Vessels mentioned in the correspondence

USS Active
According to this despatch, Active was a US paddle steamer. In 1856, a group of Indigenous people associated with the British colony were mistaken as hostile by the commander of the Active and taken into custody. Douglas intervened, the group was released and their weapons returned.
This 1857 despatch reports that the Active arrived in Victoria, carrying the American Boundary Commissioner Archibald Campbell, who was to discuss boundary issues with the British Commissioner Captain Prevost.
The Active was part of the highly competitive Victoria - Portland - San Francisco run and it became part of the North Pacific Transportation Company's fleet in the 1850s and 60s.1 An advertisement poster from 1867 lists the Active as part of California Steam Navigation Company's steamship line.2
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
RMS Africa, 1850-1868
According to this correspondence, Africa was a Royal Mail steamship, which James Cooper and family returned to Victoria on in 1858.
Africa was launched for the Cunard Line from Glasgow in July 1850, and took its maiden voyage, from Liverpool to New York, in October of the same year.1 It was 81 m long, 12 m wide and driven by both paddle and sail, which gave it a speed of 22 kmh.2 Africa could hold roughly 160 passengers, depending on their choice of class.3
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Agincourt
 
Information is not yet available for this vessel.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Ajax
 
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
HMS Alarm, 1845-1904
Alarm was a sixth-rate ship of the Royal Navy; it was commanded by Captain Douglas Curry during its time in the Pacific, from 1855-59.1
According to the Index of 19th Century Naval Vessels, along with Vixen, Alarm was involved in the rescue of two British citizens who had been kidnapped by Colonel Salas of the Nicaraguan army in 1848.2
Alarm was 40 m long, 12 m wide and built at Sheerness dockyards; it became a coal hulk in 1860 and was sold by the Navy in 1904.
  • 1. Peter Davis, HMS Alarm (1845), The Victorian Royal Navy (website). http://www.pdavis.nl/ShowShip.php?id=1033
  • 2. Alarm, Index of 19th Century Naval Vessels.
  • 3. J. J. Colledge, Ships of the Royal Navy (Devon: David & Charles: Newton Abbot, 1969), 1:30.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Albion
The Albion, a 488-tonne, 37 m long barque, was owned by Burlinson Sedman.1 Sedman leased the Albion to John Lidgette, who used the vessel to ship spars from Vancouver Island to England, under the condition that Lidgette pay the HBC a duty of 10 percent of the price of the total shipment.2
The Albion entered the Strait of Juan de Fuca on December 21st, 1849, with Richard O. Hinderwell as master and Captain William Brotchie as its supercargo.3 Despite Captain Brotchie's extensive experience of the area, as master of several HBC vessels from 1831 to 1844, the Albion struck a reef south of Victoria Harbour; the reef is now known as Brotchie Ledge.4
Although the licence to cut spars was specifically for Vancouver Island, Brotchie decided to cut spars on the American side, at New Dungeness, in the winter of 1850.5 United States customs officials ordered that Brotchie leave US territory and eventually seized, libeled, condemned, and sold the Albion.6 Later, a commission ruled that the United States was responsible for damages done to the Albion and was obliged to pay Lidgette $20,000.7
  • 1. Barry M. Gough, Forests and Sea Power: A Vancouver Island Economy, 1778-1875, in Britain, Canada and the North Pacific (Hampshire: Ashgate Publishing Limited, 2004), XI, 6.
  • 2. Ibid., 7.
  • 3. Ibid., 8.
  • 4. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 89.
  • 5. Gough, Forests and Sea Power, 8.
  • 6. Ibid., 9.
  • 7. Ibid.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
HMS Alert, 1856-1896
Alert was a Royal Navy sloop propelled by both screw and sail.1 It is unclear as to who commanded Alert during its time in the Pacific. This private correspondence mentions a commander Priser, but Davis refers to a Commander William Alfred Rumbulow Pearse.2
Alert was converted into a survey ship for the British arctic exploration of 1875-76, and it was later used by both the United States and Canada in its capacity as an arctic vessel.3
It was 49 m long, 10 m wide and built at Pembroke Dock.
  • 1. Peter Davis, HMS Alert (1856), The Victorian Royal Navy (website). http://www.pdavis.nl/ShowShip.php?id=139
  • 2. Ibid.
  • 3. Ibid.
  • 4. J. J. Colledge, Ships of the Royal Navy (Devon: David & Charles: Newton Abbot, 1969), 1:34.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Alexandra
Lewis & Dryden mention a collision, in June of 1865, between the big sternwheeler Alexandria, note the alternative spelling, and the Fidelater, which sank the latter vessel off Clover Point, bringing on a damage suit.1
On July 3, 1865, the British Colonist reports that the Alexandra is now finally laid up by her owners till the termination of her pending lawsuit.2 The paper goes on to print transcriptions of the Vice Admiralty Court case in subsequent papers.
On Monday, July 1, 1865, the Colonist reports the arrival on the Alexandra at New Westminster, from Victoria.3 The article notes that upon its arrival to port, the Alexandra was carried by the high wind and struck the Maria Scott which sustained slight damage.4
When it was not colliding with other ships, the Alexandra could be found trading across the border in Puget Sound, where, according to this despatch from 1864, it was embroiled in a minor legal tussle when the the owner and master of the Alexandra had been obstructed in the prosecution of Lawful Voyages, between this Port [Victoria, presumably] and Ports on Puget Sound.
Lewis & Dryden make no mention of the Alexandra's construction details or fate, but they do deem it an ill-starred ship.5
  • 1. E. W. Wright, ed., Lewis & Dryden's Marine History of the Pacific Northwest (Portland: The Lewis & Dryden Printing Company, 1895), 104. http://dx.doi.org/10.14288/1.0222484
  • 2. Laid Up, British Colonist, July 3, 1865.
  • 3. From New Westminster, British Colonist, July 1, 1865.
  • 4. Ibid.
  • 5. Wright, Lewis & Dryden's Marine History, 140.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Alice
James Cooper constructed the Alice, a 44-tonne iron schooner, from pieces he had brought from England to Vancouver Island.1 Cooper, who commanded HBC ships in the Pacific from 1844 to 1849, used the Alice to trade between the Pacific Northwest, Hawaii, and San Francisco.2
HBC officials viewed Cooper's activities as a threat to their monopoly and worked to impede his activities; as a result, Cooper became an extremely vocal opponent of the HBC.3
  • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 132.
  • 2. Ibid.
  • 3. Ibid.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
HMS America, 1810-1867
HMS America was an Armada class, sail powered battleship that had 74 guns when it was launched in 1810. In 1835 the ship was cut down to 50 guns.1 According to historian Barry Gough, America was the most important British vessel on the North Pacific coast during the Oregon Crisis, despite its leaving for England before the conflict was concluded.2 This controversial decision resulted in ship's captain, John Gordon, being court-martialed.3
  • 1. David Lyon and Rif Winfield, The Sail & Steam Navy List: All the Ships of the Royal Navy 1815-1889 (London: Chatham Publishing, 2004), 45-46, 101-102.
  • 2. Barry M. Gough, H.M.S. America on the North Pacific Coast, Oregon Historical Quarterly vol. 70, no. 4 (December 1969): 293. http://www.jstor.org/stable/20613128
  • 3. Gough, H.M.S. America, 309.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
HMS Amethyst, 1844-1869
Amethyst was a sixth-rate Royal Navy ship, commanded by Captain Sidney Grenfell during her time in the Pacific.1 It was involved in the second Anglo-Chinese War, or Opium War.2
In this 1858 despatch, Douglas acknowledges with satisfaction that the Amethyst is on route, with the Tribune and Pylades, from the East Indies to Vancouver Island, with a compliment of “Supernumerary Marines” aboard.
The Amethyst carried 26 guns, was 40 m long, 12.5 m wide, and built at Plymouth dockyard; the Navy sold it for use as a cable vessel in 1869.3
  • 1. Peter Davis, HMS Amethyst (1844), The Victorian Royal Navy (website). http://www.pdavis.nl/ShowShip.php?id=1054
  • 2. Ibid.
  • 3. J. J. Colledge, Ships of the Royal Navy (Devon: David & Charles: Newton Abbot, 1969), 1:39.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Amphitrite, 1816-1875
According to this private correspondence, the Amphitrite expelled a group of prospectors, of which Easterby was a member, who attempted to unlawfully mine a vein of gold the group had discovered on Haida Gwaii in 1852.
It was constructed of teak at Bombay [Mumbai] and carried 24 guns, and it sailed the BC coast from 1851-1857 under two captains, Charles Frederick and Richard Burridge.1 It was Captain Richards who, in 1859, would name a location after this ship: Amphitrite Point is located on Vancouver Island's west coast, on the southern tip of the Ucluelet Peninsula.2
  • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 43.
  • 2. Amphitrite Point, BC Geographical Names Information System.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Arabia, 1853-?
According to Hill, Sir Rowland to Elliot, Thomas Frederick 30 October 1856, CO 305:7, no. 9784, 406, Arabia was a mail packet ship. It was part of the Cunard Line, as this short article, presented verbatim, from the British Colonist confirms:
Mrs. Putnam, a colored Boston woman, who was badly treated on board the Europa, on the voyage to England, and wrote a letter to Samuel Cunard complaning of it, returned on the Arabia and had every comfort purchased by her passage money.1
Likely, this was the Arabia constructed in 1853, which served as a Crimean War transport.2
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Archer, 1849-?
According to this private letter, the Archer was a British Gov[ernment] Steamer upon which Cadell had requested, from Lytton, free transport from England to Vancouver Island. In the same despatch and included documents Merivale expresses that Cadell was a restless man and that free passage on the Archer was out of the question.
Archer was a screw-propulsion sloop of 14 guns, and it had a dramatic career: it was involved in a variety of naval actions, captured slaver ships, endured several cases of mass-sickness, and spent most of its time on the politically volatile west coast of Africa.1
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Assistance
The Assistance, a 427-tonne discovery-class ship, was purchased in March of 1850.1 George Henry Richards served as deputy commander of the Assistance during an 1852-1854 expedition to the Arctic, to search for Sir John Franklin, who was lost on an earlier expedition.2 Richards and his crew abandoned the Assistance in 1854 when the vessel became trapped in the Arctic pack-ice.3
  • 1. HMS Assistance, Index of 19th Century Naval Vessels.
  • 2. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 500.
  • 3. HMS Assistance, Index of 19th Century Naval Vessels.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
HMS Bacchante, 1859-1869
HMS Bacchante was a Liffey class, wood construction frigate carrying fifty-one guns and 560 crew.1 Like many ships built during introduction of steam power, Bacchante was equipped with boilers and a screw, but regularly used sail as a source of propulsion. Launched at Portsmouth in 1859, decommissioned in 1864, and scrapped in 1869, the ship spent its short service life captained by Donald McLeod Mackenzie in the Royal Navy's Pacific squadron.2 Bacchante was the flagship of the squadron's commander-in-chief, Sir Thomas Maitland, from 1860 to 1862.3 The ship was frequently present at Esquimalt which had, according to an 1861 editorial in Victoria's Daily British Colonist newspaper, become the the actual naval headquarters in the Pacific, despite not being formally declared so by the Admiralty.4 When Bacchante's heavy '68-pounder' pivot gun was upgraded in 1862, its surplus weaponry was transferred to Esquimalt's defensive fortifications, reducing the number of guns carried to thirty-nine.5
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Beaver, 1835-1888
Arguably, the most famous coastal ship of its era, the Beaver was a paddlewheel steamer built in England in 1835 for the Hudson's Bay Company's trade-business in the Pacific Northwest.1 It was made of sturdy oak and elm and driven by twin side-paddles and two 35-horsepower engines; it was reasonably light and nimble, at 111 tonnes and 31 m, and could achieve a top speed at 10 knots.2 As for sails, it could be rigged as both a schooner and a brigantine.3
The Beaver arrived at Fort Vancouver on April 10th, 1836.4 It spent much of its life carrying freight and passengers between outposts in and around Vancouver Island and particularly between Victoria and the Fraser River during the gold rush of 1858.5
It was sold in 1874 to a company in Victoria, who used it for barge and cargo work until it wrecked off of Prospect Point in Vancouver Harbour.6 The scope of its influence can be seen in the volume of place-names that bear its memory.7
This despatch reports that the Beaver was detained by American customs officers and notes this event's effects on trade, colony morale, and US relations. This despatch, in the following year, reports that the ship was employed as part of A difficulty which nearly led to a fatal affray with the Songies Tribe.
This despatch by Douglas reports that he proceeded to Fort Langley on the Beaver, having transferred from the Satellite and Otter, respectively, to proclaim the Act of Parliament providing for the Government of British Columbia.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Bellerophon
 
