Waterfront3

On the Waterfront: Plymouth’s Maritime History continued

A DANGEROUS BUSINESS
Like the Fortune’s cargo, stolen at sea by a French privateer, vessels, cargos and crews remained in danger of hostile privateers, war ships, and pirates well into the 1800s. Storms at sea or in the harbor could mean disaster for men and ship. (Click HERE to read the tragic story of the loss in Plymouth Harbor of the brig General Arnold and its men). The British blockade, American Revolution, Embargo of 1807 and the War of 1812 each devastated the business of the harbor, requiring great effort to rebuild each time. Along with stories of loss and destruction, Plymouth town histories include exciting stories of brave and skillful seamen’s resistance—of stripped vessels being re-rigged under cover of a dark night and a lashing rainstorm (that had scattered the harbor guards) and slipping safely out of Plymouth Bay to pursue an enemy vessel or deliver a valuable cargo.

BUILDING TRADE AND SHIPS
After 1783 and the end of 8 long years of war with Britain, Plymouth rapidly rebuilt its fishing and merchant fleets, increased its coastal and Liverpool trade, and added ports in the Mediterranean such as the Andalusian city of Cadiz in southern Spain. In the early years of the new century, while Europe spent its forces fighting Napoleon, the United States’ neutral position allowed American trade to prosper everywhere.

By 1807 Plymouth counted more than 70 vessels engaged in foreign trade. In tonnage of shipping registered in Massachusetts’ ports, Plymouth ranked sixth, preceded only by Boston, Salem, Newburyport, New Bedford, and Marblehead. Foreign vessels arrived in Plymouth harbor from Portugal, Spain, Cape Verde Islands, Russia, Martinique, and other West Indian Islands.

Attempting to bully neutral traders, Britain and France outlawed trading with the colonies of their enemies. For example, Americans who traded with Britain were prohibited from trading with France’s West Indian colonies. If Americans traded with France, they were not allowed to trade in the ports of British colonies, such as that of St. Thomas. The Americans side-stepped the prohibitions by inserting a short coastal voyage between the two ends of a vessel’s planned trade route. Samuel Eliot Morrison described this “indirect trade” undertaken to maintain peace and profits—

….Plymouth custom-house records show…what was going on in 1806 and 1807. The brig Elisa Hardy of Plymouth enters her home port from Bordeaux…with a cargo of claret wine. Part [is sent] to Martinique in the schooner Pilgrim, which also carries a consignment of brandy…from Alicante in the brig Commerce, and…gin from Rotterdam in the barque Hannal of Plymouth. The rest of the Elisa Hardy’s claret is taen to Philadelphia…and thence [to] 7 different vessels to Havana, Santiago de Cuba, St. Thomas, and Batavia.

Shipbuilding on the North River and Plymouth Bay prospered along with trade during the Federalist period. The North River’s fifteen shipyards launched more than 1000 ships from the 1640s to the late 1800s. Many were fishing and whaling vessels, and built for owners outside of Massachusetts. According to Morison, the largest vessel built on the North River was the Mount Vernon, 464 tons, built in 1815 for Philadelphia by Samuel Hartt. If a ship of 200 tons cost about $7000 in the early 1800s (Morison’s estimate), the Mount Vernon may have run to $17-18,000.

MANUFACTURES

By 1830 industries related to boatbuilding, shipping, and fishing lined Water Street and occupied the wharves, warehouses and neighborhoods near Plymouth Harbor. There were lumber and coal yards, iron foundries and forges, blacksmith shops, sailmakers, a pump and blockmaker’s shop, coopers, riggers, caulkers and gravers, shipwrights, ship carpenters, a ship carver, and numerous counting houses (accounting offices). Incorporated in 1824, the Plymouth Cordage Company’s three-story ropewalk was located in the north part of town. The firm employed up to 80 hands in the manufacture (by water power) of 500 tons of patented cordage per year.

THE TIDE TURNS
To help rebuild the fisheries after the American Revolution, in 1789 the federal government granted a bounty of 5-cents on every quintal (100 lbs.) of dried fish or barrel of pickled fish exported. In 1792 additional federal bounties were granted. Fishing and shipping continued to play major roles on Plymouth Harbor until the 1860s when the bounties were abolished and duties removed from Canadian fish. In 1888 only one fishing vessel went to the Grand Banks of Newfoundland from Plymouth.

By the mid-1800s, railroads were competing for shipping business, and the nature of the most profitable maritime trade changed. Speed became the name of the game, and the shipyards of the North River and Plymouth lacked the deep water needed to launch the 2000-4000 ton extreme clippers produced from about 1840-1870 to race across the seas. Originally developed to carry the perishable tea of the China trade, the so-called “greyhounds of the sea” were perfectly suited for the unexpected market that opened in 1849—the flood of men and supplies rushing to the gold fields of California.

In Plymouth, manufacturing gradually replaced shipping in importance. Until the late 1890s, incoming vessels continued to bring large cargoes of raw materials: among them sisal and hemp for the ropewalks, coal for the iron works. By 1920, however, most materials arrived by railroad—located next to the harbor. Still a working harbor in 1900, signs of the harbor’s next transformation could be found on Water Street.

The Old Curiosity Shop with antiques and souvenirs sold by Winslow Brewster Standish was one sign of this transformation.