Captain Ahab Had a Wife

Lisa Norling

Description

During the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, the whaling industry in New England sent hundreds of ships and thousands of men to distant seas on voyages lasting up to five years. In Captain Ahab Had a Wife, Lisa Norling taps a rich vein of sources--including women's and men's letters and diaries, shipowners' records, Quaker meeting minutes and other church records, newspapers and magazines, censuses, and city directories--to reconstruct the lives of the "Cape Horn widows" left behind onshore.

Norling begins with the emergence of colonial whalefishery on the island of Nantucket and then follows the industry to mainland New Bedford in the nineteenth century, tracking the parallel shift from a patriarchal world to a more ambiguous Victorian culture of domesticity. Through the sea-wives' compelling and often poignant stories, Norling exposes the painful discrepancies between gender ideals and the reality of maritime life and documents the power of gender to shape both economic development and individual experience.

Sujets

• 19th Century
• Histoire
• American studies
• United States
• History

Informations

• Publié par: The University of North Carolina Press
• Date de parution: 01 février 2014
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9798890871077
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 18 Mo

Extrait

Tseng 2000.7.6 11:28 OCV:0

6116 Norling / CAPTAIN AHAB HAD A WIFE / sheet 1 of 391

CAPTAIN HADA WIFE HB

Gender&American Culture 6116 Norling / CAPTAIN AHAB HAD A WIFE / sheet 2 of 391 Coeditors Thadious M. Davis Linda K. Kerber

Tseng 2000.7.6 11:28 OCV:0

Editorial Advisory Board Nancy Cott Cathy N. Davidson Jane Sherron De Hart Sara Evans Mary Kelley Annette Kolodny Wendy Martin Nell Irvin Painter Janice Radway Barbara Sicherman

6116 Norling / CAPTAIN AHAB HAD A WIFE / sheet 3 of 391 CAPTAIN AHAB HAD A WIFE New England Women&the Whalefishery, 1720–1870 L I S A N O R L I N G The University of North Carolina Press Chapel Hill&London

Tseng 2000.7.6 11:28 OCV:0

© 2000 The University of North Carolina Press All rights reserved Manufactured in the United States of America The paper in this book meets the guidelines for permanence and durability of the Committee on Production Guidelines for Book Longevity of the Council on Library Resources. This book was set in Bell types by Tseng Information Systems, Inc. Book design by Richard Hendel Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Norling, Lisa. Captain Ahab had a wife : New England women and the whalefishery, 1720–1870 / Lisa Norling. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-8078-2561-1 (cloth : alk. paper) — ISBN 0-8078-4870-0 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Whaling—Massachusetts—New Bedford—History—19th century. 2. Women—Massachusetts—New Bedford—Social conditions—19th century. 6116 Norling / CAPTAIN AHAB HAD A WIFE / sheet 4 of 391 3. Nantucket (Mass.)—Social life and customs—18th century. I. Title. SH383.2 .N67 2000 338.3'7295'0974485—dc21 99-088026

Tseng 2000.7.6 11:28 OCV:0

Portions of the book have been appeared previously, in somewhat different form, in the following publications and are reprinted here with permission of the publishers: ‘‘Ahab’s Wife: Women and the American Whaling Industry, 1820–1870,’’ inIron Men, Wooden Women: Gender and Seafaring in the Atlantic World, 1700–1920,edited by Margaret S. Creighton and Lisa Norling, 70–91 (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1996); ‘‘Contrary Dependencies: Whaling Agents and Whalemen’s Families, 1830–1870,’’Log of Mystic Seaport42, no. 1 (Spring 1990): 3–12; ‘‘ ‘How Frought with Sorrow and Heartpangs’: Mariners’ Wives and the Ideology of Domesticity in New England, 1790–1880,’’New England Quarterly65, no. 3 (September 1992): 422–46; ‘‘Judith Macy and Her Daybook; or, Crevecoeur and the Wives of Sherborn,’’ Historic Nantucket40, no. 4 (Winter 1992): 68–71; ‘‘The Sentimentalization of American Seafaring: The Case of the New England Whalefishery,’’ inJack Tar in History: Essays in the History of Maritime Life and Labour,edited by Colin Howell and Richard Twomey, 164–78 (Fredericton, N.B.: Acadiensis, 1991).

