d hardly ever stop without there was a big crowd of men there on the one pan. He’d just move along and you’d jump on the sidesticks, the big sticks with ropes on them. You’d jump on the sticks, and sometimes the sticks would strike a piece of ice and turn up, and if you were on a stick, you had to scramble. Getting out on the ice and getting aboard was dangerous. If you didn’t make it, or there was too many men and all hands couldn’t get on the sidesticks, some fellows would have to stay and the captain had to go back for them. Then he’d look overboard and call them a bunch of old women. “Bunch of old women,” he’d say, “couldn’t get aboard of her.” [SRKM 501]

Fowler, Don, p. 10

That Abram Kean. He was a bugger. He’d tell the men to jump if there was a pan there or not, he didn’t care. He’d tell them to jump and they’d jump to their arse in water. I wouldn’t jump for any man unless I saw a place to jump. Abram Kean was a case; no one liked him. No one liked him. He went until he was 84 [81]. [SRKB 840]

Gosse, Madeline and Eric, pp. 2, 15

[Mrs. Madeline Gosse is the daughter of Joseph Kean, granddaughter of Abram Kean. Abram Kean’s seven children were Joseph, Samuel, Nathan, Alfreda, Westbury, Bertha, and Cecil. Another son, the eldest or second eldest, died a young man, in an accident on the ice, skating.]

Madeline: Abram wore a wig. I think he got it in New York. Bertha married Captain Mitchell from Nova Scotia and they moved to New York. Captain Nat Kean went to New York after his wife died. Others in the family moved to New York. Three of Abram’s sons became captains: Joe, Nat, and Westbury. Two of Abram’s sons became doctors: Sam and Cecil. Sam practised in Brookfield, Bonavista Bay, and Cecil practised in Burgeo, I think, then Greenspond, and then St. John’s.

They had a large house with five bedrooms on Waterford Bridge Road. Grandmother [Abram’s wife] was an invalid for the last seven years of her life. She had a severe stroke. Alfreda kept house for Abram then. We [Madeline and Eric] had a small reception at Abram’s house after our wedding. Abram raised three grandchildren: Fred, Abram, and Joe—Nat’s sons; their mother had died and Nat went to New York and took the older children. Two of these three boys became sea captains in the American Merchant Marine. Westbury went to Halifax during World War II and went from there to New York. [SRKB 837]

Hayden, Thomas, pp. 9, 11-12, 14

They went out of St. John’s Harbour in a straight line. One spring old Abram Kean was going out in the Terra Nova. The harbour was filled with ice and they had to butt their way out. All the crew were running along ahead of him, hauling her along to help the engines. He ran up and split the pan and drowned five—just out through the Narrows. He was a terrible man, that old Abram Kean. The northern men adored Abram Kean. If he said to them, “Go jump overboard,” I believe they would.

I was with Captain Abram Kean in the Terra Nova. That was the year of the “big trips” [1933]. We were steaming towards the patch, and the Eagle was behind us. When night started, we burned down for the night, and the Eagle cut around us and kept on going for perhaps another half hour or so. In the morning we were jammed tight and the Eagle was gone on towards the patch. And from where we were with the spyglass up in the barrel, we could see all the ships working the patch. And here we were back and forth for four days. When we got clear after St. Patrick’s Day, the patch was cut.

We steamed on and ran into a small patch. We could get the best part of a load there, but he put out a barrel with a flag in it as a marker. Then we went on in hopes of finding them more plentiful. But he didn’t, and after midnight he turned back. When we got back the next day to where the marker was, some other ships were after moving in, and the patch was all killed. So then we headed through the Straits of Belle Isle and into the Gulf. When we got into the Gulf, the seals were taking to the water. We went right around the island that spring. We got 13,000. I made $26. [SRKM 513]

Hayes, Sylvester, p. 30

The Thetis [1931] had 30 or 40 St. John’s men. That was unusual. I don’t think old Abram could get them anywhere else. But I think they changed Abram Kean’s mind about townies on deck, because he carried quite a few on the Terra Nova the next spring. [SRPK 302A/B]

Kean, Edgar, p. 4

He was a clean-speaking man. He used no profane language, and he didn’t drink. He was a clean-living man: a perfect gentleman. Whatever he told you was reliable, and he called nobody [by] other than their names. [SRPK 339]

Kean, Job, pp. 18-19, 21

Old man Kean used to say to them when they’d come aboard hauling three or four seals on a rope for 2 or 3 miles, when they’d get to the ship they were tired, and old man Kean used to roar out, “Unlace your tow and go on again.” And another saying he used to have, “Now, my son, go out there and scatter yourself around” [look for seals].

Father [Charlie] was 20 years second hand with him, and he should know him more than anyone. Father always said that he was a gentleman. I heard Father say Abram used to go up in the barrel, 80 or 90 feet in the air when he was over 70 years old. And Father said one day one of the rungs gave out and he thought he was going to come down. John, Abram’s brother, died when he was 27 years old and so Captain Abram had two families then. [SRPK 305A/B]

Keel, Roy, pp. 3, 8, 9

I was three springs out with Captain Abram Kean. The last spring he was out he said, “Keel, boy, I won’t be able to send you a card anymore.” He used to send a card in the post office, a green one. You’d get it Christmas. Every Christmas I had the berth come.

He didn’t have any hair; he had a wig on his head. Sometimes it was black, more times it was blond, and more times it was white. He had four or five of these. He changed the colour.

Oh Jesus, I’ll tell you. He never spared no men, brother. He never spared no men. He cut down two brothers going out through the Narrows and never even blew the whistle, never even raised the flag. Because we were out ahead of her, a big crowd out ahead of her hollering. He broke the pan that those fellows were on, chopped them up with his blade. He didn’t care, he went on. [SRPK 327]

Kelloway, William, pp. 13-14

The last year I was out with him, he was old. The navigator didn’t like what he did down there by the Grey Islands. He went too close and the navigator said, “If ever I gets back to St. John’s, this is Captain Kean’s last spring to the ice.” So he went and told the owners that Captain Kean was too old. But Captain Kean knew there was lots of water there by the Grey Islands because he was going back and forth to the Labrador for years. [SRKB 855]

Lowe, William, pp. 12-13, 20; pp. 27-28

He thought more about a seal than he thought about a man. I was with him when he reached the 1,000,000th mark during his 46th spring [1934]. I got married on the $27 I made with Abram Kean in the Terra Nova.

I was with the Terra Nova and Abram Kean [1933]. We made a blunder. Now, I suppose Abram Kean was ashamed, because every other ship was nearly loaded. He said, “I’m going through the Straits on for the Gulf.” He went through the Straits and all hands were poisoned [angry]. It was the last of the year, and we only had 6,000 seals. Captain Kean said, “A few hands jump out there and put a seal dog [hook] down.” You puts it down on the ice, and you strikes it with an axe or something.

Anyhow, he couldn’t get a man. Jim Kendall roared out, “A concert in the main hold tonight! Tea and coffee to go. Carry your own mugs.” It was Easter Monday night. Well, about two hands sung a song, and one of the firemen took a handful of pepper and threw it on the big stove. He spoiled the concert.

The year we were up in the Gulf in the Thetis [1931], the spring we had all St. John’s hands. There was a fellow by the name of Jack [Jake?] Crotty, who was a barber right next door to the Hillview Beer Parlour in the East End. He got a berth and went to the ice; no trouble getting a berth that spring, because so many men gave it up.

We sat down one night talking in the hold. Jakey had a stick of tobacco; we used to be shy of tobacco, you know. “Say, Jake, give us a bit of tobacco to roll a cigarette in brown paper.” “Where did you get the stick of tobacco?” He said, “I cut the captain’s hair.” I said, “What! You cut the skipper’s hair. Well, you must have cut the wig.” “No,” he said, “he got no wig.” I said, “Boy, I’m after being with him too long now. I knows that he’s got a wig.” [SRFW 103A/B, SRCJL 902]

McCann, Jerry, pp. 29-30

He should be shot. I mind one time Oliver and I came up to Abram Kean’s boat. We were separated from our ship after all day. We were sure we’d get aboard of the Florizel; he was in the Florizel. It was almost dark. He cut clear of us altogether. He was a dog. Not a man on deck opened his mouth. I saw them leaning over the rail. After I got in St. John’s, I found out that they weren’t allowed. If they opened their mouths, they were cut off the next spring. [SRSR Reel 05-28-72]

Menchions, Wallace, pp. 7-8

Every ship had piles [of seal pelts] on her quarters. Captain Kean was in the Terra Nova and he was up in the Gulf [1933], and when he came alongside [in St. John’s] a bit late with empty holds, he wouldn’t even cross our deck [Ranger] to get ashore. The Terra Nova tied up outside, and he wouldn’t even cross the deck of the Ranger. He took a boat ashore. [SRKB 856]

Mifflin, Sam, pp. 10, 12

You could speak to him—Abram. He never said nothing only “devil” in his life. “What the devil do you mean, boy?” But old Bill Winsor would pop them out of him. He was nothing—only a jug of rum. I had a damn good many drinks out of him, too. Old Abram wouldn’t take you aboard too many days to dinner. I liked him. You could speak to him, he was a mannerly man. He was the best. [SRBH 714]

Noseworthy, Hans, p. 10

I remember someone telling us he had a wig, and we used to sneak up and walk behind him and try to see his wig. The wig was always off a little from the back of his neck. And the first time I saw it I wondered if they were after scalping someone else to make a wig for him, on account of hearing of him scalping [sculping] the seals. [SRPK 356]

Noseworthy, William, p. 11

Abram Kean was a hard old man. I’ll tell you what he was like. I was to the winch under the bridge. Sam Norman from Bay Roberts was bridgemaster. There was a cable or whip from the winch. The pelts were on a strap and there was a hook on the strap. They’d signal to go ahead with the winch. I was a young fellow, and I opened her all she could suffer. Now, the whip was supposed to swing in on the forward side of the riggings, but she swung aft and I landed her aft because I had no other choice.

Now, an old fellow, Joe Butler, from Old Perlican, had flippers and stuff on the strap, and he was aft waiting for them to come in forward. When she came in, I landed the whole works down on top of him. I couldn’t help it. I didn’t know he was there. I was back on to him. Now, then I got scared. I stopped everything. Old Abram Kean looked down on me. He said, “Go ahead. Go ahead. Go ahead. There’s lots more men on Middle Street, on Middle Street in St. John’s.” They said, “That’s not the first time for the strap to go back like that.” They pulled him out. I thought I had him killed. [SRKB 820]

Oliver, James, p. 16

He was a bit wild. He used to say to an oldish man, “Hurry up and come aboard. Why didn’t you send out your old grandmother?” [SRKM 523A/B]

Pearce, Israel, pp. 8-9

He was all right. I found the man all right. People give him a bad name, but I found the man all right. [SRBH 710]

Pottle, Gilbert, p. 3

He was a rough person. He was a wonderful man to get work done, he had to get seals or you’d catch it. He’d go down in the hold after the men would go out on the ice, down where the men were sleeping, and if there was anybody there he would pull them out, “Get out. If you’re able to eat your breakfast you’re able to go on the ice.” [C2803/75-220 (Patricia Penney)]

Sturge, Stanley, pp. 10, 18, 25

He was like old Santy Claus, with the rich whisker, his red cheeks, and the big fur coat and cap and mitts. He’d go up in the barrel. My son, he went up in the barrel every spring. I was with him until the last spring in the Beothic [1936]. He got up as far as the cap. He couldn’t get any further. He came down. He said, “Boys, I’m finished. I can’t get up in the barrel.”

That was his glory up in the barrel. Hear him singing up there. Happy as a bird, she rolling. The time we were in the Terra Nova she was taking 90 degrees of a sweep; he was up there with the glass, singing at the top of his voice. Happy as a bird up there.

Some would give their life for old man Kean. I didn’t find anything wrong with old man Kean. I didn’t blame him for the Newfoundland disaster. I blame the master watches.

He was a good old fellow, really. Never smoked in his life and he never drank in his life. Captain Abram used to have a big store in Brookfield, schooners and everything, but when he went [to St. John’s], all that went. He used to live on Flowers Island. There’s two islands—Flowers Island and Sturge’s Island. Sturge’s Island is the biggest island and Flowers Island is a small island. [SRPK 303, 304A, 309A/B]

Vincent, Wilfred, pp. 25, 44

He was the devil. He was a hard, hard man. If men didn’t go on the ice he had to go down in the hold to see if they were lazy or if they were sick. He was all right, but he was a driver—drive the guts out of you.

I was working with Mrs. Rowsell on Prince of Wales Street, St. John’s, when he was buried [1945], and the hearse went by with him. She said to me, “Captain Abram Kean gone along here. All the good that he did.” I said, “If he’d died when he was 20, there’d be a lot more people alive now than there is.” [SRPW 701]

KEAN, CAPTAIN CHARLIE

Doyle, Robert, p. 15

The best sealing captain I found to get along with was Captain Charlie Kean. He was a good man for his crew. He looked after his crew—his engineers, cooks, stewards, sealers, and all. If he had his men out on the ice sealing and he saw a sign of any heavy weather coming up, he’d be a worried man until his men got back on board ship again. I’d see him on the bridge, hour after hour, when it started to snow, blowing the whistle. [SRMJD 507]

Fleming, James, p. 8

Charlie Kean was the worst. All he done was want to sleep. I don’t believe he got a load in his life. All he wanted was to sleep, Charlie did. And when he got up in the morning about 10 or 11 o’clock, all he did was sit and talk, still falling asleep. [SRPK 330]

Keel, Roy, p. 9

Charlie Kean was a nice fellow. You couldn’t get any better than Charlie Kean. He was an angel. But he give it to the baccy and the baccy juice. [SRPK 327]

Sturge, Stanley, pp. 19-20

Charlie was a different man from his Uncle Abram. He looked after his men more. One time Jack Churchill was coming aboard, and fell in. He was going around in the water with his haulin’ rope and gaff and everything in the water. He was a nice bit from the ship and I saw his brother, Zack, jump right from the prow, long rubbers and all, and he grabbed his brother and brought him to the sidesticks. They hauled him in. Captain Charlie was up in the barrel. Next thing we knew he was coming down, swinging off on the rigging, frightened to death because he thought Jack was going to be drowned.

But Charlie was something like old Abram, as for men going on the ice. He always put all his crew out the one time. He’d say, “Every man follow his own master watch.” Captain Barbour was different. He’d put two men here, two men there, two men, two men, until he’d get all his crew out. [SRPK 309A/B]

KEAN, CAPTAIN JACOB

Crawford, John, p. 12

He was as knowledgeable a man as was going out there. We were in the seals in White Bay that spring [1924], and the others couldn’t get in. He kept her close to the Horse Islands and tied her fast one Sunday evening with a big line ashore, let her sweat. “Now,” he said, “if we can’t get to them, we’ll wait until they come out to us.” [SRKB 822]

Healey, Paul, pp. 6-7, 10, 12-13

On our way home [1933, Beothic] we didn’t know what to do bad enough. We had no seals! We had nothing! My mother gave me a pillow. We cut up the feather pillows we had and beat one another down in the hold. Old Captain Jacob Kean said he was going to have us up before court. We said, “You’re going to have us up before court? When we get in St. John’s, we’re going to see if we can get you hung!” The way we’d been treated. So we arrived in St. John’s on the 2nd of May. I ended up with the grand sum of $17.50. I never went to the ice after.

Billy Rowe would go up on the bridge with the captain, and he’d dance and sing [1933]. The poor captain, Jacob Kean, was in such a way, he was just about crazy. Billy was driving him crazy, because he’d say, “What’s wrong, Skipper? What’s wrong, Skipper?” “Oh my God!” Kean would say, “Oh my God! Leave me alone, will you? Leave me alone.” He had a big responsibility. He had to come in and face those people at Baird & Co. They had the ship chartered and Billy would sing and dance. “Skipper,” he’d say, “the main thing is not to worry. The main thing is not to worry.”

I can’t say for sure but they told me there had to be something wrong for a man [Jacob Kean] to do what he did [drive into White Bay, 1933], because he was a man that was going to the ice for a long time; the distance he went and the course. He went clear of all the rest of the ships. I believe myself when all was said and done he was a very sad man.

He should have known better, because once you leave the outside and you run into White Bay, you’re jammed until the ice starts to move again. They told me that the landsmen told him there were plenty of seals in there. He used to give them tobacco, and they told me that their [landsmen] idea was just to get him in there so they could get smokes. He was blamed by the men. [SRPK 306A/B]

Leaman, William John, p. 10

We killed 10,000 to 12,000 [Eagle, 1929]. Jacob Kean used to go ahead and then astern, and he beat the two sides out of the bow. On each side of the bow you could walk into her. She got leaky. We had to come home with 12,000. [SRPK 307A/B]

Mullins, Stephen, pp. 5, 16; p. 5

I came up with the wickedest and the worst, Jacob Kean, but he was a good man. He was [a] wicked, wicked man, but always got his way. He was a good sealer, a good man, but he was a wicked man, cared for nothing. He was as good as gold to you. If he had either drink, he’d give it. Jacob was the best I liked out of them all. We were lucky enough with Jacob; $80 or $90 was generally what you’d make every spring with Jacob. But he was a hard old customer, Jacob was.

Captain Jacob Kean was a hard swearer, a cruel man. He had no mercy on men, but when he had men on the ice and they weren’t all aboard, he was one of the uneasiest men in the world. I spent five years with Captain Jacob Kean. [SRPK 333, C317/66-25 (JDAW/Fred Earle)]

Thorne, Gordon, pp. 4-5

He wasn’t very much of a captain. I was only with him a couple of springs but he wasn’t like Captain Winsor. He used to make mistakes. He made a mistake one spring in the big Beothic. Got up in White Bay and got jammed. All the other ships were outside; they got what seals they wanted. [SRMD 410A/B]

Way, William, p. 6

I found Jacob Kean all right. If you were doing your work, he’d be all right. Fellows give him a bad name because they didn’t want to be on the ice. Too lazy to go. [SRPK 331]

KEAN, CAPTAIN NATHAN

Kean, Captain Abner, pp. 3, 6

He was a beautiful man [captain of the Eric in 1916]. One of the best of the Keans. There wasn’t a word out of him. Captain Nat’s last words in the morning were, “Come on, boys, if you see the weather coming on, the first flick of snow come aboard.” [SRPK 342]

KEAN, CAPTAIN WESTBURY

Burry, Stephen, p. 9

He was different from his father, Abram. He couldn’t be no better to the crew. He was a fine man, very low speaking, “All right, me sons.” That was his word. He was a pretty good hand. [SRPK 341]

Gosse, Pat, pp. 33-34

He was a nervous man because his father lost men going out through the Narrows. He was very careful. He was off his head the night we were on the ice until 4 o’clock. He put us out, and it was foggy and the captain had to have you aboard before dark. He was breaking the rules and he’d be hung if he had to lose us four men. That’s why he was gone off his head and that’s why he was so good to us about the four barrels of beef [which were ordered to be emptied overboard so they would have barrels for their flippers]. And he gave us rum—Lemon Hart. [SRMD 411]

Kean, Edgar, pp. 4-5

Westbury was a good navigator, but he used to drink a lot. He was a self [secret] drinker. Nobody knew that he was drinking before he’d be drunk. When I was with him, he was awfully careful over men. It’s like the old saying: “a burned child dreads fire.” [SRPK 339]

Sheppard, Lewis, p. 24

Wes Kean was one of the best skippers. He was a good skipper because of the Newfoundland disaster. He lost a lot of men that time. He was very cautious after that. If he hoved you out and he was going back, he’d heave a dory out and so much coal and so much grub. He took precautions the others wouldn’t take at all. But in 1939 he lost command after being involved in an accident and never got a ship afterwards. [SRKB 850]

KNIFE

Woodfine, Thomas, p. 17

I’d get a scythe [most men bought knives] that you cut hay with. I’d bring it to the blacksmith and he’d make a knife out of that. I’d make a sheath out of tapping leather. I got a knife made two or three times. [He was out to the ice 22 springs.] [SRKM 511]

LADYSMITH

Lowe, William, p. 52

The ladysmith—there was only a few bunks in that. You’d be clear of the main hold and the seals. They were choice bunks. [SRCJL 902]

Marshall, Chesley, pp. 23-25, 26

We had one old fellow in the ladysmith, and he was the cleanest man who ever left Cupids. One of my friends, Ralph Boone, who was also in the ladysmith, used to go with his daughter. Every night two judges in the crowd of us in the ladysmith would pick over the shirts to see if anyone was lousy.

This old man had a knitted suit of underwear, shirt and drawers knit of sheep’s wool. He used to take it off and check it every night. He didn’t like me and one night I was one of the judges and I had to pick his suit. I went out in the hold and got a big louse shell. They used to squeeze them with their thumbnails. I got one and brought it in and started picking his shirt.

Every time I cracked my nail he said, “Was that a louse,” and I said, “Yes, look.” I showed him that louse shell 22 times and he took his suit of underwear outside and burned it. If you had too many lice on you, the judges would pass sentence and put you down in the chain locker. We put a man down there one time and we nearly lost him. He saw a big rat and had like to die.

It was a place between the forecastle and the hold. They had the water tank there [on the Ranger] and there was a place to put up four bunks. Eight people could go in there. Sometimes you’d squeeze in 10. I used to go aboard the Ranger and mark the ladysmith before anyone else got in. That was our place for the spring. [SRKB 860]

LANDSMEN

Cobb, Norman, pp. 16-17

We [landsmen, Barr’d Islands] put out the nets in December and January and we put them out again in April and May. Mostly cotton nets, sometimes hemp about 45-55 fathom long with a 13- or 14- or 15-inch mesh. Two hands could set a net. We’d put out two or three, sometimes four. [SRKH 402]

Hynes, Ned, p. 11

I got out there and there were five old dog hoods together. I took off my hauling rope and I threw that down and I put down my nunny bag. I took my jacket in one hand and I marched up. I threw my jacket at one and then I made [a] smack with my gaff. The gaff took him across the head and down he went. Then one of them stuck in and started to bore down through the ice. I couldn’t keep the bugger back. There were clumpers as big footballs going everywhere and he went down through the ice. That left three.

They were growling, and around me. I took my jacket again and threw it and made a smack at the next one. He never turned towards my jacket at all. He turned towards me and the gaff struck him across the cheek. I had a nice gaff made out of the handle of a fish prong. He snapped at the gaff and snapped off the end of it. I had nothing only the stump. I had to give it up. I had nothing to kill him with. [C84/64-13 (JDAW/Fred Earle)]

Kelly, Jack, pp. 2-3

One of its main industries was the seal fishery. In the early days, when you [landsmen, Fogo Island] had nothing else to look forward to after the cod fishery was over and finished, you were just waiting for the wintertime to come to get your nets out and net some seals. And when the northern ice floes would come up [from Labrador] in the spring, you’d be looking to get on the icefields and prosecute another voyage. In the early days of Fogo Island the sealskins were turned into clothing and boots.

Sealskin boots were very popular and sometimes sealskins and cowskins were mixed together to make hard leather boots. [SRKH 408, 409]

Kinsella, Jack, pp. 1-2

There were six men drove away from Joe Batt’s Arm in 1917. It was Easter Saturday, April 7, and the seals came in. A crowd of men went out. My brother and I and another man—we were only about a mile off. We got 11 seals and we came in. A dense fog came in and the wind went southeast. When the wind went southeast, the ice began to move. There were three brothers, the only three in the family, Walter and Joseph and Stephen Jacobs from the south side of Joe Batt’s Arm. And there was a neighbour, Frank Pomeroy. There were two Freakes from the north side of Joe Batt’s Arm. The fog filled in and the ice runned and began to go abroad, and they never got to the land.

It was foggy and raining that Easter Saturday. Sunday, it was a gale of southeast wind, foggy and rain, sleet and cold. They wired St. John’s and they sent out the old sealing ship, the Diana. She got jammed and was there for a week. When she got clear, she went back.

In the spring a vessel was going to the Labrador and some of the crew picked up a gaff. It was Joe Jacob’s gaff, and when they came home from the Labrador, they sent it down to Joe Batt’s Arm. It’s in the Hall now in a glass case. He cut in it with his knife, “J.J. April 11, Down, Perish.” Lying down to perish, that’s what it meant. [C78/64-13 (JDAW/Fred Earle)]

Sacrey, Dorman, pp. 6-8

Father lived on the Horse Islands. The seals used to come in every year, but this time it was the biggest haul they ever had. There was a big storm from the northeast and snowing and high winds. So in the morning Father would get up and put the fire on in the stove. If it was stormy and nothing to do, he would go back to bed, and when the house was warm, Mother would get up and get breakfast.

So this was a morning like that. Father got up and put the fire on and looked out, and it was stormy. So he went back to bed. But by the time Mother got up and got breakfast, the weather was pretty clear. She looked out through the window and there was a young seal by the woodhorse. She never saw a live seal but she knew by the shape of it what it was. She shouted to Father, “There’s a seal out by the door.” So Father rushed out and there were seals from there down to the ice. They were near the sea—only about 100 feet from the high-water mark.

Father called his next-door neighbour, Mr. Lacey, and they went off killing seals in the harbour. Mother and the servant girl, Louisa, started killing seals, too. Father told them to kill the seals and to mark them but not to take the pelts off.

They were at it perhaps a week. They used to find the blue Arctic ice with water and make holes and put in rolled oats and sugar. They’d put a mug by it and as they went back and forth hauling the seals in they’d take a drink of rolled oats water. That was good and strengthening. When the seals were shipped to Twillingate in the spring, Father, Mother, and Louisa had £40. They had a wonderful year. Other women did well, too. [C598/69-23 (Zach Sacrey)]

Snow, Nelson, pp. 15-17

I killed a young hood, and I tied my dog on to the seal to help me haul it ashore [landsman]. But the dog wouldn’t haul. I would be hauling away and the next thing the dog would go back and try to eat the seal. Then I’d have to haul all the harder. Then I’d probably fall down. I was getting crooked. I came to this blowing hole and I was real vexed.

I took the dog with the harness on him and put the gaff in his collar and I shoved him down in the blowing hole under the ice. I went on hauling but after I got so far away I was sorry for what I had done. I looked back and the dog was up on the ice shaking the water off himself. I stopped and called him and he came over. I tied him to the seal again and he hauled that seal right to shore. I never had to haul at all. All I did was catch hold of the rope with one hand. Fellows had dogs for hauling wood. Some would take their dogs on the ice to smell out the seals. [SRKH 401]

LEARNING THE ROPES

Bowe, Eddie, p. 4

Tommy Sutton, belonged to Fermeuse, was me bunkmate. He was over 60. He said, “Were you ever out to the ice before, Neddie?” and I said “no.” Tommy said, “Neddie, don’t mind them fellows. I’ll show you how to pelt the swile.” I say this much, if you see a man pelting two seals and you didn’t know how to pelt the third, you would never know. [SRPK 301]

Burry, George, p. 9

Father showed me here in the house. He got three old coats and put them down on the floor and cut holes in them. “Now,” he said, “boy, this is how you got to do it. You’re going out now; you’re on your own. You’ve got to be as good as the other fellow.” [SRPK 337]

Gosse, Eric, pp. 3, 8

Then one morning [1937] somebody came down and said, “We’re into the seals.” We went on deck and it was as if there were a million babies with the bellyache, that’s what it sounded like. So we got overboard, and I didn’t know how to sculp. So I asked this chap, and he sculped a seal in about 30 seconds. That wasn’t much good to me. So I had to do it on my own and, in spite of it all, I managed to get 26 seals that day.

But when I came aboard, they soon found out who was making the bad pelts. You had to cut out one flipper. Well, I left the hole too big and I guess the pelt was spoiled. So I wasn’t very popular. I could do it, all right, but this is a finer point that I missed. What the hell, if they had a new hand they should show him how to pelt. The following day I killed and panned 56 seals, which was a good day’s work. Then on the following day my buddy was blind so I picked up with another chap. At the end of that day I had pelted 76.

I felt sorry for the poor little seals at first, but it didn’t last long. [SRKB 825]

LEVI CHAFE

Chafe, Angus, pp. 2-15

Levi [Angus’s grandfather] grew up in Petty Harbour and moved to 16 Springdale Street, St. John’s. His wife was a Cook from the Southside. He had a fascination for the sea and he used to send Dad [Walter], Eric, Ron, and Elliot down to Bowring’s and get the results of the seal hunt. They would get the figures and bring them home to Grandfather and he would write it in his book. He used to sell his book for a dollar. If he wanted a dollar for something, he’d say, “Ok, go out and sell a book.” He spent time in the dry goods business and then became an examiner of materials for the Customs House. [SRFW 109A]

LICE

Brazil, John Will, pp. 5-6

They’d have themselves covered with blue butter on their breasts and under their arms to keep the vermin down. The vermin used to perish when they’d crawl to the blue butter. Everyone that came home from the ice would be maggoty with lice because the men in the lumber woods all the winter would come out and get a berth to the ice and they’d be lousy. [SRMC 801]

Fitzgerald, Edward, pp. 8-9

Anyhow, they [the crew] were getting lousy way and that way on both ends of us [in the bunk]. Uncle Fred Mugford, I used to call him Uncle Fred, said to me, “Go up and get some kerosene oil and come down and sprinkle the bunk.” And up I goes and takes one of those two-and-a-half-gallon water buckets and draws it off about three-parts full, from the drum. I comes down in the dark with this bucket of kerosene oil—there was nothing only tin lamps, and they weren’t good, they were smoking, and there wasn’t much light, the boys would break the globes on them firing [throwing] hard bread. I took the bucket of kerosene and slopped it in the bunk. What a place to sleep in—all that kerosene oil—but we never had a louse. They wouldn’t come near kerosene oil. [SRKB 803]

Fowler, Don, pp. 7-8

People used to get maggoty with lice. My father used to say get some Epsom salts, put it in a drop of water, and run it all over you, and you’ll never get one. When I came home [Cupids] off the Neptune, Father and Mother took my clothes and burned them. They washed me in Jeyes Fluid and brought me a suit. I burned the clothes that was left. Never brought them in the house at all. [SRKB 840]

Gosse, Pat, pp. 20-21

When we came home from sealing, we had to go out in the stable and take the razor and shave off everything—all our hair, under our arms, everything.

We weren’t out a week one spring when all of us were lousy. The man who was sleeping with us was lousy. He brought them with him. He had them when he came and we all caught them off him in our bunk. Then the men to our feet caught them, then the men above us. And we’d go up when all hands would be clear of the toilet in the night, go up in the toilet and comb—all hands would bring a fine-toothed comb. [SRMD 411]

Hayden, Thomas, p. 12

For warmth you’d get a bunk near the stoves. Well, after a while the vermin would get around. Men that knew the difference would get as far from the stoves as they could. In the nighttime there was nothing strange to see a fellow with his inside shirt stretched across his knee. He had to clean it. So when he put it on and jumped into bed he’d be asleep before the lice returned. [SRKM 513]

Lowe, William, pp. 52, 65

An old man from Bay Roberts, or somewhere around there, got lousy. Jim Kent made him take off his long johns. He boiled them in a five-gallon kerosene can with kerosene, caustic soda, and carbolic—stronger than Jeyes Fluid. We used to put that on [our] underwear and we’d sprinkle it on our bunks. And this poor old man put too much on and burnt himself just the same as a red piece of steak. And he was in the bunk till we came in, four or five weeks.