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Birch
 
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Boxer
 
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Brig William
The William, as noted in this correspondence, was a British Brig that was wrecked near Barkley Sound on January 1, 1854. Captain John McIntosh, thought to be intoxicated at the time, perished in the wreck. The 14 survivors were taken to Sooke under the guide of aboriginals.1
The wreck of the William and the subsequent inquiry into the circumstances surrounding it led to the creation by Governor Douglas of a Vice Admiralty Court and the appointment of David Cameron as acting judge. It was later determined that Douglas did not have the authority to establish a Vice Admiralty Court.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Briseis
According to this despatch, Briseis was a freight ship chartered by the British government in 1858 to carry supplies to Vancouver Island and the mainland for the Royal Engineers. An enclosure with the same notes the destruction by Fire of the Barque Briseis on 8 December 1858.
Both this private correspondence and Hawes, Benjamin to Fitzgerald, Sir William Robert Seymour Vesey 9 March 1859, CO 60:6, no. 2619, 262 confirm that Briseis never made its destination: it burned at sea off the coast of Brazil, with hundreds of tonnes of uninsured supplies on board. Finally, this private correspondence mentions that Shaw, Savill and Company acted as brokers for the ill-fated Briseis.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
HMS Brisk, 1851-1870
The Brisk was a Royal Navy sloop with screw propulsion.1 It was under the command of Alfred John Curtis during its time in the Pacific from 1854-57.2
The Brisk, under the command of Frederick Beauchamp Paget Seymour,3 was part of a squadron fighting in the White Sea during the Crimean War.4
This ship was 58 m long, 11 m wide, and carried 14 guns; it was sold into mercantile service in 1870.5
This despatch notes that the Brisk and two other vessels were under orders to repair to Vancouver's Island.
  • 1. Peter Davis, HMS Brisk (1851), The Victorian Royal Navy (website). http://www.pdavis.nl/ShowShip.php?id=143
  • 2. Ibid.
  • 3. William Laird Clowes, The Royal Navy: A History (London: Sampson Low, Marston and Company, 1901), 6:428.
  • 4. Peter Davis, HMS Brisk (1851), The Victorian Royal Navy (website). http://www.pdavis.nl/ShowShip.php?id=143
  • 5. J. J. Colledge, Ships of the Royal Navy (Devon: David & Charles: Newton Abbot, 1969), 1:90.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Britannia
 
Information is not yet available for this vessel.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Brother Jonathan, 1851-1865
Brother Jonathan achieved fame in its era for both celebratory and tragic reasons. As to the former, this ship carried the official announcement to Portland that Oregon Territory had become Oregon State.1 As to the latter, on July 30th, 1865, it hit an uncharted rock off the coast near Crescent City and sunk with 244 passengers on board, only 19 survived.2 Brother Jonathan then had the regrettable label as the deadliest shipwreck in West Coast history to date.3
It avoided an earlier and greater disaster further up the coast, named as the Commodore at the time, in which it nearly sunk with 350 passengers on board.4 For its final calamity, however, it had been repaired and renamed Brother Jonathan, which, prior to the invention of the better-known Uncle Sam, refers to a fictional character created to personify the state of the United States.5
In this despatch, Douglas refers to the Commodore as an American Steamer, whose purpose at the time, in 1858, was to disembark some 450 passengers on board, the chief part of whom [were] gold miners for the Couteau country.
In the same year, this ship carried a contingent of Black travelers from San Francisco to Vancouver Island, whose purpose was to determine the island's suitability for settlement and, apparently, the reports were favourable.6
The Brother Jonathan was an impressive vessel at 67 m long and 10 m wide; its paddle wheels, one each side, were nearly 11 m in diameter and driven by an engine that had cylinders of 2 m in diameter.7 Its main saloon was 21 m long, had a dozen staterooms, and after its repairs in preparation for use under the ownership of Cornelius Vanderbilt, the ship had a passenger capacity of 750.8
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Cadboro, 1824-1860
The Cadboro, also spelled Cadborough, was a 17 m long, 5 m wide schooner built in 1826 and purchased by the Hudson's Bay Company; it arrived on the Pacific Coast on April 24th, 1827.1
From 1846-47 it carried the crew of the wrecked Shark to California. Cadboro was wrecked in 1860 on its way out of Puget Sound.2
The Cadboro is mentioned several times in the correspondence collection.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
HMS Calcutta, 1831-1908
The Calcutta was a second-rate Royal Navy wooden sailing ship of 84 guns.1 Calcutta was involved in the second Anglo-Chinese or Opium War as the flagship of Rear-Admiral Michael Seymour.2
It was built at Bombay [Mumbai] Dockyard and was 60 m long by 16 m wide.3
  • 1. Peter Davis, HMS Calcutta (1831), The Victorian Royal Navy (website). http://www.pdavis.nl/ShowShip.php?id=1186
  • 2. Ibid.
  • 3. J. J. Colledge, Ships of the Royal Navy (Devon: David & Charles: Newton Abbot, 1969), 1:100.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Caldera
 
Information is not yet available for this vessel.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
California
 
Information is not yet available for this vessel.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
HMS Calypso, 1845-1866
The Calypso was a sixth-rate Royal Navy ship commanded by Captain Frederick Byng Montresor in the Pacific Station.1 It was built at Chatham Dockyard, had 20 guns, and was 37 m long by 11 m wide.2
This 1858 despatch requests that the Calypso be employed in the military response to the murder of 42 miners, at the hands of, apparently, Indigenous men, at Fraser River. And, in another correspondence in the same year, the Calypso is ordered to Vancouver Island to re-provision the Satellite and Plumper.
  • 1. Peter Davis, HMS Calypso (1845), The Victorian Royal Navy (website). http://www.pdavis.nl/ShowShip.php?id=1192
  • 2. J. J. Colledge, Ships of the Royal Navy (Devon: David & Charles: Newton Abbot, 1969), 1:102.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
HMS Cameleon, 1860-1883
The Cameleon, occasionally spelled “Camelion”,1 and “Chameleon”,2 was a 17-gun corvette that was stationed at Esquimalt periodically between 1861 and 1874.3 It was built at the Deptford Dockyard and was 55 m long by 10 m wide.4
The Cameleon, along with the Grappler, investigated the alleged seizure of the schooner Trader by a group of Nootka First Nations and was also under orders to assess the group's threatening attitude.5
The Cameleon, captained by Hardinge, was one of several Royal Navy vessels that took part in the “Lemalcha Incident”, which was the search for the Lemalchi First Nations group from Kuper Island accused of the murder of a pair of Gulf Islands settlers:6 Frederick Marks and his daughter, Caroline Harvey. Marks and Harvey were on their way to Mayne Island from Waldron Island when wind blew their sloop off course to Saturna Island, where the murders took place. The Grappler, Forward, Topaze and Devastation were among the other notable vessels involved in the search.7
According to the 11 May 1863, edition of the British Colonist, the Cameleon, which was commissioned in 1861, [was] considered by all nautical judges to be a beautiful specimen of her class.8 The Cameleon was sold in 1883.9
  • 1. Peter Davis, HMS Camelion (1860), The Victorian Royal Navy (website). http://www.pdavis.nl/ShowShip.php?id=144
  • 2. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 277-278.
  • 3. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names, (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 101.
  • 4. J. J. Colledge, Ships of the Royal Navy (Devon: David & Charles: Newton Abbot, 1969), 1:114.
  • 5. Barry M. Gough, Gunboat Frontier: British Maritime Authority and Northwest Coast Indians, 1846-1890, (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1984), 114.
  • 6. Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names, 101.
  • 7. Gough, Gunboat Frontier: British Maritime Authority and Northwest Coast Indians, 1846-1890, 141-143.
  • 8. H. M. Screw Steam Sloop Chameleon, British Colonist, May 11, 1863.
  • 9. Peter Davis, HMS Camelion (1860), The Victorian Royal Navy (website). http://www.pdavis.nl/ShowShip.php?id=144
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Captain Cook
The Captain Cook was a Bombay-built copper-hulled snow, a type of brig, of 356 tonnes.1 The Captain Cook and the Experiment were part of James Charles Stuart Strange's trade and exploration voyage to the Northwest coast in 1785.2
The expedition, which sailed out of India in 1785, was plagued with problems.3 The Experiment was damaged in Indian waters, and so sought repairs in Batavia (Djakarta, Indonesia); moreover, many of the crew contracted scurvy.4 When the expedition reached Nootka Sound in June of 1786, it arrived too late in the season to trade.5 Strange sailed to China in September 1786, to sell the small amount of otter pelts he had been able to acquire.6
  • 1. Barry M. Gough, Distant Dominion: Britain and the Northwest Coast of North America, 1579-1809 (Vancouver, BC: University of British Columbia Press, 1980), 57.
  • 2. Robin Fisher, Strange, James Charles Stuart Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online.
  • 3. Ibid.
  • 4. Ibid.
  • 5. Ibid.
  • 6. Ibid.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Caribbean
 
Information is not yet available for this vessel.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Cecil
According to Hamilton, George Alexander to Merivale, Herman 27 September 1852, CO 305:3, no. 8866, 269, Cecil was an American Schooner that sailed from San Francisco to Haida Gwaii in 1852. From May 18th to the 26th of that year, Cecil visited Mitchell Inlet in a quest for gold but met with no success.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Chameleon
 
