A Sealing Voyage from Boston 1806

This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 8/31/2008

Autograph Letter Signed, “John Corr” 3p. quarto, Boston, August 7, 1806, with integral leaf addressed to Captain Daniel Prior, Postmaster, and reads in part: “...I duly received your favor of 5 by the hands of Mr. Patebing and am pleased that there are men enough who would like a sealing voyage & I am particularly pleased that they are willing and capable of calculating the result of one, these are the men I want and with such there is a [?] certainty of making a voyage for all parties. The plan is to send 50 men or thre abouts, if exactly fifty including all hands, a full share will be 1/50th of $150 pr. thousand skins which is deemeda full compensation, and will be found a large one if the voyage is made in sixteen or 8 months, which if we are fortunate may possibly be done...If they get no skins they will have no compensation & if they do get skins it will be easy to calculate what the compensation will be (to be paid in Boston). On the other hand if they get nothing what shall I get for the wear and tear of my ship, and expended stores, interest of money & insurance. The fact is that I would not risk the ship & so valuable an outfit iwthout great hope of succeeding, and I esteem it a great thing to have Capt. Smith & two officers who have been in our employ on those Voyages, is him I have the highest confidence & without him would not undertake the voyage by any means & as sealing will be the sole object we set out upon there is more hope of succeeding. It is conjectured this ship will carry 120 thousand skins & if they are to be caught we shall have tehm - the intention is to proceed with & sell them some in China & then return hom & settle the voyage...” More. VG.The first commercial hunting of seals is said to have occurred in 1515, when a cargo of fur seal skins from Uruguay was sent to Spain for sale in the markets of Seville.[ Sealing became more prevalent in the late 1700s when seal herds in the southern hemisphere began to be hunted by whalers. In 1778, English sealers brought back from the Island of South Georgia and the Magellan Strait area as many as 40,000 seal skins and 2,800 tons of elephant seal oil. In 1791, 102 vessels, manned by 3000 sealers, were hunting seals south of the equator. The principal American sealing ports were Stonington and New Haven Connecticut. Most of the pelts taken during these expeditions would be sold in China. The Newfoundland seal hunt became an annually recorded event starting in 1723. By the late 1800s, sealing had become the second most important industry in Newfoundland, second only to cod fishing. The peak of the sealing industry occurred in 1821, when Lloyd's Register had 164 sealing vessels on their records.

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