I see a fellow by the name of Eustace from Torbay sleep on the deck underneath a dory for a month. The other men were getting lousy. [SRFW 103A/B]

Martin, Edward, pp. 24-25

One fellow got lousy and took every bit of clothes off and put his oilskins on right next to his skin for the whole spring. One poor man got lousy and every night he would put on a change of clothes and every night he got lousier because the cleanliness was drawing the lice to him. Jerry Carroll and Jess Scott and I, we slept together. And we went up and got blue butter and kerosene oil and put it all over our bodies and the lice stayed away from us. [SRST 501, 502]

LIVING CONDITIONS

Bowe, Eddie, p. 17

Where I slept was right under the hatch; there were two bunks. When you’d take in pelts, at least one pelt of each 20 struck the bunk. That didn’t enhance the sanitary part of that bunk. Everything was greasy with swile fat and coal dust, and everything would stick to that. You could wash your hands, but if you put your hand in to get hold of the bedclothes to heave it back, the hand would be as black as bark. Every bit of the boat was like that. [SRPK 301]

Bragg, Fred, p. 8

You ate hard bread and fat pork. We used to get straw and shavings to fill the bunk. You’d lay on that. Just take off the overalls and overall jacket, and boots, leave on the pants and shirt. There’s fellows that would get in with the rope and all on them. Get up the next day ready for breakfast and go on the ice. [SRMD 406]

Bragg, Thomas, pp. 3, 5

Our food wasn’t too good and our sleeping quarters were very very bad. Two and three men in a bunk. We slept down in the hold which was limed [whitewashed], and you couldn’t have any good clothes on because you’d get it full of lime. But it was a great life. I liked it, I did. I loved it. [SRPK 340]

Fitzgerald, Edward, pp. 13-14

In 1940 there were some boys going overseas, about 400 of them at the station in St. John’s. The train was there and the parents and the sisters and brothers and girlfriends were all there. We got in and tied up at Bowring’s—we had been out about two months—and we went up to the station, too. The police were there with horses for keeping the people back. So we came up and got in among them after two months out to the ice and no washing, and coal dust and ashes, and seal grease and blood, and snow and ice. You can picture what kind of smell was coming off us, but we couldn’t smell it. Everyone else could and the horses wouldn’t come alongside us, neither would the people. [SRKB 814]

Gillett, William, p. 23

You would go around to the carpenter shops and get shavings to put in a big bag to make a mattress. You would sleep down in the hold. When she filled up, the fat would come down striking across your face. Many times on the Neptune you would have to give up your bunk and get out of it. Sleep where you could get a place to lie down. [SRCL 201]

Gosse, Doug, p. 5

In the Ungava and other iron ships there was never no trouble sleeping. They were large. But in the older wooden ships they used to take their bunks down and put more seals in. They used to call it—“They’d be burnt out.” And then they’d have to sleep on their boxes for the rest of the voyage. I was in the Neptune and some of our crew got “burnt out,” and they had to take down their bunks and put the seals there. So then they’d get in someone else’s bunk for a few hours’ sleep. When the owner would come, they’d get out and sleep on their boxes again. [SRPK 317]

Leaman, William John, p. 19

We used to bring quilts. If you had a quilt, and I had one, two quilts would be warm enough. Then we’d have a sackful of shavings. You would get a bag full of shavings to put under your quilt. Then you’d put the quilt on and just get in. You were warm enough then. [SRPK 307A/B]

Wheeler, Ernest, pp. 9-10

The master watch and the bo’sun and the wheelmen and the barrelman, they had it very good. They slept in the top house, up in the end, and the best of it they had their meals brought to them in the morning. Yes, they had it nice and cozy up there. It was the best part of the boat. Now, we fellows down in the hold—it was almost like sleeping outdoors. We were like dogs. [SRBH 722]

LOOSE ICE

Butt, Henry, pp. 14-15

The ice was very bad [1935] and a lot of the crew would have boards and get around on boards. They’d have boards to get across the ice. [SRKB 851]

LOSS OF SHIP

Thorne, Gordon, p. 3

The SS Seal blew up in 1926. Captain Stan Barbour had her out, and he was first in Harbour Grace with a load of seals and was going to make the second trip. [The oiler, James Brewin, and chief engineer, Edward Perez, died.] [SRMD 410A/B]

MANHOOD

Thorne, Gordon, p. 2

You were only a boy until then. When you went to the seal fishery, you were a man. I went out when I was 17. That was the spring of “White Bay.” All the seals were in White Bay [1921?]. [SRMD 410A/B]

MARKS

Bragg, Fred, p. 7

When we got into the patch, there was only two female seals that had pupped. We put a mark, a kerosene barrel, full of coal so it wouldn’t tip over, and a piece of canvas on a pole in it. That was a mark so you’d know where to go for some more seals. They’d be pupped then. Later we went back, but there was nothing there only the barrel. All the seals were gone. Other ships had them. [SRMD 406]

MASTER WATCH

Horwood, Warrick, p. 11

Billy Winsor didn’t depend on the master watches. He didn’t notice the master watch. Now, Captain [Abram] Kean depended on his master watches. He gave them full authority. But when Billy Winsor’s crowd got on the ice it was every man for himself. The four master watches could go together as far as he was concerned. But Abram Kean would give a lecture the first morning. He’d tell every man to obey orders and follow the master watch. Keep together in the snowstorm and don’t walk over 3 miles from the ship, even if she’s jammed. Abram Kean was a wonderful man. [C865/71-3 (L.G. Small)]

Moores, William Joseph, p. 40

The master watches were most always northern men. In the Imogene, Don Andrews from Wesleyville was my master watch the three springs I was in her. Most of them were schooner masters. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

Sturge, Stanley, p. 33

To become a master watch I had to go before a board—Abram Kean, Captain Bill Winsor, and Captain Stanley Barbour. He said, “Stanley, say the compass.” I got halfway, and he stopped me. Then he started asking me questions. After I answered, he said, “Start where you left off now with the compass.” Then more questions. $3 you had to pay for a certificate. Three shares of seals were taken out for the master watches, scunners, second hand, barrelman, about $8 or $10 more. [SRPK 303, 304A]

MERCER, WILLIAM (MAGISTRATE)

Keefe, Tom, pp. 6-7

Now, Jimmy Titford used to cook for us [1930, 1931], but now the bigger fellows and the second hand and the captain had another cook. He was a Mercer down in the harbour [Bay Roberts], Billy. They used to call him Billy Shears down the harbour. He was a judge after. [SRKB 811]

MONEY

Bragg, Thomas, pp. 30-31, 32-33

The most money I ever made from seals was $49. One year we had a better year because we stood by the Ungava. The Ungava damaged her rudder. We were out from Job’s and they were out from Job’s. We were in the seals and we had to leave the seals and go stand by her every night. We’d leave her in the morning and some time in the evening we had to go back. We stood by her and when we got off St. John’s we put a line aboard her. You had to have a line aboard of her in order to get paid. We put the line aboard of her and took her into St. John’s. We were in the old Neptune. We made $32 off our seals and we got $32 insurance, but we didn’t get it until the next fall.

I’d say the seal fishery was half the summer’s wages, although we never made any big money. You’d bring home a barrel of salted seal, you’d save up a bit of tea, perhaps half enough for the summer. You’d save up a bit of hard bread and put it in a clean bag and bring it home and a few blocks of butter. So with your bit of money it was half your summer’s earnings, half your summer’s living. When I was steward, Mr. Job came aboard. I’ll never forget him. He came aboard, and he said to me, “Tom, how much stuff is open?” I said, “Sir, it’s nearly all opened.”

“Well,” he said, “what’s opened we don’t want give it out to the crew.” And, of course, there wasn’t too much that was opened. I went down and tore the boxes off and opened them up, especially the chests of tea. I told the boys to come on and we shared it out. I had a good many pounds myself that year and my brother was out, too, and I gave it to him. Yes, I never forgot Mr. Job. He said, “Whatever’s opened, give it out to the crew.” [SRPK 340]

Burry, Stephen, pp. 3-4

I was out five springs, and the last year when I came through the door I said to the wife, “Die or live, starve or perish, this is my last.” She said, “I don’t blame you.” It was May month. I had $30 and a bag full of dirty clothes. I was five springs at it. I was four with Captain Abram and one with Wesley [Westbury]. The Beothic with Captain Abram and the Imogene with Wesley. [SRPK 341]

Butt, Cyril, p. 42

Fifty dollars, $100 was really important in the spring of the year. That bit of money came in handy going fishing on the Labrador. Because there wasn’t much money in the fishery at that time [1930s]. Fish was $1.50 a quintal. Couldn’t make any money or the merchant was sure to have every cent; he’d take it all. The more fish you got the more they took off you. [SRKM 501]

Cobb, Norman, pp. 14-15

We [landsmen] sold the pelts to Earle Sons and Company [1930s]. They had three or four establishments around here: one at Tilting, one at Change Islands, one at Herring Net, and, eventually, they bought one at Joe Batt’s Arm. And they had one here at Barr’d Islands. We didn’t get no money. What you’d get is a slip—a receipt. You’d get no cash. The pelt was weighed and you got $2 or $3 a quintal [112 pounds]. They’d give you a receipt for it and you’d go over to the shop and take that up. You’d never get any cash unless you might want a dollar for something. [SRKH 402]

Gosse, Doug, pp. 6, 8

My best trip was only around $35. My brother was out in the Imogene in 1933 and they carried in over 55,000 seals. He was only paid around $100 [$93.48]. My brother collected my money from me in them days. I was working for my father because I was young and underage. It all went to our family. [SRPK 317]

Gosse, Pat, pp. 2, 18-19

We needed the money home. That’s why I went to the seal fishery. There were 14 of us home—my father and mother, my grandfather and grandmother, and ten of us children. The old people were only getting $12 every three months.

First two springs I was out I never made a cent, but I did all right after that. The three of us went out—three brothers in 1933. I came home and bought two cod traps out of my money. Fred bought a trap boat. And Doug’s money—that went to get grub for the house, and material. So we had a new boat, we had two traps, and Doug made a hundred and some dollars besides what he made on flippers. [SRMD 411]

Kean, Job, p. 9

The seal fishery used to start you off for the summer. If you didn’t go to the seal fishery, you’d start off [the summer cod fishery] in debt. [SRPK 305A/B]

Keel, Roy, p. 15

Most of the flipper money used to be spent in the liquor store—$1.50 or $1.75 for a bottle. [SRPK 327]

Mifflin, Sam, p. 24

[Mrs. Mifflin’s comment on the fishery and her husband:] They had loads of seals and still they didn’t make anything. Fifty or sixty thousand seals to make $100. If you got $100, you’d want $30 worth of rum. That would give it a good cut. [SRBH 714]

Moores, William Joseph, p. 71

Policemen only got $50 a month then and sailors got $50 on the boats. If you made $80 to the ice in a month, you had your barrel of seal, and you had your month’s grub, with no expenses. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

Power, Robert, pp. 39-40

The spring I was in the Eagle [1926], I made $100, flippers and all. That was a lot of money. I made a lot of money. That’s the spring I had seal finger. I was home all summer but I had money for everything. I wasn’t married then. I got married in 1932.

I mind one spring in particular. I believe that spring I was on the Ungava. My wife had no baby carriage. First thing when I came home she bought a baby carriage. Some proud. [SRKM 517]

Sturge, Stanley, p. 23

We never got paid for the fast fur [the fur of the very young]. All we got paid for was the weight of the fat. Captain Abram Kean went over to the States and found out what was happening with the fast fur prices. He came back and reported it. I suppose Bowring’s paid him off. He never opened his mouth about it afterwards.

Bring in 48,000 seals, 30,000, 35,000—make $50? Two hundred and fifty men? My dear boy, I’ll tell you, she never went into Confederation too quick for the poor man. [SRPK 303, 304A]

MURRAY AND CRAWFORD (HARBOUR GRACE)

Kennedy, William, pp. 23, 30

Murray and Crawford had property on Water Street [where the Moores Plant used to be]. The seal pelts were brought in and stripped of their fat by the seal skinners. The Seal Skinners Union in Harbour Grace was the oldest union in Newfoundland. After the pelts were stripped of their fat, the skins were put in salt, and the fat was put in big vats and boiled until the oil was rendered out, and packed in barrels. [SRKB 813]

NAVIGATOR

Bragg, Thomas, p. 26

The navigator would be on the bridge all day, spotting where the men were working. In case the weather would change, he’d have them all spotted and the course to pick them up and all of that. [SRPK 340]

Moores, William Joseph, p. 39

Now [the navigator], Captain Taylor was a very stern man. He didn’t put himself down with the other fellows. When he got into St. John’s, he had an old Boondock coat with a collar and a corker hat. He was 6 foot 2 [inches]. And he was a man with, some people called it, a chip on his shoulder. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

NEPTUNE

Clarke, Allan, pp. 12-13

She was stuck in the ice [1940] and the steam tube blowed; it was a little tube like a one-inch pipe. The tubes were thick and tight together. And she blowed and there was no steam on her and they had to shut her down to try and patch her up. She got out in rough weather, drifting wherever she could go. She was going up alongside of the Funks. If she struck the Funks, we’d all have been killed.

The old engineer said, “Make your souls, boys. You’ll never see home or your loved ones no more.” When she’d go down head on, she’d drive spray right over, and the water would come down in the hold where we lived. But we pumped her out and by and by we got into the ice and fixed up the tube and got her going again.

Then we bore up for home and, coming across Trinity Bay, she blowed again. We went into Grates Cove and patched her up and, while we were there, an old fellow rowed out and asked me to give him a lamp for his stage. We had big kerosene lamps with two torches to put on the ice to mark our seals. I said to him, “Get down aboard of your boat.” And when he got down aboard her, I hove down about a half a dozen in his boat. [SRKB 858]

Doyle, Robert, p. 4

We were right in the harbour [St. John’s], in to Winsor Rock, when the Admiralty drove us out [1943]. They were afraid she’d sink in the harbour and block everything. They took us off, the big navy tugs, one of them was called the Tenacity, and then they towed her off about 5 or 6 miles. They put a shell in her and let her sink. [SRMJD 507]

Gillett, William, p. 6

The Neptune was old. She was rotten. You could pick at the timber when you were lying in the top bunk. I remember one spring we got out of the ice into a gale of southeast wind, and she started to leak too much. They had to put her back in the ice until the weather got better. [SRPK 351]

O’Neill, Arthur, p. 37

The old Neptune was the worst boat that Job’s had. They said she was hogged 4 or 5 feet in the centre of the keel. They were going to condemn her. She wasn’t going to go out to the ice, but anyhow, old Abram Kean said he’d take her and go in the Gulf. They got her ready, and she was behind the rest of them, but old Kean took her and he picked up most of his crew off the streets of St. John’s and he went in the Gulf and loaded her right to the hatches and came back and was the first in. And every man got a briar pipe and a pound of tobacco from the Newfoundland Tobacco Company. [SRKM 516]

Stevenson, Robert Louis, pp. 35, 41

The Neptune was my favourite sealing vessel. It was in the 1920s and I really had the best experiences on the old Neptune. She was called old, but she could ring off 10 knots up to the time she died. In bad weather, the Imogene would sink before the Neptune. [SRMD 414A/B]

NEWFOUNDLAND DISASTER

CBC Broadcasting (Des Brown interview), p. 9

The captain came along and gave me a bottle of brandy. He said go down and get five or six men and see what you can do. The first fellow I met I’ll never forget his name. He was standing by a pinnacle of ice. He said my name is Alfred Maidment and there’s my son there. His son was dead. I’ll never forget that name and I’ll never forget the anguish in the man’s face. I said, “You can’t help your son now.”

So I gave him a little drop of brandy, and he didn’t want to leave. I said, “A couple of fellows here will go back with you and they will take your son’s body with you.” So they did, they took him back. Now, that was the first one I saw. Then I went a little further and we came to a pan with about 20 or 25 men on it—bodies. We used to turn them over to see if there were any of them alive. One fellow I turned over was under about three tiers of men.

I felt his pulse and we got him in a blanket and four fellows, one to each corner, and we lit a fire underneath him. When you’re frostbitten and life is coming back in your body, you’re suffering some. This poor chap was 19 or 20, and when the heat got to him and he started to come to life, I gave him a sip of brandy. He started to cry; he cried for us to let him down. He was dying with pain—an awful pain. But we kept him up, kept talking to him, and saved him. [C747/70-38]

Bragg, Fred, p. 5

He put them overboard to let them walk towards the Newfoundland. They didn’t get there, half of them perished in the night. I went to the seal fishery with some of them after with Captain Bill Winsor and one fellow Tulk had the two smallest boots aboard because he had all his toes gone. “I lost all them goddamn toes,” he said. “That was that old Kean, that old son of a bitch.” “Old Kean didn’t keep them aboard; if he had, they wouldn’t have been lost.” [SRMD 406]

Greenham, Andrew, pp. 36, 57

We were in a nice herd of seals—all five steel ships. Wesley [Westbury] Kean was in the Newfoundland, a wooden ship. Wesley was jammed about 8 miles northwest of us [Adventure]; we were in the seals, and he was in none. We were in the seals—not panning, but taking them and hauling them right aboard. Wesley sent his men to his father in the Stephano to see if his father could do anything to help him get a few thousand seals.

Some went back aboard their own steamer, but the rest got aboard of the Stephano at about 11 o’clock in the morning. Weather was just coming on, mild snow, not cold. Abram took them and carried them to the south of Wesley about 3 miles further. That was 11 miles from their own ship. He put them out into a nice little herd of seals. He put them out, but the weather was getting bad. Well, he slewed around to come back to pick up his men. He never said one word to anybody; not a man knew that the Newfoundland’s men were on the ice.

Johnnie Blackmore was our barrelman. He called the captain. He said, “Captain, there’s a man coming there on the starboard side.” The captain ordered men to go and meet him. This was young Mullins—belonged to Campbellton or Valleyfield. He was only 17 years of age and I knew him. I said, “How are you getting on, my son?” “Very good, Skipper Greenham,” he said. “I’m good for another night yet.”

And the next fellow I met was a fellow from Petty Harbour, his two legs froze solid from his knee joints down. He was coming a zigzag course, but he was coming slow, coming slow. I said, “How are you feeling, boy?” “Sir,” he said, “I’m not very well.” And I gave him a drink of brandy. I always carried a little bottle of brandy along with my Redways and molasses. I gave him a drop of brandy and then I gave him Redways, brandy, and molasses mixed together. By this time Markie Bragg and Bob Strong, our master watch, were up alongside of me. I said, “Boys, look out for this fellow.” And I asked him, I said, “My son, are any more men out this way?”

He said, “You see that big black pan out here, sir?” I said, “Yes, my son.” “Well,” he said, “on the next sheet behind it there’s 12 men; they’re damn well dead, too.” I went just like the horse [fast], and when I got there and went on the sheet where he told me, there was nobody there. Well, I thought, the fellow was wandering and he didn’t know what he was talking about. But I walked over that rifter onto another sheet. When I did, over there in the lun of the rifter, there were eight men sot down looking right towards me with their eyes wide open, froze solid to the world. And to my right there were two fellows about that much above the water and to my left I could just see two heads and their arms in on the ice over the water. Well, I took off my overall jacket and stuck up a signal. Then I went with my sheath knife and chiselled away the ice to get them out.

The Adventure went down and cut out the Newfoundland and went aboard and broke the news to the captain. He knew nothing about it. He couldn’t know it; he had no wireless. He thought that his men were aboard his father’s steamer or another steamer. When they went aboard and broke the news, that man was heartbroken.

That master watch [second hand] should have kept his men together, never mind about trying to walk 11 miles to the steamer. He should have stayed where the seals were and lit a fire and built a shelter. Plenty of shielding ice to build a windbreak and get a big fire in. Get a bit of paper, light it, and cut up little shavings of the flagpoles, cut little strips of fat, then bigger pieces of fat, the carcasses and pelts. The biggest kind of a fire, that’s the main thing. If Wesley Kean’s master watch [second hand] had done that and kept his men together, they wouldn’t have perished.

Abram Kean’s fault. He carried them and put them out and never reported it to any other steamer. Not a sound. We knew nothing about it. Had he notified the other steamers they were right alongside. There were seven sealing ships and it was only 5 miles from the furtherest to the furtherest. From us to Billy Winsor, he was the southwest ship, it was only 5 miles. They weren’t all in a line, one here, one there, like that. And those men died in between all those ships. [C1187/72-89, C195/65-17 (JDAW/Fred Earle)]

Hayden, Thomas, p. 14

The seal fishery was a northern man’s game. The Bonavista Bay people, the northern people, adored old Kean. When Wes Kean put his men out from the Newfoundland, he told them where to go for seals and to go aboard his father’s ship. They went aboard of old Kean’s boat and he let them mug up and get warm. “Now,” he said, “on the ice and go kill them seals.” They were northern men. If it was southern men and they knew the storm was coming, they’d have told old Kean, “No, we’re not going to leave the ship.” But the minute he said, “Get ready and go out,” they all went. [SRKM 513]

Hayward, Charlie, pp. 2-5, 10

I was out the first time with Captain Jobie Knee in the Bellaventure in 1912 and in 1914 with Captain James Randell in the Bellaventure. He’s the man who brought the dead men in. Two of us got overboard in the morning and went out and found two men and one was dead and one was alive. And we went on then where the crowd was and a lot of dead men were sitting around and people were dying. We took one of the men and carried him on board; two of us took him and we laid him aboard and he asked for tobacco—he was a man that chewed. One of us gave him tobacco, and he told us Arthur Abbott was his name. He lived a long time after he came home.

John Keel, they said, fell in two or three times. We put him in a little house on deck and his hands swelled up. He was brought in [to] St. John’s and he was in St. John’s a long time before he died. He must have been a hard man. There were 70 odd on deck and you could see their hands. They were like stones, stones turned white. There was a man whose fingers froze and he took out the knife and cut his fingers off. He didn’t know what he was doing. [SRBH 711]

Keel, Heber, pp. 10-11

That was all old Kean’s fault. He put them out. Wes Kean’s men. My father-in-law was on the Bellaventure, and he told me. He saw a man coming and he didn’t know where he came from. He came aboard and asked where the captain was, and he told him. In a few minutes the captain came out. Every man had to get ready to go on the ice and pick up the Newfoundland crew. So they went. They took wood for making fires and brandy and rum. The first man they came to they asked him what his name was. Albert Maidment. He never spoke again.

By the time they got him to the fire he was dead. They picked up several more and they found a big bunch of men. Some were sitting and some were standing and more were dead. And the wife’s father walked up and he said, “Is that you, John Fisher?” He just spoke, “Yes.” They led him along to this big fire, and he went fishing for years afterwards. And there was another man, Jose Abbott’s father. He lived. He could just crawl, that’s all. He lived to be an old man. [SRPK 328]

Kelloway, Arthur, pp. 14-16

Grandfather was with Captain Kean. He was the first one to find the survivors. The first man they met was the smallest and puniest man among them all, and he was still alive. He was about halfway from the crowd. My grandfather said, “Do you need any help?” “No,” he said, “by the Lord Jesus, I don’t want no help. Go out there, that’s the crowd that wants help. They’re all froze together out there, huddled into one another, froze to death. They’re dying out there like sheep.” That’s what he said.

There were two brothers belonged to Perry’s Cove—Charl Kelloway and his brother. His brother was dying. He said, “When I dies now, Charl, you take the clothes off me and put them on yourself. And I got a girl in Flatrock, and when you goes back, you take her.” So he took the clothes and put on himself, and he took the girlfriend and married her. Her name was Abigail Butt. [They may have been uncle and nephew instead of brothers.] [SRKB 854]

Mouland, Cecil, pp. 9-23

I remember that time when we had to walk from the SS Newfoundland to the Stephano, about 7 or 8 miles. When we got halfway, there was an elderly man with us, and he stopped. Most of us were young fellows and we all stopped. He pointed out in the sky and he said, “Men, we’re going to have a storm.” And we laughed at him and we questioned him a little bit about it. There were spots of red all around the sky, here and there, and streaky, and he called them sun hounds. He said, “If I had one more man with me, I’d go back to my own ship, the Newfoundland.” So 30 men followed him and went back with him. He was right. Before we got on board the Stephano, it was snowing.

We kept on walking, 134 of us went on but 30 men went back. We go on board the Stephano about 11 o’clock in the morning and had a mug-up. So, anyway, we had time to get our mug-up, and Captain Abram Kean was up on the bridge. Then the captain’s orders were that we had to get over the side quick. He was a crazy man. It was snowing. It was snowing even before we got on board. But we thought that our second hand, George Tuff, had arrangements made for Captain Kean to come back and pick us up. But he told our second hand to go and pan seals.

There were no seals, so, anyway, about 4 o’clock we inquired what arrangements he [Tuff] had made for the night. He said, “Captain Kean told me to pan seals and walk to our own ship.” That was 4 o’clock, and we were knee-deep in snow. He said, “We can make it before dark. Keep the wind in the side of your face.”

We went on and on and on, and the wind was changing. We went around in circles as the wind changed. So we put up for the night. The first night it was rain mixed with snow and we got wet through the shoulders and backs. About 2 o’clock in the morning the wind changed and it got real cold. We kicked and we stamped and we jumped and we danced. There were six men died the first night; they got in the water and got chilled.

We kept marching around. We’d march around in a single file and pound one another on the back. We were hungry and sleepy. I think sleep killed a lot of those poor fellows. I wasn’t off my feet now one minute while I was out there. I wore out my long leather boots almost to the inner soles.

Now, the next day was a real bad day. It was 0 degrees [Fahrenheit], and the snow drifted so we could hardly breathe sometimes. We had a man with us, Mr. Jess Collins, and he took over as boss, and we went jigging fish, imaginary, make-believe. That made us warm. Then someone would say, “There’s not much on the jigger, Uncle Jess.” “No,” he’d say, “we’ll go to hook-and-line.” Then you’d have your two lines and you’d skiver on your imaginary capelin and you’d throw it out like you throw your line out. We all knew about it because we were fishermen. Then you’d skiver another capelin on the hook and throw out another line and then you’d wait a little bit and haul in the fish: “Oh, fish on my line.” And that’s the way we kept warm.

And then he’d say, “We’ll go on parade again now, line up, single file.” So we’d go on parade, we’d string out because we didn’t know how bad the ice might be. And then we’d try to huddle together and everybody would be trying to get in the middle because it was warmer there if you could get in there. But you wouldn’t be in there very long before someone else would be in there. All that helped to keep us warm.

Six died the first night and Wednesday morning they started dropping. You couldn’t sleep. Anybody who went to sleep never woke up anymore. I’m awful sleepy, they’d say, I think I’ll sit down for a couple of minutes. They’d sit down on a hummock and they never got up anymore.

My cousin, Ralph Mouland from home, too, was with me. I missed him and I looked across and he was lying down with the dead people. I went over and I said, “What’s the matter, Ralph?” He said, “Boy, I can’t take any more of it.” I said, “What are you going to do?” He said, “I’m going to die now.” And I said, “Well, if I were like you, Ralph, I wouldn’t give it to them to say at home in Doting Cove that you died out on this old ice.” So what little bit of strength I had I grabbed him and got him up, got him up on his feet. I kicked him and I jumped on his feet and I had a real fight with him but he couldn’t fight back. But I knocked a little bit of sense in him and got him warmed up a little bit. He lived for years and years after that, but he lost his feet, poor fellow.

Some fellows used to chip off the blue ice—the Arctic ice with no salt water in it. It’s fresh. They ate that and they didn’t live too long after they started eating it. I think it chilled them inside, whatever little bit of heat was left.

I didn’t want to die. I might have died if the storm had lasted any longer, but I just didn’t want to die. The last night was a severe night and I saw fellows falling and not getting up anymore. I was courting a girl at home and I said to myself, “I wonder who is going to have my girl if I die out on this ice?” And I started jumping around, and I said, “Nobody is going to get her.” That was in 1914 and in 1915 I married her and we lived together for 54 years, until she died.

Uncle Israel Melindy from Lumsden was an elderly man. He got his feet and his legs frostbitten and he couldn’t walk. He was crawling. I was the last one that ever spoke to Uncle Israel. He said, “When you go home, tell my wife and family that I’m gone home.” I knew what he meant by that.

Uncle Abe Tippett from Catalina—he and his two sons died. He saw the boys were going to give up and he put his arms around them and got them up. He threw his arms around the two boys and the three of them died on their feet. They couldn’t fall down because they were braced, one boy there and one there and the old man over here with his arms around them as far as he could get. And that’s the way they had to put them on the Bellaventure.

These men from the Bellaventure came and I had to walk about a mile with two men, one on each side. We saw a young seal, and I said, “Look, kill that seal.” I wanted a drink and when you put your knife into seal’s heart blood comes up like water coming through a hose. And that’s real hot and I threw myself down on the seal and I had the best drink I ever had in my life. I could feel it warming me up. And when I got all I could drink, I said to the fellow, “Cut the seal open and get the heart.” They had a big heart and I got it and I ate every bit of it. And it was the most delicious meat I ever ate in all my life. And it seemed it put new life in my frame.

The Bellaventure picked us up Thursday morning and Saturday evening at 4 o’clock we came in the Narrows [St. John’s]. I never saw so many people in my life. There were crowds of people. Everybody in St. John’s was there. The police had the pier roped off. The only ones allowed down on the pier were policemen and navy men and clergymen.

They put off the survivors first. The navy men did a lot of that. I walked off the ship and two navy men grabbed me and took me up to the Seamen’s Institute. It was called the Caribou Hut after that.

They had a swimming pool there and they tell me that the dead bodies were frozen in such shapes that they had to put them in warm water to straighten them out. They shaved every one of these men, cleaned them up, and washed them, and put a white shirt on them and put them in a nice casket and sent them home. [C1487/73-78, C1488/73-78, C1489/73-78]

Mouland, Hughie, pp. 3-7

Old Kean hove us overboard to walk 8 miles and went to pick up his own men. They should be hung. He said, “All hands overboard.” Rube Crewe cut out a heart and I got a liver. We ate that raw. And we were 58 hours freezing, dying. No sleep, hungry and perishing for 58 hours. Robert Maidment was dying; I put a pan of ice under his head, and he passed away. And Simon Cuff asked me for a chew of baccy. I gave him a lump and he died with it in his mouth. George Maidment laid down to die. Rube Crewe, Elliston, he layed down, he died. And his son came along and said, “See Father? See Father? I don’t see him standing up around now.” I said, “What man is that who just died?” He said, “That’s my father.” He was 18.

When he saw his father, he lay down with him and he died there with him. We thawed them apart in St. John’s. And David Abbott, he was dying on his gaff, the blood running out of his nose. I had no gaff; we had them all burned making a fire to warm ourselves. He was dead then; I took the gaff from under his head. I frostburned one toe. Couldn’t make my water, all the buttons were froze up. I had to make my water in my boot. And when I emptied the boot, the toe [was] frostburned. [SRDM 601A]

Parsons, Allan, pp. 12-13

My father was with old Kean, and they picked up the dead. He was walking along and one man said, “I’ve been trying to get in my door but I can’t get in.” “I get to the gate,” he said, “and I can’t get over the gate.” My father said, “What?” “No,” he said, “I’m trying to get in. My wife is in the door, but I can’t get in there.” [SRKB 867]

Stevenson, Robert Louis, p. 20

In the Newfoundland disaster there were 60 I believe from Bonavista. They had them all laid out in the Orange Hall when we got out of school. They were all different shapes, all colours, frozen, hard sights. The old people who saw them grow up couldn’t recognize them, couldn’t identify them. We were only about eight or nine, but, cripes, two or three of us together—we were right every time. It was easy for us to see the profile but they couldn’t see it. [The children were looking at them from a lower eye level.] [SRMD 414A/B]

Thorne, Gordon, pp. 19-21

Like old Abram Kean and the Newfoundland disaster. I don’t put all the blame on him. Harvey’s took the wireless out of that old ship, the Newfoundland. If old Abram knew that these men were on the ice, he certainly would have went in search for them. He took them, as he thought, 3 miles nearer their ship and put them overboard. Now, his son, Wes, on the Newfoundland, thought they were aboard the big Stephano with his father. Abram’s other son, Joe, in the Florizel, asked him. “What do you think of the Newfoundland crew?” Old Abram said, “They’re okay. I took them 3 miles nearer their ship. They’re aboard now.”

I remember all about it because we had a sister Eva who died the same time. Eva was only five years old but she could sing, and everything. I was eight years old and Mama sent me down to tell Mrs. Codner. I had two brothers on the Bloodhound and it was in the night when they came and they were expecting to see Eva any minute but she was buried.

My brother, Art, had wanted to go in the Southern Cross and Baine Johnston didn’t want to give my father two berths in the one ship. My father said, “If he doesn’t get in the Bloodhound, he’s not going.” He wouldn’t let Art go on the Southern Cross. He knew what the Gulf was like; he used to go up there all the time. Her [Mrs. Thorne’s] father was going in the Southern Cross that spring and decided not to go. He was in her the spring before and it was rough and he didn’t like it. He didn’t like her; he said she was an old ship. [SRMD 410A/B]

Tuff, Jabez, pp. 14-16, 18-19

My father’s [George Tuff] first spring out, he was 17 years old and he was in the Greenland disaster [1898]. There were 48 men lost their lives and he never had a scar on him. In the Newfoundland disaster he and Uncle Ezra Melendy left the ship’s side, and it was a beautiful morning. Uncle Ezra was after being in the Greenland disaster. Uncle Ezra brought up the conversation. He said, “George, you know this morning is identical to the one when we were caught out in the Greenland disaster?” And poor Father agreed, and they went on to talk about it. And Uncle Ezra said, “I don’t think I would survive anything like that again.” [He didn’t.]

[1914] Father used to wear three-quarter boots, and the first night he fell in and filled his boots with water. Older guys said, “Now, George, take off your boots and wring your socks out and put them back on again.” He said, “No, I can’t do that. If I do that, both my feet will freeze. So I’m going to keep that water in my boots and as long as I can keep that lukewarm my feet will be all right.” So he kept the water in his boots and the third day when he walked aboard on his own he hauled off his boots on deck and that steam was coming out of the water. And they put their hands in the water and it was lukewarm. That’s what he thanked for saving his feet.

Father thanked one man for his life: Sidney Jones. They were good buddies. They went to school together; they grew up together; and they were both Orangemen and lived right close together. Well, he and Uncle Sid came up on a whitecoat. That was the third day on the ice, and their stomachs were right empty. They sat down on the whitecoat and warmed themselves for a while and then they killed it and drank the blood and shared the heart. He said that he was never so sick in all his life. He just lay on the ice and actually gave up.

He was too sick, and he couldn’t take it anymore. He was getting comfortable on the ice, and he was going to stay there when Uncle Sid drew his Greenriver knife and he straddled him. He put the knife to his chin and he swore by his Maker. He said, “I’ll slit you open, George, and I’ll pelt you like a seal if you don’t get up.” He felt the knife touch his chin and he got up. Uncle Sid helped him to his feet and he got his finger down his throat and threw up and felt better.

He went out a few springs after that and then he gave up the seal fishery. He was not that well and he only lived to be 56. The doctors said it was due to what he endured in the two disasters. [SRBH 724]

White, Malcolm, pp. 6-7

Father went out to the seal fishery until 1918. In 1914 they were caught on the ice in the same storm as the Newfoundland. My father and another brother were two master watches. They’d always be talking about the ice. In the 1914 storm my father said, “We’ll build an ice house.” So they built an ice house and they got seals and set fire to the seals to keep themselves warm. He said to the men, “Don’t eat too much seal, just a little bit, so you won’t get thirsty.” The next morning they were picked up at 8 or 9 o’clock. He said he didn’t mind it. He said the fellows aboard the Newfoundland beat themselves out walking. But when the storm came on, Father and them stopped where they were. Some of the men were crying, but he said they ran around to keep themselves warm. They were on the Beothic with Captain Billy Winsor. [SRMD 401]

NORTHERN MEN

Goodridge, Charles, pp. 20, 74

They were a different bunch of men. Northern men don’t joke. The Conception Bay men were more like us St. John’s men. They were the best of men, always joking. And a northern man hates to go in the Gulf. [SRMJD 504, 505]

Gosse, Pat, pp. 5, 24

The northern men had no good clothes like us [from Torbay].

They’d get Sunday off. We didn’t have Sunday. They’d have it from Saturday evening to 12 Sunday night. That was a good rest. They wouldn’t do a tap on the ship, only praying. [SRMD 411]

Woodfine, Thomas, p. 7

The best men I saw dressed going to the ice were the northern men—warmer clothes—and they all had cakes in their boxes. [SRKM 511]

NORWEGIANS

Fitzgerald, Edward, pp. 20-22, 24-25

One spring we were out about 3 miles from our ship when this small Norwegian boat came up. The barrelman could speak English, and he told us to come aboard. About ten or a dozen of us went aboard and the barrelman told the cook to give us a meal. They gave us a beautiful drink of liquor and a meal of the very best of food, the very best.

Their bunks were lined with curtains and everything was beautiful and they had the best of comfort. She was a sealer and they had the best of food, the best of comfort, the best of everything, and what did we have? Nothing. Not even a toilet, only a couple of outhouses on the barrackhead. You had to pitch on that piece of two-by-four like a gull on a fence and use a snowball for toilet paper.

