by Calvin Evans
As girls grew older, usually 14 or 15, they often went to the Labrador on the family fishing venture to act as cooks and domestics for the summer. Surplus daughters were sometimes hired out to other ships’ crews as well.
Though it is known that some Newfoundland women went to sea with their captain husbands, I have been unable to find any diaries or journals from these voyages. Hattie Matthews of Burgeo, whose husband was William Matthews, sailed with him for about 10 years in the 1920s and 1930s when he was captain of the General Laurie. Hattie was the daughter of Captain George May, who had been a foreign-going master for many years. The General Laurie sank in the Mediterranean Sea, and presumably Hattie was aboard for that venture.
When Campbell & McKay’s 372-ton, three-masted ship Attainment sank off Bear Cove, Digby, Nova Scotia, in a severe storm in April 1920, Captain Shepherd’s wife was on board and, accompanied by a Portuguese sailor, she was sent ashore in a basket called a breeches buoy, as the sea was running “mountains high.” Whether she ever recorded her memories of that event is unknown. All the crew were rescued in this fashion.
One fascinating diary does exist, and provided the basis for a recently published book by Bill Haigh, Foote Prints Among the Kauri. When the Foote and Gibbons families left Exploits, Burnt Islands, and St. John’s in December 1864 to sail to New Zealand in the 132-ton brigantine Clara, which had been built at Prince Edward Island, there was on board a crew of 11 and 37 passengers, including 15 children. Mrs. M. S. Peace, a passenger, kept a diary of the six-month voyage, and Bill Haigh bases much of the early part of his book on Mrs. Peace’s diary and quotes her poem “Farewell to Newfoundland” and her ode to the new baby born on board, “Little Clara’s Song.” Mrs. Peace described in detail every vessel sighting, a near disaster with a large steamer, rolling seas, shortage of drinking water at times, food spoiling in the hot weather, entertainments organized to dispel the boredom, singsongs, religious services, and the brief stopover in Capetown, where overindulging in liquid spirits inspired Mrs. Peace to write the following pledge: “We, the officers, passengers and seamen of the brigantine Clara, promise to abstain from all intoxicating drinks as a beverage until the present voyage is concluded,” which she noted had only a limited effect. Running short of supplies, they stopped at Melbourne, Australia, where they were detained by officials for two whole months until they paid fines for six breaches of passenger regulations: “First, for not having sweet and wholesome provisions; second, for insufficient privy accommodation; third, for not having a supply of medical comforts; fourth, for insufficient hospital accommodation; fifth, for not producing a Master’s list; sixth, for not having fitted lifebuoys.” Then officials condemned the vessel’s mast and said that it must be replaced and issued two more summonses: “First, for being two berths short; second, for not having the flour correctly stowed.” Finally it was discovered that Captain Roper had not arranged for a Certificate of Clearance from an emigration agent in Newfoundland. It was agreed through a solicitor in Melbourne that all these additional expenses would be paid when the vessel was sold in Auckland. Several of the paying passengers left the ship at this point, intending to find an alternate way to New Zealand, and the Clara left on the last leg of her journey, arriving on June 30, 1865.
The Foote and Gibbons families had been sawmill operators at St. John’s and at Peter’s River, near the mouth of the Exploits River, since the early 1840s, and they were moving to New Zealand to continue that industry, which they did successfully for many years.
Newfoundland women also handled ships. Arthur Sidney Butt, in his book Telling It As It Was, affirms that the women of Flat Islands, Bonavista Bay, “handled boats almost as capably as men,” and that “certain women acted as ‘skippers’ or ‘skipperettes’ when they went on berry-picking expeditions or when they shared off-the-island grass-cutting exchanges.” Sarah Gosse Collins described her experiences in the late 1880s, as quoted in Eric Martin Gosse’s book The Settling of Spaniard’s Bay: “I sailed with father in the Victoria and with brother Bob (Gosse) in the New Era. We had some rough passages (to and from Labrador) but I was a good sailor. When they reefed I took my turn at the wheel and I could keep her into the wind with any of the boys. When I married John I never sailed again but every June I watched when the flags went to the mainpeak and they sailed away.”