Information is not yet available for this vessel.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
HMS Charybdis
HMS Charybdis was a Pearl class corvette launched with 21 guns in 1859.1 The ship, captained by Algernon McLennan Lyons, served on the Pacific Station from 1868 to 1871.2 While under Lyons's command, the ship ran aground twice — once in 1869 and then again in 1870.3 Charybdis was given to the Canadian government for use as a merchant marine training ship in 1880 and sold in Halifax in 1884.4 Other Pearl class vessels named in the despatches include HMS Clio, HMS Satellite, HMS Scout, and HMS Scylla.5
  • 1. David Lyon and Rif Winfield, The Sail & Steam Navy List: All the Ships of the Royal Navy 1815-1889 (London: Chatham Publishing, 2004), 209.
  • 2. The Navy List [June 1868] (London: John Murray, 1868), 188. http://hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015025957674; The Navy List [June 1871] (London: John Murray, 1871), 138. http://hdl.handle.net/2027/mdp.39015025957708; Military and Naval Intelligence, Times (London), 25 July 1871, 5.
  • 3. Return of All Losses and Casualties to Her Majesty's Ships […], in Accounts and Papers [British Parliament, 1872, vol. 39], 26, 28. http://hdl.handle.net/2027/hvd.32044106495203
  • 4. Canada, Chicago Daily Tribune, 12 November 1880, 10; Ottawa, Chicago Daily Tribune, 7 May 1881, 8; Lyon and Winfield, The Sail & Steam Navy List, 209.
  • 5. Lyon and Winfield, The Sail & Steam Navy List, 209.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Chatham
The Chatham was a survey brig, built in Dover, England, in 1788.1 It served as the armed tender to HMS Discovery during Captain Vancouver's 1791 expedition to map the Pacific Northwest.2 Commanded by Captain William Robert Broughton, the Chatham surveyed what would, for a time, be called the Broughton Archipelago, in Queen Charlotte Sound; it surveyed the Columbia River up to Point Vancouver, 161 km upstream.3 The Chatham returned to England in 1795 and was reportedly sold in Jamaica in 1830.4
  • 1. Chatham, Ships of the Old Navy.
  • 2. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 89.
  • 3. J. K. Laughton, Broughton, William Robert Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online.
  • 4. Chatham, Ships of the Old Navy.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
HMS Clio, 1858-1919
Davis lists Clio as a corvette class, screw-driven ship of 21 guns, with a length of 61 m and a displacement of 2,223 tonnes.1 It was built in Sheerness Dockyard in 1857 and launched from the same on 28 August 1858.2
Clio served twice on the British Columbia coast, the first from 1859-62 under the command of Captain Thomas Miller and the second from 1864-68, under the command of Captian Nicholas Turnour.3 In the latter commission the Clio became embroiled in a number of dramatic events, for example, in 1865, it destroyed the Kwakwaka'wakw village of Ku-Kultz, near Fort Rupert, when three men suspected of an earlier murder were not handed over.4
Clio is mentioned in several correspondence, including this despatch from 1859, in which Newcastle reports that Her Majesty's Government have ordered the Topaze and Clio to join the Squadron on the North West Coast of America. Another document, from 1866, reports that Rear Admiral Denman sent the Clio to afford protection and support to the British Settlers of Metlakahtla [Metlakatla], British Columbia.
The Clio went on to serve at the Australian Station from 1870-74, then it returned to the Wales coast to serve as a training vessel; in 1919, it was broken up for scrap at Bangor.6
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Colinda
According to this despatch, the barque Colinda, owned by Mr. Tomlin of London, was chartered by the Hudson's Bay Companyin 1853 to carry supplies and new emigrants to Victoria from England. This same despatch reports that off the coast of Chile, the passengers of Colinda incited a mutiny and forced Captain John Powell Mills to anchor at the Port of Valdivia, and that the passengers were tried at Valparaiso and acquitted based on lack of evidence. Apparently, they remained in Chile and refused to continue on under the command of Mills.
This despatch, by Douglas, describes the mutiny. It reports that Mills, who was also part owner of Colinda, sold much of the cargo owned by the Hudson's Bay Company. Moreover, Mills refused to pay the HBC in full for the undelivered goods and was arrested upon landing at Victoria. Colinda eventually returned to London under the command of James M. Reid.
Mills's account of the incident can be found in this private correspondence. He claims that Governor Douglas seized the Colinda in the Queens Name and converted [the ship] into a brothel for prostitutes and drunkards. Douglas's response to Mills's complaints can be found in this despatch.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
HMS Collingwood, 1841-1867
The Collingwood was a Royal Navy third-rate sailing ship.1 It was 58 m long, 17 m wide and carried 80 guns.2 This wooden two-deck ship housed 750 men, and from 1844-48 it was the flagship of Rear-Admiral George Francis Seymour in the Pacific.3
Both Ley, J. H. to [Recipient not known.] 14 August 1848, CO 305:1, no. 1589, 289 and this despatch mention the Collingwood, and refer to its anchorage in Valparaiso.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Columbia, 1835
The bark Columbia was an HBC ship of 315 tonnes, 6 guns, and 24 crew.1 It has the distinction of being one of the first few ships to enter Victoria Harbour direct from England, the first was the Vancouver in 1845.2
An 1856 despatch notes that the Columbia arrived in Victoria, from San Francisco, with reinforcements of Troops with munitions of War, in answer, presumably, to ongoing conflicts with Indigenous groups.
The Columbia was built by Messrs Green Wigram & Green and launched in 1835.3 In 1835 it served as escort to another famous West Coast ship, the Beaver, on its journey to the coast.4 the HBC sold this well-travelled ship in 1850.5
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
HMS Constance, 1846-1875
The Constance was a fourth-rate sailing ship of the Royal Navy.1 It was built at Pembroke Dock, carried 50 guns, and was 50 m long by 16 m wide.2 During its time in the Pacific Station, it was commanded by Captain Baldwin Wake Walker from 1846-47 and Captain George William Conway Courtenay from 1847-49.3 Constance was converted to a screw-frigate in 1862.4
Constance is mentioned in these extracts, which are not transcribed, in reference to letters received from Captain Courtney, who was apparently on board HMS Constance at sea.
  • 1. Peter Davis, HMS Constance (1846), The Victoria Royal Navy (website). http://www.pdavis.nl/ShowShip.php?id=188
  • 2. J. J. Colledge, Ships of the Royal Navy (Devon: David & Charles: Newton Abbot, 1969), 1:134.
  • 3. Ibid.
  • 4. Ibid.
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
Constitution
The Constitution, a wooden-propeller vessel, was built at New York in 1850 by Sam Ward and Rodman Price.1 In 1856, Hunt and Scranton purchased the Constitution in San Francisco, for use on the Olympia-Victoria route.2 However, Hunt and Scranton were unable to meet the operating costs of the vessel, so the United States Marshal sold the Constitution to Captain A. B. Gove for $10,500.3
In 1858, with the gold rush in full swing, Gove brought the Constitution to Puget Sound, to use on the Fraser River route until the gold fever abated; after which, Gove sold the Constitution, and its new owner converted it to a barkentine for use in the Puget Sound lumber trade.4
According to Lewis & Dryden, the Constitution was replaced by the Wilson G. Hunt in 1858.5 However, on May 20th, 1859, Victoria's British Colonist reports the arrival of the Steamer Constitution from Puget Sound, from which it had brought 70 head of cattle.6
Mentions of this vessel in the documents
    HMS Cormorant, 1842-1853
    HMS Cormorant was a diminutive warship, relatively speaking, at 1401 tonnes, 6 guns, and complement of 145 men;1 it was 52 m long and 11m wide.2 This side-wheel paddle sloop was built at and launched from Sheerness dockyard in 1842 and would serve on the Pacific Station, Valparaiso, from 1844-49.3 It has the distinction of being the first naval steam vessel to ply British Columbia waters, when in 1846 it arrived with several other war vessels to strengthen British naval presence on the North Pacific coast, in light of growing sovereignty-tensions with the United States.4
    The Cormorant is mentioned in several correspondence. For example, the transcribed enclosure in Pelly, Sir John Henry to Grey, Right Honorable Second Baronet Sir George 11 December 1846, CO 305:1, no. 1666, 83 mentions that the Rosalind had arrived at “Fort Victoria” on June 3rd, 1846, with a Cargo of Coals for the Cormorant.
    • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 135.
    • 2. J. J. Colledge, Ships of the Royal Navy (Devon: David & Charles: Newton Abbot, 1969), 1:137.
    • 3. Ibid.
    • 4. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1788-1846 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1975), 391.
    Mentions of this vessel in the documents
    Cowlitz
    The Cowlitz was a HBC owned barque that operated between London and the Northwest Coast.1 It was one of the first ships to enter Victoria Harbour direct from England, the leading ship being the Vancouver, in 1845.2
    • 1. Hubert Howe Bancroft, The Works of Hubert Howe Bancroft: History of British Columbia 1792-1887, vol. 32 (San Francisco: The History Company, 1887), 120.
    • 2. Ibid.
    Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Cumanche
       
      Information is not yet available for this vessel.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      HMS Daedalus, 1826-1911
      HMS Daedalus was a fifth-rate sailing ship of the Royal Navy; it was commanded by Captain George Greville Wellesley during its time in the Pacific Station.1 It was 46 m long by 12 m wide and carried 46 guns until it was reduced to 20 guns in 1843; it was sold to J. B. Garnham on 14 September 1911.2
      According to Parker, John to Hawes, Benjamin 27 February 1851, WO 1:549, no. 1801, 545 from 1850, Daedalus carried then-Governor of Vancouver Island Blanshard to Fort Rupert in search of four Indigenous men accused of murdering three British seamen. This despatch details The Daedalus's attack on the accused's camp. The inhabitants of the camp fled before it was burned to the ground; it is unclear as to whether or not the murderers were ever apprehended.
      The Daedalus is mentioned in several despatches, mostly in 1851.
      • 1. Peter Davis, HMS Daedalus (1826), The Victorian Royal Navy (website). http://www.pdavis.nl/ShowShip.php?id=1314
      • 2. J. J. Colledge, Ships of the Royal Navy (Devon: David & Charles: Newton Abbot, 1969), 1:150.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      HMS Daphne, 1838-1864
      HMS Daphne was a sixth rate, 18-gun sailing ship of the Royal Navy, and during its time in the Pacific it was commanded by Captain John James Onslow from 1842-47, and then by Captain Edward Gennys Fanshawe from 1848-52.1 It was a corvette-class vessel, 37 m long by 11 m wide, built at Pembroke Dock.2
      The Daphne is mentioned in multiple despatches, mostly in 1851 and 1852.
      • 1. Peter Davis, HMS Daphne (1838), The Victorian Royal Navy (website). http://www.pdavis.nl/ShowShip.php?id=1318
      • 2. J. J. Colledge, Ships of the Royal Navy (Devon: David & Charles: Newton Abbot, 1969), 1:152.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Decatur, 1838-1865
      Decatur, spelled Decator in this despatch, was a sloop of war of the US Navy.1 It took part in the so-called Indian Wars in the Oregon Territory from 1855-1856.2 It was named after Commodore Stephen Decatur (1779-1820), a hero of the US Navy.3
      • 1. Decatur, Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships.
      • 2. Ibid.
      • 3. USS Decatur, Naval History & Heritage Command.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Demaris Cove
      According to this letter, from Staines to Boys on 6 July 1852, Demaris Cove was owned by Palmer & Balch, who operated a shipping company that ran between Puget Sound and San Francisco.
      Staines notes that the ship sailed to Haida Gwaii in 1851 in search of gold; it did not stay long, as it was warned off by a letter that Captain Mitchell of the Una had left behind, presumably with a group of Haida people, who supposed it to be a letter of recommendation. Staines writes that the Demaris Cove returned to Olympia to bear news of the Georgianna's wreck on Haida Gwaii.
      Staines mentions that once the ship returned to Puget Sound it was charted as a Revenue Vessel by the U.S. Collector of customs, Moses, to retrieve the Georgianna's crew from the East side of [Queen] Charlotte's Island. According to Scott, Captain Balch, with the Demaris Cove, managed to safely ransom all the Georgianna's crew.1
      Demaris Cove was also involved in the rescue of passengers from the wreck of the Hudson's Bay Company ship Una.
      • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 55.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      HMS Devastation, 1841-1866
      The Devastation, launched in 1841, was a steam-driven paddle-wheel sloop that measured 55 m long and 11 m wide.1 Under the command of John W. Pike, it was involved in several missions on the coast of Vancouver Island and mainland British Columbia, which, among other duties, included sea-traffic checks near Nanaimo and the protection of British interests in Sitka Sound and the Stikine River region .2
      In 1863, the Devastation, along with the Grappler and Forward, searched for the murderers of Frederick Marks and his daughter, Caroline Harvey, around Kuper and Saturna Islands.3
      In 1864, the Devastation investigated the suspicious death of colonial agent Banfield at Barkley Sound, who was reported as drowned in October of 1862.4 According to Gough, authorities learned that Banfield had been stabbed to death by an Ohiet chief named Klatsmick, who was taken to stand trial in Victoria, but the case was dismissed for lack of solid evidence.5
      The Devastation was broken up in 1866.6
      • 1. HMS Devastation, Britian's Fighting Navy Through the Ages.
      • 2. Barry M. Gough, Gunboat Frontier: British Maritime Authority and Northwest Coast Indians, 1846-1890, (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1984), 92.
      • 3. Ibid., 141-142.
      • 4. Ibid., 114.
      • 5. Ibid.
      • 6. HMS Devastation, Britian's Fighting Navy Through the Ages.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      HMS Discovery
      HMS Discovery, a 29 m long, 303-tonne sloop, was built in 1789 at Randall & Brent's in Rotherhithe shipyard.1 Captain Vancouver commanded the Discovery, as well as its armed tender the Chatham, on his 1791-1795 expedition to survey the Pacific Northwest coast, and to wrest control of Nootka Sound from the Spanish.2
      The Discovery, which possessed 10 swivel guns, 10 four-pound guns, and a crew of 100 men, spent three years on the Northwest coast before it returned to England.3
      The Discovery spent the remainder of its service as a bomb vessel, an army hospital ship, and, finally, as a convict hulk, before it was dismantled in 1834.4
      • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 162.
      • 2. Ibid.
      • 3. Ibid.
      • 4. Ibid.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Dryad
      The Dryad was a 204-tonne brig, launched in 1825 and purchased in 1829 by the HBC, who employed it as a trade-vessel in the Pacific Northwest until it was sold in 1836.1
      In 1834 the Dryad arrived at the mouth of the Stikine River under the command of Ogden, who intended to erect an HBC trading fort;2 however, the Russians had already hurriedly erected Fort St. Dionysius and claimed that the surrounding territory was off-limits to the HBC, despite the Convention of 1825, which gave the British the right to access the Stikine.3 Rather than risk conflict, Ogden headed south, to the Nass River, where he and the Dryad's crew helped relocate Fort Simpson to its current location.4
      The Akriggs state that before Ogden departed the site of old Fort Simpson he and his crew experienced hostilities with the First Nations people of the area; Ogden took two Aboriginal hostages aboard the Dryad until all HBC men were safely aboard the vessel.5 The Dryad then traded near Haida Gwaii, then the Queen Charlotte Islands, until it returned to the Columbia River in November of 1834.6
      • 1. James R. Gibson, Otter Skins, Boston Ships, and China Goods: The Maritime Fur Trade of the Northwest Coast, 1778-1841 (Montréal, QC: MicGill-Queens University Press, 1991), 312.
      • 2. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1788-1846 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1975), 294.
      • 3. Ibid., 279.
      • 4. Ibid.
      • 5. Ibid., 280.
      • 6. Ibid., 281.
      • 7. Ibid.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Eagle
      According to Hamilton, George Alexander to Merivale, Herman 27 September 1852, CO 305:3, no. 8866, 269, Eagle was an American Brigantine that sailed from the Columbia River to Haida Gwaii in 1852. From May 2 to June 7th of that year, Eagle visited Port McNeill in a quest for gold but met with no success.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      East Lothian
       