This volume was published with the generous assistance of the Greensboro Women’s Fund of the University of North Carolina Press. Founding Contributors: Linda Arnold Carlisle, Sally Schindel Cone, Anne Faircloth, Bonnie McElveen Hunter, Linda Bullard Jennings, Janice J. Kerley (in honor of Margaret Supplee Smith), Nancy Rouzer May, and Betty Hughes Nichols.

Frontispiece:‘‘The Sailor’s Adieu.’’ There were several versions of this extremely popular image, sometimes paired with a second image titled ‘‘The Sailor’s Return,’’ including a widely distributed series by Currier and Ives. This particular lithograph dates from ca. 1845 and was produced by Baillie and Sowle of New Bedford, Mass. Courtesy of Old Dartmouth Historical Society–New Bedford Whaling Museum (Trans. 785)

04

03

02

01

00

5

4

3

2

1

To my father, 6116 Norling / CAPTAIN AHAB HAD A WIFE / sheet 5 of 391 Alfred Norling, and the memory of my mother, Kristin Norling, with much gratitude, appreciation, and love.

Tseng 2000.7.6 11:28 OCV:0

Tseng 2000.7.6 11:28 OCV:0

6116 Norling / CAPTAIN AHAB

HAD A WIFE / sheet 6 of 391

C O N T E N T S 6116 Norling / CAPTAIN AHAB HAD A WIFE / sheet 7 of 391

Tseng 2000.7.6 11:28 OCV:0

Acknowledgments, xi Introduction: Captain Ahab Had a Wife, 1 1. Nantucket and the Eighteenth-Century Whalefishery, 15 2. Family, Faith, and Community on Colonial Nantucket, 51 3. The Impact of Religious Reform, Revolution, and Romanticism on Nantucket, 83 4. New Bedford and the Nineteenth-Century Whalefishery, 117 5. Love, Marriage, and Family in the Nineteenth-Century Whaling Communities, 165 6. The Failure of Victorian Domesticity on Shore and at Sea, 214 Conclusion: The Nantucket Girls Song, 262 Appendix: Annotated List of Major Informants by Family, 271 Notes, 281 Bibliography, 329 Index, 357 Series List, 373

M A P S&I L LU S T R AT I O N S 6116 Norling / CAPTAIN AHAB HAD A WIFE / sheet 8 of 391

Tseng 2000.7.6 11:28 OCV:0

Maps The American whaling industry’s home region, 10 Major eighteenth-century whaling grounds, 25 Major nineteenth-century whaling grounds, 124

Illustrations ‘‘The Sailor’s Adieu,’’ frontis Nantucket in 1811, 18 ‘‘The Manner of Catching Whales,’’ ca. 1744, 22 ‘‘Stove boat,’’ ca. 1840, 23 ‘‘Waste book’’ of Nantucket merchant Micajah Coffin, 31 View of Nantucket from the house of Walter Folger, 1797, 64 Portrait of Mrs. Judith Macy, ca. 1799, 71 Title page of Phebe Folger’s commonplace book, 1797, 85 New Bedford, ca. 1805, 95 Mrs. Phebe Folger Coleman, 115 View of New Bedford from Fairhaven, ca. 1845, 126 View of the river at Russell’s Mills, Dartmouth, ca. 1870, 127 New Bedford’s commercial district, ca. 1870, 129 New Bedford waterfront scene, 1868, 130 ‘‘South Sea Whale Fishery, No. I,’’ 1835, 136 ‘‘The Proposal,’’ scrimshaw carving, 141 Swift & Allen account book, 146 ‘‘Popping Corn,’’ ca. 1856, 177

Letter datelined New Bedford, 15 November 1850, 185 Miniature portrait of Captain Thomas Burdett, 187 Scrimshaw implements and table set, 189 William Ashley, 206 Hannah Crapo Ashley, 207 Captain Edward Ashley, 210 Adra Catherine Braley Ashley, 211 Mary L. Burtch Brewster, 242 Captain William Brewster, 243 Interior,Charles W. Morganaftercabin, 1925, 245 View of Lahaina, ca. 1848, 252 ‘‘Captains of the Stone Fleet,’’ 1861, 266 ‘‘Captain’s Wives,’’ ca. 1865, 267 Scrimshawed whale tooth ‘‘Domestic Happiness,’’ 268 6116 Norling / CAPTAIN AHAB HAD A WIFE / sheet 9 of 391

Tseng 2000.7.6 11:28 OCV:0

Tseng 2000.7.6 11:28 OCV:0

6116 Norling / CAPTAIN AHAB HAD A WIFE / sheet 10 of 391