THE PROPERTY OF A PRIVATE COLLECTOR
[MARITIME]. Manuscript document, Log of the Ship Flora, under Captain William Manson, from Liverpool to Newfoundland then Newfoundland to Madeira and home to Liverpool, 27 July 1770 to 2 February 1771. Folio, 32 leaves, in a uniform hand, coarse paper wrappers, bound at edge with string. Titled on upper cover, "Journal Book 1770, Willm Manson."
Details
[MARITIME]. Manuscript document, Log of the Ship Flora, under Captain William Manson, from Liverpool to Newfoundland then Newfoundland to Madeira and home to Liverpool, 27 July 1770 to 2 February 1771. Folio, 32 leaves, in a uniform hand, coarse paper wrappers, bound at edge with string. Titled on upper cover, "Journal Book 1770, Willm Manson."
A ROUGH ATLANTIC CROSSING IN THE HURRICANE SEASON. The pages in Manson's are divided into five vertical columns to record the hour, knots, half-knots, course, and the weather. At the end of each day a horizontal column records longitude, latitude, distance from London and from Skellock Island. Nearly every day is a chronicle of "heavy," "cross," "prodigious" and even "monstrous" seas. 28 August: "Strong gales...sea very high...Decks never clear of water." 30 August: "Blows excessive hard...Ship labours very hard..." On 7 September, the ship is in the path of a full-blown hurricane, "the sea monstrous high from the west." On 9 September the winds "split the main sail in several places." On 28 September the main stay sail is "split all to rags." After reaching Newfoundland on 29 September, Manson rests two months before sailing again on 27 November from Newfoundland towards Madeira. He encounters still more hard weather. "The sea runs monstrous high and cross," he writes on 30 November," and he fears "some of our cargo [fish] has got damaged by yr ship straining & water getting down although all possible means has been used to prevent it." He makes back home to Liverpool on 2 February 1771, "with the Assistance of God."
A ROUGH ATLANTIC CROSSING IN THE HURRICANE SEASON. The pages in Manson's are divided into five vertical columns to record the hour, knots, half-knots, course, and the weather. At the end of each day a horizontal column records longitude, latitude, distance from London and from Skellock Island. Nearly every day is a chronicle of "heavy," "cross," "prodigious" and even "monstrous" seas. 28 August: "Strong gales...sea very high...Decks never clear of water." 30 August: "Blows excessive hard...Ship labours very hard..." On 7 September, the ship is in the path of a full-blown hurricane, "the sea monstrous high from the west." On 9 September the winds "split the main sail in several places." On 28 September the main stay sail is "split all to rags." After reaching Newfoundland on 29 September, Manson rests two months before sailing again on 27 November from Newfoundland towards Madeira. He encounters still more hard weather. "The sea runs monstrous high and cross," he writes on 30 November," and he fears "some of our cargo [fish] has got damaged by yr ship straining & water getting down although all possible means has been used to prevent it." He makes back home to Liverpool on 2 February 1771, "with the Assistance of God."