      Information is not yet available for this vessel.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      HMS Eclipse
      HMS Eclipse was a Royal Navy vessel based in the South Pacific during the New Zealand war in the 1860s.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Eliza Anderson
      The Eliza Anderson, a 43-metre long, 283-tonne sidewheeler, was built in 1859 by Samuel Farnam for the Columbia River Steam Navigation Company.1 The Eliza Anderson had a 66cm by 183cm vertical-beam engine and, at the time, was the largest low-pressure steam vessel in the Oregon Territory.2
      The Eliza Anderson was in continual service for 10 years, and monopolized the Victoria and Puget Sound routes.3 In April of 1866, the British Colonist reports that the Eliza Anderson brought news to Victoria of the total loss of the Labouchere.4
      The Olympia took over the Eliza Anderson's routes in 1870, but the Eliza Anderson continued to run as a spare vessel until 1877.5
      From 1877 to 1882 the Eliza Anderson was laid up, and eventually sank while at a dock in Seattle; however, it would be later refitted and used on the New Westminster-Seattle route.6
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Emerald
       
      Information is not yet available for this vessel.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Emily Harris
      Emily Harris was a one-hundred-foot-long screw steamship built in Victoria by Peter Holmes for Harris, Carroll & Co. The ship was named after the daughter of Thomas Harris, one of the owners. The ship sank on 14 August 1871 following a boiler explosion.1
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      England
      According to Parker, John to Peel, Sir Frederick 28 November 1851, CO 305:3, no. 10075, 215, England was a vessel from Liverpool and commanded by a Captain Brown. In 1850, three British deserters from the Hudson's Bay Company traveled to Fort Rupert on the ship England.
      Pelly, Sir John Henry to Grey, Right Honorable Second Baronet Sir George 11 February 1851, CO 305:3, no. 1322, 360 notes that the deserters were eventually caught and murdered by natives of the northern part of Vancouver's Island, who, according to this document, had been mistakenly told by George Blenkinsop that there would be a reward for the white mens[sic] heads.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Enterprise
      According to this despatch, the steamship Enterprise departed from Fort Langley, up the Fraser River to Fort Hope, under the command of Colonel Moody, accompanied by 100 Seaman and Marines, in January of 1859.
      The vessel and party were sent as a police force, and, according to Lillard, by the late summer 1864 the Enterprise accessed Sooke Inlet with approximately 100 commuters a day.1
      • 1. Charles Lillard, Seven Shillings a Year: The History of Vancouver Island (Ganges: Horsdal and Schubart Publishers Ltd., 1986), 114.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Euphrates
      According to this private correspondence, Euphrates was a freight ship chartered by the British government in 1858 to carry men of the Royal Engineers and supplies to Vancouver Island and the mainland. As indicated in Corry, Henry Thomas Lowry to Carnarvon, Earl 13 October 1858, CO 60:2, no. 10430, 29, Shaw, Savill and Company acted as brokers for Euphrates.
      On June 27, 1859, the British Colonist reports that the Euphrates arrived in Esquimalt, from London, and that during the 160-day voyage, one Edward Ellingfield of Yarmouth was lost overboard, despite efforts to save him with Hen-coops.1
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Europa
      According to Hill, Sir Rowland to Merivale, Herman 5 April 1859, CO 60:6, no. 3630, 42, the Europa was a British contract packet. Akrigg and Akrigg note that in May of 1835 the Europa had been at the mouth of the Nass River, trading blankets, rum, and tobacco for beaver skins.1
      • 1. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1778-1846 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1975), 290.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Exact
      According to this private correspondence, Exact was a US vessel. It sailed to Haida Gwaii in December 1851 in search of gold. It was presumed shipwrecked by Thomas Boys, from the evidence of pieces of a vessel that were found on the southwest side of Vancouver Island. It is not clear from the despatches if it did, in fact, flounder. Douglas, in this correspondence, refers to Exact's return to Victoria from Gold Harbour, unsuccessful in its search for gold.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Experiment
      The Experiment was a Bombay-built copper-hulled snow, a type of brig, that weighed 102 tonnes.1 The Experiment and the Captain Cook were part of James Charles Stuart Strange's 1785 trade and exploration voyage to the Northwest coast.2
      The expedition, which departed from India in 1785, was plagued with problems.3 The Experiment was damaged in Indian waters and sought repairs in Batavia (Djakarta, Indonesia); moreover, many of the crew members contracted scurvy.4 The expedition reached Nootka Sound in June of 1786, too late in the season to trade. The expedition was considered a financial disaster.5
      • 1. Barry M. Gough, Distant Dominion: Britain and the Northwest Coast of North America, 1579-1809 (Vancouver, BC: University of British Columbia Press, 1980), 58.
      • 2. Robin Fisher, Strange, James Charles Stuart Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online.
      • 3. Ibid.
      • 4. Ibid.
      • 5. Ibid.
      • 6. Ibid.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Schooner Explorer
       
      Information is not yet available for this vessel.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Firwood
      According to this private correspondence, the Firwood was a screw steamer, dispatched in September 1858, to transport passengers and trade from San Francisco to Victoria, and further up the Fraser River. Its presence, as a British-operated vessel, appears to have been necessitated by the number of competing American ships that were running the same route.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      HMS Fisgard, 1819-1879
      HMS Fisgard was a 46-gun frigate-class vessel, launched from Pembroke Dockyards, England, on July 8, 1819.1 It was dismantled in the late 1870s, having sailed for over 60 years.2 In 1843 Captain John Alexander Duntze took the bridge and sailed it to the northwest Pacific shores.3
      According to a despatch sent by the officers in charge of Fort Victoria, the Fisgard anchored in the waters before the Fort in May of 1846, with orders to remain on the coast until relieved. This imposing multi-gun vessel contributed to a growing British military presence on the coast at the time.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Flying Dutchman, 1860-1865
      The Flying Dutchman was a steamship built in Victoria in 1860; it was 28 m long and 5.5 m wide.1
      Captain William Moore, born in Hanover, sailed to Haida Gwaii in 1852 aboard a known opium-smuggler, the Tepic.2 Moore sailed the coast for a time and, eventually, built the Flying Dutchman, which he used to make the first steamer-trip on the Stikine River in 1862, with a barge in tow and 125 people aboard.3
      In this despatch from September of 1862, Douglas reports on the ship's historic voyage: Steamer Flying Dutchman, lately employed in Fraser River, is now plying on the Stickeen, and has successfully accomplished its ascent to the distance of 140 miles from the sea. Douglas adds that her enterprising owner intends to push on to about 160 miles, to reach the Upper Narrows.
      In August of 1863, the ship carried Crease, as part of a party of 30, to visit the Pioneer Mills located inside the First Narrows on Burrard Inlet.4 The captain at the time, Captain Deighton, would become the famous figure “Gassy Jack”, of Vancouver's Gastown district.5
      The Flying Dutchman was broken up in 1865.6
      • 1. John M. Mills, Canadian Coastal and Inland Steam Vessels (Providence, Rhode Island: The Steamship Historical Society of America, Inc., 1979), 43.
      • 2. E. W. Wright, ed., Lewis & Dryden's Marine History of the Pacific Northwest (Portland: The Lewis & Dryden Printing Company, 1895), 82. http://dx.doi.org/10.14288/1.0222484
      • 3. Ibid.
      • 4. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 288.
      • 5. Ibid.
      • 6. Mills, Canadian Coastal and Inland Steam Vessels, 43.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      HMS Forward, 1855-1869
      HMS Forward was a 4 gun, British-screw steam-vessel that, according to this despatch, was stationed on the Victoria and San Francisco route prior to 1860.1
      The owners of the Forward were hoping to obtain the mail contract between Victoria and San Francisco, but the ship was withdrawn in 1860, due to its inability to compete with the Pacific Mail Steam Ship Company.
      It appears that, from Romaine, William Govett to Rogers, Baron Blachford Frederic 16 November 1860, CO 60:9, no. 10799, 28, and another, the Forward was converted to a gunboat. Forward and its sister-ship, Grappler, were converted for the sole purpose of duty on the Northwest coast and each had a crew of 40 men.2 Throughout its time on the West Coast, Forward undertook a variety of tasks, such as the transport of passengers and supplies, and it acted as a police-force vessel.
      The editor of Daily Evening Express was held captive in the Forward's lower deck and exposed to much verbal abuse for printing unflattering comments about the conduct of Commander Lascelles and the crew of the Forward during a policing mission.3 After several hours, the Forward set out to sea and the editor escaped by jumping overboard, nearly drowning before being picked up and dropped back on shore.4
      In 1869, the Forward was purchased for $7,000 by Millard and Beedy of Victoria and from there was sailed, under the command of Captain Sutton, to San Francisco, where it was made again into a gunboat, after which it became a pirate ship under a Salvadorian flag.5 As a privateer, it was commanded by the infamous captain “Viscayno”, who used it to raid the city of Guayma and seize two ships, the San Pablo and the Colina.6 The Mexican government called in US and British ships to pursue the Forward and, eventually, this led to a full-blown gun-battle in the Teacapan River, which ended with the Forward run aground, its engines broken to pieces, and the ship burned to the water's edge.7
      • 1. Forward, Index of 19th Century Naval Vessels.
      • 2. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 202.
      • 3. Ibid., 287.
      • 4. Ibid.
      • 5. E. W. Wright, ed., Lewis & Dryden's Marine History of the Pacific Northwest (Portland: The Lewis & Dryden Printing Company, 1895), 176. http://dx.doi.org/10.14288/1.0222484
      • 6. Ibid.
      • 7. Ibid.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      HMS Ganges
      HMS Ganges was the the last sailing ship-of-the-line that the Royal Navy would ever commission to service abroad, and a transcribed minute in this despatch from 1858 notes that Ad. Baines would himself leave Callao for Vancouver [Island] the 28th of August in his Flag ship, to bolster all adequate naval support to that important part of H.M. Dominions.1
      Ganges, launched in 1821, was the first ship built in the Ganges, or Formidable, class of vessels.2 Its design was based on the captured French prize-ship Canopus, which Walbran notes as the handsomest and swiftest ship in the British Navy.3
      Ganges was roughly 60 m long, carried 84 guns and 700 men, and while it was in the Salish Sea it helped comprise a formidable British naval presence, which is illustrated in the minutes of this despatch from 8 August 1860.4
      • 1. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 134.
      • 2. David Lyon and Rif Winfield, The Sail & Steam Navy List (London: Chatham Publishing, 2004), 95.
      • 3. John T. Walbran, British Columbia Coast Names (Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre, 1971), 199.
      • 4. David Lyon and Rif Winfield, The Sail & Steam Navy List (London: Chatham Publishing, 2004), 95.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Georgianna
      According to this private correspondence, Georgianna of Sydney was a 41-tonne sloop owned by William Rowland of England. Georgianna sailed to Haida Gwaii in 1851 in search of gold. It was wrecked on the East side of Haida Gwaii and the crew were held by the Indigenous people.
      Demaris Cove was charted as a Revenue Vessel by the US Collector of Customs Mr. Moses in order to rescue Georgianna's remaining crew. According to Scott, Captain Balch, with the Demaris Cove, managed to safely ransom all the detainees.1
      • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 55.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      HMS Grappler, 1856-1883
      Grappler was a 3-gun gunboat built in 1846; it arrived in Esquimalt from England, along with the Forward and the Termagant, on 12 July 1860, with Lieutenant Commander Alfred Herby at its helm.1
      Grappler operated on the British Columbia coast from 1860-68, until it was sold at public auction and then converted into a freighter, after which it sailed under several owners for the following 15 years.2
      Prior to its conversion and sale, Grappler had a rather storied history in the Salish Sea. It was involved in the Admiralty's efforts to, as Paget, Lord Clarence Edward to Rogers, Baron Blachford Frederic 29 June 1863, CO 60:17, no. 6387, 33 puts it, prevent the illicit traffic in spirits on the East Coast of Vancouver Island, particularly for the Indigenous population, who had, according to the same correspondence, committed outrages on White Men. A later despatch, from 1865, notes the Grappler's alleged illegal seizure of a vessel suspected of smuggling.
      Drama and controversy followed Grappler to its fiery fate on 29 April 1883, when it burned on route up the eastern coast of the Island and, according to Walbran's account, lost a large number of persons, said to be seventy-two, principally Chinese passengers on their way to the canneries.3
      • 1. John T. Walbran, British Columbia Coast Names (Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre, 1971), 216.
      • 2. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 234-35.
      • 3. Walbran, British Columbia Coast Names, 216.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Great Britain, 1843-1886
      According to Romaine, William Govett to Merivale, Herman 16 August 1858, CO 6:25, no. 8315, 34, Great Britain was a steam ship owned by Gibbs Bright and Company. They offered to bring British troops to Vancouver Island in 1858, an offer which the Admiralty declined.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Grecian
      Grecian was a British bark, captained by Robert B. Miller, that carried passengers and cargo to Vancouver Island via the Sandwich Islands in 1860.1 The ship's cargo included construction materials intended for lighthouses at Esquimalt and Race Rocks. Lighthouse keepers William Roberts and George Davies, who was accompanied by his family, also made the voyage.2
      According to Victoria's Daily British Colonist, when the ship arrived at Victoria, the passengers and crew [spoke] in the severest terms of the conduct of Captain Miller during the voyage.3 They claimed that Miller was drunk for the majority of the trip, and, as a result of this, while moored at Honolulu, the British Consul had ordered him to remove all liquor from the ship. Miller appeared to comply, but when the voyage resumed, he was found drunk again. A search of his cabin revealed two casks of ale, two casks of porter, and six dozen and a-half casks of sherry wine.4 The day after this report appeared, Miller rebutted the charges against him in a letter to the editor of the paper, denying that he had been ordered to throw my liquor overboard, and arguing that the only liquor in my room was the sherry wine.5
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Harpooner
      Harpooner was a barque or brigantine chartered by the Hudson's Bay Company in 1848 to bring settlers and supplies to the Pacific Northwest.1
      It arrived in Victoria in 1849 carrying labourers, miners, carpenters, bakers, and men recruited by Captain Grant.2 John Muir and his family were on board Harpooner as was James Yates.3
      The miners eventually went to Fort Rupert and the ship carried on to Fort Vancouver and Hawaii.4
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      HMS Havannah, 1811-1905
      HMS Havannah was a fifth-rate sailing ship of the Royal Navy.1 Early in its career, it took part in the Napoleanic Wars.2 It was commanded by Captain Thomas Harvey during its time in the Pacific station.3
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      HMS Hecate, 1839-1865
      HMS Hecate was used on the Pacific coast late in its career, and was sent to replace the duties performed by HMS Plumper in 1860.1
      Hecate was a 50 m long, 11 m wide, paddle-wheel sloop armed with four guns; it was launched on 30 March, 1839.2 Commander Anthony Hoskins sailed it into Esquimalt harbour in 1860, then the majority of the Plumper's crew and officers transferred aboard for continued survey service.3
      Hecate ran aground in 1861, near Cape Flattery, and was, eventually, and after several repair stops along the way, relocated to England by 1864, where it would be decommissioned the following year.4
      • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 256.
      • 2. Inconstant, 1836, Index of 19th Century Naval Vessels.
      • 3. Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names, 256.
      • 4. Ibid.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Helena
       