And when we finished our meal and were leaving, the Norwegians gave us each a round tin with 50 cigarettes. Why could those people have all this comfort? The Norwegians showed us how to take the work out of sealing. They showed us the whip lines with small cables on drums that would haul the pelts in instead of the men dragging them aboard.

When the Norwegians came over here, the whole thing changed completely. The Carino Company and Carlson, there was no motel or hotel could treat the men any better. There were seven or eight or 10 washrooms, T-bone steaks, snacks, unbelievable food. The captain [and] chief engineer ate with the men; they were Norwegians. The old Newfoundland captains were set aside from the crew all together but the Norwegians weren’t like that. And if you had a spare day, there was lots of liquor aboard, but that would be used with common sense. We went from rags to riches when the Norwegians came. [SRKB 814]

Fleming, James, p. 16

I’ll tell you what the Norwegians did. We had to come aboard the Ice Hunter. Another fellow and I had killed 10 or 15 seals and I took my scarf and my gaff and made a flag and drove it in the ice. About three or four days after that, just at dark, the Norwegians brought up 10 or 15 pelts and my scarf and put them aboard our boat. There’s not too many would do that. The Norwegians wouldn’t take your seals. [SRPK 330]

Gillett, James, p. 6, 20

They had small ships [early 1940s], and they never had the power. In our big ships we generally used to have them in our wake. Sometimes they couldn’t get through. But as the years went by they got better ships, and we couldn’t do anything with them; they were better than us. They used to kill a lot of old seals when they never had the power to get the young.

The Norwegian companies came in and drove the price [of fat] up. [SRPK 332]

O’Brien, Joseph, p. 12

I spent one spring at the ice. I went sealing out of Halifax on a Norwegian boat in 1950 or ’51. We went in the Gulf of St. Lawrence and got probably three-parts of a load there. We left that and came up on the northeast coast and filled her up there. I never saw a gaff, never knew what a gaff was. We were using about 3 fathoms of half-inch rope with a small iron hook on the end of it. We struck the seals on the head with this iron hook and then pelted them. Then we used the hook and the rope to tow them. But when we came across the Newfoundland boats, every man had a gaff. [C2981/77-176]

Parsons, Mark, pp. 12-13, 20-21

There were 12 or 14 Norwegian boats [1940s]. You’d be among them lots of times. And we used to change cigarettes. They’d have Camels and Lucky Strikes and we’d have Players and Royal Blends. They had a rope with an iron hook. They’d kill the seals with the iron hook and then they hooked it in the seal’s eye and towed it.

I’ve made $750, but that was on Norwegian boats not on Newfoundland boats: Norwegian boats from Halifax. We left here on the train and went up and went across the Gulf [1947?]. I had my berth. I just phoned the captain, Captain Merrill, a Norwegian, a lovely man. I just phoned his office, and he said, “Yes, boy.”

There were 29 of us Newfoundlanders. She was a lovely boat. Oh, my son! There was no hotel around any better than she was. Karl Karlsen owned her. There was everything aboard her. Come aboard in the evening and go get a shower. What a difference! Have a bath if you wanted it. You’d be aboard them Newfoundland boats some time before you’d get a bath. I only went on her once because it was too damn hard to get up there to Halifax. [SRKM 507]

OLD SEALS

Short, Charlie, p. 13

We were down to Belle Isle, and they were thick. The ice was tight. The old seals used to go up in bulks to try to break down the ice. The captain called the gunners aboard. He said the batsmen would do better. We killed 3,800 of them with bats then. [SRBH 702]

ON THE ICE

Bowe, Eddie, pp. 7, 19

The best thing I could see out there to stand against hunger were the whitecoat hearts. Hell’s bells! You’d eat two or three of them [and] you’d go all day without getting hungry. The blood was nice, too.

If you had good pan ice and lots of water, two pelts would nearly float along on their own. If it was frosty, it would be hard to tow [on the] dry ice. I didn’t see nobody with [pulling] three pelts in frosty weather. [SRPK 301]

Butt, Cyril, pp. 24, 26

Mostly when they put down men in the morning she’d put them out in a straight line. Then he’d steam back to where he hove off the first men and start picking up the seals. If the ice was too heavy and the ship couldn’t get around, you’d walk to the seals. You’d make a pan of 300 or 400 seals and sometimes the ice would break in the middle of the pan. A lot of seals were lost like that.

Everybody had their buddy. You had your mate on the ice; you’d never go alone. On loose ice you’d take your rope, about 18 feet long—one fellow would catch hold of it and he’d go first. [SRKM 501]

Gosse, Doug, p. 15

When leaving the ship, you always took your grub bag. And your oilskins were wrapped up and strapped under your arm. You wouldn’t wear them unless it came to snow and rain. But whenever you got overboard, no matter how fine the day, you always took them with you because you didn’t know what time you were getting on board. If it got cold, you could put them on and it would help to keep you warm. [SRPK 317]

Gosse, Eric, p. 20

I always carried a flask of rum and molasses on the ice. I didn’t tell anybody that because if there was rum around people were going to have it. Nobody suspected that I did. But I never used it except when we were coming aboard. If you were tired and your ship was there and you were pretty certain that you were going to get aboard quickly, this helped, or it seemed to. [SRKB 825]

Gosse, Pat, p. 22

We’d cut out a piece of cake every day and put it in our lunch. You’d get your rolled oats and raisins; you had a bag of them. You’d dig a hole and put them in the snow. You’d get down on your hands and knees then and dip them up with your hand and eat them. And hard bread. That was your lunch. Some people would take a little bit of cheese. [SRMD 411]

Vincent, Wilfred, pp. 20-21

I was master watch one time in the Beothic with old man Kean, and the ship was jammed. We were sent overboard to a spot of seals, and we came to a swatch. A swatch was ground-up ice—very difficult to cross. This was almost impossible to get across, but we got across it anyhow. And then when we came back in the evening, we couldn’t get across.

It had opened north and south, gone abroad, gone abroad. It was too far to walk to the north end and too far to walk to the other end. We had to stop. I had 40 men in my watch and it wasn’t very pleasant when it came dark. Then the sky got funny-looking, like we were going to have weather. And you’d hear the boys then: “Goddamn fool! He had no business to come across there. He might have known that.” I had to put up with all that. I couldn’t open my mouth. They’d beat the head off me. So we were out there dodging [walking] back and forth, trying to keep warm. It was cold enough to freeze you. Anyhow, our captain phoned [telegraphed] another ship that was free and it came and picked us up about 2 o’clock in the morning. [SRPW 701]

PANNING

Leaman, William John, p. 3

You’d put 25 or 50 or 100 seals on a pan. A couple of fellows would be buddies, and we’d have our gaffs and ropes—3 fathoms of rope, to lace up the seals. You’d lace up two or three. If you only had one, you’d shove the rope through the eyehole and go on with it. If you had three or four, you’d lace them, take the tow line around your back, and haul them to the pan and put them together. You’d put a flag up with a letter on it—“R” for Ranger. You’d stick up the flag in the middle of the seals. More times you’d be near a good pinnacle and you’d shove it down where it couldn’t come out. You’d have three little ropes to tie down the flag to the pelts. The captain would go around picking them up. He’d have a few fellows aboard of her, jumping out, strapping them on, winching them in, as they moved along the ice. [SRPK 307A/B]

Sheppard, Lewis, p. 4

When you’re panning seals, the first seals had to go face down [fat down]. But you would pile the rest face up. [SRKB 850]

PASTIMES

Butt, Cyril, pp. 32-33

[When the ship was jammed] you’d fool around, talking, going around the ship. Some fellows would get together and have a game of cards, a bit of poker for matches. There’d be fellows always making something like those little draw buckets on a couple of little bars. They’d carve whistles and little boats out of wood. Fellows were good with the pocket knife. [SRKM 501]

Dawe, Harvey, pp. 12-13

We were stuck, nothing to do [c.1926]. Fellows making buckets, laying around in the daytime, walking around the deck. We’d start dancing in the nighttime and we’d be at that until 2 or 3 o’clock in the morning with fellows making music. The fellows with bands around their arms were girls. I remember one night, Bill Bartlett, Captain Bartlett’s son and second hand, put his head down in the hold at 3 o’clock in the morning and said, “Boys, the skipper says it’s time to quit.” [Ed.: Apparently Bonavista and Wesleyville sealers did not dance!] [SRKB 804]

Kean, Job, p. 14

We were telling yarns and cooking up scoffs. Stealing out of the galley. They used to steal stuff out of the galley at night for a scoff. The old cooks would get some mad. [SRPK 305A/B]

Moores, William Joseph, pp. 59-60

Fellows playing cards, making those wooden buckets. They’d cut them out all in one piece, and sleeping. Even if you were burnt down, you still had your three-hour watch. We had a fellow from Elliston. He was a great fellow for singing songs. We had an electric light in the middle. When we got tired of the songs, some fellow would beat the bulb out. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

Warford, Henry, pp. 11-12

[When ships were jammed], fellows would carve little dancing men out of wood with their pocket knives. They used to have court work. Some fellow would do wrong and another would sit as judge. Then we’d have really active lawyers. Amongst the sealers there would be fellows who knew everything about the law. We’d try the fellow who did wrong and, if he was found guilty, he’d be put in the chain locker for so long. There’d be a jury, too. [SRKB 863]

PELTS

Bragg, Fred, pp. 38-39

[When pelts left on the ice and the flipper holes were frozen over], we had to take a small stick and sharpen the end of it and poke it through the flipper holes. I said, “There’s a way you can take those pelts aboard and not damage them.” I said, “Get the ice net, what we take the ice in, and put the damn things in that.” And we got it, spread it out, put the rope into it, in five minutes you could take a full bagful aboard. We found out how much the hoist could lift, and you know what, you could take aboard more in an hour than you take aboard in a day using the strap. [SRMD 406]

Bragg, Thomas, p. 23

Sometimes you’d steal a scattered pan going along. The skipper would sing out, “Is that our pan?” “Oh yes, sir. That’s our pan.” You’d hoist it aboard. Half the time the skipper knew it wasn’t but didn’t say anything. You wouldn’t steal too much, because you might lose out. You might haul one pan on top of yours and the next thing you know the other fellow would come up and take your seals, too. There were a lot of fellows who used to take pans, but I got to say that for Captain Dominey, he didn’t want that to go on. [SRPK 340]

Butt, Cyril, p. 18

There wasn’t much to sculping a seal once you’d seen one sculped. You’d turn the seal up on his back and you’d take your knife right up to his lip and you’d go right down to his daddles, down to his tail, and the fat would open. Then you’d skin the seal. Fellows could do it in a few seconds. But it was dirty. Sometimes you’d cut the veins and the blood would strike you right in the face. You’d hardly know a man sometimes, his face would be that black. And sometimes you wouldn’t wash for days and days. There wasn’t much to it. If you knew how to sculp a seal and lace them up and you were willing to work, that was it. [SRKM 501]

Ford, Andrew, p. 1

When you sculp a seal, you mark a letter in the fat, a letter of the steamer’s name. The blood runs down to the skin and that mark is always in the skin. That’s how they find out who took [or stole] the seals. [C1113/72-44 (P. Ford)]

Gillett, James, pp. 13-14

We used to pack the pelts on deck for a couple or three days to cool them. If you put down a warm pelt among the others, you’d ruin them. I had over 300 one spring that I had to throw away. All tainted. Too warm. [SRPK 332]

Healey, Paul, p. 16

The seal pelts went to oil [1933, jammed in White Bay]. They weren’t worth anything, and we ate all the flippers and carcasses. [SRPK 306A/B]

Sturge, Stanley, p. 26

Four or five men down in the pound or two pounds. The rest of the men would haul the pelts along and heave them down, over the hatch, down where the men were. The men would stand to one side until they’d get enough down to tier over the pound so they could put ice on it. Then you’d take baskets, and the men would pass ice down. You’d pass ice down and they’d take a shovel and spread it over the pelts. The pelts would be face up [fat side up]. The crowd on the deck all had their oilclothes on because of the grease. The scunner [second master watch or deck router] down in the hold would count. When he’d get 21 down, he’d sing out, and cut her off. When the men got them spread over, he’d cut a notch in his stick. Then he’d call out again to heave more down. They’d keep on like that until they got them all stowed. [SRPK 309A/B]

Wilson, George, p. 4

We had about 15,000 but we got jammed and didn’t get in till the 1st or 2nd of May. Nearly every seal pelt that was aboard of her was gone to oil. [SRKH 411]

PELT TALLY

Lowe, William, p. 90

The master watch would give one of his bright boys a stick, a marker. Every 21 seals you made a mark for 20, you cut a notch. [SRFW 103A/B]

PENIS

Codner, Jesse, p. 14

The Chinese would be down after those cockies. Yeah, oh my God Almighty, they were mad after them. They were kind of an ivory; they were bone. They used to send them away, by Jesus, get big money for them. Used to make handles for knives and everything like that out of them. And they would get them out of the old hoods, too. They used to make medicine out of them, too, they tell me. They made good medicine for something, for some disease. The Chinese, they’d be down as soon as you came in, on board. They’d buy them all, everything was there. But now you had to get the old fat, young seals would not have anything worth money. I used to stow them away in a big tub, ice them down, stow them away. [SRPK 355]

Gillett, William, p. 9

They used to get 25 cents apiece for them, 50 cents for those from the big dog hoods. I didn’t bother this, but some people did. The Chinamen would come aboard with burlap bags and buy them. They were mostly laundry fellows and I did hear that they used to use them in their starch. [SRPK 351]

Goodridge, Charles, p. 72

When I was a stowaway [the stowaways would cut the cocks out], I used to go out on the ice and cut them out. You had to keep changing the ice on them. The Chinamen wouldn’t buy them if they weren’t in good condition. In the laundry they’d have them all over the stove drying. [SRMJD 504, 505]

Hiscock, Lester, pp. 4-5

For a big seal cock you’d get 25 cents. I don’t know what they did with that. Someone said they used to blow the starch out. They used to go right mad for them, the Chinamen would. They’d be fighting over them and everything. The sealers used to cut the big ones out, out at the ice. They’d bring in bagfuls with the Chinamen buying them all. [SRJP 301]

Lowe, William, p. 45

You’d get more for them than you would for flippers. I think the Chinese used them to make some kind of starch. [SRCJL 902]

Noseworthy, Hans, pp. 20-21

The Chinese used to go down to meet the ships. They used to want their dicks; that’s a delicacy in Hong Kong. They’d pay top price for them. They used to say it would increase your sex life or make you live longer. [SRPK 356]

Rideout, Arthur, pp. 9, 17

I was a boy of 18 or 20. The gunner shoots the seals, and he goes on. I’d go up and see if he was dead. If he wasn’t dead, I’d roll him over and give him another crack across the throat. Slit him open, and take his dick out, and put it in a bag. There was quite a bit of money in that. When we came in the Chinese would be all over the place looking for their dicks, penises, I’ll use the word penis. Of course, the bigger the seal the bigger his penis. The Chinese used to send them home, I believe. Probably they ate them. That wasn’t going on first when my father was going to the ice. Fellows would say, “Well, Jesus, you can make more money off of the cocks than you can make off of the pelts.” [SRPK 352]

Winsor, Allan, p. 29

We used to save the seals’ cocks for the Chinese. Now, what the Chinamen would do with them I don’t know. Some said there was something in the bone they used to get out, the marrow of the bone. [SRST 503]

PRANK

Marshall, Chesley, pp. 21-22

This night I went to the baker and asked him for a loaf of bread. He wouldn’t give me a loaf. Now, the old bo’sun had a big brown cat and just as I was coming back from the galley he came up alongside my leg and started to purr. Now, the little shack where they used to mix the bread was on deck and there was a ventilator in the roof. They used to open it when it got hot. I picked up the cat and I climbed up. When I looked down, the baker was just putting his hands down in the barrel of flour and dough. When he got his hands in, I dropped the cat. He came on deck. He couldn’t see me. He said, “If I knew the blood of a bitch that done it, I’d skin him alive and bring him aft to the captain.” He never found out and the old cat was going around with dough stuck to his legs. [SRKB 860]

POLAR BEAR

Martin, Edward, pp. 28-29

One spring with Stanley Barbour we found a big polar bear. The gunner waited until he got 20 feet from it and, when the water bear opened his mouth, he put a bullet right down his throat. The captain wanted the skin, but the men wouldn’t give it to him. So he gave them 20 minutes to get it aboard. It took two winches to hoist it aboard. It was that big. They brought it aboard, skinned it, and ate it. [SRST 501, 502]

PREPARATION

Bowe, Eddie, p. 12

You had to go to confession and you had to go to the rails. You were supposed to have medals and prayer beads and holy water and Easter water. [SRPK 301]

Gosse, Pat, p. 3

My father had moonshine made up [1931?]. Everyone would have moonshine and he gave me his trunk then, what he used to keep the money in, for to put my stockings, my moonshine, my tobacco, my pipe, and everything like that in. [SRMD 411]

Kean, Job, pp. 2-3

We’d gather in the store after school [Brookfield]. After Christmas the first thing the men would say, “Boys, we got to get something to make slides” for dragging their suitcases and clothes bags up to Gambo. They had to go 40 miles to get the train to go to the seal fishery. And they used to make their slides. My father [Charlie] was captain of the Eagle for 13 springs. Sometimes they used to get a dog team to take them up. And my uncle used to go second hand. And Father, too, but I can only remember Father when he was captain.

I can remember them all getting ready—everyone getting their sleighs—and getting this tin, which come off the boxes, to put on the runners. And then they’d really slide along easy. There were no roads. They would have to drag that over the barrens, cross the ponds, up to Gambo. Then they’d get on the train and come into St. John’s. First thing they used to have to do is go down to Horwood’s or one of the lumber companies and get some shavings for laying on boards on the ship. The sealers used to come up from Lumsden, all around Cape Freels, they’d all pass through Brookfield on their way to the seal hunt. [SRPK 305A/B]

Moores, William Joseph, p. 22

[There was only William and his sister in the family and therefore more money resources for William.] You’d take three or four pairs of socks, couple or three suits of underwear, you’d have a box of clothes—good warm inside clothes. I knew some policemen and I used to get those policemen’s pants, wonderful warm pants. They’d give them to you or sell them to you. Then you’d have a suit of canvas made to go over all: that’s six-ounce canvas. The older generation used to have leather boots. I did one spring or two. Then the short knee rubber with a piece of leather across the tap [sole] and a bit of leather on the heel. You’d put chisels and sparables in the taps, because if you didn’t, you wouldn’t stand up on the ice. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

Power, Walter, pp. 8, 15

About five years after [the Viking disaster], I went to look for a berth. They were very hard to get. I went up to Bowring’s Cove, and Mr. Gushue gave me a berth. He signed me on, and I took up my crop. I got my stuff. Now, I had some moonshine to run off and I had to get the bed down from upstairs. My wife wanted to sleep in the front room. It was too cold upstairs.

I got the bed, and the other fellow started running off the moonshine for me. I had no clothes bag, so my wife went to the store and got one. She put my cuffs and socks and two suits of underwear and pants and long rubbers in it. I had to get to Torbay with that on my back and with my three bottles of moonshine. Jimmy drove us to Torbay, and we went from Torbay with Billy Moores.

We had a wonderful time that night going around from ship to ship. We all had drinks and we sang songs. We sailed at 10 o’clock the next morning. We cleared $67 [most likely 1937, Stan Barbour, captain in the Terra Nova]. I had a gallon of molasses and I had a box of hard bread and some fat pork and tea. I had a wonderful lot of stuff. [C1200/72-133 (M. Wilkinson)]

Wheeler, Captain James, p. 6

You had to cover the deck with wood because when you’re going to the ice you had tacks in your shoes. They would do the deck with inch lumber so that would save the original deck. The crew didn’t have to do it but they’d generally hire on four or five of the crew to help do it. To help the Bowring’s crowd that worked on her. They would probably pay $1.50 or $2 a day. [SRCL 204]

QUARTERMASTER

Gillett, William, p. 11

[He was quartermaster on one trip.] You had good grub and you had a steward to look after you. You had a nice bunk to sleep in. Things were 50 per cent better. The quartermaster was on the quarterdeck. When you were butting the ice, you had to back up. If you saw a big pan of ice or a big growler near the stern, you’d sing out, “stop her.” It might strike and break the shaft. That was your job. When the pan would fall away, you’d sing out, “all clear.” [SRPK 351]

QUINTERING

Kelloway, William, pp. 20-22

I enjoyed sealing. I didn’t care when I jumped on the ice if I was in the water or out. One day we were all down with our ropes off lying down. I was in John Cross’s watch, and he came to the hatch. He said, “How about some of you young fellows come up? There’s a seal off the starboard bow.” We were getting seals for our barrels and I jumped up and went and left my rope and gaff.

When I looked down on the sidesticks, there was a fellow there. Now, I got down on the sidesticks. Then he jumped on a pan and I waited until the ship got to the next pan and I jumped. I was ahead of him and the two of us took off after that seal. When I got to the seal, I had no gaff to bat him with. I struck him with my fist and knocked him out. I had him knocked out, and I took him on my back and buddy wouldn’t help me.

Well, boy, what a roar aboard the ship. Now the seal came back to life and I had him on my back and he trying to get clear. The old man roared out, “Heave down that seal and let the other fellow help you haul him in.” I said, “He won’t help me.” “Well, come on,” he said. So when I got to the side, Uncle Pad Short, belonged down here, he hove down a seal dog [a hook] and he hove down a gaff. I killed the seal and put the seal dog in and Uncle Pad Short hauled him up.

And this fellow went aboard ahead of me and steeled his knife to pelt that seal. Uncle Pad said, “Are you going to let that fellow take that seal?” “No, boy,” I said, “give me your knife.” He gave me a knife, and the doctor was up on the bridge and he timed me. I didn’t know he was timing me. I took the pelt off in a minute and a half. “Now,” I said, “here, Pad, take the carcass.” Pad took the carcass and put it in his barrel. [SRKB 855]

Tuff, Jabez, pp. 2-3

I was out in the Imogene with Captain Wes Kean [1938 or 39] and I worked in the mess hall my first spring out, waiting on tables. You see this one had a great big mess hall and several tables. I would only go on the ice for seals when all of the other crew were out and we would be picking up loose seals or picking up seals that were already pelted. We’d be getting out and strapping them on, two or three guys from the mess hall. They were quinters. A seal about half a mile away would be spotted and you’d have to go and kill that one and bring it to the ship; then on the other side. You were going back and forth like that all the time. There were two or three of us young guys, 18 or 20 years old. It was just fun for us. We just wanted to be doing it. [SRBH 724]

RANGER

Lane, Watson, p. 3

The Ranger went ashore on the end of Baccalieu [1942] and she had a crew about the same as the Eagle and they all came aboard with us [Eagle]. So the only sleep we got then was when one fellow would get out of his berth and the other fellow would get in. We were up there two weeks like that. After that we bore up for home. [This was during her 69th spring at the ice and the end of her career.] [SRPK 325]

Russell, Roland, pp. 3, 11

A friend got the berth from Thomas Devine [merchant in King’s Cove]. We went into the Straits, into slob ice—no seals [1942]. We were forced to make harbour every evening. So we went into Red Bay; then we left for Groswater Bay; the three boats—the old Ranger, the Terra Nova, and the Eagle. I was in the Eagle. We got as far as the northern ridge of Belle Isle and got jammed. The Terra Nova, she drifted outside of Belle Isle. The next day we got clear. It started to storm: northeast wind and snow. We drifted all that night—the three boats—and all the next day. We didn’t know where we were drifting.

So we drifted all day and, about 2 o’clock, we made the lighthouse on Baccalieu up in the Straits. So we drove up in the Straits and the Terra Nova came up on the other side of Baccalieu. The next day we sighted the old Ranger coming into the slob. She drove up, she drifted up, and she drifted in, right in on the northeast end of Baccalieu. She was jammed there and she was taking on water, and there was trouble with her engines. So she drifted into Baccalieu, and that’s where she ended up. She was going to strike shore. They put out their dories and some of our crew went to meet them. So we got them aboard just about duckish. It was dark when we got them aboard. Well, we had the Ranger’s crew and our own crew.

Then we drifted and we went right in and I don’t think we were more than 200 feet from the shore, and that’s where she jammed. We were there three days—Thursday evening until Sunday morning. The wind veered Sunday night, and we got clear again. We had no seals: 1,600 mostly bedlamers. Captain Sid Hill called Bowring’s and they told him to abandon the voyage and land the crews.

Anyway, we landed them according as we came up the shore. We landed some men in Wesleyville, and landed us in King’s Cove. There were three of us. We walked over from that. I think we made 40 cents. The Terra Nova drifted up on the other side of Baccalieu and cleared herself. Anyway, we had to do the best we could with the Ranger’s crew. Levi, a fellow from St. John’s and me, we bunked together. We took one fellow in our bunk. So we had three in our bunk, where it was only made for two. Sometimes in the morning when we’d get out someone else would get in the bunk.

That spring [1942] there was no ice. It was a mild winter and there was no ice made on the upper [south] part of Labrador. I think the seals were in Groswater Bay that spring. That’s where we planned to go, but the old boats weren’t able to get there. Anyhow, there were no seals that spring. That spring there was no sheet ice, no proper whelp ice—only slob ice. [SRBH 708]

Sturge, Stanley, p. 33

I was with Captain Charlie Kean in the old Terra Nova [1942]. It was in the war and we were hove to off Fogo. The wind was 90 to 100 [miles per hour] and the big combers that rolled down were from 85 to 100 feet long. We hove to all day, and the next day. Captain Abe Kean Jr. was second hand. Captain Charlie wanted to go help the old Ranger. Captain Abe said, “If you turn, we’re gone. Let her stay hove to. I know what this one can do. I’ve been in her.” He was always “in her” with old man Kean. Everything was swept right off her deck. The Ranger was lost. [SRPK 309A/B]

Wilson, George, pp. 13, 22

[1939, he was the second last man to jump into the lifeboat] The seas were rolling as high as 65 feet. The Ranger went up and the lifeboat went down—it looked like it was 60 feet. Frank Neville jumped last and landed right on Wilson’s chest and almost killed him. Many sealers gave up and took to their bunks. Some of these men had been in the Navy and were the best kind of sailors. They just gave up. The engineers were all drunk when the Ranger left St. John’s. The old bo’sun would catch hold to the rail, and he was full to the two eyes. He’d say, “Go down you blood-of-a-bitch, go down and don’t come back.” I never witnessed anything like it. [SRKH 411]

RELIGION

Brazil, John Will, p. 14-15, 16

When the sealers were going to the ice from the Southern Shore, they always brought a bit of blessed candle that they used to get from the nuns. They would send them around to the fellows who were going to the ice. They were on the ice this day and there was a fellow belong to Witless Bay, Jim Green was his name, he went down in holes twice, up to his waist in water. My father was with him, and he said, “Jim, did you drop the blessed candle on your boots before you came out?” “Boy,” Jim said, “it’s no difference today if I had Palm [Sunday] in mine, I’d go down just the same.” They used to have the skin boots then and they’d put three drops of blessed candle wax down in their boots; Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, each boot. Father always kept a piece of blessed candle in his pocket.

Jim Brothers from the Cove—Port Kirwin—was a wonderful man to pray. He knelt down and said his prayers for an hour while all hands would be up in their bunks. Once, while he was at his prayers, someone fired a boot at him—someone up in a bunk. Jim never opened his mouth. He finished his prayers and then he got up and challenged every man aboard. He said, “If anyone feels like taking me on, get out.” They didn’t. The next night after they knocked off, he knelt down to say his prayers, and a big northern man [presumably a Protestant] spoke up. “Now,” he said, “anybody fires anything at Jim Brothers tonight, I’m the man that gets out.” And there was never anything happened after that. [SRMC 801]

Fowler, Don, pp. 11-12

We burned down for the night in a field of ice. I was a master watch. At 4 o’clock we were called, and when we came up, here was this island of ice coming right for our stern. It was five times as big as the ship and it only had to touch us and it would put us down. Everyone was screeching and going to jump overboard. I said, “Boys, look, take your time, he’ll pass.” I put the sign of the cross on it nine times and it came right up alongside the corner and scrubbed along and went on. And they all said I saved their lives that time. [SRKB 840]

Gosse, Doug, p. 6

We’d have our rosary beads and stuff like that. We’d never sail without it. But we’d never flash it around for someone to see. We’d keep that to ourselves; that was private. [SRPK 317]

Leaman, William John, p. 38

I found a small crucifix. I showed it to Lar, a Roman Catholic fellow. He said, “Boy put that in your pocket.” I had it for years in my pocket to the ice. It’s all right. You’ve got to believe in it. If you don’t believe in it, it won’t be no good to you. [SRPK 307A/B]

RETURN TRIP

Butt, Cyril, p. 36

We’d tidy up the ship, wash her down with sea water, pick up all the bits of old fat and heave it overboard. Someone would say, “Boys she bore up for home.” You’d see a scattered fellow cleaning himself up—getting washed, taking off his beard. Melt some snow and wash your eyes out. [SRKM 501]

RUNNING ICE

Doyle, Robert, pp. 17-18

We got caught in a running joint for 40 hours. The ice against the land was stationary, and the outside stuff was running. It could tear a ship to pieces. You could see one big pan of ice coming in alongside of her. We were lucky; it must have been the man above had all to do with it. The pan of ice turned down and a piece went up in the air the height of the spars. If it had to keep on coming, it would have passed right through her. Her deck hove up about 6 inches and never went back down. [SRMJD 507]

Kelly, Jack, pp. 8-9

I [landsman] had a very narrow escape in 1939. I killed seven young whitecoats and I made up two tows; I took three in one tow and four in the other. Now, the ice was running and I didn’t realize it, I was that much interested in my seals. By and by I heard a sound of guns and a signal in on the land and I knew there was danger. So I slipped the seals and began to try and make the land. The ice was going aboard and the wind was veering. I used to have to lie down on the gaff until the ice would tighten up and go together again. When the ice would tighten up, I would have to jump up and run again. Stanley Hewitt and Jim Hancock landed me on the shore with ropes. [SRKH 408, 409]

SAFETY

Humphries, Maxwell, pp. 15-16

When the barrelman came down for his meals, the captain would go up. He would take over, looking for seals and looking at the men on the ice, watching them to see where they were. When they put you out in the morning, they put out a black punt. They used to tar those punts in them times to go ice hunting [to make them visible]. They put so much hard bread aboard the punt and they’d tell you to back to that punt at such a time. Well, before it would get dark everybody would be to this punt. If they wanted to be picked up, they had to be to this black punt, and nobody had any trouble then because the men were all there. [SRBH 720]

SALVATION ARMY

Saunders, Roy, pp. 2, 6

[1934-39] Major and Mrs. Charles Woodland were appointed leaders of the No. 2 Corps of the Salvation Army of St. John’s in 1934. They started a sealer’s meeting sometime later. Major Woodland was an outport man and knew sealers. He came up with the idea that it would be a good thing to have a sealer’s meeting. The Major organized services that were specifically geared to appeal to the sealers who were gathered in St. John’s to go to the ice. The services were arranged, if at all possible, on the eve of their departure to the ice. The church would be crowded, standing room only, possibly 400-500 people. Men, such as Cecil Mouland of the Newfoundland disaster, were presented, and gave vivid accounts of their experiences and how faith in God played the dominant part in their lives. Cecil Mouland especially inspired many of his fellow sealers by the witness of his personal faith, and often he would lead a hymn, or some of the corps singing, that took place. Mainly the audience consisted of men. They would lean back and sing wholeheartedly. [SRPK 324]

Sturge, Richard, p. 22

We always used to go up to the No. 2 Salvation Army Barracks on Adelaide Street. Mrs. Woodland, a Salvation Army Officer, always had a farewell service. [SRPK 336]

SCHOONER

Gillett, William, p. 17

My father was skipper of a schooner called the Nancy Bell. He got caught in the ice in a gale of wind off Bonavist Cape [and the schooner lifted out of the water]. They drifted out over the Grand Banks before she fell down in the water and got free. They lost their rudder but they got into Catalina. [SRPK 351]

SCREECHER

Parsons, George, p. 41

A screecher was an abandoned seal with no mother, and it screeched constantly. He’d be thin with a yellow cast on his fur. Some men would take and hide them away. They’d shove them under a piece of ice so no one could kill them. They could do without him, and he might survive. [SRKM 508, 509]

Short, Andrew, pp. 22-23

I was in the Thetis in 1930 with Sammy Wilcox and we got jammed up in the Gulf. The Terra Nova was up there that same spring and she was jammed, too, about 2 miles from us. We were there 18 days. Anyway, we got clear and left with the Terra Nova coming behind. We were steaming along through a nice lake of water in the night and by and by we heard this screeching. So we stopped and waited, and when the Terra Nova came up with Captain Parsons, Sammy Wilcox said, “Captain Parsons, I think there’s ever so many whitecoats here.” “Yes,” said Parsons, “according to the screeching there’s no trouble to get a load of fat here come daylight.” And when it came daylight, there wasn’t a thing to be seen on the ice, only a screecher. That was the worst trip I ever had. [SRSR (1986, 1987), 01-26-86]

SCRUNCHEONS

French, Lionel, p. 28

Sometimes a little bit of meat was left on the pelt and that’s what the people over around St. John’s used to come down and get. A little bit of rib off the pelt and they used to call it scruncheons. They used to string it on a bit of line, take it home, fry it, and eat it. [SRKB 812]

Hiscock, Lester, p. 17

We used to go down and cut the scraps off the pelts. The sealers would leave a lot of meat on the pelts and we used to cut the scraps off and sell them for 25 cents a string. You’d get about two pounds on a string—a string or a bit of rope or a bit of wire. People would go mad for them. They were better than steak. [SRJP 301]

Noseworthy, Hans, pp. 7-8

They’d pile the pelts on the wharf, and there’d be young fellows, 9- and 10-year-olds, mostly from the Southside. They’d be trying to get at the scraps. The scraps were supposed to be better than the flippers. I often ate them, and I did enjoy them. The scraps were little bits of meat that were left on the fat, and the sealers wouldn’t take the time to cut it off. Well, you would cut the scraps off and put them on a gad, like trout. Not everyone would get in but some boys would get in and cut out the scraps. The men would say, “Don’t cut the pelts.” [SRPK 356]

SCULPING

Keel, Roy, p. 6

Thirty-eight seconds. They timed me more than 10 times taking off the pelt. Thirty-eight seconds. There was only one man, Fred. He and I went out together. He took them off in 37 seconds. [SRPK 327]