Surely one of the most incredible stories of women and the sea is that of young Anne Harvey of Isle aux Morts (“Island of the Dead”) on the south-west coast of Newfoundland. On a stormy morning in July 1832 she was the first to hear the distress call of a ship breaking up on the treacherous rocky shoals. Anne, her father George, her younger brother, and Anne’s Newfoundland dog went out in their dory to help. Her father realized that they must somehow get a rope aboard the ship so they could rig a breeches buoy in an attempt to rescue the people. The ship’s lifeboats had all been smashed and the sea was full of floating debris as passengers and crew crowded together at the forecastle area. Anne suggested that her dog was such a strong swimmer that he could swim through the roiling sea and take the rope, tied around the dog’s shoulders and middle, to the ship. He did, and the three Harveys were thus able to rescue 163 people and care for them until help arrived from outside the community a week later. Anne’s role in the rescue, including her handling of the dory in the rough seas, was truly remarkable, but she had been fitted for the task by growing up on the sea and by the careful mentoring of her father. The Harvey family was awarded a medal for their bravery by the King of England. Many years later one of the Coast Guard vessels working the Newfoundland and Labrador coasts was named the Anne Harvey in recognition of the young woman’s feat.
In Bay Roberts in the 1920s or 1930s there was a young woman whose surname was Batten who skippered a ship with her father as they brought coal from North Sydney to Newfoundland. Ann Miller of Fogo, whose husband was Paddy Miller, was skipper of a ship plying between her home and Botwood, probably in the 1950s. And more recently, Angela Butt was a 1998 graduate of the Marine Institute and served as captain of the J & B out of St. John’s that summer. She was described in the M. U. N. Gazette as “possibly the first female schooner captain in the province’s 500 year history.”
Such was women’s involvement in the family fishing venture that when the salt-fish trade began to disappear and fish caught on the fishing grounds could be taken directly to fish plants, it was a natural transition for women to stay in the boats and to be designated legitimately as fishermen, and later as fisherpersons. It is a cynical interpretation of the practice to say that women only did this at a later period so that they could collect unemployment insurance.
Later Newfoundland Women Shipowners
I checked the Newfoundland ship registers up to 1990, but I hesitate to give detailed information about some of the later women ship-owners for perceived reasons of personal sensitivities. Both in this chapter and in Appendix A, I have used the 1960s as a cut-off date in providing details of all transactions. It may, however, be of interest to list the names of later owners, with minimum details. These are a mixture of sole owners, joint owners, mortgagees and executrixes. The vessels are a mixture of fishing ships, working ships, yachts and pleasure boats. The abbreviation Mort. in the last column indicates that the woman was a mortgagee for the ship. The abbreviation M.O. is for managing owner.
Woman
Place
Occupation
Phyllis Marie Hillyard
Cupids
Married & M.O.
Joan Rayleen Sharpe
St. John’s
Married
Helen Louise Pollock
Lewisporte
Housewife & M.O.
Susan Mary Petursson
St. John’s
Married
Edna Ackerman
Trinity, B.B.
Married
Gertrude Kelly
Beau Bois, P.B.
Widow
Hazel Marie Stuckless
Gander
Housewife & M.O.
Eva Wareham
St. John’s
Widow
Ruth Story
Portugal Cove
Clerk/Manager
Bessie Wilhelmina Savory
Lewisporte
Homemaker
Zena Leonard
Southern Hbr.
Widow
Florentine Hynes
Fox Island River
Widow & M.O.
Marjorie Brown
Baie Vert
Widow
Mabel Roberts
Springdale
Housewife
Joan Allison Herder
Topsail
Widow
Joan Allison Herder
Topsail
Widow
Maisie Herritt
Sandyville
Married
Elizabeth Joanne Hatcher
Rose Blanche
Married & M.O.
Mamie Weir
Little Bay Islands
Widow
Lenora Fagan
St. John’s
Widow
Fannie Roberta Cole
Winterton
Widow
Judith Collins
St. John’s
Married
Joan Verna Petten
Port de Grave
Married & M.O.
Rose Ting (or Ling)
St. Lawrence
Company Director
Rose Ting
St. Lawrence
Company Director
Rose Ting
St. Lawrence
Company Director
Rose Ting
St. Lawrence
Company Director
Vivian Wright
St. John’s
Businessperson & M.O.
Date
Ship
Status
1968
Pea Jay
Sole
1969-72 Cormorant
Mort.
1970-
Aigle de Mer
Sole
1971-73
Rusty Scott
Sole
1971-
Bonny Girl
Sole
1972
Mortier Bay
Executrix
1973-75
Miss Sheila Marie
Sole
1974
Barry & Carol
Executrix
1969-72
North Bay
Sole
1975-78
Flying Swan II
Sole
1977
Terry Maurice
Executrix
1977
Mary Evon
Executrix
1978-79
Elessia Elizabeth
Executrix
1979
Chris & Pete
Executrix
1980
Raybeu
Executrix
1980
Beothic II
Executrix
1980
Devon John
Joint
1984
Elizabeth Joanne
Executrix
1983-87
Miss Green Bay
Executrix
1983
Makkovik
Executrix
1984-
Judy Janet
Mort.