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Hope
      Charles T. Millard built the steamer Hope in 1860 to convey goods and passengers on the Fraser River route from New Westminster to Port Douglas.1
      According to the Nov 21, 1860 edition of the British Colonist, the a new steamer called the Hope performed the best day's work that [had] yet been done on the Fraser.2 The Colonist relates that the Hope's successful run is proof of the benefits of river trade and travel, compared to the old dangerous mountain travel.3
      The January 28, 1876 edition of the Colonist mentions that the Hope served as a hotel at Wrangel when, during a storm on the 14th of January, it was washed from the beach up on the hill side, going through several houses and making the occupants scatter very quickly.4 Subsequently, after its grounding, the vessel does not appear to have been fit for duty, as the machinery from the Hope was up for auction in September, 1877.5
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Imogene
       
      Information is not yet available for this vessel.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Imperial Eagle
      The Imperial Eagle, originally the East India Company ship Loudoun, was a 20-gun vessel of 406 tonnes.1 Captain William Barkley commanded the Imperial Eagle in 1787, under the Austrian flag, in order to avoid an East India Company trading license, which was required of all British ships.2
      In June of 1787 the Imperial Eagle reached Nootka Sound; Barkley was fortunate to find John Mackay, who shared with Barkley his geographic knowledge of Vancouver Island, as well as his knowledge of the Nuu-chah-nulth people, with whom Barkley wished to trade.3 Barkley traded successfully, particularly in Nootka Sound, Clayoquot Sound, and Barkley Sound, which Barkley named after himself.4
      Barkley then re-discovered what is now Juan de Fuca Strait.5 Captain Cook had previously claimed the strait did not exist.6 Eventually, the Imperial Eagle arrived in China, in December of 1787, where its cargo was sold.7
      • 1. J. Walbran, British Columbia Coast Names (Vancouver, BC: Douglas & McIntyre, 1971), 33.
      • 2. Ibid.
      • 3. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 59.
      • 4. Barry M. Gough, Barkley, Charles William Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online.
      • 5. Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names, 295.
      • 6. Barry M. Gough, Barkley, Charles William Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online.
      • 7. J. Walbran, British Columbia Coast Names, 33-34.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      HMS Inconstant, 1836-1862
      HMS Inconstant was a fifth-rate frigate of the Royal Navy, designed by Captain Hayes and launched on June 19th, 1836.1
      A transcribed 1849 enclosure in Pelly, Sir John Henry to Grey, Right Honorable Second Baronet Sir George 28 February 1851, CO 305:3, no. 1800, 362 notes that the Inconstant's captain at the time, John Shepherd, refused passage to disgruntled HBC employees, who were dissatisfied about the absence of their Employer, and wanted to, in the character of Distressed British subjects, make for San Francisco.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Schooner Ino
       
      Information is not yet available for this vessel.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Investigator
       
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      USRC Jefferson Davis, 1853-1862
      Jefferson Davis was a topsail schooner and one of six US Revenue Cutters of the Cushing Class.1
      It was named in 1853 for the then US Secretary of War and future President of the Confederate States of America, Jefferson Finis Davis. Its home port was Olympia.2
      According to this despatch, USRC Jefferson Davis was commanded in 1855 by Commander Pease and was involved in a dispute with Douglas over the ownership of San Juan Island.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      John Bright
      On February 4th, 1869, the John Bright sailed out of Admiralty Inlet with a cargo of lumber and struck a reef near Estevan Point while caught in a gale.1 Twelve of the twenty-two people on board likely drowned; however, the ten that made it to shore were allegedly shot, and their bodies were hacked to pieces and mutilated by a number of Hesquiat First Nations individuals, who also plundered the vessel's wreck.2
      The master of the schooner Surprise—not to be confused with the side-wheel steamer Surprise—carried news of the act back to Victoria, where the local newspapers and public opinion demanded retribution.3 Governor Seymour was reluctant to act immediately and waited three months before he finally sent the HMS Sparrowhawk to investigate, after the Victoria Evening News accused Seymour of disgraceful and criminal neglect.4
      The crew of the HMS Sparrowhawk discovered the remains of at least eight individuals, and the vessel's surgeon determined that murder had indeed occurred in several cases.5 The destruction of a number of houses and canoes compelled the surrender of two culprits—Katkinna, a chief who confessed to the crime, and John Anietsachist, who continually claimed to be innocent.6 Both were convicted of murder at court in Victoria, and were subsequently executed in the presence of their entire tribe back at Hesquiat.7
      • 1. Barry M. Gough, Gunboat Frontier: British Maritime Authority and Northwest Coast Indians, 1846-1890, (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1984), 125.
      • 2. Ibid.
      • 3. Ibid.
      • 4. Ibid., 126.
      • 5. Ibid.
      • 6. Ibid., 126-127.
      • 7. Ibid., 127.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      John L. Stephens, 1852-1879
      Built in New York for the Pacific Mail Steamship Company in 1851,1 the John L. Stephens was 84 m long and apparently named for one of founders of the Panama Rail-Road.2
      It was placed on the Panama to San Francisco run, arriving in San Francisco on 3 April 1852, where it remained in this service until October 1860.2 In 1864 it ran between San Francisco and the Columbia.3 In 1878, it was sold in San Francisco to Sisson, Wallace and Company, who sent it to Karluk, Alaska, as a floating cannery; it was retired upon its return to San Francisco and broken up in 1879.4
      • 1. Will Lawson, Pacific Steamers (Glasgow: Brown, Son & Ferguson, Ltd., 1927), 203.
      • 2. John Haskell Kemble, The Panama Route, 1848-1869 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1943), 233.
      • 3. Ibid.
      • 4. Ibid.
      • 5. Ibid.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Kepel
       
      Information is not yet available for this vessel.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Kingfisher
      In August 1864, a group of 10 Ahousat First Nations individuals allegedly pillaged and [burned] the Kingfisher, a sloop involved in seal oil trade near the mouth of Matilda Creek, and murdered its crew.1
      When news of the Kingfisher's fate reached Victoria, Rear-Admiral Denman sent the Devastation to investigate—the vessel arrived at Matilda Creek to find 195 Ahousat First Nations armed for battle.2
      The events that would ensue, later called the “Ahousat Incident”, would result in, according to Gough, the Royal Navy's most extensive punishment [on the north west coast].3 In total, the Royal Navy destroyed nine villages and 64 canoes; as well, at least 15 First Nations individuals were killed in the struggle.4
      However, Chief Justice David Cameron acquitted the individuals arrested because he believed that he was not able to use the testimony of First Nations witnesses.5 Cameron, who was often under scrutiny as chief justice because of his lack of legal training, overlooked an 1843 imperial statute that allowed such evidence with crown consent.6
      • 1. Barry M. Gough, Gunboat Frontier: British Maritime Authority and Northwest Coast Indians, 1846-1890, (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1984), 114-115.
      • 2. Ibid., 113-114.
      • 3. Ibid., 114.
      • 4. Ibid., 121.
      • 5. Ibid.
      • 6. Ibid.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      La Plata
      This 1858 despatch reports that the La Plata is to be detained until the arrival of the Queen's Messenger from Osborne, at the behest of Lytton. And, another 1858 despatch, in an enclosure, suggests that the La Plata was commanded at the time by one Captain Meller, who appears as one node in a web of communications critical to the conveyance of the Royal Engineers to the Vancouver Island.
      On January 26th, 1867, The Lancet reports that another of the Royal West Indian Mail Company's steam ships, (La Plata) arrived in Southampton from Saint Thomas bursting with yellow fever.1
      Perhaps this is the same La Plata that The New York Times reported sunk in the Bay of Biscay in 1875.2 Boatswain Henry Lamont and quarter-master John Hooper were reported rescued from a makeshift raft three days after the La Plata foundered.3
      The Ships List notes that the first Arabia, 1852, was renamed La Plata while under construction.4
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Labouchere, 1858
      This 1858 despatch reports that the HBC steamer Labouchere will start from the port of London on Thursday morning the 2nd [September] for Vancouver Island. By 1859, it had arrived on the coast and began work as a trade vessel, and it was a skookum craft, indeed, built of Baltic oak and teak, and, no doubt, imposing at over 61 m in length.1 Labouchere was driven by a large paddle wheel, the engine for which could generate a respectable 180 horse power.2
      Greater drama precluded the Labouchere's demise. It was refit in 1856, at considerable cost, for mail service between Vancouver Island and San Francisco, but on its first run it ran onto a reef in a fog near San Francisco.3 It reversed off the reef but soon flooded beyond hope, and in the scramble for the lifeboats Captain Mouatt was forced to shoot a man who had attempted to board a lifeboat before the women.4
      Victoria's Daily British Colonist newspaper reported that Eliza brought news of the total loss of the Labouchere in April of 1866, which, the paper adds, is an announcement not so melancholy in its nature or so important to the interests of mankind as this same ship's news that President Lincoln had been assassinated.5
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Lady of the Lake
      According to Douglas writing in Douglas, Chief Factor Governor Vice-Admiral Sir James to Pelham-Clinton, 5th Duke of Newcastle Henry Pelham Fiennes 9 October 1860, CO 60:8, no. 11678, 196 in 1860, he arrived at Port Anderson in time to participate in a trial run of the Lady of the Lake. He reports that the trial was most successful and that the machinery [was] working well, and no casualty whatever occurring to cause delay.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Lady Washington
      Information is not yet available for this vessel.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Lama
       
      Information is not yet available for this vessel.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Laurel
      Laurel was a merchant ship involved in a dispute with First Nations in 1861.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Leander
       
      Information is not yet available for this vessel.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Lightning
       