Whitten, Stephen, p. 14

Ernie Lake from Twillingate had only one arm. He was a one-armed sealer and could pelt seals and do his share among men who had two arms. [SRPK 308A/B]

Woodfine, Thomas, p. 13

Fred Phillips from Bonavist[a] showed me how to sculp the first seal that I killed. If you cut a pelt through, it was spoiled. But then you could be a bit cute: you’d shove it down the bobbing hole and it wouldn’t be seen. [SRKM 511]

SCUNNER

Bragg, Thomas, p. 26

When the scunner would be on the ice, the second hand would scun her then. [SRPK 340]

Kean, Edgar, pp. 7-8

I was second master watch. I had to scun the boat—the scunner. When my watch was on, I had to go up in the barrel and scun the boat. Now, aboard the one that I was in, they always called the second master watch a scunner. In more [other] boats they called him a deck router. Then the master watch would go up in the barrel and the second master watch would be looking after the crowd on deck. The scunner’s barrel was the first barrel you came to. Up over that again was the barrelman’s barrel. Nobody went in that one only the barrelman and the second hand and the captain. The scunner would scun the boat through the ice. [SRPK 339]

Sturge, Stanley, p. 21

The scunner got to watch the leads and see how to get through. The scunner is what they sometimes call the “second master watch.” [SRPK 309A/B]

SEAL EATING HABITS

Stone, Harry, p. 7

There was one thing that was quite noticeable when I was going to the seal fishery, probably depending on the depth of the water. Among the old seals on the sheets of ice as you passed through, you would see fish on the ice, dozens of fish. Seals would bring up codfish, haddock, red fish, and turbot from deep water. They wouldn’t eat it themselves, apparently they ate what they wanted in the water. They were more or less killing it for sport. They would bring it up and leave it on the ice and the seagulls and the crows would eat it. [SRCL 205, 209]

SEAL FINGER

Butt, Cyril, p. 20

It mostly came from strain—if the finger was strained. You wouldn’t get it from young fat but the old seals. You’d strain a joint in your finger and the fat would get in the joint. You’d take the seal ahold by the eyes and you’d haul and you’d strain a joint. Not from a cut, it had to get in the joint. [SRKM 501]

Carter, Roland, p. 33

My brother Sandy who was out in the Caribou had a seal finger—his little one. When he came home, this old lady who used to live here, she cured him. [SRBH 718]

Doyle, Robert, p. 45

An old fellow used to come to the house with Father. He had a seal finger. His finger was the shape of a seal. He could never bend it. The top of his finger, to look at it, was just like a seal’s head. [SRMJD 507]

Flynn, Frank, pp. 13-14

I must have scratched it with the cable or with my knife. I didn’t find it until after I got home and the finger started to swell up. I went to Mrs. Graham Bussey; a lot of people used to go to her and she’d put plasters on it. It wasn’t getting any better, and I finally ended up going to old Dr. Crichet. He lanced the finger right down through the nail and, since then, every nail has grown out split. [SRKB 802]

Gill, Heber, p. 17

My uncle way back around 1900 had seal finger. The nail was turned down right over the top of his finger. [SRPW 703]

Gosse, Pat, p. 12

We had a little woman down here in Torbay—a little dwarf. She used to make bandages with mushrooms and rosin pitch. She’d bake the mushrooms in the oven and then she’d grind them up to a powder. Then she’d put the rosin pitch on a cloth, and then she’d put the powder on it. And you’d put that on and it never came off until it fell off. We wouldn’t go to first-aid or to the doctor. We went to her. [SRMD 411]

Hayden, Thomas, p. 22

I had one. I was home here for months. You put a fly blister on it. I went to Dr. Stanford. He said, “The only thing I know to give people is a fly blister.” It’s like a stamp. You’d put it on, and the next morning there’d be a water blister. You’d let [cut or prick] the blister, and if there was any grease, it would flow out. You’d do that for two or three days until it ate into the bone. If it gets in the joint and you don’t get it out, you can’t bend the finger. Some people would get them taken off because a seal finger was only in the way. [SRKM 513]

Mifflin, Sam, pp. 16-17

I shoved my hand down in the blood and it struck a clumper of ice. I went and showed it to old Captain Bill Winsor. “Well,” he says, “there’s two of you now, Gordon Penney got one, too.” The doctor in St. John’s will have to take it off. Gordon Penney says, “You going to take it off?” “I’m going to take it off,” I said, “if you take off yours.” “No,” he said, “I’m not going to take it off.” And they put a blister on it. I had a hell of a tormenting pain coming home. And we got off the track, too, for four hours in Princeton. But I came on and I went up to see old Doctor Hillick Forbes. He took the grey plaster off and put on a black one. In four days I had to go again. He took it off again. He said, “Now you got your finger for the summer.” But it never straightened, couldn’t get the shape of the old seal’s neck out of it. [SRBH 714]

Vincent, Wilfred, p. 18

There was an old Mrs. Stafford over on the Southside [St. John’s]. She was the seal-finger doctor. No doctor could do what she could do. She’d cure a finger doctors would take off. [SRPW 701]

SEAL FRIES

Stevenson, Robert Louis, p. 25

Leo McCormack had lamb’s testicles [fries] in Spain. Leo came to me this morning. He said to me, “I’ll get a pan and we’ll cut up that patch of whitecoats and get a pan of them [testicles].” He fried them. You never tasted anything better in your life. Blackwood, when we told him what we had for tea, he went out and got sick. He vomited up everything. That was seal fries. [SRMD 414A/B]

SEAL OIL

Kelly, Jack, p. 18

We ate the carcasses I [landsman] brought in and if my neighbours weren’t as lucky, I gave them some of mine. Then you’d cut off the fat and put it in a barrel and let it rot like cod livers. Then the fat would come on top and you’d skim that off. [SRKH 408, 409]

SEALSKIN BOOTS

Combden, Raymond, pp. 11-13

[Landsman] Every year we’d bark six, seven, eight or ten skins. We’d bark badlamers and sometimes the young ones to make sealskin boots. I suppose I’ve made a hundred pairs of sealskin boots for people all over Fogo Island. Barking them, there’s a lot of work to that. When they came off the seals, you know what it’s like when they come off the seals, there was two or three inches of fat. And you had to get that on a big board and poke [scrape] the fat off. Nail them up on the side of the store or put them in a frame, lace it in a frame, we put them in a frame.

When you’d get two or three days sun on them, you’d go and get the knife and scrape all the excess fat off and give them a few more days in the sun to dry up the oil and you’d put them in a brook. There’s two brooks in Wild Cove, one in the centre and one up in the bottom. You’d go up and find holes big enough to put the frames down in and put them in so that water would be running against the grain of the fur; yeah, not with the grain but against the grain. It would take two weeks roughly, in the water in the summer—early summer, late spring.

The weather would begin to get warm. It would take two weeks or more to rub the fur off it. Every once in a while we’d go there and look at them, see if they were under water. And then we’d dry them and see if we could rub the fur off with our fingers. If we could, we’d take them in the punt and carry them down home and clean them off and hang them in the frames, put them up to dry, scrape them over. And they’d get nice and clean.

And you’d get spruce rind—white spruce rind, red spruce rind—and break it all up in pieces. It would be dried and we’d break up a big pile of that into a puncheon tub. Just an old-fashioned puncheon; put that in there and throw the water into it—fresh water. Let it soak for a while, probably two or three days or a week. And you’d take the skins out of the frames, those big frames.

Take them all out and double them up, and put them in, so much bark in between every fold, so they wouldn’t be close together; put them all in the puncheon tub. I allow they’d be there for three weeks. Take them out once in a while, change them around every four or five days. Put them back in again. By the time the summer’s fishing would be over, we had the skins barked, ready for boots. When they were barked, they were beautiful, beautiful. You could roll them up like cardboard paper. By and by when the time comes and the snow starts to fly, get out them skin boot patterns, cut them out and make skin boots. It was a lot of work. I’d get $3.50 or $3.75, around there for a pair of skin boots. [SRKH 412]

Parsons, George, pp. 19-20

You’d try to get sealskin boots. They were the best boots. The hide leather boot used to leak. But the sealskin boot was made good. We used to get them from Labrador. The fishermen who were down there fishing in the summer used to bring them home to me—the skinnyhopper. No soles on them. I’d bring them to George Johnson and he’d put them in the last. He had the wooden boots the size you wanted. He’d make the boots for you and peg them with wooden pegs. There were no nails in the sealskin boots that I had. I used to get a man Rowe to bring them home from Labrador. You’d pay $5 for two boots. George Johnson would use little half-inch wooden trennels [tree nails], about three tier of them around the edge of the boot. [SRKM 508, 509]

Woodfine, Thomas, p. 9

You’d get them with your crop. The skin boot was the best. It wouldn’t gall your feet and it wouldn’t leak. They were made with taps and heels on them. You’d put the chisels in yourself. You’d buy them to Neyle Soper’s, maybe 10 cents or 15 cents worth. Put three in the heel. The chisels would only go in so far. It was like the head of a horseshoe nail. You’d put sparables in your taps. You could get red skin boots or you could get black ones. Black ones were the best. [SRKM 511]

SEALER’S BOX

Sullivan, William, pp. 13-14

We used to call them ice boxes [an ice box was about 5 feet long]. When you get ready and go up to take your clothes bag up, you’d take your ice box with you. We’d have a bit of sugar, tea, butter, a couple of cakes, your mug, your spoons, and what they used to call a boat’s kettle, a skillet now I suppose you’d call it. And a teakettle. You’d have all that in the ice box. The people from down north, they wouldn’t have it [the icebox] because it was too far. Myself and Fred Bragg and Freddie Williams slept together in the one bunk and messed together [ate out of the same pan]. [SRMD 404A/B]

SEALERS’ SWEEP

Kennedy, William B., pp. 6, 16

The Sealers’ Sweep began in Harbour Grace around 1927. Albert Walsh [later Sir] was one of them who initiated it to help the poor. He was Grand Knight of the K of C. Some fellows formed little clubs among themselves. They bought up a number of tickets every year. The result was little bunches of prizewinners. They cost 10 cents per ticket and they were sold in drugstores and various shops. Some fellows would write home from away and buy tickets to help the local cause. [Albert Walsh was the school principal in Harbour Grace when he won $1,000, which he used to go to Law School, and changed careers from school teaching to law.] [SRKB 813]

Murphy, Ted, p. 2

My job was distribution manager and collector in charge of collection on the sweepstakes—to see that all tickets were distributed and placed in different stores throughout, and in every outport in town. There were 250,000 tickets at 10 cents each, then that increased to 400,000. [SRPK 348]

SEAL WHISKERS

Hiscock, Lester, p. 4

The Chinamen would be there on the wharf buying whiskers. For big long whiskers out of seals they’d give you 5 cents each. We’d be down with a pair of pliers or a pair of tweezers and pluck them out. The longer they were, the more money they’d give you. [SRJP 301]

SHIP SUPPLIES

Whitten, Stephen, pp. 8-9

We had to buy gaff handles, flagpoles, large birch and spruce sticks for prises [levers]. We bought them from the men from Flatrock and Torbay. Also we had to provide hauling ropes and a lot of coal. Another item was a medicine box: bandages and ointments. We usually had a first-aid man, who was called the druggist, and he signed on as one of the crew. [SRPK 308A/B]

SHIPS

Bragg, Fred, p. 1

I was out to the ice around 27 springs. I was with Captain Bill Winsor most of the time. Billy Winsor was the captain of the Ungava with Job’s all the time. He used to be in one of Job’s older boats, the Thetis. When they got the new boat, the Ungava, they transferred him over. The Ungava was a year later than the Beothic. They were two sister ships. Any fault they found in the Beothic they corrected in the Ungava. [SRMD 406]

Bragg, Thomas, pp. 8, 9-10

They were fine old ships [Neptune, Thetis]. They were old wooden ships, and they used to have sails on them. If you wanted to get to port or starboard, you had to hoist up the jibs. The Neptune was a little better in the ice than the Thetis.

I think the worst was the old Ranger. Then there’d come the Thetis, the Neptune and that crowd. But they were all right. If you didn’t get with the fast boats, you’d muck along with them. [SRPK 340]

Butt, Henry, p. 8

The Eagle was what they called the lucky boat. Generally, she’d go to the ice, get her load of fat, and then be first in to get the pipe and tobacco. [SRKB 851]

Cornick, Cyril, pp. 3, 6

The Eagle was built in Norway in 1902. Bowring’s bought her under the name of the Sophie. We changed her to the SS Eagle and the famous Captain Arthur Jackman took her to the ice in 1904. The Eagle had three bows in her—where she beat them up so many times. One year she had her bow beaten out and the captain built a sort of cradle around on the inside and stuffed it with hard bread and brought her in with her bow beaten out. [SRSR 03-31-83]

Fitzgerald, Edward, p. 16

They were wonderful ships. There are no tradesmen today, no part of the world, could build the ships today that were built at that time. Those wooden ships lasted 60 or 70 years ploughing the icefields. [SRKB 814]

Flynn, Frank, p. 24

The Eagle was a lucky little ship to the ice. She was a good little boat in the ice, one of the best of the wooden fleet. [SRKB 802]

Hoskins, Edgar, p. 4

She [Thetis] was very good. She was an old boat, used to be an old square-rigger. That was my first spring and her last. When we came into St. John’s to discharge, she was taken out through the Narrows and sunk [1936]. [SRBH 723]

Humphries, Maxwell, pp. 6-7

The Neptune was the best boat for getting through the ice. She brought in some pile of seals in her day. She brought in over a million. The Beothic wasn’t half as good as the old Neptune. [SRBH 720]

Porter, Taylor, p. 14

She [Viking] was a good ship—a fine ship regards to conditions, couldn’t be no better. But she never had much power; she’d jam in slob. [SRKB 809, 873]

Wheeler, Captain James, pp. 4, 10

When the war broke out in 1914 the Bruce [on the Port aux Basques-North Sydney run] was sold to the Russians for icebreaking. So the Kyle went on the Labrador for one year, and then when they sold the Bruce, the Kyle was switched to Port aux Basques-North Sydney. She was there until the Caribou came out in 1926. Then the Kyle was put back on the Labrador run until they sold her to Earle. I liked the old Kyle. She was a good icebreaker. [SRCL 204B, 208A]

Whitten, Stephen, pp. 17, 20

Years ago most of the sealing boats were sheathed with greenheart right from the keel all the way up—a complete covering of greenheart all over. It was brought up from British Guyana in the ships that brought down fish and so on. They came back with molasses and rum and greenheart. I remember over at Bowring’s old property on the south side of Mudge’s, which ended up a lumber yard until 1962, over where the synchrolift is right now, many thousand feet of greenheart. I think it was 2 and 2½ inches thick, 6 to 7 inches wide, and 20 to 30 feet long. Very heavy wood. That was put on in the spring of the year. They’d check the greenheart and put the sheathing over the deck before they went to the ice.

Some sealing boats never moved out of St. John’s Harbour until the next spring. They were coal burners, not practical, not economical to run. They weren’t good freighters but good for survey parties, testing water and ice conditions, etc. Occasionally there were Arctic and Antarctic expeditions. The newer ones carried fish to market and coal from North Sydney. [SRPK 313, 314]

SICKNESS

Fitzgerald, Edward, pp. 4-6; p. 12

A friend got the measles. I had the measles, so I used to look after him. He was getting fresh meat and cabbage and raisin duffs. I’d take his plate and go forward to the galley and get the clever big dinner, better than the sealers had. I’d come back and Alf would eat part of it and I’d eat the rest. Then I’d go back and get another plateful. I could eat like a shark. This was going on for a considerable length of time. And by and by they said, “That man must be getting better. He’s eating an awful lot.” I lived like a king, because he could have all he wanted.

I saw a young man out there, 22 years old, it took him three weeks to die. That man, I pitied him, he used to roar with pain. No one ever looked at him until he died. The old-timers said he had appendix—he had the pain all across his stomach. And that’s what they said, his appendix burst. They made a box and salted him in. [SRKB 803, 814]

Hussey, William, pp. 12-13

If you were sick, you had to bide in your bed. Lots of them weren’t sick; they just didn’t want to go on the ice. But you’d never be in your bed with old Kean because the minute the last man was out he’d go right through her looking in every bunk; the other captains wouldn’t do that. [SRKB 805, 870]

Martin, Edward, pp. 48-49

We got the news on our steamer that the Imogene was bore up for home. A man on our steamer used to go with a girl who got married to a man on the Imogene. Within a half hour of hearing the news about the Imogene leaving the ice for home, the man on our steamer went stark-raving mad. He put all the brin bags down the chimney and pissed on them. What a smell! He hove pans and bags over the side of the boat. And he filled up his bunk full of old carcasses. The poor bugger died in the mental hospital afterwards. [SRST 501, 502]

Snow, Alfred, pp. 7-8

I tended on three men in bed 21 days with the measles. That was in the Eagle—Bill Gushue, Bob Warford, and Carl Hussey. They had the measles and the captain asked me to tend on them. They were very sick, and I had the measles a couple of years before that. I had to shovel no coal when I looked after those men. I’d go out on the ice daytime, and when I’d come in off the ice, I’d get ready to look after those sick men. They had lovely conditions up in the hospital. They’d be glad to see me coming. They couldn’t eat all their food and I’d take half to eat myself. They had better than what we had. They were sick for 21 days. [SRKB 853]

SIDESTICKS

Seymour, James, p. 27

We’d know handy about when we were coming in: when we got our fat picked up and there was nothing around. The captain would say to haul in the sidesticks. We knew then that we were “bore up” for St. John’s. [SRKM 502]

Street, Arthur, p. 14

You’d jump aboard the sidesticks, and you’d shift to give the next fellow a chance. We were on a pan. This fellow jumped aboard and wouldn’t shift to let me get aboard. I saw I was going to get out in her wake as she was going ahead. I said if I gets in her wake that’s all of it. I took the gaff and I stabbed him in the arse. He made a dart up. I jumped on the sidesticks. When I was getting in over the rail, he had his gaff up going to nail me. My first cousin dropped him. I got aboard and I talked to him. I said, “Look here, you were supposed to shift and let me get aboard, but you were trying to get me out in the wake.” [SRBH 712A/B]

SIGNING ON

Whitten, Stephen, pp. 26-27

Although 95 per cent of sealers could sign their names, the Bowring’s employee signed for me. You got the man to touch the top of the pencil to make it legal. They wished to have a well-written list of names, easy to read, which is why the men weren’t given the pen to sign themselves. Then an exact copy was made and after roll call the next morning one copy was given to the captain and one copy was put in the office safe. [SRPK 313, 314]

SLEDS

Winsor, Captain Ches, pp. 2-3

We were always after the fellows from Cape Freels and Lumsden. They had the better slides. I remember one time the Ungava came in[to] Valleyfield to pick up the crew from the north. We’d watch and see which was the best slide. And you’d wait until he’d go aboard: “I’ll take the slide.” [SRMD 402A/B]

SOUTHERN SHORE

Brazil, John Will, p. 7

Michael Cashin had a big business going in Cape Broyle and he dealt to Bowring’s. He used to get berths from Bowring’s. Then he got in as the member for the Southern Shore and he used to get berths for the fellows right along the shore. I heard my father saying that from the Southern Shore, Renews to Cape Broyle, and right down the shore, there’d be about 300 men out to the ice. [SRMC 801]

SQUARE FLIPPERS

Bath, George, pp. 5-8

We’d get five or six square flippers [seals]. It’s a wonderful seal, a big seal, it’d be as much as two hands could handle. If you kill them in the water, it was a real tussel to get them on the ice. We [landsmen] killed several and we couldn’t get them on the ice. We killed eight one winter.

First, we’d pelt them on the ice. We’d bring in the pelt and sometimes we’d bring in the carcass for the dogs. We’d skin the fat off the skin and then we’d make a frame that would take the skin. We’d cut lace holes all around and we’d lace the skin in the frame and we’d gradually clean all the fat off the front part. Sometimes we’d take the hair off the back.

We’d shake some sawdust on the front part and rub it in to take out the last grease. Then we’d shake a bit of salt on it and let it dry in the store all summer. In the fall we would use it for boot bottoms. We’d mark the bottoms and cut them out. Our bottoms used to be 16 by 8 inches. You’d make 20 to 22 sets of boot bottoms from one square flipper.

We used the bedlamer seal for the skin-boot legs. We’d clean them in the same way and shave the hair off with a knife. The front part would be white and the back part would be black. Everybody around here [Fogo, Twillingate?] knew the kind of pattern to take to make skin boots. We’d have a pattern for the top part—the leg; we’d have a pattern for the tongue part; and then the bottom. The bottom would be 8 by 16 inches. We’d sew up the leg with needle and thread. We used wax or soap, whatever we had. [C389/67-35 (JDAW/Fred Earle)]

Codner, Jesse, p. 35

One time we shot a square flipper, one of the great big ones. They hoisted him aboard. They had to use the four donkey engines getting him on board. He was a big animal: 1,400 pounds. [SRPK 315]

ST. JOHN’S

Lowe, William, p. 39

First when I started going to the seal fishery [1918] you’d see about 10,000 people down around Water Street. All you could see were outport people walking up and down with long boots or buying a tin kettle or a tin pan. St. John’s would be blocked. [SRCJL 902]

Moores, William Joseph, p. 30

We’d all go in line. Sometimes old Abram Kean would take the lead. He was called the commodore. And the old ships would go behind. There’d be the Terra Nova, Neptune [Job’s], and the Thetis [Job’s], the Ranger, and the Eagle. They were the older ships. Then the Beothic, the Imogene, and the Ungava—all [of] them would follow in line. When you’d get outside, you used to scatter and go north. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

Parsons, George, pp. 15-16

You couldn’t afford to spend too many dollars [waiting in St. John’s for the boat to leave]. You could get in a boarding house for $1 a night but you didn’t want to do that much. I was aboard the Eagle once. There were three of us from Carbonear, and we were sat down on boxes in the hatch. There were another 15 or 20 men there. My boat wasn’t ready, there was no bunks built up in her. And I sat down on the box and I used to reach my hand down through the hatch and haul up a knob of coal to keep the fire in. A little square stove about 20 inches square and 3 inches high. [SRKM 508, 509]

Power, Robert, pp. 13-15

We’d know what boat we were going in and, when you’d get in to St. John’s, you’d get your box and bag and you’d pay someone [with a horse] to haul it down to Bowring’s wharf and you’d pull it aboard. They’d have an old stove down in the hold and you’d straighten away your sack for the night and you had your own food to eat—a hunk of bread, and tea. The next day or a couple of days after you’d sign on. Once you signed on, the cooks were there. Then you had no better. They’d call all hands ashore before they’d leave and he’d call the roll. Be on the wharf and he’d call the roll. He’d call your name and you’d go aboard. [SRKM 517]

STEALING PELTS

Boone, John T., pp. 8-9

Landsmen [in the Straits of Belle Isle] came on dogs and komatiks and took our pelts. We picked up two komatiks and brought them in to St. John’s on the old Ranger. The ice went off the land and they had to leave their komatiks behind. [SRKB 862]

Gillett, William, p. 27

One spring I never got aboard until 3 o’clock in the morning. The ice was going apart. We had about 500 seals on a pan. The ice came apart so you had to stay where you were. There was a cold raw wind. We saw the steamer coming. It was 2 o’clock in the morning when she got alongside us. We had 500 pelts on that pan and the Eagle had 500. The second hand asked who owned them. I said, “That’s the Eagle’s.” He said, “Stuff the flag under the ice.”

Captain Barbour found it out and called me down to his room. I said, “Captain Barbour it’s not me, it was the second hand.” He said, “Did he tell you that?” I said, “Yes, he told me to stuff the flag under the ice.” Captain Barbour wouldn’t steal. But if you don’t steal, the other fellow would. Billy Winsor was out; he was a wonderful man for stealing seals. Ab Kean, the more fog the better, to get someone else’s fat. [SRCL 201, SRPK 351]

Keel, Heber, p. 25

There were two oldish men, Haywards [landsmen], out after seals. When they were coming in and passing by the schooner, the captain was up in the barrel. He said, “You got our seals! What’s your name?” “Nar name, sir,” he said. “Haul away, Art.” [SRPK 324]

O’Neill, Arthur, pp. 34-35

The sealers would steal pelts. The captains weren’t in favour of it. But the sealers would do it on their own. When they’d come across a patch of seals with another ship’s flag on it, they’d cut that flag off and stick their own on it. Sometimes the pelts would be marked with the ship’s name [letter]. When those pelts came to the plant and were skinned and went through the rollers, that name would come out on the pelt. And they would know the pelts were stolen. One time Captain Badcock came to pick us up and some of the boys said, “There’s a pan of seals there with our flag. That’s our flag there. Our flag is on them. They belong to us.” Captain Badcock said, “It might be our flag, but it’s not our seals.” He wouldn’t take them. [SRKM 516]

STEWARD

Bragg, Thomas, pp. 27-28

Captain gave me the job. I wasn’t looking for it. He just called me down and asked me would I take the job and I said yes. I had to take all the food from the galley down into a little pantry and serve it to the skipper and the second hand, the barrelmen and the four master watches and the navigator. That’s the crew I used to have to look after.

And make tea and toast for them at 3 o’clock and again at 9 o’clock. And I’d be finished until the next morning at breakfast time. They ate much better than the rest of the men. They used to have fresh meat three times a week, fruit and jelly, bully beef [tinned] to open for Sunday evening for tea, and boiled ham. I’d eat the same food and I’d get $5 more than what the sealers would make. [SRPK 340]

STORM

Boone, Mac, p. 4

Three o’clock in the evening it came in from the east and we never got aboard until 3 o’clock in the morning. We ran around the pan and we burned the gaffs and burned the ropes to keep ourselves warm. [SRKB 834]

Boone, William, p. 17

I was in the Beothic and we were out on the ice and got caught in a snowstorm. We were the last to be put out, and the ship went back to pick up the other fellows and their seals. Then the storm came up. We tried to stay together on a big pan of ice; you couldn’t move anywhere because there was no place to go. The Imogene came and picked us up about 2 o’clock in the morning. A lot of people got frostburnt. My face was all frostburnt; I couldn’t shave for a long, long time. [SRKB 824]

Bragg, Thomas, p. 20

I was never caught out in a storm. We walked a long ways from the ship one day and she was jammed and we had to walk back. The weather came on and it was a bad evening. But we had our compasses set before she closed in. We all got aboard safe and sound. That’s the only time I saw it rough. The old skipper was very careful. He didn’t want anybody to be caught out. [SRPK 340]

Butt, Cyril, p. 23

They wouldn’t usually put you overboard if it was stormy. Charlie Kean was a good captain for men. He’d tell you, “Now, if it looks like it’s going to be stormy or if you sees it getting stormy, try to get as near as you can to the ship.” And for the men to bunch up. [SRKM 501]

Dawe, Harvey, pp. 22-23

I was on the Terra Nova heading for the Gulf and we ran into a storm. I had to go to the outhouse up on deck and just as I got out of it a big sea broke and took the two outhouses, one on each side. [SRKB 804]

Flynn, William, pp. 21-24

One night we got caught on the ice until 2 o’clock. There was a storm with northeast winds, and we couldn’t see anything [in 1929]. There were 10 or 12 of us and we broke up the gaffs and got a fire going and got the seals burning. About 2 o’clock the boat came and we got aboard. We got a drink of rum but two of Bartlett’s men were still out there: Uncle Billy Delaney from the ridge and Jake Dawe from Port de Grave.

The doctor came down and said, “We’re after finding Bartlett’s two men. One of them can’t walk, and there’s a crowd gone out to meet them. I got a bottle of medicine here for someone to take to them.” I had just got aboard, but I said, “I’ll take the medicine. I’ll go out.” He said, “Sure, you just came in.” I said, “That’s nothing.” I only went a little ways when I met them coming. Uncle Billy Delaney was walking, but Jake Dawe was on the stretcher. They had to hoist Jake up, but Uncle Bill pushed them away, “Get away. I can go up that ladder. I don’t want no help.” [SRKB 815]

French, Lionel, pp. 13, 26

We sailed in the afternoon and went up the Southern Shore that night [Ranger, 1939]. It was a very good night, but the next morning it was kind of a red dawn. The old bo’sun thought that we should have went into Trepassey. But anyhow, it was St. Lawrence they wanted to go. If they could get in St. Lawrence, they could wait their time; and the next day we could go in the Gulf in the ice. There was a navigator aboard, too. He was in charge when she was in the water. Captain Badcock used to take over when she would strike the ice.

So we were up off St. Lawrence and we were almost ready to go in when we got a shower of snow like you see this time of year in March. They wouldn’t go in, in the snow, they wouldn’t know where to go. So she just stayed outside. It was evening now, starting to get dark. It wasn’t too bad until 12 o’clock when it seemed like the boat started to fall away. What happened was the firemen let the fires out and she had no power. She couldn’t pump any water and she couldn’t do anything. We were there all that night drifting and the next morning they sent out an SOS.

The Newfoundland was nearest to us and she came down just as the weather was changing and the wind was starting to blow. We tried everything. We cut open barrels of oil to make the water smooth and I suppose we must’ve cut open barrels of molasses by mistake, too. Anyway, there was about 6 inches of snow and oil and molasses on her deck, or so it seemed. There was a kind of swell and the Newfoundland put out a lifeboat with the mate on board.

It came alongside and they called for 25 men but only 18 got aboard. The lifeboat went back and put them aboard the Newfoundland and left to come back, but the wind was picking up and she couldn’t make it and she went back to the Newfoundland. Then the Newfoundland decided she was going to take us in tow and so she dropped a life buoy and we picked it up and got two big lines aboard. I suppose they were 3- or 4-inch lines, great big lines. Our captain told us to tow us before the wind, but the captain of the Newfoundland sent back that he was going to tow us to the nearest port, Burin. So here we were going right into this strong breeze of wind.

She used to roll and she sloused down this way and she’d slouse down that way; nothing could stand it. So we were only in tow about an hour when one of the lines broke and, before long, the other one broke. Well, now we were on our own. There was a good pump on her, if there had only been steam enough. But I suppose the firemen were drinking. I’d say that’s what happened in the first place.

The second engineer seemed to be all right, and we tried to get the fires going. Now, I’m not sure if it was two fires up and one down or one up and two down. But we got gaffs and wood and rubber boots and we tried to get the fires going. We got about 20 pounds of steam on her and I asked the engineer, “How many pounds of steam have it got to have to work the pump?” He said, “Forty.” But it didn’t seem like the fires were drawing. She was rolling back and forth and the water was up to one of the fires. After a while we gave it up. That’s all you could do, just stop and take it.

The wind breezed and it was cold, bitter frost. We drove across Placentia Bay and a lot of people gave up except for one middle-aged man. We got together with some fellows and formed the bucket brigade and we got at the hand pumps. All night we were pumping, trying to keep the pumps going. The knobs of coal used to come up in the pumps as big as your face, used to suck the coal up, and then we’d haul the pump up and try to clear it.

Nothing to eat, we couldn’t get nothing to eat. Just kept at it. Some fellows would get a little rest and go again. And some fellows would give up altogether. It seemed like we were driving right on Cape St. Mary’s—the light on the Cape was so bright that night. Oh how bright was that light on Cape St. Mary’s, and it seemed like we were going straight forward. It was a night something like when the Ocean Ranger went down. It was a bright, windy, frosty night, but we drove out around Cape St. Mary’s.

We drove around Cape St. Mary’s and we had old chains out on her stern to try and get her stern to it so she wouldn’t be broadside. She was sort of on her quarter; the wind was on her quarter. We didn’t get any real seas over her, only the spray. But that was enough; she was always iced up, just like an island of ice, that’s what she was. When it came daylight, we had drove out around Cape St. Mary’s; we drove around Point Lance; we drove between the Bull, Cow, and Calf. And sometime that day the Imogene came in and took us in tow.

Early that night we got in Trepassey. We got in Trepassey that evening; she came and towed us in. I don’t know. I went to sleep, and the next morning when I came to myself, it was daylight. I woke up, and I said, “Where are we?” They said, “We’re in Trepassey tied up to the Imogene.” “Well,” I said, “that’s good enough for me.” So we all went aboard the Imogene then and fastened up the old Ranger, made good lines aboard of her. The Imogene towed us down and we got back to St. John’s that night, Saturday night, 12 o’clock.

I was two nights, Wednesday night and Thursday night, with no sleep. I slept Friday night in Trepassey. We had to work, you got to work. A lot of people weren’t working, some people have no nerve. One man said, “No.” He couldn’t do it. He opened up his box of clothes and said, “Take whatever you want. I can’t do anything. This is it. Take whatever you want—clothes or anything you want, anything that’s there.”

There’s times like that; there’s some people can do it and others can’t. No doubt about it. No doubt about it. A lot of people could have done things, but wouldn’t. I don’t know why people gave up so much. It seemed like they just gave up; and there’s some people can’t do it, it seemed like the boys, mostly boys, with the help of a man or two kept her going. It was mostly young men who kept her going. It was a hard time. We came home.

Perhaps if the firemen had nothing to drink things would have been different. If they hadn’t let the fires go out, everything would have been all right. That’s all that happened, they let the fires go out and the pump wasn’t working. No great lot of water was getting into her; when the bucket brigade could keep her down, the flooding wasn’t all that serious.

The next year we went up in the Gulf in the Terra Nova with Captain Badcock. He wouldn’t go back in the Ranger. The Terra Nova was a bit better ship; she was laid out different and she was bigger than the Ranger. Captain Llewellyn Kean went in the Ranger. We had a very good trip that time in 1940. We didn’t have any trouble, went out, and went up in the Gulf, but we were late striking the seals. We struck them on Good Friday, late in March. We only had one day and it was 12,000 we got. They were all big seals; they average about 40 pounds a pelt. That was good seals. We made about $60 [$60.20] that year. We made the best bill by 6 cents over the Imogene. [SRKB 812]

Gillett, William, pp. 15-16

We had one tough night, St. Patrick’s Day. That day he put us all out. He went around east of the Funks and got stuck—jammed. We were about 30 miles away now. The weather came on about 2 o’clock. We all got together. About 5 o’clock it was bad—wind and snow. Some fellows fell in the water. We had some old seals and we made a fire. We got the fat and we cut some sticks from the gaff handles and made a fire. Stripped the clothes off them, wrung the clothes, and got their clothes on them again and run around. Take them by the arm and keep running them around.