1985-86
Albatross V
Joint
1985
Sherry Roxanne
Sole
1986-89
Sandra & Carolann
Sole
1986-89
Cape La Hune
Sole
1986-89
Ashuanipi
Sole
1986-89
Nina Maria
Sole
1990-
Manta Ray
Sole
CHAPTER FOUR
Summary and Conclusions
This book takes us back to a time when women, battling against almost insurmountable odds, carved out a place for themselves in previously unfamiliar territory.
How many women shipowners were there, and how do their numbers compare to those of male owners? In the microfiche edition of the ship registers to which I have referred several times, the listing covers the years from 1820 to 1936, i.e., 116 years. In 1820, 84 vessels were registered, and for the next three years the average number of registrations per year was about 40. Vessel registration reached a high of 243 in 1825 and then averaged about 95 vessels per year over the next five years. The first woman made an appearance in the listings in 1818 (Mary Parsons, widow of Clown’s Cove), though Eric Gosse affirmed that Margaret and George McCarthy of Carbonear, who re-registered their ship George in 1823, were joint owners of that vessel as early as 1804.
A total of 97 women shipowners were found in the microfiche edition of the ship registers for the period 1820 to 1936. This number compares with a total of 16,629 owners for the period. In this total number we must consider that in many instances the names of five or six men (and even more) appear as joint owners of a particular ship, often the shipbuilder and his sons or a group of brothers. However, when the subsequent transactions to the original registrations were checked, an additional 173 women were found, making a total of 270 women shipowners. By searching the records from 1937 to 1990, another 138 women shipowners were found, for a total of 408. As is evident from this study, several other women boat owners and shipowners were identified from various written and oral sources. So we are looking at a Newfoundland sample of between 500 and 600 women.
In some of the very early census records, widows owning boats and plantations accounted for roughly 10% of the population. That seems unusually high, and the statistics above do not approach that figure. Again, by way of comparison, the Conception Bay Plantation Book of 1805 lists about 147 women property owners; these women had some kind of connection with 156 of the 1062 plantations or properties. However, not all of these women were boat owners and involved in fishing ventures. These were mostly waterfront properties but some were being leased to other tenants by women owners. There are several references to “on waterside,” “by the seaside,” “beach,” “wharf,” and so forth. There are specific references to flakes on 45 of the plantations, to stages on 39 and to “stores” on several. Some of the entries lack any kind of specific information, and at least one was not a waterfront property since it was said to be surrounded by woods on all four sides. It is impossible to be certain how many of these women were actually involved in the fishery, and there is no point in guessing.
And now, back to the ship registers for 1820 to 1990. When broken down into 20-year periods from 1820 onward, we find the following numbers of women shipowners:
1818.................................. 1
1820-1839............................. 19
1840-1859............................. 20
1860-1879............................. 10
1880-1899............................. 41
1900-1919............................. 81
1920-1939............................ 121
1940-1959............................. 81
1960-1979............................. 23
1980-1990............................. 11
Grand Total.............................. 408
Again, it must be said that this number covers women in the ship registers only. There is a scarcity of factual data from the earlier periods and a lack of precise documentation in all too many instances. Despite these problems, can we now say that the objectives of this research have been “proven” or substantiated in a satisfactory way when we consider the evidence presented? The research set out to show that:
i. Women were involved in a substantial way in the early economy and society of Newfoundland and this involvement included ownership of boats, ships and waterfront properties associated with the fishery.
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This is probably the easiest of the objectives to substantiate. There is clear evidence in court records, in the plantation books, in the early census records, in the ship registers, and in the general literature that women’s role as owners was substantial. We do not need to belabour this point.
ii. It was real ownership and we are dealing here with real money.
Obviously, there were many cases in which registration of a ship in a woman’s name, and particularly in a wife’s name, was a paper transaction. No money changed hands in this type of transaction. But the intent was sincere and honest, as we saw with Henry and Myrtle Hatcher of Rose Blanche, and with Simeon and Violet Blanche Butt of Harbour Le Cou. The intent was that, should the husband die, the woman and her children were provided for, and other members of the family were limited in their claims on the estate.
A widow who continued to partner with her deceased husband’s male partners was risking her livelihood, often on dangerous ventures. A spinster who bought a ship or ships on her own was risking her fortune, even if it was inherited money.