      Information is not yet available for this vessel.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Lord Western, 1840-1853
      Lord Western was a British Barque of 539 tonnes.1
      In 1853 it was traveling from Victoria to San Francisco but was wrecked off Estevan Point on the west coast of Vancouver Island.2 Most of the crew made it back to Victoria on the ship's boats, except for Captain Parker and three other men, who were left behind. Douglas sent the Hudson's Bay Company steam ship Otter to rescue the four men, who returned to Victoria on December 26th.3
      This despatch, from 1854, describes in detail the Lord Western's ordeal and demise.
      • 1. Barrie H. E. Goult, First and Last Days of the 'Princess Royal', British Columbia Historical Quarterly 2 (1949): 107.
      • 2. Ibid.
      • 3. Ibid.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Lotus
      As mentioned in Chartres Brew's 1858 account of the wreck of the ship Austria, Lotus was on its way to Halifax when it met up with the ship Maurice who had rescued the surviving crew and passengers of Austria. Brew and eleven other passengers, who wanted to proceed quickly to North America, were given passage by Captain Trefry of the Lotus.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Marquis of Bute
      This despatch, by Douglas, relates that the Marquis of Bute was a British ship that visited Victoria in 1855. Several of the crew robbed the ship and deserted. They fled to the United States where they were apprehended and then released by Governor Stevens. The same correspondence goes on to discuss the costs incurred in the event.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Martrell
      According to Douglas writing in Douglas, Chief Factor Governor Vice-Admiral Sir James to Pelham-Clinton, 5th Duke of Newcastle Henry Pelham Fiennes 9 October 1860, CO 60:8, no. 11678, 196 in 1860, The paddle-wheel, 25 horse-power Steamer [was] a small boat of 50 tons burden, built by Mr Decker, an enterprising American, conveyed my party in four hours to Port Pemberton at the further extremity of Lillooet Lake.
      Information for this vessel is not yet complete.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      SS Mary Dare, 1850-1854
      Mary Dare was a 149-tonne Hudson's Bay Company brigantine.1 It arrived in Victoria in 1847, commanded at the time by James Cooper.2
      This 1851 despatch reports that the master of the Mary Dare discovered gold on Haida Gwaii. Until returning to England in 1853, Mary Dare ran supplies between Fort Vancouver, Victoria, and Hawaii; during this time it was commanded by James Allen Scarborough and William Mouat.3
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      USS Massachusetts, 1849-1867
      USS Massachusetts was a wooden steamship of the US Navy.1
      It originally operated as a trans-Atlantic auxiliary packet ship and was later used to transport troops during the Mexican War.2 It took part in the Puget Sound War, and spent most of the years 1855-57 along the Pacific Coast of North America.3 It was converted into a barque for use as a storeship in 1863, and was eventually sold in 1867.4
      This 1856 despatch mentions its arrival to Victoria.
      • 1. Massachusetts, Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships.
      • 2. Ibid.
      • 3. Ibid.
      • 4. Ibid.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Maurice
      In this private correspondence, Brew gives a lengthy description of his experiences during the burning and sinking of the Austria, his carrier from England to British Columbia. Brew was among the few random survivors rescued by the Maurice, which he describes as a French ship, of Nantes, captained by Ernest Renaud, who is credited further for his his tenderness and delicacy in dressing the injuries of the rescued, particularly, three badly burned women.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Medway, 1841-1861
      According to this private correspondence, Medway was a Royal Mail Steam Packet Company wooden paddle steamer. In 1858, Medway transported men of the Royal Engineers across the Isthmus of Panama with the assistance of Captain Hole.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Mexican
      According to Hamilton, George Alexander to Merivale, Herman 27 September 1852, CO 305:3, no. 8866, 269, Mexican was a US schooner that sailed from San Francisco to Haida Gwaii in 1852. From April 28th – May 8th of that year, Mexican visited Mitchell Inlet in a quest for gold but met with no success.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      HMS Modeste, 1837-1866
      HMS Modeste was an 18-gun wooden sloop; it sailed Victoria-area waters from 1844 to 1847.1 From 1837 to 1841 it was commanded by Commander Harry Eyres, off Spain, Mexico, the east coast of Africa, and China—it fought in the first Anglo-Chinese war.2
      Commander Thomas Baillie sailed it throughout the Pacific from 1843 to 1845; from 1851 to 1853 Commander William Compton sailed it in Mediterranean waters, where it remained until 1854 under the command of Augustus Butler.3
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      HMS Monarch, 1832-1866
      HMS Monarch was a second-rate sailing ship of the Royal Navy.1 It spent most of 1854 in the Baltic fighting in the Russian/Crimean War, and in 1855 and 1856 Monarch visited Victoria, as the flagship of Rear-Admiral Henry William Bruce of the Pacific Squadron.2
      This despatch reports that it formed part of the Squadron employed in the Pacific, and another mentions Bruce's arrival on the Monarch at “Esquimalt Port”.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Nanaimo Packet
      The Nanaimo Packet was a schooner that was taken into custody on 30 May 1869, because its captain had illegally provided alcohol to a group of First Nations.1 Authorities would later confiscate the vessel and fine its captain $500.2
      • 1. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 374.
      • 2. Ibid., 375.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      HMS Nassau
       
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Nereide
      The SS Nereide, a 253-tonne 10-gun ship, was launched in 1821 and purchased by the HBC in 1833.1 The HBC appointed William Brotchie as Nereide's commander in 1839, and it traded throughout the Pacific Northwest.2 The HBC sold Nereide in 1840.3
      • 1. Judith Hudson Beattie and Helen M. Buss, eds., Undelivered Letters to Hudson's Bay Company Men on the Northwest Coast of America, 1830-57 (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 2003), 412.
      • 2. J. Walbran, British Columbia Coast Names (Vancouver, BC: Douglas & McIntyre, 1971), 64.
      • 3. Gibson, Otter Skins, Boston Ships, and China Goods, 312.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Norman Morison, 1849-1853
      Norman Morison was a 529-tonne Hudson's Bay Company ship.1 It arrived on the west coast in 1850, bringing supplies for both the Russian American Company and the Hudson's Bay Company, as well as labourers and their families.2 It made the trip from England to Victoria two more times between 1850-53.3
      According to Pelly, Sir John Henry to Grey, Right Honorable Second Baronet Sir George 11 February 1851, CO 305:3, no. 1322, 360, in 1850, three British seamen deserted from the Hudson's Bay Company and left Norman Morison while it was anchored in Victoria. They fled to Fort Rupert and were eventually caught and murdered by natives of the northern part of Vancouver's Island who had mistakenly been told by George Blenkinsop that there would be a reward for the white mens[sic] heads.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      North Star, 1853-1866
      North Star was a paddle-wheel driven steamer, 82 m long and 12 m wide, built by Jeremiah Simonson in 1853 for the US business tycoon Cornelius Vanderbilt.1
      Vanderbilt toured Europe in the ship in 1853.1 The New York Times reports on the North Star's return to New York on 24 September 1853 and notes its condition as admirable; the article recalls that when the ship left for Europe, on 21 May of the same year, it ran aground on the rocks at Corlaers Hook.3 It was soon repaired and sailed again, but not without incident, this time political: At Naples the authorities refused Mr Vanderbilt permission to land, deeming it, in their wisdom, quite an impossible thing for a single individual to travel about the world so independently, and fearing some sinister design by those detestable Yankees against the peace in Neapolitan dominions.4
      From 1854 onward the North Star served as a mail and passenger ship and was even chartered for tours of duty with the Quartermaster's Department and War Department.5 For a time, it functioned as a Pacific Mail liner.6 In January of 1859, San Francisco newspapers noted the North Star as part of a line of steamers intended to run between New York and San Francisco by way of Panama.7
      This noble ship, described as probably the strongest fastened vessel of her tonnage afloat,8 was finally broken up in New London, Connecticut, in 1866.9
      • 1. Will Lawson, Pacific Steamers (Glasgow: Brown, Son & Ferguson, Ltd., 1927), 25.
      • 2. John Haskell Kemble, The Panama Route, 1848-1869 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1943), 237.
      • 3. The New York Times [Archives], Return of the North Star, The New York Times.
      • 4. Ibid.
      • 5. Kemble, The Panama Route, 237.
      • 6. Lawson, Pacific Steamers, 25.
      • 7. Kemble, The Panama Route, 82.
      • 8. John Overton Choules, The Cruise of the Steam Yacht North Star (Boston: Gould and Lincoln, 1854), 19.
      • 9. Kemble, The Panama Route, 237.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
      Olympia
       
      Information is not yet available for this vessel.
      Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Orbit
        Recovery was a 154-tonne brigantine bought by the Hudson's Bay Company in 1852.1 It was built in 1845 and originally an American vessel named Orbit.2
        This private correspondence reports that at the end of December, an American vessel, the Orbit, was on route to Honolulu from Olympia when it ran into the same gale that ruined the Una. Apparently, the Orbit was blown aground and lost its rudder; it sustained other damages. Thereafter, Douglas bought her & proceded [sic] to fit her out, and renamed it the Recovery.
        In 1852 it was sent to find gold at Haida Gwaii under the command of Captain John F. Kennedy.3 From 1852-58 it was commanded by William Mitchell who took it on various trading runs to Hawaii.4
        During the gold rush of 1858 it was stationed on the Fraser River as a guard ship and involved with issuing mining licenses.5 It was eventually sold to Lennard and Green of Portland, who used it for trade to Hawaii and China.6
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Oregon
         
        Information is not yet available for this vessel.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Orpheus
         
        Information is not yet available for this vessel.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Ossipee
        The Ossipee was a wooden sloop of war constructed in June of 1861 and launched in October of the same year. The vessel derives its name from a river that runs from the Ossipee Lake, in New Hampshire, to the Saco River, in Maine.1
        The Ossipee, which the author of this Public Offices document refers to as the “Ossifree”, spent many years in the service of the US Navy. While stationed in the Pacific, from 1866 to 1872, the Ossipee attended to American interests along the coasts of Mexico and Central America.2
        On September 27, 1867, the Ossipee embarked on a journey from San Francisco to Sitka, Alaska, to convey the Russian commissioners to the ceremony in which Russia would transfer Alaska to the United States.3
        The Ossipee sold at Norfolk on 25 March 1891.4
        • 1. Ossipee, Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships.
        • 2. Ibid.
        • 3. Ibid.
        • 4. Ibid.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Otter, 1852-1861
        According to this despatch, Otter was a Hudson's Bay Company Steamship. In 1853 it was involved with the rescue of the crew of the Lord Western, who were shipwrecked off the west coast of Vancouver Island.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Pacific, 1850-1875
        The Pacific was a sidewheel steamship, 69 m long, built by William H. Brown of New York for $100,000.1 It launched 24 September 1850, and arrived in San Francisco on 2 July 1851.2 The Nicaragua Steamship Company operated it on the coast from 1853 to 1858, and the Merchants Accommodation Line ran it from 1858 to 1863, on the route of San Francisco to the Columbia River.3
        On 18 July 1861 it sank in waters off Oregon but was raised and repaired.4 In 1872, the Pacific Mail Steamship Company bought the Pacific, selling it to Goodall, Nelson, and Perkins in 1875.5 On 4 November 1875, it collided with the sailing ship Orpheus, off Cape Flattery, and sank almost immediately.6 Only two survived of the nearly two hundred fifty people on board.7 This tragedy was made all the more grisly as bodies of the drowned washed up along the shores of Vancouver Island, with one young girl landing near her family home.8
        On Tuesday morning, November 16, 1875, the British Colonist declared the wreck of the Pacific one of the most terrible calamities the world has ever known.9 And, it would seem that the Orpheus fared better, but barely, as an auction notice for its salvage appears to the right of the Pacific report.10
        • 1. John Haskell Kemble, The Panama Route, 1848-1869 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1943), 241.
        • 2. Ibid.
        • 3. Ibid.
        • 4. Ibid.
        • 5. Ibid.
        • 6. Ibid.
        • 7. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 407-08.
        • 8. Ibid., 408.
        • 9. The Veil Lifted, British Colonist, November 16, 1875.
        • 10. Wreck of Ship Orpheus, British Colonist, November 16, 1875.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Palerma
        According to Hamilton, George Alexander to Merivale, Herman 27 September 1852, CO 305:3, no. 8866, 269, Palerma was a US brig that sailed from San Francisco to Haida Gwaii in 1852. From April 29th – May 15th of that year, Palerma visited Mitchell Inlet in a quest for gold, but met with no success.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Panama
        The Panama was one of the first steamers built for the Pacific Mail Steamship Company's coastal Pacific trade.1 It was built for $211,000 by William H. Webb in New York, and launched on 29 July 1848; it measured 61 m by 10 m by 7 m.2 Panama arrived at San Francisco on 4 June 1849 and served the San Francisco to Panama run until 1853, but it made only one voyage in 1854, and in 1856-57 it served as a spare steamer in Panama city.3
        From 1858 to 1861 the ship ran between San Francisco and Puget Sound; in February 1861 it was sold to Holladay and Flint.4 Holladay and Brenham gave it to Mexico in 1868, as part of a mail contract, then the Mexican government renamed it Juarez and employed it as a revenue and transport steamer on the Mexican coast.5
        In this despatch from 1852, Douglas reports on the arrival of the Panama, with 750 passengers aboard, to Victoria, and that its arrival was driven by the gold excitement throughout this Colony.
        • 1. John Haskell Kemble, The Panama Route, 1848-1869 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1943), 242.
        • 2. Ibid.
        • 3. Ibid.
        • 4. Ibid.
        • 5. Ibid.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        HMS Pandora, 1833-1862
        HMS Pandora was a 319-tonne wooden sailing vessel.1 In 1836, it was commanded by Lieutenant commander Robert Wintle Innes, in Falmouth, until it was out of commission at Plymouth during 1843.2
        From 1845 to 1848 it was employed as a survey ship under the command of Lieutenant James Wood, during the the Oregon boundary dispute with the United States.3 From 1850 to 1856 it served as a survey ship again, this time in Australia, under the command of Byron Drury.4
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Pekin
        Pekin was chartered by the Hudson's Bay Company and transported colonists to Vancouver Island in 1850.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Sloop Petrel
         