The sheet of ice was like the pavement on the street. It was dark and there were some fellows ready for the straightjacket. They thought it was another Greenland disaster. I was young, only 22 years old. I was warm with plenty of warm clothes and socks. Anyway, we had some fellows to talk to them and get their morale up. Talking and singing and keep running around. The wind slackened a bit and turned to rain and light snow again. I had good ears. About 8 o’clock I heard a whistle.

I said, “Boys, I hears the whistle.” “No, you don’t” they said. I said, “I do hear a whistle.” It was half an hour before everybody else heard the whistle. She was coming slow. The captain doubled up all the firemen and put plenty of coal to the fire to get good speed out of her. By and by she was getting handy enough you could hear her coming. Our master watch whistled. Now he said, “Boys when you hear her blow again every man who can bawl, bawl.” Two hundred and seventy-five men can make a lot of noise.

By and by he blowed and stopped and we all hollered. Toot, toot, toot, he heard us. It was about 10 o’clock he got to us. The master watch said, “Now, boys, separate cause she is going to split this pan.” She came up alongside and split the pan and one half the crowd went one way. Captain Barbour asked if everyone was there. We thought they were. He said, “Thank God for that.” That was the toughest time I had out there. [SRCL 201]

Kirkland, Mrs. Carrie, pp. 8-11

Uncle Josiah was a master watch with Captain Jacob Kean in the Adventure in 1914. They went out on the ice about 2 or 3 miles from where the ship was burned down. They were working the fat when a sudden storm burst and you couldn’t see a hand in front of you. They didn’t know where they were; you couldn’t see anything. Uncle Josiah said, “We’ll have to try to get aboard, and I’m going aboard now if you want to follow me.”

It was very hard, because when it is stormy you can’t see the cracks in the ice, and men would fall in. Then the men would say, “We’re going to be all lost. We’re going to be all drowned. We’re not going to the vessel; the vessel is not this way.” Uncle Josiah would say, “You can do what you like; you can follow somebody else but I’m going aboard.” After a while he said, “The vessel is just up here.” The men followed, stumbling and falling in and saying, “Josiah, you’re queer in the head. You’re seeing things. There no vessel up there ahead.” “Oh yes, boys, she’s just up there now, 40 or 50 yards away.”

So they followed and looked up and saw the vessel, and they started up the side of her. The captain was beside himself. “Josiah,” he said, “how did you do it? I never thought I was going to see any of you again. How did you bring the men aboard?” Uncle Josiah said, “When I left this morning, I walked northwest. When the storm came on, I knew I was northwest of the vessel, and I smelled smoke.”

“Smelled smoke, Josiah?” “Yes, Skipper, you fellows are not like me. I don’t chew and I don’t smoke and I got cute nostrils. I smell things that you fellows don’t. I smelled smoke and every yard I went the smell of smoke got stronger and stronger. I knew I was walking towards the vessel.” He brought his 50 or 60 men safe to the vessel that night, and that was the same time as the Newfoundland disaster. [C604/69-15 (Elizabeth Genge)]

Menchions, Wallace, pp. 11-12

We were in the Ranger in 1939 and we got caught in this storm on our way to the Gulf. We thought we were finished. The water got up to the fires and put them out and she was helpless. The Newfoundland was the handiest ship—she was a passenger ship from Halifax. She came up and took one boatload of men, but it was too rough to get any more.

They fired [shot] a line aboard and took us in tow and the tow line broke. We were in [the] vicinity of the False Quays in St. Mary’s Bay and it was coming on night. Captain Badcock expected the Ranger to strike on the False Quays at any time. I was master watch and I was in the bridge. He thought hard about it; he said, “I’m an old man. All the crew is young people in their prime.”

But we didn’t hit the Quays, she passed along, but it must have been terrible shallow water, because there were mountainous swells. The next morning the Imogene arrived and they fired a line aboard and they used so much cable that it didn’t part. She towed us into Trepassey and then on in to St. John’s. [SRKB 856]

Mugford, Joe, pp. 2-4

The firemen all got drunk, and they couldn’t keep steam on the boiler. George Wilson was the last man who jumped in the Newfoundland’s lifeboat and they never had guts enough to come back and take the rest of the crowd. I was wheelman and old Tom Carroll was going around with a bottle of rum and I was chasing him with a mug. The Imogene came up and towed us in. [SRKB 826]

Parsons, Andrew, p. 10

One time in the Terra Nova we had a storm. There was four of us to the wheel, and Jim Howell was wheel master. We struck a very strong southeast wind, and the captain said to us, we were down on the deck and he was up in the bridge; her bridge wasn’t covered in, just canvas around it. And he looked down, and he said, “Boys, if we don’t strike ice by 10 o’clock I don’t know what to think of it.” Around 2 o’clock we struck ice and half an hour after that it was all settled down. You don’t have to go far into the ice before it makes the water pretty calm. [SRKB 843]

Rowe, Ronald, pp. 3, 15

We left St. John’s [Ranger, 1939] and after we passed Cape Pine news got around that she was leaking. They tried the pumps, and her pumps wouldn’t work. Then we started a bucket brigade. The water came up to the fires and then we had no control over her at all. We sent out an SOS and the Newfoundland coming up from Boston picked up the SOS and she come alongside. They sent a lifeboat, and me and my buddy were supposed to wait till the last lifeboat.

When the lifeboat came alongside, I gathered the line and, just as I was tying on the line, a fellow gave me a push and I fell down in the lifeboat. Another fellow jumped on my hand and put my hand out of commission. When 18 of us were aboard, we went back to the Newfoundland. They lowered down a ladder and I had one hand to get up over the ladder. Another fellow came behind and pushed me up, and when I got to the rail of the Newfoundland, a fellow grabbed me by the hair and pulled me in on deck.

Then they took us down to the saloon and gave us a big feed. The firemen and the bo’sun, they were all drunk. The only ones weren’t drunk were the second hand and the skipper. On the Newfoundland we watched the Ranger wallowing in the sea and all you could see on the deck was one man on the bridge and that was Dickie Badcock. He was a fine man. Most of them give up. Even the second hand give up. He went down in his bunk and never came up no more till they towed her up in Trepassey.

When I landed in St. John’s, I met O.L. Vardy on Water Street. He was working for the newspapers, and he says, “Are you one of the sealers?” I says, “Yes.” He says, “I wants a story from you.” So we went up into a tavern and he loaded me up with Jockey Club [beer] and I give him the story. And he give me $25. I got home on the train, and when I got home, I packed my suitcase and headed for the United States. [SRKB 861]

Spurrell, Cecil, pp. 6, 14

I came aboard one day, myself and Walt Carter from Greenspond. We had a tow along with us and we came aboard for dinner. We had killed what was in our line. Somebody looked down in the hold and said Captain Wes wants to speak to Cec when he’s finished dinner. I went up and asked him what he wanted. He was on the bridge. He said, “Cecil, you’ll have to take my glass and find out that.”

He had a big extra glass for spying. I said, “What is the point, Captain?” He said, “There, right where the sun is setting. There’s a watch crowd there. I knows you can’t see them.” “Yes,” I said, “I can see them pretty plain.” “You can,” he said. “Yes,” I said. He said, “It’s more than I can do.” I said, “I can tell that they’re walking about like people mesmerized, who don’t know what to do or where to go.”

“You’re right,” he said, “their master watch is there along with them and their scunner.” He said, “You and Albert take 21 torches and start from the nearest pan and put one and go on like that. Make the last one a double, so we’ll know where you’re to.” It was a bad night. The wind was southern and snowing. We went and when we reached the last pan we put the two torches there.

Then I took me compass and went on further looking for the crowd. Then I heard a cry and I started bawling, too. They were coming. Then the ship came up when all the pelts were picked up and she picked we up, and the pans of seals what the two torches were on. That was a bad storm and the snow was right thick. When he took us aboard, it was getting on towards 12 midnight, a bad night. [George Tuff was the barrelman.] [SRBH 716]

Sturge, Stanley, pp. 26-28

One spring, we got up in the morning and the glass was down. My brother Bill was master watch, I was bridgemaster. The seals were there, and it was all hands out. “Now,” old Kean said, “the glass is down, men. If you see the snow coming, come back.” It was blowing a nice breeze and when we got 5 or 6 miles from the ship, the snow came.

John Rose Calloway was the first to turn back with his watch. Next Garland Godden turned back. I said to Bill, “Are you going back? It’s getting pretty bad.” He said to Abram Best, the fourth master watch, “Abram, I’m going back.” Abram said, “I’m not going back. The old man sent us out for swiles, and I’m going for them.”

So we caught a glimpse of the ship, and Bill set the ship by his compass. Every man was chewing tobacco and the tobacco will stick to the snow. We followed the spots of tobacco for an hour and a half with snow blowing right in our faces. All of a sudden we heard the whistle and we were straight for her. The old man said, “Bill, where’s Abram?” “Uncle Abram wouldn’t turn.” “Oh no,” he said, “that’s Abram, that’s contrary Abram.” “Come aboard,” he said, “and get a cup of tea.” So we went aboard, and he went up on the deck to see if he could see anybody coming.

He was walking back and forth the bridge blowing the whistle. Then, when the snow would clear, you could see a man. He got them aboard and he said, “Abram come up I want you on the bridge.” Uncle Abram went up on the bridge and old man gave him a going-over. Abram went down and got contrary and got in his bunk and wouldn’t get out. If anything had happened to us, Captain Kean would have been blamed. It wasn’t his fault, it was the master watch[’s]. [SRPK 303, 304A]

Warford, Henry, p. 7

My brother got such a fright he wouldn’t go back [Ranger, 1939]. I don’t think he went sealing afterwards. I got the berth on her second trip and we went to the Front. Most we got was old seals; we never done well. [SRKB 863]

STOWAWAYS

Bragg, Fred, pp. 11, 14

The first spring in the Ungava we had five stowaways and we put them ashore in Pouch Cove. Captain Winsor said to me, “Get them in charge of a magistrate or something.” I said, “If they refuse that.” He said, “Oh the hell with them, if they don’t take transportation.” They’d hide in places that Job’s didn’t know were in the ships. I saw this Cyril Quilty. He went with us five or six springs and they couldn’t find him. They never found him. The firemen used to put one mattress in the bunk, put Quilty in, put the other mattress on top of him. We couldn’t find him, I’d be stood up alongside him right in the room. [SRMD 406]

Crawford, John, pp. 20-21

There was one young fellow one spring, young Gladden, he was only 11 years old. They asked him why did he do it. “Stowed away, sir,” he said, “to get something to eat. There’s nothing to eat in St. John’s.” The men used to give them a few cents. [SRKB 822]

Goodridge, Charles, p. 5

In those days [1925] it was a wonderful thing to do. You’d consider yourself a man after that. That spring about 35 stowaways went out. [SRMJD 504, 505]

Gosse, Eric, pp. 7-8

We had eight stowaways. One night I said to them, “Get some flippers, and we’ll cook them.” I had some onions and pork with me. They got them. I didn’t ask where they got them; it wouldn’t be wise. I had potatoes, too, but I didn’t have enough. But suddenly the potatoes appeared. So we cooked up the big feed, and we all two flippers each. [SRKB 825]

Hayes, Sylvester, pp. 2-7

In 1929 I was 12 years old and stowed away on the Norwegian ship SS Savarolus, taking fish to the West Indies. Got signed on as a deckboy and paid off back in St. John’s.

In 1930 when I was 13 years old, I stowed away on the Swedish Oranea to Brazil with fish, and then cotton to Sweden, and Bristol for coal for St. John’s.

In 1931 when I was 14 years old, I stowed away on the Thetis under old Abram Kean. There were 11 stowaways on her besides myself. I stowed away in the storeroom, the dry store room, that was right forward and down below. I stowed away on Friday night, and she didn’t sail until 1:30 Saturday afternoon. Monday I came up when we were practically in the Gulf. I was the last to come up. All the other 11 were out ahead of me.

So they just took my name and sent it home and they notified my mother. All 12 of us got signed on and they gave us a full share. I had to clean the firemen’s forecastle, bring along the grub for them from the galley, and wash up the dishes after them. Occasionally I used to go on the ice and when we were picking up seals I used to drive the winch. And then we’d stow the seals down in the hold and ice them. So I used to do a regular man’s work. The men acted favourable towards us. They’d give you an old pair of jeans or an old pair of overalls or an old pair of boots.

The firemen used to give me all kinds of clothes. They used to see that I wouldn’t be cold. I believe that Abram Kean was superstitious and used to believe in stowaways. He used to like to see them. I know Al Blackwood was superstitious for sure because the two springs I was in her she had the largest catches that were ever brought in, 55,636 and 52,030.

In 1935 I was on my way to South America at that time—she got 37,000. I learned later that Al Blackwood told the master watches if they found me aboard to let me bide. He called me a lucky stowaway. The captains didn’t want to see too many. One spring the Ungava put 20 ashore and still there were three or four that got away on her. In the Eagle [1932] I hid down under boilers.

There was an ice blockade, and she didn’t sail until Sunday morning. So I was down there an extra 24 hours. It was warm anyway. In the storeroom of the Thetis [in 1931] it was cold. All I had was a sandwich and a little rum flask of water. That had to do for two or three days. The time used to go pretty fast.

On the Imogene [1933/34] I used to get on top of the boilers. And when they’d come in to search the top of the boilers, I used to hang out on my fingertips over the boilers, hang out over the stoke hole. They’d shine the light in and I’d be hanging out over the edge of the boilers. When they’d turn their backs and go around I used to hop up and come up on top and get behind them. On the Thetis I used to drive the winch. I used to drive it on the Imogene, too, but on the Thetis I took in all the fat.

On March 15, 1931, the Viking blew up. I had been on the ice with some of the engineers. I was in the wireless operator’s room talking to the operator, Mr. Billy Sinnott, when news was flashed over the wires that the Viking had blown up. [This account differs from that of Walter Gaulton—see Viking disaster.] Mr. Sinnott wrote out the telegram and he was reading it out aloud. When he was finished, he gave it to me and he said take that up to the captain’s cabin and wait for a reply. When I got up, I knocked on his door. He opened the door, and he had on those big heavy underwear they used to wear and braces and said, “Come in.” Of course I went in and gave him the telegram.

I could see his shoulders sag when he read it because the skipper of the Viking’s name was Abram Kean, too. I believe he was a relative. Anyway, he told me to come back later for a reply. Right away word spread because the wireless operator’s room was right outside the firemen’s forecastle and right alongside the forecastle was the crew’s galley. One of the master watches had a son on the Viking, and that son was killed. The master watch’s name was Johnny Cross. [SRPK 302A/B]

Lowe, William, pp. 3, 29, 70; p. 10

I was a young fellow still going to school [1918]. I just got up one morning and instead of going to school I just went down on board a seal steamer and stowed away. I was 12 years old. I stowed away underneath a pork barrel. I got a friend to put a pork barrel over me, but he wouldn’t go. He was afraid. I wore short pants. The old bo’sun, Mr. Crocker, from Adelaide Street made a canvas suit for me. We had slight canvas aboard. I drove the winch. I practically hoisted every seal aboard that they killed that spring.

After my first time out, the captain wrote a letter to my mother asking if she’d let me go out again. She said, “It’s up to himself. I can’t get no good of him.” I went out again the next spring. But still I was a stowaway. I was too young to sign on. The captain knew I was aboard but he didn’t see me; he didn’t want to see me.

Now, if you stowed away out to the ice, you might make more than the crew. They’d take up a collection. Now, the first spring I was out I made a few dollars and the skipper, Wes Kean, gave me an order to go up to Bowring’s. I got a suit of knickerbocker pants, a pair of shoes, and a shirt. One spring I was a stowaway in the Ranger and my brother was a stowaway in the Eagle.

You’d start looking for stowaways at 5 o’clock in the morning. You might be banging 20 or 30 off of her. Silvie Hayes was a stowaway with me the same year I was icemaster on the old Thetis. Sil was only a young fellow. We had 15 of them and we banged another 15 out of her. If they all had to get away, there’d be about 30. Silvie was only a small boy and had another fellow with him around 11. [SRFW 103A/B, SRCJL 902]

Maddox, Arthur, p. 10

They’d get in with the firemen, because they belonged to St. John’s. They had the firemen look after them. They wouldn’t get with us. They weren’t mixed up with us at all. [SRBH 707A]

Martin, Edward, p. 2

My father was chief steward, and when I went down in the cabin, he told me to go home. Instead of going up over the ladder to go home I went into his room and got in his bunk and fell asleep. I woke the next morning. I was put to work in the firemen’s forecastle and slept on a box over the chain locker. There were no bunks. Then when the men used to go out on the ice, I used to hoist the seal pelts aboard on the winch. That was all that spring. [SRST 501, 502]

Noseworthy, Hans, p. 19

They were looked on as little heroes, they were young and they couldn’t get a berth. Probably lots of them wanted to get clear of school. [SRPK 356]

Parsons, George, pp. 56, 61

One time we found a little stowaway, we were off in the middle of the Harbour, and they put him ashore. He said, “I hope ye haves all the trouble in the world.” She had a diesel; she had been a coal burner. Her stack caught fire. The firemen didn’t believe me, but one came up and saw it. We put the fire hoses on it; the powder was close by and in danger. When we got it douted, we opened the round door into the stack and it was piled with 2 x 4 lumber and match board, someone had piled in the stack. The little stowaway should have been left aboard. He wasn’t that old, and we could have found enough grub for him and let him go out and have a look at the seal fishery. They’d found him in a lifeboat up on deck with an old bit of clothes. [SRKM 508, 509]

Short, William, pp. 9-10

There was a stowaway in the old Eagle—a little fellow about 15 years old. There were four of us: Jack Faulkner, Sidney Leonard, Jack Bishop, and me. We had to watch him on the ice. We fitted him out and took care of him. He got his share when we came in and he got a berth for the second trip. [SRBH 703A]

Stevenson, Robert Louis, pp. 21-22

One time I think there were 12 stowaways aboard. The firemen used to help them get aboard sometimes for trimming the coal. They gathered together out there and hove seals’ guts at each other instead of snowballs. They had only a bit of clothes. “Wharf rats,” they were called. Everyone of them came from St. John’s. And, boy, they were wicked. The stuff that would come out of their mouths! [SRMD 414A/B]

Stone, Harry, p. 6

One trip we had a stowaway. He was about 30, but he wasn’t married. He was as good a man as anyone else on board. He did just as much work as they did and in fact he got a full share when we came in. One day he got a nasty cut, and I had to put stitches in it. I said, “Now, I got morphine and I got rum. What would you rather have before I put the stitches in?” He said, “You put the stitches in, then I’ll have a drink of rum.” [SRCL 205, 209]

Whitten, Stephen, p. 6

Every year there was always the stowaways. If they weren’t discovered that morning before sailing, they went on to the seal fishery. They stayed out and in some cases they turned out to be decent young men. I’ve heard of cases where they did such a good job that the captain asked for the firm to make sure that they were reimbursed when they got back. I’ve heard of cases where the sealers themselves gave them their share of flippers. On some occasions they got a regular trip to the seal fishery thereafter. [SRPK 308A/B]

STRIKE

Christopher, William, pp. 14-21

We were out with old man Kean in the Terra Nova. It seems the voyage was supposed to end on the 15th of April. But we hadn’t done much with the seals. We were burned down for a couple of days and we formed a committee and went to the captain and told him we weren’t satisfied with staying out. We gave up our ropes and gaffs. The master watch came down for the wheelman but he wouldn’t go up. So he said to me, “You go to the wheel.”

I said, “Yes, I’ll go to the wheel, sir, if I can get another man with me.” The old wooden steamers had double wheels and they used to take four hands to the wheel. I got another man and went to the wheel and when they gave me the course, the course was southwest. Everybody was satisfied then because we were going towards St. John’s. Captain Kean took us to court, but we engaged a lawyer by the name of Fox and the case was thrown out. [SRKB 868]

Doyle, Robert, pp. 13-14

I was on the Eagle with Captain Sid Hill when they had the strike. Years ago when they used to go on strike, they used to heave their gaffs on the forward hatch. When you’d see the sealers heaving their gaffs on the forward hatch that meant they were going on strike. A lot of the reason they went on strike was because they weren’t getting no seals, and time was getting along, and fellows wanted to go home to go fishing. [SRMJD 507]

Fleming, James, pp. 21-23

In Green Bay there was a strike. A hundred men struck; 30 or 40 or 50 didn’t. I didn’t. We were in the Terra Nova and the captain wanted to go north to get old seals. It was getting late, the food was getting short and they wanted to go home. This old master watch went around one night with a paper. About a hundred men put their x’s down. They lashed the wheel, and we went around in Green Bay for three or four days. They wouldn’t let anyone touch the wheel. On the last of it Bowring’s sent out for the captain to bring her in. [SRPK 330]

Gillett, William, pp. 19-20

We were in the Beothic [1927], we had a month on the Front, then we steamed into the Gulf. We got into a storm off St. Pierre and lost our dories and puncheons of molasses which were on the deck. So we went into Port aux Basques. The sealers went on strike; some took over the train or tried to take it over, but they only got a few feet. They were on the moonshine. The train engineers got back control of the train. The captain told the watchman, “When you think they are all aboard around daylight, let me know.” So around 5 o’clock we slipped out to sea. When they woke up, we were out in the Gulf and they were ready for the straightjacket. It was May [April 25th?] before we got back into St. John’s. We made about $60. [SRPK 351]

Keel, Heber, p. 9

The men wanted to come in sometime in April [1944]. They didn’t want to chase old seals, so they went on strike. There were only three in our watch never struck: I was one, and Fred Butler, and Gus Butler. And in another watch there were only a few. We never had enough to take in ice or get coal to the engine. So we came in and took out our seals. The policemen caught three or four of the leaders and put them in the penitentiary. They got a lawyer and the lawyer said it was mutiny on the high seas. They had to pay only $3. [SRPK 324]

Parsons, Allan, pp. 23-25

My father was out with old Kean, and they all struck. They wanted to go to the Labrador fishing. When they came in to St. John’s, old Kean said, “Any man that struck will never get a berth no more with me.” Well, eight or nine springs after that Father got a berth with old Kean in the Nascopie. Kean called him up to the bridge. He said, “You, the man with the white jacket come up. I’ve seen you before.” Father said, “No. I was never aboard with you before.” And he got clear. [SRKB 867]

Sturge, Stanley, p. 28

Now, they always had to pay for berths [before 1902], $3 for the berth for the seal fishery. They got up against it, and they had a strike. They were going to haul the Neptune up on Water Street. They had the line on her and every man was ready to haul her up, 3,000 or 4,000 men. One of the Calloways, Bill I think, was the man singing the song: “Haul on the bowline. Haul, boy, haul.” My cousin, Skipper Joe said, “Yes, my son, we would have hauled her up in the street.” They [the merchants] settled. No way of getting at them. The way they settled was, you take up a crop for $9, you pay $12. [SRPK 309A/B]

Thorne, Gordon, pp. 9, 30

The Gulf is not like the Front. It is a harder place; there is more danger up there. The ice is all in big sheets, and the ships get crushed between them. You can’t stay between the sheets; you got to get her so the sheets will take the pressure, not the ship. One night we ran short of coal and we had to run down to Corner Brook, and a storm came on. There was no danger but the old Sable Island didn’t have very much power. Captain Winsor knew nothing about Corner Brook. He didn’t know if she could make it or not. She was all iced up—you couldn’t see from the wheelhouse—and she was just bobbing up and down.

Joe Mullett was to the wheel and we made it. But some of the crew got disheartened and they went on strike. Myself and Ralph King went down and told Captain Winsor that the crew was on strike. “What,” he said, “the crew on strike. Everyone of them needs money more than I do and I’m trying to make it for them. What are they going on strike for?” Seals were a big price at that time, and we were sure to get a load. Some men were queer.

They just wanted to go back to St. John’s. Billy Winsor told me, “You go to your job on the bridge and the man that interferes with you I’ll shoot him.” Billy Fifield, the barrelman, told me he said to Captain Winsor, “Why don’t you get out with the gun?” He said, “I wouldn’t do it, I’m after seeing strikes bad out there to the seal fishery.” As it happened, we didn’t have no trouble. He wired Job’s and told them the crew was on strike and they wired back and told him to go straight to St. John’s and then go out on a second trip. I didn’t go out with him because I had a lot of work to do with our fishing premises.

When the strikers went down to Job’s to get paid, Captain Winsor was after stopping $40. Mr. Job said, “This is not Job’s doing. This is Captain Winsor’s.” They had law work on that after, and Captain Winsor won it. He won it. Yes. Because we were sure of a load of seals, and here a bunch of young fellows, half-fools, to go on strike. I didn’t know what they wanted. There was a good chance of making a good dollar out there. I guess they just got scared on account of being caught on the shore that night. They didn’t depend on Captain Winsor, figured he wasn’t use to being up there [Corner Brook?]. [SRMD 410A/B]

SUNDAY

Butt, Cyril, p. 33

Now, we slept with a bunch of people from down in Western Bay area. They were Catholic people and Dr. Patrick O’Flaherty’s father, Gus, used to say the rosary around our beds. We used to say, “We’ll move now, we’ll go up to make some room for your people to come here and have your service. “No,” he’d say, “You’re mot moving out of that. You’re staying here; you know it’s a very good sailor who knows his faith.” He was a fine man, Gus O’Flaherty. [SRKM 501]

Fleming, James, pp. 14-15

Old Abram Kean had a load killed for the Beothic and he left about 18,000 seals. So he came out, and we went in where the seals were. It was a Sunday, and we never had one. All hands came on deck ready with their gaffs, and ropes, and lunch bags and all. And Captain Barbour wouldn’t allow us to go over. It wasn’t allowed. And the seals were crawling around—thousands of big ones. So Captain Barbour asked old Captain Kean what we should do.

“Well,” said Captain Kean, “I’ll tell you what I would do. You got 200 men aboard and neither dollar yet. I’d go down and get in my bed and say ‘now boys you can do what you like. You can go out or bide aboard.’ That’s all I’d say.” But Captain Barbour wouldn’t let us out. We got out Monday morning and in three days we had 18,000 killed and flagged. All the herd; we got them all. [SRPK 330]

Gosse, Pat, p. 11

The northern men wouldn’t go on the ice on Sunday. They’d be singing their hymns and they could stay aboard. But we had to go on the ice, all of us. [SRMD 411]

Lowe, William, pp. 67-68; p. 30

Years ago you could be a Sunday man. If you were a Sunday man, you sometimes couldn’t get a berth the next spring. But the captain couldn’t compel you to go on the ice on a Sunday. The RCs would have the rosary about 6:30 in the evening. The Church of England would probably have a service. The Salvation Army would sing hymns. You’d be picking up seals, probably hauling seals, but you wouldn’t kill them. If you were with Abram Kean, and you were a Sunday man, you were finished. Don’t come looking for a berth no more. [SRFW 103A/B, SRCJL 902]

Oliver, James, p. 29

We had a man from Kingston, Pat Short. He was master watch. When we’d have the rosary, he’d always read the rosary for us. We used to have it down in the hold. Some of the others would stay in their bunk. More fellows would be sitting on their boxes. When we’d kneel down, they’d kneel down with us. [SRKM 523A/B]

Porter, Taylor, p. 5

I went with Dickie Badcock in the Viking in 1930. We sailed from Dawe’s coal shed in Bay Roberts. We struck the seals on the Front and steamed in among them and burned down. It was a Saturday evening, and we were all lied in the bunks talking to one another. Captain Dick comes forward, and he says, “Men, I can’t tell you to go overboard. You can please yourselves. It’s against the law to tell you to go overboard. But if you go overboard now, you got a chance to get a barrel of flour for your family.” He says, “Tomorrow or the next day all the big boats that passed us by, the Ungava and the Imogene and all the big ones will be back.”

Whatever, we took him to his word and we all went overboard. She was lighted up with torches. We killed all that night and the next day and when daylight broke we missed one man, Ches Russell, belong to Coley’s Point. We never expected to see the poor fellow no more but we picked him up on a big sheet of ice. He was running around keeping himself alive. We took him aboard, and then the Imogene came up across us and cut us off, and we never got a seal after. We got 14,000 out of it. [SRKB 809, 873]

Sturge, Christopher, p. 28

One Sunday we passed through seals all day. This was around the 27th, 28th of March. We could have had 20,000. We got up Monday morning and not one of them was there. That night the wind had veered to the eastward and came around and they were gone. I still thinks now we should have gone overboard and killed them seals. That’s what we was out there for, a living. We shouldn’t have known it was Sunday. You was out there trying to get something to live. I don’t think there was any harm done. [SRBH 719]

Sturge, Stanley, p. 30

In my father’s day, there was a special pound for seals for those men who would kill on Sunday. So he went out the first Sunday. When he began to pelt, the blood came out and hit him between the eyes and went about 5 feet up over him. He stuck the knife in the sheath and walked aboard. Old Captain Barbour said, “Stephen, where are you going?” Father said, “I’ll never pelt another one, Captain, on a Sunday.” He told him what happened. He laughed to kill himself, the old captain did. “All right,” he said, “Come on aboard. You’ll get no share of those seals.” Father said, “God damn if I want one.” [SRPK 309A/B]

Vincent, Wilfred, p. 32

You weren’t allowed to kill seals on Sunday. So anyhow, we didn’t have much of a voyage and they saw a spot of old seals from the barrel on Saturday evening. Wessie [Westbury] came up and said, “If you don’t go this morning, remember you’re taking shoes and stockings off of your children’s feet.” This is the kind Wessie was. He’d rather be lecturing than anything else. He was what you call a professor. But he was a nice man. [SRPW 701]

SUPERSTITION

Stone, Harry, p. 7

I’m not superstitious. I see rats walking ashore and I was never on a ship that was lost. A lot of people don’t like sailing on Friday, the 13th. We left here one time on Friday the 13th. One fellow walked ashore; he wouldn’t sail. We made out quite well that trip. I can’t complain against the 13th because I got two of my tickets on the 13th and the first vessel I was command of [navigator], she was launched on the 13th, and she sailed on her first voyage on the 13th. [SRCL 205, 209]

SWATCH

Ford, Andrew, p. 20

The ice would be jammed, no water. There would be a pool of water where the sheets nipped—a swatch. The seals would come up in this. [C1114/72-44 (P. Ford)]

TAME SEAL

Parsons, Mark, pp. 39-40

We had one seal one spring right against the boat. When I got out the first day, I said, “Boys, don’t kill that seal, now, leave him alone, let him stay there, see how long he’ll be there.” The boat was jammed there in the ice. We tied a piece of yarn around his neck, and we used to feed him. He got the best feed ever, and he used to grow so much overnight.

When you’d get out in the morning, you wouldn’t see the yarn—it would be sunk down in the fat. You’d untie the yarn and slacken it up for him. Some fellow would bring out a pan of milk; another fellow would bring out a pan of bread and potatoes and peels and scraps of dinner. He’d lay into that. He was like a youngster, now that’s what he was like to us. When you’d get overboard in the morning, he’d be singing out, bawling at you, come over and stretch his neck up to you. You’d smooth him down. We let him stay there all spring.

If the boat was going to go, we’d get out and pick him up and put him on board and bring him with us. And when we’d get out where the seals were at, we’d put him overboard and feed him. We brought him into St. John’s harbour with us. He was the biggest kind of seal then. We had him in a dory and we used to feed him and put in ice with him. He’d suck the ice for a drink. When we got in, we let him go in the harbour. He didn’t want to go. He was there beside the boat bawling to get aboard again. We left him in the harbour chasing the boat. [SRKM 507]

TERRA NOVA

Clarke, Allan, pp. 11-13

We went up in the Gulf with Captain Stan Barbour, and we got stuck [1939]. Nine days she never turned over the blade. Then the wind changed, and we drifted around the Magdalen Islands. We got out then and blasted her out with blasting powder. We loosened her till she backed out. Then we went on and on, and we couldn’t see no seals, and we had to turn around and come in. I never made a cent that spring.

We got in St. John’s and Bowring’s gave us tickets for the train to Carbonear. We went up to the station to wait, and there was this fellow there with a big truck. He said he’d take the crowd of us out. We all got up in the back of this old truck with our boxes and left for Carbonear. There were fellows from Avondale and Brigus and Clarke’s Beach and all them places.

In South River the truck went down to the axles into the road and we couldn’t get ahead. There were only four of us on her then. Anyway, we went back to Brigus for the night, and we went down and we asked Sergeant Trickett in Brigus to put us in jail. He put us in and gave us something to eat and gave us our breakfast the next morning.

In the morning Forward [was] coming through with his truck, and I asked him if he would take us. I hove my box aboard and myself and my buddy got up in the back. When we got to Carbonear we were hungry and we went to the restaurant. I had 75 cents. I bought my dinner and paid for it and it was 70 cents. I had 5 cents left and I said I better go up to Aunt Jane Curley’s and get 5 cents worth of candy to bring home to my mother. That’s what I done, and I got home with not a cent and as lousy as a goat. [SRKB 858]

Parsons, Andrew, p. 8

The Terra Nova was the best boat. She was a better [built] sea boat than the Ranger. She was a wider boat. [SRKB 843]

Whitten, Stephen, p. 10

She was the most famous of Bowring’s fleet. She was lent to the British Admiralty for use by Captain Scott for his Antarctic expedition in 1910. She returned to Newfoundland and prosecuted the seal fishery until 1942. That was her last trip. That year she made a voyage to Greenland to deliver materials to an American base. She was damaged by heavy ice and sank in deep water without any loss of life. [SRPK 308A/B]

TICKETS

Moores, William Joseph, pp. 31-32

In Carbonear we wouldn’t leave until the day before the boat was signing on. We could go to St. John’s, the train was running twice daily. But the people north would probably come up three or four days ahead. You had a ticket, your name and number would be on it. And you’d go and sign on, and you were signed on until the 1st day of May. Your ticket was your agreement, your article, that you “would serve the said master until the 1st day of May or until such time as the master decides to abandon the voyage.” After the 1st of May your article was out. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

TINSMITHS

Fleet, John, pp. 2, 13

We, my father and I, made blasting cans, torch lamps, oil cans, mixing pans, billy boilers, boat’s kettles, big roast pans. We started it early in the new year and we worked then right up till the sealing ships were ready to sail. We made stuff on contract for the different companies. We used copper, galvanized tin, and black metal. You’d use black metal for making the big roast pans. Up to 22 gauge metal. If they wanted anything heavier we had to get it welded. We used to have eight or 10 men in our shop on George Street [St. John’s] working at nighttime. The slut (pronounced slute) kettles, 2, 3 gallons each were made from copper, they were for tea and coffee. Boat’s kettles were made of copper also, usually. [SRPK 353]

TOBACCO

Bragg, Thomas, pp. 11-12

Some fellows would run short. But you could get it back in the cabin—hard tobacco like Beaver and Jumbo. You’d smoke that on the last of it. You’d go and ask the chief steward. You’d have a plug of tobacco and he’d take your name—just mark it down. But it was not very often you’d get out of tobacco, unless you made a late spring. And we were never out very late, because our coal wouldn’t stand that long. We’d always be back anywhere from the 20th of March to the last. [SRPK 340]

Healey, Paul, p. 17

We went short of tobacco, and I was so fond of a smoke [1933, jammed in White Bay]. Jack Codner had tobacco. Now, he’d go off for a stroll, sometimes a mile, and then he’d hide behind a pinnacle of ice and get a smoke. I’d watch him, and I’d always find him. He used to say, “You’re coming again.” And I’d say, “Yes, Jack and I got to get a few draws out of that pipe. I’ll never live tonight if I don’t.” He’d say, “Here boy.” And I’d take the old pipe and get a few puffs. [SRPK 306A/B]

Lowe, William, p. 27; pp. 42-43

You couldn’t afford to carry enough tobacco with you. They carried Beaver tobacco or VC tobacco or Anchor tobacco; they were big sticks, a quarter of a pound. About the third day out, you’d see a fellow go with a spruce stick to grind the spruce and roll up a cigarette in brown paper. I smoked it. I smoked tea leaves.

They’d carry out so much tobacco, all hard tobacco. The captain would have some in the slop chest in case the crew ran out. But if you got no seals, you got no tobacco. They weren’t going in debt; Mr. Bowring was not going in debt. [SRFW 103A/B, SRCJL 902]

Power, Robert, p. 30

I remember one spring I had to get a pair of boots and a knife. I got my $9 crop and I didn’t have a cent to get tobacco. I said the only thing is I’ll have to give it up. I couldn’t go bumming the first day out. It was a beautiful day; we were out in the Gulf that spring. I was dying for a smoke, but I couldn’t bum it.

I waited until 6 o’clock when they [the officers] all got down in the cabin getting their supper. Down I goes and knocks on the cabin door. Captain Badcock said, “Come in, what are you looking for?” The chief engineer, chief cook, all of them were there. I said, “I’ll tell you what, I never had a smoke today.” Well, boy, they had some laugh over that. He said, “That’s too bad, what did you do with the crop?” I said, “I had to get a pair of boots and a knife, and I couldn’t get a stick of tobacco.” He kept me there fooling around with me. They had a great laugh over it. Captain Dick said, “Natty, give him two plugs of tobacco.” So after that, no bother, I’d go to the chief steward and he’d give me a couple of sticks. [SRKM 517]

Snow, Alfred, p. 10

I was on the Ranger [1937?]. It was a good trip. We were first in, and I got a pipe and two sticks of Anchor tobacco. I didn’t smoke. There was an old man here, John Thomas Boone, a sick man, and he smoked. When I came home, I went down and gave him the baccy and the pipe. [SRKB 853]

TORBAY

Gosse, Doug, p. 17

In Torbay there might be 50 men on the ships out to the ice. There were hundreds trying to get berths that couldn’t get on the ships. [SRPK 317]

TOWING

Burry, George, p. 9

Sometimes you had to haul seals a long ways, 7 or 8 miles. You had to drag them with a hauling rope on your back, usually three. If the ice was rough, you’d grab [space] them long. When one would come up over a pinnacle, you wouldn’t be hauling the weight of three at the one time. One would come up and fall down, the other would fall down, and then the other one. But if the ice was smooth, you’d haul them right tight together. The old fellows knew how to do it. They had all the tricks of the trade and they passed them along. [SRPK 337]

Fitzgerald, Edward, pp. 11-13

Grandfather Ned Fitzgerald [Brigus] was an outstanding sealer. He was seen once towing 15 whitecoats. He was unbelievable. He spent 50 years out to the seal fishery [when the ice was covered with a film of water, a sealer could tow more pelts]. [SRKB 803]

Marshall, Chesley, p. 28

If the ship was jammed, sometimes you’d walk her out of sight. You’d get a tow and you’d all come back in a line one behind the other, maybe 150 men. The man ahead would just put one foot ahead of the other. That long line of men was called the “sealer’s crawl.” [SRKB 860]

Moores, William Joseph, p. 35

You’d have three pelts, generally, in the pull. A scattered fellow would make out he could take four. He might get a mile before he would have to trip one. If you acted sensible, you’d take your three pelts. You keeps the skin to the ice for easy hauling. If the flesh gets to the ice, it’s harder hauling and also tears the fat off. Now, you puts the oldest man ahead, not the youngest, and the old man would take what he thought was a fair dodge [pace]. That’s for a long pull, 2 or 3 or 4 miles. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

O’Neill, Arthur, p. 6, 38-39

You’d lace up a tow. If you just put the pelts on a rope and not lace them up, you’d have a job to haul them, because they’d be flat. But lace them up right, they’d slip along just like a slide. You’d start from one seal and you’d reeve the tow rope through the eyes, and then you’d cut a little hole in each side of the pelt, around where the flipper was at, and you’d go through that with your rope, and then you’d take another seal and go through the eyes and then you’d go through him and them go through the other one and you’d haul three or four seals. They’d haul easier for you especially with a bit of light snow and a drop of fresh water on the ice. You’d haul fur side down.

Old Kean came up [Gulf], ran into the seals, took his load, and went on. We were jammed the whole spring. We had to haul most of ours, tow them. We had a lot killed and we never got them all. We’d make three tows a day when we started. Then it came down to two tows a day and, be gor, it come down to one tow a day. You’d leave the ship in the morning with the stars in the sky, and you’d walk the ship out of sight. You’d pick up your tow of seals and the stars would be in the sky again before you’d get back to her. I should say you’d walk 13 or 14 miles over the ice. You’d haul three pelts and the master watches had a compass and knew the course. It was hard going. Along the way you’d stop for a spell. You’d turn the seals bottom up and sit down on them and get a mug-up and a bit of hard bread—a lunch and a smoke. [SRKM 516]

TRAGEDY

Kelly, Jack, p. 8

About 70 years ago [c.1917, Fogo] three [lands]men by the name of Jacobs—Joseph, Stephen, and Walter—and Frank Pomeroy, William Freake, and William Joe Freake went away in the morning, out on the ice, and never came back. [SRKH 408, 409]

Lowe, William, p. 17

I think it took us a week to get out through the Narrows [1924]. Abram Kean had all his men out hauling his ship, with her engine going. About 200 men hauling. When she went astern, a bunch of them fell in the water. Three never came up. Lost three of them in the mouth of the Narrows. [SRFW 103A/B]

TRAIN, CONCEPTION BAY

Boone, William, p. 8

On the train they put her right up [fighting], just put her up. Some fellows would get in the horrors from the rum. I remember the first bottle we bought. They wouldn’t sell it to me; I was only 17. Charles Button was younger than me, but he had a beard, [and] he looked older. We were buddies. Charles got the bottle of rum and the two of us got paralyzed drunk. [SRKB 824]

Crawford, John, p. 9

All Conception Bay used to be out there. They’d come from the shore, from Grates Cove and from all around here [Carbonear]. There were two trains and each of the trains had two engines and eight or ten cars fast to them. The station was full. Men coming in, dogs and slides coming off the shore, all hands to the station, pile into the train. [SRKB 822]

Power, Robert, p. 10

We’d go to St. John’s from Carbonear on the “Sealers Train,” they used to call it [1920s]. Leave Carbonear quarter to four in the evening. [A] sealer’s train ticket was $1.50. [SRKM 517]

Wilson, George, pp. 4-5

When we got to Clarke’s Beach, there was neither light in the train nowhere [1930s]. Even the train itself had neither headlight. Everything was beaten up and all the windows beaten out. [SRKH 411]

TRAIN DISPATCHER

Lahey, Ray, pp. 3, 7

There were special rates for sealers on the train [1930s]. If we knew that there was a couple of hundred sealers going to be at Gambo on Tuesday, we would send out five or six second-class passenger cars on a freight train on the previous night. Have them set off at Gambo and leave a train man there to maintain and keep the fires going. Then an east-bound freight train the following night would pick up the passenger cars with the sealers and bring them to St. John’s. We never used an express train for that. It wasn’t necessary in Carbonear because the daily passenger train left Carbonear at 7:30 in the morning. We had hard wooden seats in the cars, and we had a box car for the men to throw their bags in. People returned home in small numbers, not in bulk like they arrived. [SRPK 350]

UNGAVA

Bragg, Fred, pp. 40-41

The Ungava was reinforced. Between every two timbers there was another one. What they put in for timber was the channel iron that they have on the railway. And she was double-timbered. She was way stronger than the Beothic and faster than the Beothic, although they had the same engine. [SRMD 406]

Butt, Henry, p. 10

[In 1935] we hit a piece of ice and buckled the shaft and I think the rudder was out of commission, too. We had to come in and the Terra Nova had to stand by in case we’d want a tow. The Terra Nova went back to the ice again. [SRKB 851]

Maddox, Thomas, p. 4

We were out one spring [1938] and we never saw a seal before St. Patrick’s Day, the seventeenth of March. All hands had it given up; even had their gaffs cut out, taken off the handles. And we struck the seals the 17th of March in the evening. The old Ungava was a big boat, carrying 280-odd men. We made $156 a man. And after I got home here, when they heard how much money we made, they were frightened to death. They said we had enough money forever. [SRPK 326]

Power, Robert, p. 16

The spring I was in the Ungava we had the heaviest trip of seals ever came to the country—Captain Peter Carter took them there off Baccalieu. They were as thick as sand on the beach. A hot day and they were all sunburned. They weren’t worth bringing in for a crew. [SRKM 517]

Sullivan, William, p. 33

The Ungava first arrived in 1928. She was an awful size of a ship. She was built for the war in 1918. The Beothic was a sister ship of hers. [SRMD 404A/B]

UNLOADING

Butt, Cyril, pp. 37-38

A two-watch crew would be on today and then the other two would be on tomorrow. Out to the ice we used to cut one flipper out so you’d have a place to put the strap through. When you’d be taking them out in St. John’s, you’d cut out that flipper that was still there. In the evening them flippers would be shared up amongst the two watch crews, and we’d sell them. Pelts were weighed on a jig—112 pounds, a quintal. It would take two to five days to unload, depending on how much fat you had. [SRKM 501]

Fitzgerald, Edward, pp. 6-7

We hauled into Bay Bulls alongside the Northern Ranger and we hauled 25 tons of coal out of the Northern Ranger’s bunkers, enough to get us into St. John’s. And there was a man came off in a punt, sculled off. He was a great hand to sing and he sang them old Irish songs all night, and one fellow was giving him a piece of fat pork and another fellow was giving him a quart of molasses and another fellow was giving him some tea. He told us he was on relief and if he got caught with this stuff, he would lose his 6 cents a day. So anyhow, just in the grey of dawn he said, “I got to go.” You couldn’t hear him speak he was that hoarse after singing all night. He had this little punt and she was loaded with hard bread and everything. He was tickled to death and went ashore in the grey of dawn. [SRKB 814]

Gosse, Eric, pp. 11-13

We came in with a good load of seals [1937]. I changed my clothes and went to my aunt’s. I didn’t work aboard. Now, you could pay someone to unload and I arranged with a chap to do my work for me. So I went down [to the wharf] two days after. I wanted to get some flippers—I had none, [as] the few I did have were stolen. When I got on the wharf, the first man I ran into was Ken Mullett, my master watch. He said, “Where the hell have you been?” I said, “Well I got somebody to work for me.” He said, “Well, boy, he’s not working for you.” I said, “Let’s talk about it, but before we talk about it let’s have a drink.” We had a few drinks, and he said, “We’ll forget about it, about the fellow who was working for you, it’s okay, no problem.” [SRKB 825]

Gosse, Pat, p. 17

We’d get up at 3 in the morning and we had to be out there [St. John’s] at 7. We had to walk to town and walk home [Torbay]—that was 18 miles. You’d be put down in the hold strapping on seals; there was nothing at all to eat. My sonny man, when it’d come 6 o’clock in the evening, you were lagged; you were gone. Now, you had to walk home, and you’d have four or five dozen flippers to bring home on your back. [SRMD 411]

Thorne, Gordon, p. 15

The spring we had the big trip in the Ungava [1933] I was nine days landing seals, walked back and forth to Torbay. Walk out in the morning, walk back at night. You’d leave over to the Southside about 7 o’clock, just getting dark. Walk all the way—mud up to your ankles. [SRMD 410A/B]

VIKING DISASTER, 1931

Bath, George, p. 1

They arrived here that day around 8 o’clock in the morning. The crowd that nothing was wrong with were pulling along the disabled people in the dory. They got in here [Horse Islands] and the people took them into their homes. We had 14 in our home; we looked after 14 men from Monday morning around 11 o’clock until the following Saturday. We didn’t have beds to give them but we made them comfortable and we fed them and looked after them as best we could. [C388/67-35 (JDAW/Fred Earle)]

Gaulton, Walter, p. 9

I used to visit me buddy, Bill Sinnott, when I’d be off watch. I was in this evening sitting down talking to him, and he was at the wireless. I see his face turn white. He said, “There’s something wrong now.” When he finished, he said, “Listen, I’m going to tell you. I got to go up and visit the captain.” And he told me about the Viking explosion. He said, “Stay here, don’t go out until I come back. I got to report to the captain first.” So I stayed there. The reason I had to stay was because Bill Sinnott didn’t want anybody to hear until he reported to the captain first, on account of the relatives aboard our boat. [SRPW 105A]

Gill, Heber, pp. 2-4

We were on the Beothic with Peter Carter off Blanc Sablon in the St. Lawrence on the Canadian side and we thought the ship was turning around to go on the Labrador somewhere to look for seals. After a while it got around to the crew that there was a disaster, a ship lost near the Horse Islands.

We went up around the French Shore to the Horse Islands, and we got there around dark Tuesday or Wednesday evening. The ice was packed tightly into White Bay so we only got within 8 or 10 or 12 miles of the Horse Islands. The next morning we could see a man on the ice, with the spyglass from our barrel. Our watch, Walter Carter’s watch, from Greenspond, was on then and the captain told Walt to take a few men and go on the ice and see what was going on.

Ten or 12 of us went. When we got near enough, we could see this man stood there and there was part of a dory with another man in it. Johnson from Catalina was the man there with him, and he had the side of the dory broken up and burned to keep the other man as comfortable as he could and he had his own greatcoat taken off and put around this man, who was Fred Best, one of the men working with Frissell.

We tied our hauling ropes together and made a long painter and then we pulled the dory, very careful because the ice was very rough, and we didn’t want to jar the men too much. After a long haul we got them out to the ship, and by this time the Sagona was there, stuck in the ice only about 50 yards from our boat, so we put them right aboard the Sagona.

And the men were now coming off from the Horse Islands and boarding the Sagona, too. So the next morning the Sagona was gone; she got out; she didn’t come in quite as far as we were. But we were still stuck in the ice, and we lost four or five days there before we moved. [SRPW 703]

Hayes, Sylvester, p. 33

My buddy owned a Newfoundland dog, Cabot. We sold him to Varick Frissell for $15. When they were going out through the Narrows, the dog jumped overboard and swam ashore. I had a friend killed on the Viking, Eddie Cronin. He was a stowaway. If I didn’t make the Thetis, I was going on the Viking. I had two chances: the Thetis on Saturday, Viking on Monday. [SRPK 302A/B]

Leaman, William John, pp. 4-5

I was in the Eagle then with Captain Wes Kean. We were near St. Anthony and we had to come up to the Viking disaster. My brothers and them were out, and they picked Captain Abie [Abram Jr.] Kean. All hands were out looking. We went over on a pan. Wilson Leaman, my first cousin, said to me, “Look here! That’s like a fellow’s foot.” He was dead on the pan. We picked up the fellow and brought him aboard, and Captain Kean said, “Have he got anything, any name or anything down in his pockets?” They put their hands in his pocket, and they saw, “Name: Peter Bartlett, Conception Bay.” They put him in a big box and put salt on him. A ship came out and took all the men. [SRPK 307A/B]

Linthorne, Arch, pp. 2, 10

We were down in the hold. The movie people done it. That’s who blew her up—the movie people. Them millionaires down from the States; that’s who done that. They had that bomb rigged for Monday morning when all hands would be on the ice. They had the bomb rigged up for 9 o’clock in the morning, and 9 o’clock in the night she went.

It blew the whole stern off her altogether. My brother, Jim, and brother-in-law, Bob Bartlett, were at the wheel. All that was aft went. We all run on deck and jumped overboard. We had Dickie Walker from down here in Brigus [as] master watch. He was an oldish man; he was the leader. He said, “We’re going to the Horse Islands.” The Horse Island people came off to meet us. They had dog teams. We were there three days. We had plenty to eat and drink; we got treated good. And a good place to lie down.

Frissell had a big black dog with him. Oh boy. And the dog went with her; the dog never lived. There was a plane out for a month looking for the dog. The movie men were nice; two nice men to talk to. The poor fellows never got ahead with the picture. [SRKB 839]

Lowe, William, p. 70

Only three men out of the “black gang” [engine room] came out of her. The three engineers went and the three oilers went [died]. Only three firemen got out of her. [SRFW 103A/B]

Moores, William Joseph, p. 10

We left St. John’s and we went north. We killed a couple of thousands seals in White Bay. We had to walk because we didn’t want to push and get caught if the outside ice flow came up. We used to walk about 16 miles. We’d leave at dawn, go in, and get a tow. Back at dinnertime, got your dinner, and go back for another tow. We made two tows a day till we got them. We decided to go north.

There was no ice, just this heavy slob. Then a northwest wind and a blinding snowstorm came on. We hove to all night, and in the morning we came back and anchored under Belle Isle. The sea was too rough to use the galley, so we had nothing to eat for a couple of days. But we started to drag, so we runned into the Straits. The next day we were cutting around but the ice was all abroad because there was no body of ice on the outside coming up the Labrador coast to jam it in. There were a good many scattered seals but not enough for a ship of that size and 220 men. You couldn’t throw your men out; you could only put a few here and a few there.

That evening we picked up a message from Bowring Brothers, a nice lovely evening. Captain Cy read the message: “Viking blown up, 7 miles east of the Horse Islands. Men still on ice. Can you get there in 24 hours?” Now, we were about 279 miles from the Horse Islands. And we give it to her that night, full speed, hold on where you could. She’d strike them big growlers, making about 12 or 14 knots. We came down in 19 hours. We got to the area. The Beothic and Ungava were there, but they couldn’t get in.

So we punched in to about 7 miles of the island and the men were gone ashore. We got there in the night and in the morning they asked for volunteers to go to the island. The Viking’s men, 100-odd men went in to the Horse Islands and ate the 16 families out. They asked us if we would take ashore an average of 10 or 15 pounds of grub to supplement what them men ate. That’s what we done. So we went ashore. I remember I had two big tins of bully beef, about 10 pounds each, and some hard bread and other stuff.

Dr. Frank Moores had come out in the Sagona; he went ashore with us. When we got in about 2 miles, I went down to my waist. Dr. Moores said, “You’re in the water.” I said, “I’m not, that’s ground ice, sish.” We had to pick our way through. That’s how we got in to the island. We went ashore and put all the food we had in the small boats the people had. And we met the survivors coming off.

Some were too bad to walk. They pulled them in dories they had brought in from the Beothic. I remember one guy, a fireman. Dr. Moores stopped him. The fireman had, somehow or other—he was blowed up through the stokehole. He had hooked in something and was raked right down the right side. We searched everywhere. We’d come across old wreckage and broken dories but we never found bodies.

There was a stowaway. They had give him a white canvas jacket. And a man told me he seen him going up and the jacket was red. He came down into the wreckage. Anyhow, we got the Sagona out and she took the survivors in. We went north to Hopedale and the ice was there but few seals. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

Oliver, James, pp. 17, 31

The Viking was just like a big schooner. Wooden one. She was very big. The movie people would call us up. You’d run across the deck and you’d hold fast to the rope and you’d sling yourself over. That’s what they liked the most. They’d take pictures then. They’d give you a good snort of whiskey. I was in me bunk. We were just after having the rosary up in the top house and I came down. I kept me skin boots on, and I got up in the bunk. I was hove right down on the deck out of the bunk with the shock.

And the coal stove was in our place, what they used to call the dungeon. The stove tipped over, full of coal, the coal smoke going up everywhere, and we all scravelled for the steps going up. We got a fright. I put me hand on the stick to get up and there was a fellow trod on me hand and all the sparables in the heel of his boot went down through the back of me hand. We all got up. I think there was 14 bunks in the dungeon. When all hands got up, then all you could see coming up out of the hatch was coal smoke, all afire down there.

There were fellas going everywhere, grabbing clothes. I had only me pants, sweater, and my skin boots. I got an old oilcoat I put on and an old cap I picked up on the deck. There was a raised deck on the Viking and it was blowed off from the raised deck right aft to the rudder. The rudder was sticking up in the stern and she was all afire. The ice was right loose and a big swell on the water. Soon as I jumped over the rails, I went right to my neck. A fellow from Colliers caught me by the oil hat and hauled me up on the ice.

We had to walk ashore. I emptied me boots seven or eight times that night. We had the dories to take the wounded. The captain wasn’t hurt much, only a lot of scratches on his face. He was up on the bridge. This oiler had his arm broke, tied up in slings. We had nine dories when we left, and when we got to the Horse Islands, we had one left. The bottoms fell out of them; the sides fell out of them. The landsmen came out with boats. Boats used for sealing; they had an iron shoe on the keel. They had ropes out from the land about 30 fathoms [180 feet]. You had to catch hold of the rope and go in hand over hand.

There were 17 families there. There were two stoves in every house. We were there three days. The Beothic came and we walked out. They filled up the dories with bread, butter, beef, tea, sugar, and we had to tow them in to the land. We left the dories there. The Imogene was there and the Beothic and the Ungava. They gave a lot of stuff to the people.

The reason a lot of people didn’t get hurt [when thrown from the ship] was because the ice was slishy. If you fell in the slishy stuff, you wouldn’t get hurt. But if you fell on a solid pan, you really would get hurt. The Viking burned until 1 o’clock the next day, with all the fat. The government gave every man $50 worth. We had to go to the Royal Stores to take it up in clothes. [SRKM 523A/B]

Pearce, Israel, pp. 2-3, 16

I went in the Viking my first trip out and that was a bad spring, a bad spring. We got in a storm, and when we got out of the storm, there was nothing left on the deck and no cookware or anything in the galley. She fulled up down in the hold with water, and the bo’sun said, “Boys, if you don’t get her pumped out the Southern Cross is coming.” So we kept her pumped all we could. When the storm was over, we made it in to Poole’s Island. We had the movie people aboard and we were in there a day or so.

On Sunday night we were down having prayers around 9 o’clock, when she was caught in a blaze. I put on my coat and came up. I had a job to get up. Three or four of us jumped over on the ice. The ice was slack and there were people in the water, but that’s all I could do; I was trying to save my own life. We hauled the dory with two fellows in it all broke up, and we reached the Horse Islands about 1 o’clock the next day. They came out with food, and we stayed there a couple of nights.

We were coming through the ice when the movie people blew her up. They dropped the butt in a magazine where the powder was at. [SRBH 710]

Power, Walter, pp. 3-4

There were a good many Catholics in her [Viking] and it came around to say the rosary. Nick Roche from Logy Bay was in her, and he was bridgemaster. He said, “Why don’t you say it?” So I said the rosary, and when I had the rosary said, I said, “Nicks, do you want a drink?” “Well yes,” he said. I had a bottle of moonshine. I got it out and I gave Nicks a drink, and while he was getting down out of the bunk, he broke his teeth, and then she [the Viking] blew up. He said, “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph, we’re all gone.”

All hands rushed on deck. I had no cap on. I said, “It’s just as well to go one way as to go the other.” So I went back down in the hold and unlocked my box. I had a half-dozen pairs of socks, three or four pairs of cuffs, a bottle of moonshine, [and] four pounds of tobacco. I had no reeve strings on my bag and when I came on deck I had only a pair of socks left in the bag. We took the dories off her deck.

One man was pitched from the wheelhouse; he had his back broke. We had another man with his leg broke. So we took the two of them in the dory, and we hauled her all night and about 2 o’clock the second day we got ashore on the Horse Islands. The landsmen came out to meet us. All hands were hungry and thirsty, and they brought us to their homes and gave us food. There were 28 of us in one house. The ships came to pick us up, and we got in [to] St. John’s. The member, Mr. Squires, gave us a bottle of rum between five of us. When we came home [Flatrock], we were all feeling good. So that was the end of the Viking. [C1200/72-133 (M. Wilkinson)]

Spracklin, Ernest, pp. 2, 21

We left St. John’s; there wasn’t much wind, but the second night out we ran into a vicious storm. It was my first trip to the ice, I was 16, and I wasn’t much of a seaman. It was a vicious storm, and sometime during the night, the water started to get into the fires. That was a very, very dangerous situation, and at one point the captain, Abram Kean Jr., came down in the hold to get people to go up and man the hand pumps—the mechanical pump had failed.

I tried to go up through the hatchway, but my brother-in-law, he was my bunkmate, he grabbed me and pulled me back and threw me on the bunk and said, “You stay there.” And I did. But he told me, and I saw it after, they had guidelines all along her deck and the seas were washing over her from one end to the other. And people had to man those pumps and that’s how they kept her going. At one point during the night, the Viking was going whatever the old engine could keep her going, her head in the wind. But she was also going a knot astern.

The galley and everything was all smashed and everything moveable was gone. The master watch, Winters, he lost his life on the Viking; he got her into Poole’s Island, out of the storm. I was one of them that had to shift coal from one side of her to the other to list her over so the experienced guys could get down and find the leaks and caulk the seams below the waterline. We were a day and a half.

The weather abated and we steamed out around Cape Bonavist and in towards the Horse Islands. They decided to push her in and jam her for the night and burn her down. And that’s what they did. It was a Sunday night and we were all down below in the bunks. The next thing the ship vibrated and every light in her went out. It was as black as pitch and you couldn’t see what was going on.

My brother-in-law and I, we still had our clothes on, overalls, Guernsey sweater, and rubber boots. Anyhow, we got out of there and got up through the hatches. Fellows pushing behind trying to get up. When we got up there, a guy said, “You got to get over the side, she’s going to go.” Anyhow, we got over the side. She was jammed in the ice and the ice was very rough, pinnacle ice. Anyway, we got over and got away about 25 or 30 feet from her. There was a group of 35 or 40 men on the side I was on.

The whole stern of the ship was ablaze. You could hear the bullets whistling through the stern when the fire got at them. The fire was pouring out of her, and you could see the propeller. The propeller was out of the water because once the stern blew out of her she lifted up because she was light. And the propeller was turning. A big pan of ice floated by where the propeller was pushing the ice from her and there were two men on that.

In the firelight you could see the blood on them, where they had been smashed up. They tried to stand up and eventually one stood up and they tumbled right out in the water. They were never seen after. There was nothing one could do; we had nothing with us. Anyhow, we stood there for a while and some of the hardened sealers, the experienced sealers, they said, “We can’t stay here; we’ll have to get aboard again.” Some of them went aboard and got two or three dories off her. They undid the lashings and got the dories over the side.

They got out there and they picked up two or three guys that were on the ice. They found them and one of them was Captain Kean. Captain Kean had on a big sheepskin coat, and I’d say that’s what saved him. They put him in a dory, and another fellow broke his leg jumping over the side and they put him in a dory. That dory had about 25 men with her. They got ropes and tied them to the dory and we pulled away from there. One of the guys was a master watch, and he said, “Captain Kean, do you have any idea where we are or what direction?”

Kean opened his eyes and told him which direction to take to go towards the land. Now, it was all rafted ice and growlers and pinnacle ice, and you could not walk in a straight line. It was impossible; you had to go around them and tow the dories. We walked all night and pulled our dory all that night. The next morning you could see groups of people in different areas; say 20 in a group 100 yards in one direction, probably 30 or 40 men somewhere else a bit further ahead of you.

The next afternoon, before dusk, we got ashore on the Horse Islands. They were people on the shore watching, waiting for us to get in. We could see them. When we got in, they did have a dog team there and they took the captain and the other wounded man who was with us. They took them away to a hospital or nursing home or whatever they had on the Horse Islands. Now, some of us did get wet trying to get ashore because there was a wash going on and the ice was falling in and falling out. There were only pans of ice and you had to run and jump to get ashore. So some people did get wet then.

But then we were ashore. I stayed with a family named Bartlett. I think she was the aunt of the wireless operator. Twelve of us stayed in her house. We took off our boots. They threw cold water down in my rubber boots because they were stuck to my feet, froze on to my feet. They threw cold water down there so they could get the rubber boots off. There were other people there the same as me; some had their hands frozen and cut, and some had their nails torn where they’d slide and try to grab the pinnacles of ice.

These people on the Horse Islands treated us good. They were isolated from October to May and had to get everything brought in, in the fall, to last them all winter. They were great people; it is hard to believe they could treat so many people, 100-odd, coming ashore like that. Mrs. Bartlett had her family and 12 of us. We had a big feed of brewis, saltfish [and] brewis. But she apologized. I can see her now, she was a nice woman. She said, “I have no potatoes to put in the brewis, only hard bread and saltfish.” She made soup. I think it was seal soup and bird soup and a big pot of porridge. I understand they sent down food after we came back to help them keep going until the spring of the year.

We stayed there two or two and a half days and then we had to walk back again over the ice to get to the boats. They couldn’t come in to the Horse Islands. We had a great big line of men going out; whatever was on the island all kept together and walked out. The boat I came back on was the Sagona; there were about four other ships out there that time, the Imogene, Beothic, Franklin, and one other further out. We got on the Sagona and that was full of doctors and nurses. Cluny MacPherson, I think, was the doctor in charge. They got the wounded on, and we came back to St. John’s.

Now, there were some people never got ashore. They were out on the ice. We didn’t see them; we knew about that after. They were out there, and they froze. Like Clayton King from Brigus, the wireless operator. He was blown out on the ice, and he never moved after that. He stayed right there, and he lost his legs because they were frozen. Captain Kennedy, the navigator, died on one of the boats on the way back to St. John’s. Jack Breaker [?] died on the ice trying to get to the Horse Islands.

I believe one of the men that was on the pan of ice while she was still burning was Frissell. I believe he was the one that tried to stand up, his face nothing but a mass of red. He tried to stand, and he just tottered and fell right into the water.

The magazine [powder, etc] was right on her stern, probably 6 feet wide and the whole depth from her keel up. Now, that’s where all this stuff was stored.

Now, when you’d burn down in the ice, you’d put flares on the deck—a wick in a can with old grease or something, like a lantern with no cover. These were put around the deck to warn other ships. The theory that a good many sealers had is that one of those things did the damage.

Anyhow, we got back to St. John’s on the Sagona, and they took all the disabled ones, the ones who needed medical attention, they took them off first. Then they took us to the YMCA and looked after us. We were there two days. Then they gave us all a slip of paper and we went to the Royal Stores, and we could take up clothing and stuff like that to the value of $50. Then they sent up back home to Brigus. [SRKB 828]

WATCH

Keel, Heber, pp. 8, 37

We had three-hour watches: 8 to 11, 11 to 2, 2 to 4, and a 4 o’clock breakfast [1941, Terra Nova]. Sometimes we’d split the watch. The dog watch was 5 to 6:30 and 6:30 to 8. The worst watch was 11 to 2. You’d lie down at 8 or 9 o’clock. At 11 o’clock you had to get up and go on watch stowing seals. Then you had to be up for your breakfast at 4 o’clock. Hardly no sleep at all. [SRPK 324]

Moores, William Joseph, p. 60

You’d hold your watch till you finished discharging. You had three-hour watches. Three eights. Say you went 8 to 11, 11 to 2, 2 to 4 (the dog watch changes the watch), 4 to 6, 6 to 8. Well now, you’d hold them watches till you got in St. John’s. There were too many men to put all hands discharging the one time. You’d split the crowd; you’d put one crowd on one day and the next day they’d be off, till she was discharged. About 50 men in each watch. [SRKM 504, 505A/B]

WATCH (DOG WATCH)

Gosse, Pat, p. 22

You’d be just finished your supper and you’d get what is called the dog watch. It was two hours. That was a good night’s sleep. You’d go on at 6 and come off at 8. Well, then you had from 8 until 4 the next morning. Every four days you’d get that. When you’d get that shift, that’s when you’d cook a bit of liver for yourself. [SRMD 411]

WHEELSMEN

Butt, Cyril, p. 41

There was a special wheelman in every watch. [SRKM 501]

Porter, Taylor, p. 28

I was wheelmaster and I was responsible and there were three men with me. Four men to the wheel, a double wheel, higher than my head. One wheelmaster in every watch, two hours to the wheel, then another watch would take over. [SRKB 809, 873]

Spracklin, Walt, pp. 7-8

We were all on the decks waiting, so many on the sidesticks, when Captain Dominey sang out and put up his finger for me to come up, and certainly I did. I went up with my gaff in my hand and my bag and rope on my back, went on up in the bridge. He said, “Sure, are you any good to steer?” I said, “I had never done anything like that in my life.” He said, “Too good to learn?” “No, sir,” I said, “I’m not.” He said, “One of our wheelmen is sick, would you mind doing it?” I said to him, “I know nothing about compasses and that.”

He said, “You come from Brigus?” I said, “Yes.” He said, “Good men come from Brigus. No problem. The barrelman will tell you which way to go. He could use his hands for you if you don’t know starboard and port.” I said, “I’m up to that. I’ll do it.” I spent three days aboard of her steering in my turn. I used to get meals down forward just the same as one of the crew. And Captain Dominey was a nice man. If I went back to the ice again, maybe I would have gone with him. [SRKB 833]

WHELPING

Dodd, Jack, pp. 3-5

We had some old-timers aboard [1921?] and one fellow stood out to me. He called me up on deck. He said, “Do you see two foxes over there on the ice eating something?” I said, “What would they be eating?” He said, “They’re eating parts of seals. This looks to me like this ice is a whelping pan, and it wouldn’t surprise me a bit if we’re going to strike the seals.”