        Information is not yet available for this vessel.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        HMS Plumper, 1848-1865
        This 43-metre vessel was common enough on the coast to have at least ten geographical features bear its name.1 Plumper was launched at Portsmouth in 1848, as a barque-rigged steam sloop, and its name was not a reference to the rotund, but, in the naval parlance of the times, to a sudden shot or heavy blow.2
        The boat certainly made an impression on the coast, in more ways than name, as it appears in use, in a variety of capacities, in dozens of despatches.
        When Plumper first arrived in Victoria, it anchored in Esquimalt Harbour.3 Captain George Henry Richards was in command, and tasked with surveying the coast in greater detail, with particular scrutiny to be spent on the waterways pertinent to the maritime boundary question—largely, regions between the Haro and Rosario straits.4 Richards, apparently, grew tired of Douglas's other requirements for the vessel, such as policing and transport.5
        • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 464.
        • 2. Ibid.
        • 3. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 101.
        • 4. Ibid.
        • 5. Ibid., 102.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Polyphemus
         
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Porpoise
         
        Information is not yet available for this vessel.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        HMS Portland, 1822-1862
        HMS Portland was a fourth-rate wooden sailing ship of the Royal Navy.1 In the 1850s HMS Portland was Commanded by Captain Henry Chads and was the flagship of Rear-Admiral Fairfax Moresby in the Pacific.2
        Portland was the first Royal Navy flagship to visit Victoria.3 The Oregon Treaty of 1846 contained ambiguity around the ownership of the San Juan Islands. HMS Portland's visit to Vancouver Island was partially a display of power to deter US territorial claims in the area.4
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        HMS President, 1829-1903
        HMS President was a Royal Navy frigate of the fourth-rate.1 President was part of the Anglo-French squadron during the Crimean War, and from 1854-62 it was the flagship of Rear-Admiral Henry William Bruce in the Pacific, commanded at that time by Captain Charles Frederick.2
        According to this 1856 despatch, President was sent to Vancouver Island to ease the fears of the colonists regarding potential attacks from the Indigenous population. It is unclear from the despatches whether or not HMS President ever arrived.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Prince of the Seas, 1853-?
        The Prince of the Seas was a square-rigged sailing merchant-vessel built in Saint John, NB, by James Smith in 1853; it was 59 m long and 11 m wide.1
        In Booth, James to Fortescue, 1st Baron Carlingford Chichester 23 May 1861, CO 305:18, no. 4093, 292, from May 23 1861, Booth writes on behalf of the Privy Council for Trade to report that stores for the use of the Lighthouses at Vancouvers Island will be sent aboard the Prince of the Seas, which, according to Booth, sailed from London on May 20th. The same document lists said supplies for both the Race Rocks and Fisgard lighthouses.
        The 27 December 1861 edition of Victoria's Daily British Colonist newspaper announces the arrival of Prince of the Seas and lists its goods from London, which include English Drugs and English Chemicals, Pilot Jackets, Oil Paintings, and Bandannas.2
        • 1. David R. MacGregor, Merchant Sailing Ships, 1850-1875 (London: Conway Maritime Press Ltd., 1984), 47. http://n2t.net/ark:/13960/t6p01kn0k
        • 2. Now Landing, Daily British Colonist, (Victoria) 27 December 1861, 1. http://n2t.net/ark:/13960/t8bg4mw30
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Prince of Whales
         
        Information is not yet available for this vessel.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Prince Rupert
         
        Information is not yet available for this vessel.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Princess Real
         
        Information is not yet available for this vessel.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Princess Royal, 1854-1872
        Princess Royal was a Hudson's Bay Company ship, built upon recommendations by Simpson, who saw trade opportunity in spars from Fort Rupert, and a chance to build a boat that could enter Victoria harbour, fully loaded, unlike its predecessor, the Norman Morison.1
        Simpson's new ship was built of oak and teak, and was copper-bottomed, 44 m long and 9 m wide, and it was scheduled to sail to Victoria in May of 1854, but due to delays, it left from England in June, with more than 100 passengers aboard.2 The journey is a snapshot of the arduous nature of such extended sea voyages of the era: babies were born or died along the way, there was a mild mutiny in protest of the meager rice rations, and many more died of illness.3 Princess Royal finally landed, in Nanaimo, in late November.4
        It met its fate near Moose Factory, James Bay, when it sailed into a snowstorm and, eventually, grounded on a bar.5 Apparently, some Cree men in the area went on board the hulk to salvage tar-filled barrels to use as canoe sealant, but it was too cold to drain the barrels, so the men lit a fire, which spread to engulf the ship.6 The pack ice carried its burned skeleton to the sea the next Spring.7
        • 1. Barrie H. E. Goult, First and Last Days of the 'Princess Royal,' British Columbia Historical Quarterly 1 (1939): 15-16.
        • 2. Ibid., 16.
        • 3. Ibid., 17-19.
        • 4. Ibid., 20.
        • 5. Ibid., 22.
        • 6. Ibid.
        • 7. Ibid., 23.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        HMS Providence
        HMS Providence was a 33 m long sloop purchased by the Royal Navy in 1791.1 William Broughton commanded the Providence from October 1793 until it sank in 1797.2
        The Providence was commanded by Broughton to meet Captain Vancouver on the Northwest coast, but Cook was gone by the time Broughton arrived.3 Broughton proceeded to Asia, where, for a period of four years, he surveyed the coast of Asia, as well as areas among the Kurile Islands, Japan, Okinawa, and Formosa.4
        On 16 May, 1797, the Providence struck a coral reef somewhere between Formosa and Okinawa and the crew was unable to save the vessel.5 Broughton received a court martial for the loss of the ship, though he would be acquitted later.6
        • 1. J. J. Colledge, Ships of the Royal Navy: An Historical Index (New York, NY: A. M. Kelley, 1969), vol 1, 442.
        • 2. J. K. Laughton, Broughton, William Robert Dictionary of Canadian Biography Online.
        • 3. Ibid.
        • 4. Ibid.
        • 5. Ibid.
        • 6. Ibid.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        HMS Pylades, 1854-1875
        HMS Pylades was a Royal Navy screw-driven corvette-class vessel, which carried 21 guns.1 It was built in 1854, at Sheerness dockyard; thereafter, it was launched into the Baltic Sea, to fight in the Crimean War.2 Pylades served two commissions on the coast as part of a navy contingent sent to buttress British gold-claims in the 1850s.3
        It arrived, along with HMS Tribune, at Esquimalt Harbour, in 1859 with a crew of “supernumerary marines”, who were to assist the Royal Engineers until such time as needed for military defense.4
        In this despatch, Douglas notes the arrival of Pylades and its fighting crew, and professes much satisfaction in having so effective a force available in case of Emergency.
        • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 482.
        • 2. Ibid.
        • 3. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 154.
        • 4. Ibid.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Queen
         
        Information is not yet available for this vessel.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Queen Charlotte
         
        Information is not yet available for this vessel.
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
        Racer
         
        Mentions of this vessel in the documents
          Random
          In 1864 an unknown culprit fired upon a pair of First Nations constables aboard the sloop Random near Port Simpson—one of the constables died.1
          According to Gough, incidents such as this prompted Rear-Admiral Denman to advise the Lords of the Admiralty that a large force of small vessels would be essential to keep the peace in the area—not only among the First Nations, but also to prevent injustices experienced by First Nations individuals in the service of the The Crown at the hands of white settlers.2
          • 1. Barry M. Gough, Gunboat Frontier: British Maritime Authority and Northwest Coast Indians, 1846-1890, (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1984), 117.
          • 2. Ibid.
          Mentions of this vessel in the documents
          Robertson
          Robertson was a three-masted, 105-foot wooden sailing ship built by Scott and Sons at Greenock, Scotland in 1832.1 In 1859 the ship was chartered to carry freight, including stores for the Royal Engineers surveying the Oregon Boundary, to Victoria.2
          • 1. Johnston Fraser Robb, Scotts of Greenock: Shipbuilders and Engineers, 1820-1920 [vol. 2], PhD diss., University of Glasgow, 1993, 82. http://theses.gla.ac.uk/1376
          • 2. Max. A. Robertson, ed. The English Reports [vol. 112] (Edinburgh: William Green & Sons, 1911), 376-381. http://hdl.handle.net/2027/coo.31924064792728; Draft, Merivale to Hammond, 24 January 1860 [other document included] in Barnard to Merivale, 12 January 1860, CO 305:15, no. 361, 108. V605AG01.html
          Mentions of this vessel in the documents
          Rosalind
          According to Pelly, Sir John Henry to Grey, Right Honorable Second Baronet Sir George 11 December 1846, CO 305:1, no. 1666, 83, sent from the Hudson's Bay Company in 1846, the Rosalind was a Brig that was chartered by Government at £250. stirling a month. On June 3rd, presumably in 1846, it delivered a Cargo of Coals for use by the Cormorant.
          Mentions of this vessel in the documents
          Royal Charlie
          In 1860, while a number of different First Nations groups were camped at Victoria for various reasons, including trade, and general curiosity, a group of Haida First Nations fired upon the schooner Royal Charlie.1 Admiral Baynes sent two boats and 100 marines from the Ganges to confiscate the weapons of those involved.2
          • 1. Barry M. Gough, Gunboat Frontier: British Maritime Authority and Northwest Coast Indians, 1846-1890, (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1984), 67-70.
          • 2. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 206.
          Mentions of this vessel in the documents
          Royal George
           
          Mentions of this vessel in the documents
          San Jacinto
          The San Jacinto derives its name from the San Jacinto River in Texas, which was the site of a decisive victory over the Mexican Army, on 21 April 1836, in the battle for Texas's independence.1
          The San Jacinto was built at the New York Naval yard in 1847 as an experimental ship to test new propulsion concepts. Finally launched in 1850, the San Jacinto had a long and notable career of service, despite a number of engine and machinery problems.2
          After the vessel served in the West Indies in 1855, the San Jacinto ferried Townsend Harris, the American consul general to Japan, to Shimoda, Japan, where Harris became the first foreign diplomat allowed on Japanese soil, and also helped open Japan to foreign relations.3
          Later in 1856, the San Jacinto served with the United States Navy's East India Squadron in a civil war in Chinese waters, as well as in the Second Opium War.4
          In 1859, while with the Africa Squadron, the San Jacinto aided in the efforts to curb the slave trade. Captain Charles Wilkes took over command of the San Jacinto in August 1861 prior to its journey back to the United States to join the Union Navy in the US Civil War.5
          While en route, Wilkes intercepted the English Mail Packet Trent, east of Havana, which carried a number of Confederate diplomats.6 Douglas makes note of the incident in this correspondence.
          The vessel spent several more years in the service of the Union Navy. On 1 January 1865, the San Jacinto hit a reef in the Bahamas; while some of the equipment was salvaged, the vessel itself took too much damage. The San Jacinto's hulk was sold on May 17, 1871.7
          • 1. San Jacinto, Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships.
          • 2. Ibid.
          • 3. Ibid.
          • 4. Ibid.
          • 5. Ibid.
          • 6. Ibid.
          • 7. Ibid.
          Mentions of this vessel in the documents
          Santa Cruz
          The Santa Cruz ran from California to British Columbia and Vancouver Island. In 1861, the ship was loaned to the U.S. government, was fitted out as a revenue cutter, and renamed the General Sumner. The government sold it for $40,000, whereupon the owners sold it again in China for $81,000; it was destroyed by fire on the Yangtze River in 1862.12
          • 1. Colonist, 19 April and 9 May 1862.
          • 2. E. W. Wright, ed., Lewis & Dryden's Marine History of the Pacific Northwest (Portland: The Lewis & Dryden Printing Company, 1895), 69, 100. http://dx.doi.org/10.14288/1.0222484
          Information for this vessel is not yet complete.
          Mentions of this vessel in the documents
          Santa Gertrudis la Magna
           