The afternoon of the 12th we found the seals. You could hear them squealing, but you couldn’t touch them until the 15th. You could hear them on this side and on that side and on the head. We were after running into them and he was afraid to stop the boat, afraid he’d get jammed in the ice, and he was keeping going, and you could hear thousands of seals screeching—the young ones crying for their mothers.

The old mother feeds them just before night; then they go down and they don’t come back until morning, and the young ones are hungry. You could bring the little whitecoats in your arms. They weighed about 40 pounds and they looked so cute. There were times we had the deck full of whitecoats, and the captain used to say, “Throw them over, throw them over.”

We put them over and even tied ribbons around their necks. If it was a frosty night the next morning the string on the ribbon would be sunk in the flesh. They’d grow that much overnight. If the night was warm, you couldn’t see any difference in the string, but if it was frosty they’d grow. On the morning of the 15th he blew the whistle for us to go. It was like going over the top in the war. [C2827/75-189 (Patricia Penney)]

O’Neill, Arthur, p. 53

The way it was with seals, they’d find the hardest ice. They don’t pup on bad ice. They make sure they get good ice, ice that’s good from the time the pup is born until he’d old enough to look after himself. [SRKM 516]

WHITECOATS

Butt, Henry, p. 9

They were always bigger in the Gulf. In 1934 they were big fellows: they were averaging 90 and 100 pounds. Now, out on the Front the seals were not so big and a lot of times they’d average 50 to 60 pounds. [SRKB 851]

WILCOX, CAPTAIN SAMMY

Morgan, Fred, p. 13

We went into Trepassey and anchored the Thetis that night, and we left in the morning. Captain Wilcox said, “Boys, the gulls are flying high. It’s going to blow.” We spent a day and a night hove to. I guarantee you it was blowing. [SRKB 859]

WINSOR, CAPTAIN BILLY

Dodd, Jack, pp. 11-14

We were doubling pans and a big lake of water broke in the ice about a mile wide [1921]. It trapped 27 of us on one side. We couldn’t even see the ship. Our master watch got across to be with us, and he told us our ship was jammed. He said, “I don’t know what to think of it, and it looks like there’s a snowstorm coming.” He said, “Don’t sit down. It’s pretty cold. Keep walking around.”

We had two fellows there, two brothers, and one was crying. Someone said, “Jim, what are you crying about?” He said, “George and I will be lost and when poor Mother hears of this it’s going to break her heart.” The master watch said, “You’re nuts. What are you talking about? You’re not going to die. Our ship will be picking us up.” He said, “Our ship is jammed, sir, and she’ll never get to us. The snow is coming and we’ll never live the night. I’m going to lie down. It’s just as well to lie down first as last.” The master watch said, “You’re not lying down.” We tried to get a fire going but couldn’t, and some of us were wet and the clothes were freezing.

About 12 o’clock in the night it cleared, and someone said, “There’s our ship coming.” How glad we were to see the lights and hear the ice grinding, but when she got handy to us, it wasn’t our ship, it was the Thetis. Her captain, Billy Winsor, had men out also and was looking for them. He was on the bridge, and he said, “What ship do you belong to?” Our master watch hollered out as best he could through the squall, “The Diana.” “Well,” he said, “your ship is jammed about 20 miles from here.” Our master watch said, “Captain, are you going to take us aboard?” “Oh,” he said, “I got my own men to look out for.”

That wasn’t very encouraging, and the Thetis steamed away from us. I’ll never forget as we watched her lights go down and then finally die away in the squall of snow. Anyhow, around 3 o’clock, he came back. He wasn’t a bad guy, but he was supposed to be a tough captain. He came back up this length of water again, and he said, “Stand by, I’m going to pick you up.” Oh, I’ll never forget how glad we were.

We scrambled to the side and two or three fellows fell in the water. They didn’t wait until the ship got right in and she broke up the pans they were on. So we got aboard and went down in the hold. We knew some fellows and they tried to make us comfortable. The captain came down himself, and said, “Stand by now; you’re going to get a grog.” This was rum, and these were prohibition days. He sent down a fellow with a jar and a tin mug. When he came to me he said, “How much do you want?” I said, “The full amount.” “Oh no,” he said, “that’s too much for you.”

So he gave me half a mug of rum. Well, was it ever strong! I had to make five or six gulps to get it down, and I got drunk. I wasn’t used to drinking. It seems we all got a jag on because the older fellows got more. Captain Billy Winsor was there and he didn’t look like a captain at all. He looked like one of the men; he looked so rough and tumble. Then he went up and the men said that we could get in their bunks and have a little rest. Just as I got in the bunk, I think about 5 o’clock, someone said, “All the Diana’s men on deck.” I wasn’t even gone to sleep. So we went up, and he put us all overboard, put us on the ice. I said, “My God, this fellow is crazy.” Now, all he was after doing was to put us on the other side of the lake where our ship was jammed. We couldn’t see her. She was about 20 miles away and we had walk to her. It was about 5:30 in the morning, and we walked and walked and walked and our master watch kept us cheered up. [C2827/75-189 (Patricia Penney)]

Gosse, Pat, p. 34

Captain Billy Winsor was a big man. I went in and asked him would he give me a berth. Gordon Thorne was getting his. He said, “Yes, now take me on your back and bring me across the street and bring me back.” I said, “You get on.” So he got on my back—I suppose he was 200 pounds. When he got on my back, I brought him across the street and brought him back. He said, “Come in,” and he fulled a tumbler of rum and the two of us sat down. [SRMD 411]

Hayden, Thomas, p. 16

Stan Barbour was a real gentleman, but Billy Winsor was a devil. He’d curse and swear and do it all. You had to give him his due. He was a wonderful sealing captain. If the seals were out there, and he located them, you could be sure you’d make a bill. [SRKM 513]

Kelloway, Ephraim, p. 2

I was with Captain Sid Hill one spring and Captain Peter Carter one spring, but all the rest [10-12] were with Billy Winsor. A good man. He was a hard man, too. You had to go; no grass was growing under your feet with Billy Winsor. [SRBH 715]

Maddox, Arthur, pp. 2, 14

He’d get a seal before he’d get a man. We had some good captains out there. Best kind. Old Billy Winsor, I’d say he was the worst that was out there. I was only with him a couple of times. [SRBH 707A]

Maddox, Thomas, p. 12

As long as he got the seals he didn’t care what the men did. Some people, especially down around his own home, thought a lot about him. [SRPK 326]

Sacrey, Dorman, p. 9

Captain Bill Winsor was a great sealer. He came down off the Horse Islands one time and the people saw him. Now, the people [landsmen] would never tell the vessels where the seals were but they used to go aboard to hear the news. So Father and John Lacey went aboard. The captain gave them a few drinks, and they chatted. They got so drunk they told him where the seals were. Captain Winsor gave Father and John Lacey about two pounds of tea each, but they were so drunk they left the bag open and had nothing when they got home. [C598/69-23 (Zach Sacrey)]

Thorne, Gordon, pp. 4, 5, 17

Billy Winsor was a hard man. A good man, but he wanted everybody to do his work. He was right ambitious. I’ll never forget the words he said to me. He said, “The devil will take the last man. I hope he won’t take you.” Captain Winsor wasn’t out in 1933 because the Commission of Government wouldn’t let him command a ship. If he wanted to command a ship, he had to give up his job as Minister of Telegraphs. And he couldn’t do that.

I used to go in and see him once in a while in the post office, and he’d say, “I may talk them out of it.” But he couldn’t. They wouldn’t let him go. Soon he was back again. He was back again to take his holidays and go to the seal fishery in 1935. He was a great man. I liked him a lot. He had to have seal every day while he was out there. Seal had to be cooked for him: flippers, carcasses, liver, hearts, something. He just loved it.

He first went with Captain Sam Blandford, just an ordinary hand, a deck hand. He went from that to bridgemaster, master watch, and then he went second hand with him. And he was comical you know. He said, “That wasn’t the best of it. He [Sam Blandford] had a lovely daughter and I got her too [Jose].” She and Billy Winsor had a couple of lovely daughters. They’d be down in the morning when we’d be sailing.

He was a clever-looking man. Great big full eyes, a round face, and he’d be up there and the daughters would be hollering out to him, “Best of luck.” He was good. He was always lucky. He always got his share of seals, more than his share sometimes. One spring we didn’t get anything, the steering gear broke. That was his fault because he ran her full speed astern. He made a blank that spring [1937]. The steering gear broke. That was his [Billy Winsor’s] fault because he ran her up full astern where she was only going easy astern. But he figured if she got back a bit and got a good butt in, she’d go ahead further. The Neptune had to take a line to us going in the Narrows. We could steer her along with the winches out of the land, but you couldn’t take a chance on going in through the Narrows. That’s the only blank I made. The rest of them were all good. [SRMD 410A/B]

WIRELESS

Stevenson, Robert Louis, pp. 2, 12

My first trip on the Imogene I was the wireless operator, but I did not get a share of the seals. On my second trip I did. I fought for it. Eight a.m. to 8 p.m. I was more or less on duty. When they got two hands, that meant a continuous watch. The Marconi Company owned the gear that was aboard. They owned the sets. They installed them. I was hired by Marconi. [SRMD 414A/B]

WOMEN

Kelly, Jack, pp. 12-13

In the early days the women went out from Joe Batt’s Arm Point and pulled in seals—the name was swiles then. One old lady, Sis Hackett, she married Will Jacobs in the States after; she told me that when she was a young girl she went out to Joe Batt’s Arm Point and pulled in seals in the spring of the year. She went out with the men. And Jerry Donahue’s mother, she hauled seals, too. [SRKH 408, 409]

WORK ON BOARD

Bragg, Thomas, p. 4

You’d really work. You’d be shovelling coal all the time. You left St. John’s loaded with coal and you had to take that coal out before you could get any seals down. You had to have so many empty pounds for the seals to go down into. [SRPK 340]

WORK ON SHORE

Healey, Paul, pp. 23-25

My father worked at the seal fishery on shore for quite a number of years. They [and his friends] lived in a house on the Southside for $4 or $5 per week, six or seven in one room. They used to go to work at 6 in the morning and come back for their breakfast at 8 o’clock. They used to buy their food in a corner store, quarter pound of cheese, quarter pound of bacon, bologna, tin of milk, pound of sugar. And I can remember my father coming home to Maddox Cove on a Saturday night with a $20 bill in his pocket after the whole week. He’d get three weeks to a month at the seals every year. [SRPK 306A/B]

Hiscock, Lester, pp. 2, 19

I started with Bowring’s in 1931. The first job I got was answering the telephone in the office; I made $6 a week. After that I got moved up to the loft at the skins: cleaning them and washing them, salting them and packing them in puncheons. The rum used to come here in puncheons and Bowring’s used to buy the puncheons to send the skins to England. They used to draw off the seal oil and they had a big glass house where they used to refine the oil. And then it used to go aboard the tankers—Olympic or Driller—and go to Lever Brothers in England.

They’d have a big round pan, about 9 inches in diameter, used for skimming seal oil off and pouring it into barrels through a funnel. It was made of copper and lined with lead. [SRJP 301]

Noseworthy, Hans, p. 15

A lot of fellows used to come to look for work on the Southside, from Petty Harbour, Torbay, and different areas; in the early 30s. I can remember them coming in on dog slides from Petty Harbour. They’d have four or five dogs and they’d go along the road on the catamarans and then they’d find a certain place and tie their dogs up. On the back of St. Mary’s School you’d see five or six, or seven or eight, maybe ten dog teams and a couple of men on each sled. There were times I see them parked on the back of Bannikan’s Tannery on Waterford Bridge Road. They’d get feed there for the dogs, and they’d stay there until it would be time to go home in the evening. [SRPK 356]

WORK ON THE ICE

Bragg, Thomas, p. 5

Sometimes the ship would get jammed and we would have to walk to the seals, maybe 5 or 6 miles. If the ship still couldn’t get to them, you’d double up the pans. You’d haul one pan and put it on another and you might have 1,000 or 1,500 on the one pan. If the ship still couldn’t get to them, you’d haul them aboard. As you get a few aboard, you’d make it heavier, and maybe she’d work herself into where they were to. [SRPK 340]

Butt, Cyril, p. 22

Fellows would act blind and sick just to get a day aboard, especially if they were out for four or five days. [SRKM 501]

Power, James, p. 11

And there was a fellow from Job’s firm, Tommy Job, on her, and when I came aboard in the evening, he brought me up to Tommy Job, the master watch did, up to the captain and Tommy Job, because I did 105 seals. Eighty seals was a big day’s work for anybody but, now I’m going to tell you, I was more tender in the stomach the next morning than Tommy Job was. I used to shove in on myself to cough. And along with sculping them, I batted for the master watch because he was an older, middle-aged fellow, and the Imogene was coming up from down north and she could scour the ocean and take what seals was there away from you. By juniper, it was some hard. [SRKM 512A/B]

Conclusion

As James Boswell wrote at the beginning of his great study of Samuel Johnson (of course, in a different context), how does one write the story of a great writer who so often had written great biographies of others? My question is, How can I, a simple observer, draw conclusions about the lives of Newfoundland sealers that can come anywhere near doing real justice to their careers and lives in the sealing industry? But I have tried by publishing The Ice Hunters (1994) and now by inviting them to speak for themselves. This is the result.

Newfoundland sealing during the modern coal-burning-steamer era (c.1914-1950), as portrayed in the memories of the individuals included in this study, leads to interesting conclusions. These conclusions show the daily lives of the ordinary sealers, particularly on the ships and on the ice, and their families, as well as the captains and, to some extent, the businesses which invested in the sealing enterprise.

The long interviews give a picture of the overall industry, particularly that of the chief participant—Bowring’s. It is made clear by Derrick Bowring that the industry had a fatal flaw in that it could not pay for itself because it lasted only about a month. In the beginning, about 1800, the fishermen could use the same boats for cod fishing in the summer months bringing supplies around the coastal outports in the fall and sealing in the spring. In addition, boat building and small ship building were carried out in the winter months. However, the increasing size of boats and ships promoted the importation of shipping and ruined that enterprise and the introduction of steam power in the 1860s made sealing in wooden brigs and schooners uncompetitive and impractical. A more modern example, the extremely efficient ice hunter, the SS Imogene, could not be usefully employed all year long, and when it was lost, it was never replaced. Only the old coal-burning steamers that had once been used to carry saltfish to market were kept tied up in St. John’s and used for sealing.

But despite all the negativity recorded about the seal hunt, it is obvious that it was an activity that was attractive to the underemployed fishermen of Newfoundland. Men, especially younger men, often tried desperately to acquire a “berth to the ice.” Remembering that the Great Depression struck in 1929 with the Wall Street collapse and that had been preceded by the post-Great War depression of c.1918 and then followed by Newfoundland’s loss of Responsible Government in 1934, it is not difficult to understand that employment opportunities, especially for fishermen, were extremely bleak.

Furthermore, people could no longer emigrate to America, where immigration was closed because of the Depression. Three of my aunts and one uncle managed to do so on the grounds that their father had become an American citizen in 1896 but upon returning home found that Robert Bond’s new government was promising work and delivered upon his promise mostly because competition in the saltfish markets favoured Newfoundland until 1908 and the succeeding government under Edward Morris borrowed heavily to build branch rail lines and there was general prosperity until the post-war period. His American citizenship thus became the key to part of his family members moving to the USA.

The ordinary sealers can be seen as hard working and energetic to the point of the unbelievable—the distances walked is a prime example: The men from the Wesleyville area faced a 60-mile walk hauling 60-70-pound sleds with their belongings, and the stories of hours of travelling over the rough ice on the Front and the longer treks over, granted, smoother ice in the Gulf where towing seal pelts to the ships at the ice edge could take a half day with only enough daylight to make two tows per day. They were often forced to go overboard onto the ice while their ship was moving, and come back on board the same way. And they spent this workday of daylight to dark with only hard bread provided by the ship owners, supplemented with a handful of raisins and oatmeal brought from home and hearts cut from the seals they killed. In addition, the day’s work was often accomplished while soaking wet from falling into the water. And at night they usually worked for four hours stowing seal pelts, shifting coal, and dumping ashes—8-10 p.m. or 12-4 a.m.—allowing them only a maximum of four hours for sleep.

The sealers were generally tolerant of and kind to each other. Take the case of the man who offered to haul his neighbour’s sled to Gambo in addition to his own. His neighbour, though ill and probably elderly, thought that he could manage on the ice if only he could get to the Gambo railway station and travel on to St. John’s, where he could board the sealing ship for which he had his ticket. He walked to Gambo and eventually joined his ship in St. John’s, and it is implied that he enjoyed a successful voyage. Respect was shown to Roman Catholics who said their rosary in the hold of the ship on Sunday nights and most understood Methodist opposition to the killing on Sundays. Then there was the concern over men who were sick or ice-blind; and the acceptance that some men were too old to stow pelts and too old and slow to quinter from the ship’s side. The rest of the sealers on the ships understood this and supported them.

The food supplied to the ordinary sealers was much inferior to that which was served the captain and officers, but certainly after the 1916 legislation it greatly improved. Lopscouse or beans for breakfast with hard bread and sometimes freshly baked soft bread accompanied with butter and tea could help maintain their strength and energy on the ice. As mentioned, most men brought dry rolled oats and raisins from home to eat on the ice with hard bread and readily available raw seal hearts. After 1916, supper was generally boiled duff and salt beef; barrels of the latter and barrels of flour provided the basic diet. The ships were also generally well supplied with tea, salt pork—often eaten raw—hard bread, and butter. Many men cooked seal hearts, liver, and seal meat with onions at night when the cooks were off duty and the cooking stoves were not being used. In general, the men were quite contented with the food during the period under study, that is, until they were invited aboard the Norwegian sealing ships sailing from Nova Scotia in the late 1930s and throughout the 1940s and 1950s. Then the contrast between Newfoundland and Norwegian working and living conditions stood out with startling differences. By then a number of Newfoundland sealers went annually to Halifax to join Norwegian ships for their trip to the ice.

Getting berths “to the ice” (hardly was it referred to as berths for the seal hunt or fishery) was considered an important part of the sealing experience. As can be seen in the interview excerpts and longer narratives, it happened in various ways. Clergymen were a popular source for berths if the fisherman supported his priest or minister financially. Andy Short describes instances where he managed in this way, and one can assume that he paid his church dues regularly. One’s local community merchant or shopkeeper was another source and these local dealers expected the fishermen to spend their money at their shops and deal with them on a regular basis. In addition, before 1934 many politicians were able to get berths for their favourite constituents; for example, Peter Cashin relates how his father, Michael Cashin, always received berths from his old friend, Captain Arthur Jackman. Naturally, that practice ceased in 1934 when the Commission of Government replaced the local Responsible Government, so for most of the period of this study, it was not a factor. But as one informant stated, there were many ways to obtain a berth, including the use of alcohol.

By having the sealers to speak for themselves, the reader can better appreciate their lives and work efforts. Only one informant mentions “a rite of passage” to manhood as part of the first berth “to the ice” obtained by a young man. As the interview in question occurred in the 1980s, this statement was obviously copied from the jargon introduced by the social scientists at MUN in the 1960s, who had an urge to explain Newfoundland’s developments using their vocabulary and not that of the sealers. The sealers’ own explanations are much more satisfying.

Maybe if confederation with Canada had been rejected in favour of responsible government, Newfoundland’s seal and cod resources would have been better protected; but would health care and education quality have been advanced? In recent decades, Canadian/Newfoundland seal hunters have come under much criticism for hunting seals and more money has been made by many of the people opposing the seal harvest than hunters can make in the industry itself. However, as we (in 2014) can observe, this seems to be changing as we are all beginning to accept that a balanced approach to harvesting the resources of the seas is possible and necessary.

Acknowledgements

I must take this opportunity to thank the following for their advice, assistance, and support: Mary Devine (vice-president of the Newfoundland Historical Society [NHS] in the early 1980s); George Story (a past president of the NHS), and Gordon Handcock, who succeeded Mary Devine as NHS’s vice-president and the other members of the NHS executive. They all joined in sponsoring the Oral History Project. In addition, I thank the federal civil servants who administered the funds on behalf of the Canada Employment and Immigration Commission (CEIC): Calvin Smith and James Howard, and James Jamieson, who regularly audited the project. I also called upon Philip Hiscock, who was in charge of the Memorial University’s Folklore and Language Archives (MUNFLA), to give us seminars on the correct way to conduct oral history research. I also asked assistance from Diane Dawson, then senior secretary of the History Department, to perform a similar function in the use of computers, which were just beginning to replace typewriters. I must thank both individuals. I must also thank those who helped me in recent years to prepare this publication: Mekaela Mahoney, for her role in helping me organize the material; Fran Warren, administration officer of the History Department; Renee Clowe, secretary to the Head of the Department; and Dr. Iona Bulgin. And, last but not least, the various Heads of the History Department, including the most recent, Dr. Sean Cadigan, who have helped me to proceed smoothly with this work.

Appendix 1

Informants

A

Abbott, Harold—Bonavista, b.1913, Year Interviewed (Int.) 1986

Abbott, Wallace—Bonavista, b.1909, Int.1986

Adams, George—Brigus, b.1911, Int.1987

Andrews, Arthur—Cape Island, b.1908, Int.1986

Andrews, Lester—Wesleyville, b.1921, Int.1986

Andrews, Mrs. Martha—Wesleyville, b.1916, Int.1986

Andrews, Wilfred—Cape Island, b.1903, Int.1986

Angel, John Bartlett—St. John’s, b.1913, Int.1986

B

Badcock, Fred—Bay Roberts, b.1916, Int.1987

Badcock, Harold—Coley’s Point, b.1914, Int.1987

Badcock, Robert—Coley’s Point, b.1910, Int.1987

Badcock, William—Bay Roberts, b.1912, Int.1987 (twice)

Barbour, Capt. Carl (b. 1900) and Elsie—Newtown, Int.1986

Barrett, Nath—Bishop’s Cove, b.?, Int.1987

Bartlett, Clarence—Bareneed, b.1909, Int.1987

Batten, Roland—Bareneed, b.1916, Int.1987

Beecham, Jack-Allan—Bareneed, b.1903, Int.1987

Best, Jacob (b. 1900) and Agnes—Brookfield, Int. 1986

Best, Thomas—Wesleyville, b.1920, Int.1986

Bishop, Jacob—Wesleyville, b.1903, Int.1987

Blackmore, Capt. Wilfred I.—St. John’s, b.1920, Int.1986

Blackwood, Capt. Samuel—Brookfield, b.1914, Int.1987

Boone, Jack—Clarke’s Beach, b.1911, Int.1987

Boone, John T.—South River, b.1911, Int.1987

Boone, Kenneth—Seldom, b.1918, Int.1987

Boone, Mac—Clarke’s Beach, b.1907, Int.1987

Boone, Robert—Bareneed, b.1911, Int.1987

Boone, William—Bareneed, b.1909, Int.1987

Bowe, Eddie—Big Pond/Bay Bulls, b.1906, Int.1986/87

Bowring, Derrick—Liverpool, England, b.1916, Int.1986

Bragg, Fred—Pouch Cove, b.1907, Int.1986

Bragg, Thomas—Greenspond, b.1915, Int.1986

Brazil John W.—Renews, b.1909, Int.1987

Breen, Elizabeth—Fox Cove, b.1893, Int.1987

Brewer, Newman—Grates Cove, b.1917, Int.1987

Burry, George—Greenspond, b.1925, Int.1986

Burry, Stephen—Greenspond, b.1907, Int.1986

Butler, Augustus—Bonavista, b.1912, Int.1986

Butt, Cyril—Carbonear, b.1917, Int.1986

Butt, Henry—Carbonear, b.1913, Int.1987

C

Carter, Roland—Wesleyville, b.1908, Int.1986

Chafe, Angus—St. John’s, b.1917, Int.1986/87

Chafe, Cyril S.—St. John’s, b.?, Int.1976

Chafe, Edward—St. John’s, b.1920, Int.1986

Chafe, Jacob—Petty Harbour, b.1910, Int.1986

Chaisson, John P.—De Grau, Port au Port, b.1898, Int.1977

Christopher, William—Port de Grave, b.1896, Int.1987

Clarke, Allan P.—Victoria, b.1916, Int.1987

Coady, William Sr.—St. John’s, b.1916, Int.1987

Cobb, Norman—Barr’d Islands, b.1914, Int.1987

Codner, Jesse—Torbay, b.1911, Int.1986/87

Codner, William Sr.—Torbay, b.1894, Int.1986

Cole, Florence—Victoria, b.1921, Int.1987

Coles, Job—Elliston, b.1900, Int.1986

Collins, Ernest—Durrell, b.1941, Int.1987

Combden, Raymond—Wild Cove, b.1910, Int.1987

Connolly, Robert J.—Bristol’s Hope, b.1899, Int.1986

Cornick, Cyril—Lewisporte, b.1906, Int.1986

Crawford, John—Carbonear, b.1900, Int.1987

Curran, James—Ferryland, b.1897, Int.1987

D

Dawe, Frank—Coley’s Point, b.1892, Int.1987

Dawe, Harvey—Port de Grave, b.1904, Int.1987

Dawe, Thomas—Hibbs Cove, b.1913, Int.1987

Donhue, John—Joe Batt’s Arm, b.1910, Int.1987

Donhue, Len—Joe Batt’s Arm, b.1915, Int.1987

Doyle, Robert—St. John’s, b.1924, Int.1987

E

Earle, Fred—Carbonear, b.1924, Int.1986 (twice)

Escott, Mrs. Philip—St. John’s, b.1896, Int.1986

F

Fitzgerald, Edward—North River, b.1921, Int.1987

Fleet, John—St. John’s, b.1929, Int.1986

Fleming, James—Spillars Cove, b.1905, Int.1986

Flynn, Francis—Sydney, NS, b.1918, Int.1987

Flynn, William—Spaniard’s Bay, b.1903, Int.1987

Foley, Harold—Tilting, b.1913, Int.1987

Fowler, Don—Cupids, b.1917, Int.1987

Frampton, Capt. Max—Smith Sound, b.1921, Int.1986

French, Lionel—Bay Roberts, b.1915, Int.1987

Fry, James—English Cove, b.1904, Int.1987

G

Gaulton, Jesse—Cape Freels, b.1911, Int.1986

Gaulton, Walter—St. John’s, b.1905, Int.1986

George, Bernard—Carbonear, b.1932, Int.1986

Gifford, William—Port de Grave, b.1913, Int.1987

Gill, Heber—Pinchard’s Island, b.1908, Int.1987

Gillett, Capt. James—Twillingate, b.1909, Int.1986

Gillett, William (Capt. C.W.)—Twillingate, b.1905, Int.1986

Goodridge, Charles—St. John’s, b.1910, Int.1987

Goodridge, Ronald—St. John’s, b.1914, Int.1987

Gosse, Doug—Torbay, b.1922, Int.1986

Gosse, Eric—Spaniard’s Bay, b.1912, Int.1987

Gosse, Madeline—St. John’s, b.1915, Int.1987

Gosse, Pat—Torbay, b.1914, Int.1986

Green, Capt. John—Little Bay East, b.1907, Int.1986

H

Hancock, Capt. William—Change Islands, b.1920, Int.1986

Harris, Mrs. Pauline—St. John’s, b.1921, Int.1986

Hayden, Thomas—Carbonear, b.1908, Int.1986

Hayes, Sylvester—St. John’s, b.1917, Int.1986/87

Hayward, Charles—Bonavista, b.1891, Int.1986

Healey, Paul—Maddox Cove, b.1911, Int.1986

Hearn, Andrew—Sydney, NS, b.1911, Int.1986

Hearn, Michael—Harbour Grace, b.1910, Int.1976

Hiscock, Lester—South Side/St. John’s, b.1920, Int.1987

Hoskins, Edgar—Greenspond, b.1918?, Int.1986

Hounsell, Capt. Thomas

Humphries, Maxwell—Cape Freels, b.1908, Int.1986

Hussey, William—Port de Grave, b.1907, Int.1987

Hutchings, Ambrose—Spaniard’s Bay, b.1908, Int.1986

K

Kane, Thomas—Renews, b.1896, Int.1987

Kean, Captain Abner—Pool’s Island, b.1897, Int.1986

Kean, Miss Annie—Pool’s Island, b.1895, Int.1986

Kean, Charlie

Kean, Edgar—Hermit Cove, b.1908, Int.1986

Kean, Job—Brookfield, b.1930, Int.1986

Keefe, Tom—Bay Roberts, b.1908, Int.1987

Keel, Heber—Bonavista, b.1914, Int.1986 (twice)

Keel, James—Bonavista, b.1914, Int.1986

Keel, Roy Sr.—Bonavista, b.1914, Int.1986

Kelloway, Arthur—Salmon Cove, b.1915?, Int.1987

Kelloway, Ephraim—Wesleyville, b.1897, Int.1986

Kelloway, William—Salmon Cove, b.1909, Int.1987

Kelly, Jack—Joe Batt’s Arm, b.1919, Int.1987

Kennedy, William—Harbour Grace, b.1909, Int.1987

L

Lahey, Ray—South Dildo, b.1903, Int.1986

Lane, Watson—Faire [or Deer] Island, b.1922, Int.1986

Leaman, William—Petty Harbour, b.1908, Int.1986

Linthorne, Arch—Long Pond, b.1905, Int.1987

Lowe, William—St. John’s, b.1906, Int.1986/87

M

Maddox, Arthur—King’s Cove, b.1920, Int.1986

Maddox, Steven—King’s Cove, b.1915, Int.1986

Maddox, Thomas—King’s Cove, b.1910, Int.1986

Mahle, Captain Henry—Bud, Norway, b.1922, Int.1986

Maloney, Cyril—Bay Bulls, b.1903, Int.1987

Marshall, Chesley—South River, b.1914, Int.1987

Martin, Edward—St. John’s, b.1914, Int.1987

Mason, James—Melrose, b.1926, Int.1986

Maunder, Aubrey—St. John’s, b.1907, Int.1986

McCann, Jerry—Gull Island, b.1892, Int.1974/5

McCarthy, Justin—Harbour Grace, b.1927, Int.1986

Menchions, Isaac—Spaniard’s Bay, b.1916, Int.1987

Menchions, Wallace—Bay Roberts, b.1914, Int.1987

Menchions, William—Bishop’s Cove, b.1915, Int.1987

Mifflin, Sam—Bonavista, b.1907, Int.1986

Moores, William Joseph—Carbonear, b.1911, Int.1986

Morgan, Fred—Port de Grave, b.1910, Int.1987

Mouland, Cecil*—Doting Cove, Musgrave Harbour, Int.1986

Mouland, Hughie—Int.1986

Mugford, Joe—Clarke’s Beach, b.1908, Int.1987

Mulcahy, John J.—Bay Bulls, b.1918, Int.1987

Mullaley, Elizabeth—Northern Bay, b.1891, Int.1987

Mullins, Stephen—Greenspond, b.1891, Int.1986

Murphy, Cyril—Keels, b.1910, Int.1987

Murphy, Mrs. Ruperta (Paddy)—St. John’s, b.1918, Int.1986

Murphy, Ted—St. John’s, b.1920, Int.1986

N

Noseworthy, Annie—Spaniard’s Bay, b.1904, Int.1987

Noseworthy, Hans—Bryant’s Cove, b.1925, Int.1987

Noseworthy, William—Bay Roberts, b.1908, Int.1987

Nugent, Mrs. Alice (Manning)—Oderin, b.1915, Int.1986

Nygaard, Bernard—Norway, b.?, Int.1986

Nygaard, Knut—Norway, b.?, Int.1986

O

Oake, Harold B.—Fogo, b.1910, Int.1987

O’Brien, Msgr. E.J.

O’Brien, Msgr. Joseph M.—Carbonear, b.1917, Int.1986

O’Flaherty, Augustus—Northern Bay, b.1908, Int.1986

Oliver, Edward—Gull Island, b.1910, Int.1986

Oliver, James D.—Gull Island, b.1912, Int.1986

O’Neill, Arthur—Harbour Grace, b.1913, Int.1986

P

Parsons, Allan—Bay Roberts, b.1911, Int.1987

Parsons, Andrew—Carbonear, b.1910, Int.1987

Parsons, John—Carbonear, b.1918, Int.1987

Parsons, George—Carbonear, b.1913, Int.1986

Parsons, Mark—Carbonear, b.1918, Int.1986

Parsons, Capt. Peter—Templeman, b.1912, Int.1986

Parsons, William—Harbour Grace, b.?, Int.1986

Pearce, Israel—Spillars Cove, b.1904, Int.1986

Penney, Alex—Seldom, b.1922, Int.1987

Penton, Sylvester—Joe Batt’s Arm, b.1921, Int.1987

Pickett, Capt. Percy—Trinity, b.1897, Int.1986

Porter, Taylor—Port de Grave, b.1898, Int.1987

Power, James—Cupids, b.1915, Int.1986

Power, Robert—Carbonear, b.1907, Int.1986

Puddister, Capt. Frank—Bay Bulls, b.1919, Int.1986

R

Reddy, Kenneth—Fermeuse, b.1948, Int.1987

Rideout, Arthur—Templeman, b.1907, Int.1986

Roberts, James—Brigus, b.1923, Int.1987

Rossiter, James—Carbonear, b.1915, Int.1987

Rowe, Ronald—Cupids, b.1910, Int.1987

Russell, Edward (Ned)—Riverhead, b.1883, Int.1976

Russell, Roland—Tickle Cove, b. 1904, Int. 1986

Russell, Capt. William—Coley’s Point, b.1915, Int.1987

Ryan, Joe—Riverhead, Harbour Grace, b.1910, Int.1972

S

Saunders, Roy—Shoal Arm, Notre Dame Bay, b.1911, Int.1986

Seymour, William James—Butlerville, b.1911, Int.1986

Shears, Bertram—St. John’s, b.1895, Int.1976

Sheppard, Lewis—Massachusetts, USA, b.1916, Int.1987

Short, Andrew (Andy)—Kingston, b.1900, Int.1973, 1976, 1986

Short, Charlie—Bonavista, b.1904, Int.1986

Short, William—Bonavista, b.1905, Int.1986

Shute, William Sr.*—Harbour Grace South, b.?, Int.1980

Slade, Selby—Perry’s Cove, b.1916, Int.1987

Smith, Cyril—Salmon Bight, Labrador, b.1895, Int.1987

Smith, Eric—Bishop’s Cove, b.1916, Int.1987

Smith, Fred—Bishop’s Cove, b.1912, Int.1987

Smith, John A.—Bishop’s Cove, b.1918, Int.1987

Smith, William—Bishop’s Cove, b.1912, Int.1987

Smith, Violet—Clarke’s Beach, b.1897, Int.1987

Snow, Alfred—North River, b.1918, Int.1987

Snow, Nelson Sr.—Fogo, b.1923, Int.1987

Spracklin, Ernest—Brigus, b.1914, Int.1987

Spracklin, Ern Pat—Brigus, b.1912, Int.1987

Spracklin, George—Brigus, b.1906, Int.1987

Spracklin, Walt—Georgetown, b.1917, Int.1987

Spracklin, William—Cupids, b.1914, Int.1987

Spurrell, Cecil—Pool’s Island, b.1897, Int.1986

Squires, Harold—St. John’s, b.1923, Int.1987

Stevenson, Robert Louis—Fogo, b.1898, Int.1986

Stone, Capt. Harry—Monroe, Trinity Bay, b.1914, Int.1986

Street, Arthur—Bonavista, b.?, Int.1986

Sturge, Christopher—Wesleyville, b.1916, Int.1986

Sturge, Richard—Wesleyville, b.1912, Int.1986

Sturge, Stanley—Brookfield, b.1906, Int.1986

Sullivan, William—Pouch Cove, b.1907, Int.1986

Swain, Thomas—Perry’s Cove, b.1906, Int.1986

T

Thorne, Gordon—Torbay, b.1904, Int.1986

Troake, Capt. Peter—Twillingate, b.1908, Int.1986

Tucker, Wilfred—Port de Grave, b.1900, Int.1987

Tuff, Jabez—Templeman, b.1919, Int.1986

V

Vincent, Wilfred—Brookfield, b.1889, Int.1987

W

Walsh, Barth—Fermeuse, b.?, Int.1987

Warford, Henry—South River, b.1912, Int.1987

Way, William—Bonavista, b.1898, Int.1986

Wheeler, Ernest—Greenspond, b.1922, Int.1986

Wheeler, Capt. James—Greenspond, b.1900, Int.1986

White, Malcolm—Greenspond, b.1915, Int.1986

Whitten, Stephen—Southside, St. John’s, b.1924, Int.1986

Willis, Mark Gordon—Fogo, b.1911, Int.1987

Wilson, George—South River, b.1913, Int.1987

Winsor, Allan—St. John’s, b.1917, Int.1987

Winsor, Capt. Ches—Wesleyville, b.1916, Int.1986

Winsor, George—Wesleyville, b.1912, Int.1987

Woodfine, Thomas—Northern Bay, b.1897, Int.1986

*Not part of the Shannon Ryan Collection

MUNFLA Collection: 1960s and Early 1970s

Compiled by Rosemary O’Keefe, July 25, 2011

Appendix 2

Oral History Project

Team Members 1986 and 1987

The Oral History Project team was appointed during and after Christmas 1985/86. I hired Brent Howell as manager and Christine Bown, Martha Drake, Paul Kenny, Cynthia Layden, and Fran Warren as trainee interviewers. It was to be a 16-week project, and at the end of this period several trainees left for other positions. I had rented space from Waldo Scharwey, owner of West End Electronics, and I purchased tape recorders and cassettes, rented a photocopier, installed phones, and gathered some used furniture. I applied for a further grant and Waldo, very kindly, allowed me to hold on to my rental space while awaiting a response from CEIC and their political superiors. Then in the fall of 1986, the Project received another grant and we continued, with personnel joining and leaving at various times and several persons coming on board at the end to finish the last typing. The Project wound up in December 1987, when I returned to my position at MUN.

The following is a list of the team members for the entire project: Brent Howell, first manager; Paul Kenny, second manager; Fran Warren, third manager; and Josephine McGrath, fourth and last manager; Kevin Bussey, Michelle Cleary, Marie Curran, Michael Dinn, Martha Drake, Keith Hewitt, Cynthia Layden, Cathy LeBlanc, Ken Maher, Joe Pinsent, Scott Tuck, Patricia Warren, and Linda White.

Index of Interviewers

Shannon Ryan, SRSR

Kevin Bussey, SRKB

Marie Curran, SRMC

Michael Dinn, SRMJD

Martha Drake, SRMD

Keith Hewitt, SRKH

Brent Howell, SRBH

Paul Kenny, SRPK

Cynthia Layden, SRCL

Cathy LeBlanc, SRCJL

Ken Maher, SRKM

Josephine McGrath, SRJM

Joe Pinsent, SRJP

Scott Tuck, SRST

Fran Warren, SRFW

Pat Warren, SRPW

Appendix 3

Chafe’s “Notes of the Voyages”

1924-1941*

1924

The steamers were held in port from March the 7th until the 10th owing to the ice blockade.

S.S. Terra Nova, Capt. Ab. Kean, lost three of his crew the day after sailing, by drowning—David Whelan, Maurice Breen and Hubert Hiscock.

The seals this spring were taken in White Bay between Partridge Point and Harbor Deep, where the greater portion were driven owing to Easterly and North East winds prevailing the month of March.

The “Baby Avro” plane on board S.S. Eagle got away for 35 minutes on March 30th and located several patches of seals, one patch of upwards fifty thousand, “4 miles long and by 8 miles wide.”

S.S. Viking, Capt. Wm. Bartlett, in company with the S.S. Sable I., Capt. Geo. Murley, and S.S. Stella Maris, Capt. Geo. Whiteley, fishing in the Gulf, were jammed practically all the spring in the vicinity of Deadman’s Island. The latter two were fitted out by Messrs. J.A. Farquhar & Co., of Halifax, and secured only 2,000 seals which were taken to North Sydney to be manufactured.

It is estimated that upwards of 40,000 seals were secured by landsmen on the French Shore and 5,000 hauled at Twillingate.

1925

The ships prosecuting the 1925 Sealfishery sailed at 8 a.m., March 9th under very favourable conditions. The law prohibits the killing of seals before March 13th.

The S.S. Stella Maris Captain George Whiteley took the lead in sailing, and on March 11th the ship started to leak badly and at 6 a.m. the crew of 43 men had just reached the ice when she went down. They were on the ice without any ship in sight for at least 8 hours before being rescued by the S.S. Prospero, Captain Albert Burgess, who is to be commended for the promptness with which he answered the S.O.S. call.

The ice this spring was well off the land and very much broken up, and was very difficult to work the seals to advantage owing to so much fog. Seals are reported numerous and scattered all over the ocean.

Captain George Barbour was the first to arrive in the S.S. Neptune with 20,604 prime seals. He struck the seals on March 20th, 40 miles N. by E. [of the] Funks—he brought home 15 of the Stella Maris’ crew which shared $28.97 per man. She sailed again on April 11th on her second trip, and arrived on May 4th with 8,226 old seals, bringing the total catch for the S.S. Neptune in her 52 springs up to 1,004,193 seals, valued at $2,800,000.00; and we are pleased to place on record, that Captain George Barbour has brought in the greatest number of seals the past 9 springs, viz: 156,671 nett weight 3,528 tons 11 cw. 0 qr. 10 lbs—value $403,920.00.

1926

March 5th—the date of sailing was four days earlier than last year, as it was considered advisable to do so, and give the captains an opportunity to locate the seals before the day arranged for killing—March 13th.

On March 6th the Steamers were from 20 to 30 miles E.N.E. of the Funks, meeting with heavy Ice. March 10th, the Aeroplane from S.S. Beothic, flown by Aviator Caldwell made a flight, and located a patch of seals estimated about 100,000 from 40 to 50 miles North of [the] Funks—with Northerly winds prevailing the Ice, with seals were driven near the land in the vicinity of Cape Bonavista, where most of the Steamers secured their trips—and the landsmen hauled on shore about 6,000. The S.S. Senef and Motor Boat F.P. Union sailed from Port Union on March 23rd, and in a few days they secured a paying trip of seals, which were landed at Twillingate together with those, taken by landsmen and manufactured by the Messrs. Ashbourne Estate.

April 8th, S.S. Seal, Captain Stanley Barbour sailed on her second trip, calling at Trinity to take on board 28 men, which made a total crew of 79—having left Trinity at 3 o’clock the following morning and at 9 a.m. an explosion took place in the Engineroom which resulted in the death of Oiler James Brewin and Chief Engineer Edward Perez the crew took to the ice and a further explosion on board took place, and she sank at once—the crew was rescued at 2 a.m., April 10th by S.S. Eagle, Capt. A. Blackwood, and brought to St. John’s. Oiler James Brewin passed away at 10 p.m. in a Dory on the ice, and Engineer Perez died from the effects of burns at the General Hospital on April 14th[.]

Capt. Geo. Barbour in S.S. Beothic was high liner with 48,421 seals, his men killed about 56,000 seals during the spring, but several thousands of them were lost in various ways.

Capt. Wm. Bartlett of the S.S. Viking, the only Sealing Steamer fishing in the Gulf met with poor success, as the steamer was jammed only a few miles from the seals all the Spring. He claims that out of his 43 years consecutively master of Sealing Steamers, he never found the ice conditions, such as it was this Spring.

1927

March 5th the nine Steamers sailed under favourable conditions. The Airplane was taken out this Spring on board the S.S. Nascopie, Capt. Ab. Kean and in charge of Aviator Caldwell, who made an eighty-five minute flight on the 9th without locating seals.

However on the 11th and 12th the Steamers separated[,] four of them were about forty miles north of the [F]unks, and the others about fifty miles south of them, all of the ships picking out their favorite position among the Seals, waiting patiently, for Monday 14th to commence the slaughter, when 60,000 were killed, something like 120,000 was taken from these two patches, than [sic] the Ice conditions became bad which prevented the ships from bringing in a full load each.

The Schr. Young Harp, Geo. Bragg Master and the motor boat F.P. Union, Wm. K. Ridout [sic], Master sailed from Port Union. The Young Harp arrived at St. John’s March 14th with 4,353 prime seals than [sic] sailed for Port Union landed her seals and went again on a second trip. The F.P. Union secured only about 80 seals and at this date May 5th the Young Harp has not arrived. Her Seals will be manufactured at Twillingate by Messrs. Ashbourne’s Estate.

The following sailing vessels prosecuted the Sealfishery in the Gulf. Guide, Edward Seeley, Master, 73 tons 15 men landed 1147 young harps. Phyliss L. Westhever Theo. Keeping, Master 99 tons, 21 men, landed 600 seals and the Lizzie M.K. E.J. Bragg, Master, 47 tons, 12 men, landed 312 seals.

The Steamer Thetis was dispatched to the Magdaline [sic] Islands by Messrs. Job Bros & Co, Ltd and Messrs Bowring Bros, Ltd, to bring to St. John’s some 20,000 young seals that was taken there by landsmen. They will be jointly manufactured by these two firms.

1928

Eleven steamers sailed on March 5th, two of which prosecuted the voyage in the Gulf, S.S. Terra Nova, Capt. John Parsons, and the S.S. Neptune, Capt. Wm. Bartlett, “Commodor of the Fleet”. Both steamers arrived with full loads.

A large body of seals was located in the Gulf by the Avian Plane in charge of Pilot Colin Caldwell, but his late arrival at the Northern front, owing to the unfavourable weather, his services were of no advantage to the steamers.

Schooner Young Harp, Capt. Geo. Rideout, sailed from Port Union on March 9th, with a crew of twenty-nine men, and arrived March 25th, with a full load of seals—6,175, the crew shared $139.00 [each] and went again on a second trip and secured 2,381 prime seals. The steamer Trawler Florencia Capt. Geo. Bragg, Owner and Master, sailed from Greenspond on March 14th, and struck the seals on 4 p.m. the same day, and arrived at Port Union on April 7th, with a full load of 5,872 seals. His crew of forty men shared $100.80 [each] Young Harp and Florencia’s seals numbering 14,428 are being manufactured at Twillingate by Messrs Ashbourne, Limited.

Schooner Guide Edward Seeley, Master, sailed from Port aux Basques for the Gulf fishery, but on the last of March got caught in rafting ice and became a total wreck off “Three Rock Cove” [Port au Port Peninsula]. The crew made a safe landing.

This spring the seals were in small patches and scattered all over the ocean. On the 15th March they were 105 miles E. by S. [of] Belle Isle in the Straits to 30 Miles E.N.E. [of] Fogo.

Total catch of Seals by all vessels—241[,]450.

1929

The auxiliary sealing schooners met with poor success. Most of them were late in sailing, and owing to exceptionally heavy ice, and continuous gales, the working of seals was rendered more difficult than for many years.

The following prosecuted the voyage and their turn-out was—Swile, Charles Blackwood, 18 men, 1243 seals; second trip, 2 seals. F.P. Union, Thomas Rideout, 27 men, 200 seals; Irene May, M. Sheppard, 13 men, [122] seals. Young Harp, George Rideout, 29 men, 959 seals. Lone Flier, Sol. White, 28 men, 900 seals. Dazzle, Gideon Bown, 28 men, 50 seals. Humorist, John C. Dominy, 32 men, 801 seals. Arethusa, Wm. Bulgin, 32 men, none. Total, 4277 seals.

S.S. Vedas, Captain C.A. Murley, prosecuted the sealfishery in the Gulf. This steamer was fitted out jointly by J.B. Mitchell, Esq., Halifax, and the Marden-Wild Corporation of North Sydney. The specification of seals landed was 11,529 young harps, 241 old harps—11,770. Gross weight 224 tons, 0 cwt. 2 qrs. 23 lbs. Nett 215 tons, 0 cwt. 1 qr. 2 lbs. Nett value, $21,743.34. Crew of 117 men shared $61.42. Steam trawler Mac Hinery, Capt. George Young was also out from Halifax, fishing in the Gulf and secured 101 seals.

S.S. Florencia, Captain John Bragg, was lost on April 24th about 36 miles off Cape Bauld, when out on her second trip, having on board at the time 250 pelts. The crew of 34 men were brought home by the S.S. Nascopie, Capt A. Kean.

The avro avian plane in charge of Captain Colin Caldwell, made three flights from St. Anthony this spring, and on March 5th was successful in locating five patches of seals over an area of 80 square miles—about 50 miles north-east of Fogo.

1930

The sealing fleet sailed under very favorable conditions, and three days after sailing the S.S. Eagle, Capt. W. Kean, reports striking the seals about 105 miles S.E. [of] Belle Isle, and on the 13th the steamer was 125 miles S.E. by E. [of] Belle Isle, in a patch of seals estimated to be fifteen miles in diameter.

The total catch of seals by the eleven steamers was 218,644, and by the six auxiliary schooners 22,592, or a grand total of 241,236.

The S.S. Ungava, Capt. Wm. Winsor, had with him this spring at the sealfishery Mr. Varrick [sic] Frissell, Mr. Sweeney, and Captain Bob Bartlett, with the troupe engaged in the production of “Talking Pictures.” After their arrival they chartered the S.S. Viking. Captain Bob Bartlett in charge, and sailed again for the icefields, for the purpose of completing the film of the “Northern Knight” returning with 53 seals.

S.S. Vedas, Captain C.A. Murley, supplied jointly by J.B. Mitchell, Esq., Halifax, and the Marden-Wild Corporation of North Sydney[,] prosecuted the sealfishery in the Gulf, and meeting with poor success, she arrived at North Sydney on April 12th with only 227 seals.

The Avro-Avian bi-plane was again used this season in locating the seals, with Captain Alex. Harvey in charge. On March 15th [it] was put out of commission for the rest of the season.

1931**

It is our sad duty to record an explosion that occurred on board the S.S. Viking, Capt. A. Kean, Jr., at 9 p.m. Sunday night, March 15th, about 8 miles east of the Horse Islands [White Bay]. The steamer caught fire and sank. 24 of the 147 persons on board lost their lives, including Messrs. Varrick Frissell and A.E. Penrod, talking picture men of the U.S.A., and Captain [William Kennedy,] navigator, died on his way home, from hardships endured before being rescued, and his companion, wireless operator King, had both legs amputated in the General Hospital.

Schr. Sir William, Edward Quinton master, owned and fitted out for the sealfishery by the F.P.U. Trading Co., Port Union, foundered in rafting ice on March 20th. The [crew of 28 men] was rescued by the S.S. Eagle, Capt. W. Kean.

The Belgian steamer S.S. Lestris, 937 tons nett, commanded by Captain Mack, Arctic navigator, sailed from North Sydney to the Gulf sealfishery with a crew of 163, mo[stly Newfound]landers. She arrived at Channel on April 24th with 4500 seals. One of her crew, Frank Strickland, aged 19 years, of N.S., was accidently [sic] shot.

Owing to continuous easterly and south-easterly winds during the month of February, and no severe frost, whelping ice was not found by the various captains in the usual loc[ality. The seals] made their way north in the vicinity of Gros Water Bay to whelp. A small patch of 25,000 seals were killed in White Bay.

Schr. Jean, Capt. Wm. Bulgin, was fitted out by Messrs. Ashbourne, Limited, and after spending two weeks cruising Green and White Bays returned with only two seals.

From three to five thousand seals were hauled ashore by landsmen.

1932

Only six streamers sailed for the sealfishery this spring, all to prosecute the voyage on the front; there were no steamers sealing in the Gulf. One sailing vessel, the Lizzie M.K., 47 tons, 13 men, Edward Seeley master, sailed from Channel, and secured 400 young and 550 old seals. Messrs. E. Pike, Ltd, Channel, exported 1920 seals to the Marden Wild Corp., N. Sydney.

On March 15th, Captain Stanley Barbour, of the S.S. Neptune, reported main shaft broken. S.S. Sagona, Capt. Jacob Kean, was despatched to tow her home. On March 13th, Capt. R. Badcock of the S.S. Ranger reported losing propellor; the S.S. Kyle, in charge of Capt. Dalton, was despatched to tow her home, which arrived on March 21st, and the Sagona with Neptune in tow arrived April 1st.

Seals were very much scattered this spring, anywhere from the Flemish Cap to the Round Island on the Labrador. Capt. Blackwood of the S.S. Imogene, steamed through 40 miles of ice on which the seals were so scattered that he did not think it advisable to put his men on the ice. Quite a number of seals were hauled on shore by the residents of White and Green Bay Shore catch estimated about [paper torn].

1933

Six steamers prosecuted the sealfishery this Spring, and almost all of them arrived with exceptionally good trips.

The steamers struck the seals from 8 to 10 miles to the Eastward of Belle Isle—estimated between 80,000 to 100,000 in the patch.

To Captain A.C. Blackwood of the S.S. Imogene goes the honour of securing the greatest number of seals in one trip ever brought to port, viz: 55,636.

And to Captain Peter Carter of the S.S. Ungava goes the honour of securing the greatest weight of seals “gross” ever secured by any steamer in one trip, viz: 1254 tons, 19 cwt., 1 qr., 25 lbs.

The schooner Joseph Earl, Capt. Theo. Keeping, cleared from Channel for the sealfishery on March 23rd with a crew of 11 men and arrived on April 21st with 315 young and 10 old harp seals.

The auxiliary schooner Young Harp, Capt. Geo. Norman, cleared from St. John’s on March 14th for the sealfishery (by the Northern Sealers Traders) with a crew of 28 men, and arrived with 25 seals.

The schooner G. and F. Blackmore, Capt. J.H. Blackmore, also cleared for the sealfishery from Port Union on March 29th, but owing to the ice being close on the land she did not meet with any success, and arrived on May 5th.

The motor boat, Jigger, Capt. John Griffin, with a crew of 4 men also took part in the catch of St. John’s and secured 3 young and 3 old seals.

1934

The sealfishery just closed has been the most successful for years.

The captains reported the ice very heavy and difficult to work their ships through. However, one of the most powerful ships of the fleet, the Imogene, Capt. Al. Blackwood, located a patch of seals 95 miles N.E. by N. of the Funks—estimated about 175,000 whitecoats, the rest of the fleet worked into this patch and cleaned them up, all of which secured good trips, with the exception of the S.S. Thetis. Capt. John Dominy, when forcing his way through the heavy sheet ice developed propellor trouble, and secured only 5000 from the edge of the patch. This ship was towed to St. John’s by S.S. Imogene, Capt. Al. Blackwood. The aux. schr. Young Harp sailed from Port Union on March 21st and the schooner G. and F. Blackmore from the same port on March 22nd.

Capt. Abram Kean has just closed his 46th spring as master of steamers in this industry, bringing to port 1,007,119 seals, valued at $1,865,313.67.

Capt. Al. Blackwood, who was master of the S.S. Imogene for the past six springs and three previous in the S.S. Eagle, landed in his nine springs 267,706 seals, valued $381,622.70.

In the vicinity of Green and White Bays some three to four thousand seals were secured by landsmen.

1935

This spring the steamers had very heavy ice to contend with and bad weather.

The more powerful steamers in forcing their way to the Eastward on March 11th, struck a small patch of very young seals in strings estimated to be about 40,000 a few miles South South East of Cabot Island near Cape Bonavista.

The date of killing opened on March 13th. Only one aux. schr. Young Hood cleared for the Northern Sealfishery this spring, Edward Quinton, master. One of the crew of S.S. Eagle died at the icefields, Arthur Cheater of Flat Island B.B., his body was brought to St. John’s on S.S. Imogene.

With the arrival of the first steamer, Messrs, Bowring Bros., Ltd., advanced the price of young fat from $3.50 to $4.00. The sealers signing on for the former price.

The catch this spring is 84,360 seals valued at $151,038.46 less than 1934.

1936

The steamers sailed on March 7th, under very favourable conditions, the time for killing seals by law opens March 13th. This spring the captains had little difficulty in getting to where they expected to locate the seals, as the ice was thin and broken, but the weather was foggy. The steamers had done quite a bit of steaming about before the S.S. Eagle, Captain Sydney Hill struck the seals about 120 miles N.E. by East of the Funks on March 16th.

The Aux. Schr Young Harp, Captain Wm. Rideout with a crew of 29 men sailed from Catalina on March 13th, and when last reported she had on board 1500 seals, young and old, together with these, and the shore catch, should amount to twenty thousand [total].

We are pleased to place on record, that Captain Al. G. Blackwood was high liner—and that, in his eleven springs as master of steamers he has made a splendid record of 334,652 seals, valued at $467,223.56. Congratulations Captain.

1937

The steamers sailed at 8 a.m. March 6th. The ice just moved off St. John’s sufficiently for them to get away, and by the 13th, the date for killing, the steamers were in the vicinity of Bell[e] Isle in the Straits—owing to ice conditions being very heavy, the steamers did not strike the seals until March 17th, off Battle Harbor.

The S.S. Ranger, Capt. Badcock, was the only sealing steamer in the Gulf. He also found the ice conditions very bad for working seals. He was the first to arrive back, April 6th.

The Norwegian ship Ora of Mandal, Norway, was engaged at the seal fishery this spring. She sailed from Mandal on March 7th, and on March 24th she was in the vicinity of Bell[e] Isle. The last report from her was that she had killed 1500 “Blue Jacket” Hoods [young hoods].

Quite a number of seals were landed on shore by the landsmen in the vicinity of White Bay; also on the South West Coast, and about 10,000 of the latter were purchased by Messrs. Marden-Wild Corporation of Massachusetts, and were taken to Halifax, N.S. to be manufactured. The crew’s share (being one-third) of the Imogene’s voyage was purchased through Mr. K.M. Brown, President of the Fishermen’s Protective Union, and sold to E.R.A. Chafe, representing the E.S. Ullmann-Allied Co. Inc., of New York. These seals were taken to Port Union by auxiliary schooners and manufactured there.

The S.S. J.M. Olds, White[,] master, sailed from Twillingate on April 21st, and up to May 5th she had 100 young harps.

1938

Owing to St. John’s being packed with ice most of the steamers did not get away till late in the afternoon of March 5th. The same conditions prevented the fleet from reaching the seals by the 14th, the day for killing.

On March 18th the seals were located about 80 miles E. by N. of the Funks. Owing to the seals been so far off-shore very few were secured by landsmen.

The S.S. Sagona, Capt. C. Blackwood and the S.S. Ranger, Capt. R. Badcock, fishing in the Gulf, burned down in the seals waiting for the day for killing.

The Sagona was chartered by Messrs. E.S. Ullmann Syndicate of New York, and was represented in Newfoundland by the late Captain E.R.A. Chafe, M.C.

Three Norwegian sealing steamers, Polaris, Polarbjorn and Ora were in company with our East Coast sealing fleet, the former two secured 31,000 seals. But the Ora, Captain Bratlid, was abandoned on April 21st, about 30 miles from the Funks and sank with her 11,000 seals on board. The crew of 52 men was taken off the ice by S.S. Eagle, Captain Charles Kean, and on their arrival at St. John’s, Captain Olsen, Norwegian Consul, had made all arrangements to have the crew cared for and their passage secured by S.S. Belle Isle for their home via. Halifax.

The aux. schr. Young Hood, Capt. Ed. Quinton, and Young Harp, Capt. Wm. Rideout, sailed for the sealfishery from Port Union. The Young Hood secured 2,733 seals, crew shared $68.41 per man, and Young Harp secured 3,473 seals, crew 28 men shared $58.43. Schr. Leila Gillis, Captain J. Lawrence, sailed from Port aux Basques and took 241 young harps.

1939

On February 28th, the first of our sealing fleet sailed for the Gulf sealfishery. S.S. Ranger in command of Captain R. Badcock, on March 2nd when about sixteen miles South of St. Lawrence she encountered a terrific storm—gales of wind and very heavy sea that flooded the engine room and putting out the fires. S.O.S. call was sent out which was received by the S.S. Newfoundland, Captain Murphy—who hurried to her assistance, work of transferring the crew, numbering one hundred and fifty, owing to such a heavy sea and gale of wind, only one boat load of eighteen of the crew was taken off the S.S. Ranger and put on board the S.S. Newfoundland, which steamer stood by until the S.S. Imogene, in command of Captain E. Burden arrived on the scene. This steamer was rushed by Messrs. Bowring Bros., Ltd. to assist in saving the rest of the crew if possible. On the Imogene reaching the Ranger which was then about thirteen miles off Cape St. Mary’s, Captain Burden succeeded in getting a line on board, and towed her into Trepassey, 10 p.m., March 3rd.

Newfoundland then continued her voyage to St. John’s having on board the eighteen men rescued from the Ranger’s crew.

On March 5th in early morning the Ranger was towed into St. John’s by S.S. Imogene, Captain E. Burden[;] the Ranger was placed on dock as soon as possible when repairs were effected. March 14th she sailed again to the sealfishery on the northern front in charge of Captain Ll. Kean and a new crew of 140 men, quite a few of the first crew sailed in her, the others went home thinking she would not go out again. March 17th, St. Patrick’s Day, Capt. Kean struck the seals about 40 miles S.E. of the Funks in company with other steamers, from which about 50,000 seals were secured between them.

Messrs. Bowring Bros. decided to send the S.S. Terra Nova in the Gulf to replace the Ranger. March 7th, Captain Wm. C. Winsor of S.S. Ungava reported four Norwegian sealing steamers 100 miles North East of the Funks and on April 14th again reported five Norwegian steamers secured between them some 19,500 seals.

S.S. Imogene, Capt. W.B. Kean, abandoned the voyage on April 14th, to proceed to the S.S. Bochum of the Hamburg-American line which was damaged by ice 150 miles East of St. John’s. The Imogene led the way through the heavy ice flow [sic], and both steamers arrived in St. John’s on April 16th. Scarcely any seals whatever were taken by landsmen this spring.

1940

The sealing fleet sailing from St. John’s on March 5th had no heavy ice to contend with but heavy sea and dense fog prevailed until very heavy ice was met between Cape Bauld and Belle Isle in the Straits. Here the steamers more or less became jammed, and seals were located some two or three miles distant. Killing and panning took place from the 10th, and [to the] 19th, approximately 120,000 very young harps were killed and panned, and some 10,000 of these were lost. The first seals were slightly over 30 lbs. in weight.

The Norwegian ships Quest, Saelis, Polarbjorn, Polaris and Arctos were then at the edge of the ice and reported about the last of March that they had 17,000 seals between them. On May 8th, three of the Norwegian steamers arrived at St. John’s, the Arctos with 12,700 seals, Polarbjorn, 11,700 and Polaris 7,500.

Terra Nova, Captain R. Badcock, was the only steamer from St. John’s fishing in the Gulf. She secured a good trip of prime seals and her crew shared the biggest bill for the voyage.

Some 10,000 seals were taken by landsmen on the East Coast and in the Straits.

The 13-ton schooner Whitecoat with a 79 year old Captain, Isaac Young, sailed from Twillingate on March 11th with a crew of 8 men for the sealfishery. This small schooner had not been seen nor heard from the time she sailed until she arrived at Wesleyville, B.B. on April 3rd with 300 hood seals, the weight of 500 young. Congratulations Captain Young.

1941

The sealing steamers sailed March 5th and practically no ice was encountered up to the 13th, the day set for killing of seals. In fact the steamers were in clear water from St. John’s to about 30 miles South East of Belle Isle. They went as far North as Gross [sic] Water Bay and up to the 19th of March only a few Whitecoats had been seen and scattered families of Hoods.

In company with our fleet of four steamers was two Norwegian sealers the Polaris and Polarbjorn, these sailed from a Canadian port.

On March 24th, Griquet reported—Seals in narrow strips and scattered, passing South, steamers in the vicinity. Steamers then came South in the mouth of the Straits where most of the seals taken were secured. Seals estimated taken by landsmen would be about 10,000. A law was brought in force by the Commission of Government granting seals to be taken on Sundays. Two men died on board S.S. Terra Nova—Jesse Bishop of St. John’s and William Fleet of Trinity.

Aux. schooner Whitecoat, Captain Isaac Young, of Twillingate, secured 490 seals—mostly young.

* From 1924 to 1941 Levi Chafe included these “Notes of the Voyages” with his sealing catch records. These were printed as broadsheets and never published in book form as he and/or Mosdell had done earlier in 1895, 1905, and 1923. They appear here unedited, with one exception: I have replaced the double quotation marks with italics for the names of ships.

** The edges of the 1931 and 1932 broadsides are torn; interpolations are supplied by the editor.

Bibliography

BOOKS

Anspach, Lewis Amadeus. A History of the Island of Newfoundland. London, 1819.

Brown, Cassie. Death on the Ice. Toronto, 1972.

Chafe’s Sealing Book: A History of the Newfoundland Sealfishery from the Earliest Available Records Down to and Including the Voyage of 1923. Statistics prepared by L.G. Chafe; introductory review by W.A. Munn; and edited by H.M. Mosdell. 3rd ed. St. John’s, 1923. [In this present volume, I use the textual information from Chafe’s Sealing Book (1923) and the tables from Chafe’s Sealing Book (ed. Ryan, 1989).]

England, George Allan. The Greatest Hunt in the World. Montreal, 1969. Originally published in 1924 as Vikings of the Ice.

Jukes, Joseph Beete. Excursions in and about Newfoundland During the Years 1839 and 1840. London, 1842.

Ryan, Shannon. The Ice Hunters: A History of Newfoundland Sealing to 1914. St. John’s, 1994.

——. “The Newfoundland Cod Fishery in the Nineteenth Century.” MA thesis, MUN, 1972.

Ryan Shannon, ed. Chafe’s Sealing Book: A Statistical Record of the Newfoundland Steamer Seal Fishery, 1863-1941. St. John’s, 1989.

Ryan, Shannon and Martha Drake. Seals and Sealers: A Pictorial History of the Newfoundland Seal Fishery. St. John’s, 1987.

Smith, Nicholas. Fifty-two Years at the Labrador Fishery. London, 1936.

NEWSPAPERS

Express (St. John’s)

Mark Lane Express (London), 1880

Evening Telegram (St. John’s)

Royal Gazette (St. John’s)

OTHER SOURCES

CO/194/129 British Colonial Office, series 194

House of Assembly Journals (HAJ), Newfoundland

“Report of the Evidence from the Sealing Enquiry, 1914-15” [photocopy, editor’s personal files]

Shannon Ryan was born in Riverhead, Harbour Grace, Newfoundland, in 1941 where he received his early schooling. He began teaching in 1956 and by 1968 had taught and/or served as school principal for nine years in Newfoundland and the Northwest Territories and had received a B.A. (Education) from Memorial University of Newfoundland. Ryan received a B.A. and M.A. (History) from MUN during the following three years and was hired by MUN in 1971, retiring as professor of history in August 2006. He received his Ph.D. from the University of London in 1982.

During his career, he published in Oral History, Maritime History, and Newfoundland/Labrador History, including a monograph on the seal hunt (to 1914) and one on the saltfish industry (1814–1914). For several years, Ryan served as graduate coordinator of the History Department and as chair of the Newfoundland Studies Minor Program, both at MUN.

Outside the university, he served as president of the Newfoundland Historical Society, chairman of the Atlantic Oral History Association, and as Newfoundland’s representative on the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council (SSHRC), as well as a member of other heritage groups including the Cupids 400th anniversary committee and, most recently, the Elliston sealing memorial committee. Ryan was elected a Fellow of the Royal Historical Society and is an Honorary Research Professor of History, MUN.

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Also by Shannon Ryan

The waters off Newfoundland, in the North Atlantic, held the world’s most abundant supply of codfish, which, when discovered, was in great demand. Unlike the fur trade, the other major early commercial activity in what is now mainland Canada, the production of codfish did not require year-round residence. It did, however, require numerous men, young and old, for the fishing season, which ran from spring to early fall.

This successful English-Newfoundland migratory fishery evolved into an exclusively shore-based, but still migratory, fishery that led to the formation of a formal colony by 1818. Shannon Ryan offers this general history as an introduction to early Newfoundland. The economy and social, military, and political issues are dealt with in a straightforward narrative that will appeal to general readers as well as students of Newfoundland and Labrador history.

Shortlisted for the 2013 Atlantic Book Award for Scholarly Writing

Shortlisted for the 2013 Heritage and History Award

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Table of Contents

The Last of the Ice Hunters

Copyright

For Margaret

Contents

Map

Preface

Introduction

Part 1

Part 2

Conclusion

Acknowledgements

Appendix 1

Appendix 2

Appendix 3

Bibliography

About the Author

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Also by Shannon Ryan