          Information is not yet available for this vessel.
          Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            Santa Saturnina
            The Santa Saturnina was a comparatively small sloop, at roughly 12 m long and 3.5 m wide.1 It was built in Nootka Sound in 1790.2 Scott notes that the Santa Saturnina was constructed from pieces of the Santa Gertrudis la Magna, thought to be the first European-built ship in the Pacific Northwest.3
            In 1791, under the command of José María Narváez, the Santa Saturnina explored Barkley Sound, the Strait of Georgia, and the Haro Strait, and sailed within sight of Desolation Sound and Nanaimo Harbour.4
            The Santa Saturnina draws its name from the German martyr St Saturnina, patron saint of farmers and wine merchants.5
            • 1. John Crosse, "The Spanish Discovery of the Gulf of Georgia" British Columbia Historical News, 25 (1991-92) 30-32.
            • 2. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 524.
            • 3. Ibid.
            • 4. Ibid.
            • 5. Ibid.
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            Santiago
            The Spanish naval ship Santiago is famous for several reasons: it was the first European ship to reach 54° 40' North, to map and reconnaissance the northwest coast, and to document an encounter with the Haida people.1
            The Spanish were keen to extend northward their territories on the Pacific coast, and so, in 1774, Viceroy Antonio Bucareli ordered Juan Pérez to sail to and make landfall at 60° North.2 Furthermore, Pérez was to watch for any Russian settlements along the northern coast, to look for suitable sites for colonization, to possess land for Spain, and to trade peacefully with any encountered native populations.3
            Pérez sailed from the Spanish naval base of San Blas on 25 January 1775 and reached present-day Graham Island, in Hadia Gwaii, on July 18th of the same year.4 Only days later, a small number of Haida people encountered the Spanish near present-day Langara Island.5
            This historic meeting was the first among several similar encounters that would go on to affect significant political, social, and economic outcomes for the Haida—and other Indigenous peoples—the Spanish, British, Russian, and US governments.6
            The Santiago was a three-masted frigate, 25 m long and 8 m wide, constructed at San Blas from local Mexican lumber.7 The ship was intended to house 64 crew, but the log for Pérez's voyage lists 88 expedition members and 24 passengers.8
            BCGNIS lists two geographical features named “Santiago”, a creek and a mountain, the latter at least draws its official name from Perez's famous ship.9
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            Sarah Sands
             
            Information is not yet available for this vessel.
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            Saratoga
            The wooden sidewheel steamer Cortes, originally christened the Saratoga, was 67 m long.1 It was built in New York in 1852, for Davis Brooks and Company, for $198,000.2 It sailed for San Francisco on 10 July 1852 and operated between San Francisco and Panama for the New York and San Francisco Steamship Line until the following summer, when it was purchased by Cornelius Vanderbilt, who ran it between San Francisco and San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua, until March 1855.3
            In 1858 and 1859, it sailed between San Francisco and Panama, for the New York and California Steamship Company, and in 1860 for the Atlantic and Pacific Steamship Company.4 The Pacific Mail Steamship Company purchased it in 1860 and kept it on the Panama route until February 1861, when it sold it to Flint and Holladay, who chartered it to China in 1862, where it remained until 1865, when it burned at Shanghai.5
            • 1. John Haskell Kemble, The Panama Route, 1848-1869 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1943), 222.
            • 2. Ibid.
            • 3. Ibid.
            • 4. Ibid.
            • 5. Ibid.
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            HMS Satellite, 1855-1879
            HMS Satellite was a corvette-class vessel of 1,327 tonnes, with 21 guns.1 Prevost captained it for its time on the Pacific Station, from 1857-60, and it appears in dozens of despatches, mostly in 1858.2
            It was launched from a Devonport dockyard in 1855 and sailed in South America and China, in addition to its work on the West Coast, where it acted, in 1858, as a guard-ship and licence-checker for miners on the Fraser River. It was broken up in 1879, but its memory lives on in the Salish Sea in at least three geographical place names: Satellite Channel, Passage, and Reef.3
            • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 526.
            • 2. Ibid.
            • 3. Ibid.
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            HMS Scout
            In August 1866, the HMS Scout ferried Governor Kennedy on a tour around Vancouver Island in an attempt to establish peaceful relations with the First Nations groups on the west coast.1 The Scout once again served in this capacity in 1873, when the vessel conveyed Lieutenant-Governor Trutch and Attorney General McCreight to the Skeena during the “Skeena War” in an attempt to placate members of the Gitsegukla First Nation.2
            • 1. Barry M. Gough, Gunboat Frontier: British Maritime Authority and Northwest Coast Indians, 1846-1890, (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1984), 123-124.
            • 2. Ibid., 205.
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            HMS Scylla
            The HMS Scylla, a 1331-tonne corvette that possessed a twenty-one-gun armament at its launch in June 1856; however, the Royal Navy appears to have reduced its armament to sixteen.1
            The vessel was part of the Royal Navy's “Flying Squadron”, which, in May of 1870, resided for a period at Esquimalt that, at the time, was described as Esquimalt's finest hour as a British naval base.2
            • 1. Peter Davis, HMS Scylla (1856), The Victorian Royal Navy (website). http://www.pdavis.nl/ShowShip.php?id=130
            • 2. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 390-391.
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            Sea Bird
            The Sea Bird was 69 m long steam-powered side-wheeler, driven by a 110-horsepower walking-beam engine.1 It was brought from New York to San Francisco in 1850-51.2 It was owned by Captain J. T. Wright and Sons and brought to the Fraser River in 1858 by Captain Francis Connor to transport miners to the gold fields.3
            On its second trip up the Fraser to Hope, Sea Bird grounded on what is now called Sea Bird Island, a few miles below Hope.4 Every passenger but the cook escaped attack and robbery from local Indigenous residents.5 Following the plunder, the cook was taken to a naval hospital at Esquimalt, where he eventually died from his injuries.6 On 7 September 1858, the vessel caught fire and beached on Discovery Island, near Victoria, and burned to the waterline.7
            In this despatch, Douglas mentions the Sea Bird as an American river steamer that, at the time, in 1858, would ply with passengers, mostly miners, between this Port [Victoria] and Fraser's River.
            • 1. Gordon R. Newell, Ships of the Inland Sea (Portland: Binfords & Mort, 1960), 16.
            • 2. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 531.
            • 3. Ibid.
            • 4. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 120.
            • 5. Ibid.
            • 6. Ibid.
            • 7. Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names, 531.
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            Sea Nymph
            According to the July 28, 1860 issue of the British Colonist, the Sea Nymph was a British barque, built in 1859, with a deck length of 37 m, a beam of 7 m, and a depth hold of roughly 5 m; it was advertised for auction, in Victoria, with all her Sails, Boats, Chronometer, Barometer, Sympiesometer and other gear.1
            According to Murdoch, Thomas William Clinton to Merivale, Herman 21 February 1859, CO 60:5, no. 2013, 497, the Sea Nymph was bound for British Columbia, a voyage upon which at least one passenger, a Mr. Cadell, complained about the state of the ship and the treatment of the passengers. The Sea Nymph, however, did not fall under the guidelines of the Passengers Act, so Government officials lacked power to intervene. The same despatch mentions that the owners appointed a new Master, who saw that all passengers were comfortable, and ensured that the Sea Nymph was in a proper state by the time it departed to sea.
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            Shark
            According to Hamilton, George Alexander to Hawes, Benjamin 14 September 1848, CO 305:1, no. 1809, 319, Shark was a US schooner which brought Americans to Fort Vancouver sometime before September 7th, 1846; Shark was commanded by Captain Howison.1
            The Shark became, on several occasions, a symbol of US naval power, and when it was sent to Honolulu for repairs, in 1846, it was to be that it would later sail up the Columbia River, ostensibly on an exploratory mission.2
            Given tensions in Oregon Territory at the time, the Shark was likely sent to assert US trade and naval dominance. However, things did not go as planned for the mission. On September 10th, the Shark struck an uncharted shoal off the mouth of the Columbia, and was swept by the tide into a churn of waves.3 The ship was lost, but all crew survived; ironically, all hands chartered back to San Francisco on the Cadboro, an HBC ship, and one very much British.4
            • 1. Shark, Dictionary of American Naval Fighting Ships.
            • 2. Ibid.
            • 3. Ibid.
            • 4. Ibid.
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            CSS Shenandoah
            At its launch in Scotland in 1863, the CSS Shenandoah, which originally bore the name Sea King, was intended to be a British transport vessel;1 however, a US Confederate agent, through furtive and duplicitous means, was able to purchase the Sea King for use in the Confederate Navy.2
            After sailors hurriedly prepared the Sea King for war and renamed it the CSS Shenandoah, the vessel headed for the shipping lanes between the Cape of Good Hope and Australia to disrupt American trade. The Shenandoah next moved into the North Pacific, where, in the summer of 1865, it preyed on American whaling vessels.3
            Unaware that the Civil War had ended in the aftermath of the Confederate surrender earlier that year, the Shenandoah's captain, Waddel, continued his mission into June of 1865.4 In August 1865, Vancouver Island governor, Kennedy, received a letter from the US consul, which was included in the documents enclosed with this despatch, that informed him of the Shenandoah's continued warlike activities despite the end of the war.
            Also in August 1865, having now learned that the war had indeed ended, Waddel steered the Shenandoah on a route back to England, and surrendered the ship upon arrival.5 At the close of the Civil War, the Shenandoah was the only Confederate ship to circle the globe, and was the last vessel to surrender.6
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            Shubrick
            According to Romaine, William Govett to Fortescue, 1st Baron Carlingford Chichester 27 September 1859, CO 305:12, no. 9686, 47, on August 11, 1859, Rear Admiral Baynes was invited to conference on the US steamer Shubrick, by Lieutenant Colonel Casey. Baynes declined the meeting on the Shubrick, but extended an invitation to Casey to come aboard his own ship, HMS Ganges.
            The Shubrick is mentioned also in this despatch, in which Governor Seymour was forced to send a request to its Commander not to fire a salute, as he lacked the ability to return the compliment due to a lack of supplies.
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            Silistria
             
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            Skiddy, 1820-1859
            Little information is available on this vessel while it was called the Skiddy, a New York pilot boat; however, it was purchased by the US Navy in January 1853 and renamed the Fennimore Cooper—it was used as a tender on a surveying expedition to the Bering Strait, North Pacific, and China Seas.1
            According to this private correspondence, the Fennimore Cooper was a US surveying schooner, that was scheduled to make a stop in Japanese waters sometime in late 1858. The final destination for the Fennimore Cooper is not specified in the despatch, but its stop in Japan was for the purpose of delivering Joseph Hui, whom Rowlandson recommends as a prospective interpreter & to Lord Elgins Japan Expedition.
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            SS Sonora, 1853-1868
            The SS Sonora, a wooden sidewheel steamer, 82 m long, was built for the Pacific Mail Steamship Company in October 1853.1 It sailed the PanamaSan Francisco route from May 1854 to May 1863; in 1865 it made one more voyage to Panama, to deliver troops.2 In 1868, it was dismantled and broken up in Sausalito.3
            An enclosure in this 1858 despatch reports that Captain Grant of the Royal Engineers, and a contingent of engineers, transfered to the Sonora, bound for San Francisco.
            • 1. John Haskell Kemble, The Panama Route, 1848-1869 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1943), 247.
            • 2. Ibid.
            • 3. Ibid.
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            Southern Eagle
            According to this private correspondence, from 1858, Edward Hammond King wrote to the colonial office that he would be embarking on the Southern Eagle for San Francisco.
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            HMS Sparrowhawk
            The Sparrowhawk, a 613-tonne gunvessel launched in 1856, saw considerable action as a police vessel in the Pacific Northwest from 1865 to 1872.1 Among the notable cases in which the Sparrowhawk was involved were the Kincolith Murders and the John Bright Affair.
            In 1868, hostilities between the Nisga'a and Tsimshian First Nations resulted in several deaths, including three members of the Kincolith Christian mission.2 In May 1869, Governor Seymour, aboard the Sparrowhawk, arrived at Kincolith, and oversaw traditional negotiations of peace between the two First Nations groups on the vessel's deck.3 Before the vessel departed, Seymour assured the chiefs that if any further violence ensued, the matters would be dealt with in accordance with British law.4 Upon the return trip to Esquimalt, Governor Seymour suddenly took ill and died near Bella Coola.5
            The crew of the Sparrowhawk also investigated the alleged murder of those aboard the vessel John Bright, and the pillage of the vessel's wreck by individuals from the Hesquiat First Nation. Katkinna, a chief who confessed to the crime, and John Anietsachist were tried and executed for the crime.6
            The Sparrowhawk sold in 1872, and the new owners then sold its engines and converted it to a sailing vessel. The Sparrowhawk made several voyages to China before it was lost in the China Sea during a typhoon. The vessel's engines served in the Moodyville sawmill well into the 20th century.7
            • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 559.
            • 2. Barry M. Gough, Gunboat Frontier: British Maritime Authority and Northwest Coast Indians, 1846-1890, (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1984), 195-196.
            • 3. Ibid., 197.
            • 4. Ibid.
            • 5. Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names, 559.
            • 6. Gough, Gunboat Frontier: British Maritime Authority and Northwest Coast Indians, 1846-1890, 127.
            • 7. John T. Walbran, British Columbia Coast Names (Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre, 1971), 467.
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            HMS Speedy
            According this despatch, in November 1861, the Speedy conveyed a shipment of rifles to the government on Vancouver Island for the use of a volunteer rifle corps.
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
            Starling
             
            Information is not yet available for this vessel.
            Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              Sulphur
              The HMS Sulphur, a 381-tonne, 32 m bomb vessel, was launched in January of 1826 and disposed of in 1857.1 It was the last bomb vessel in the Navy List.2 Sulphur was sent the vessel to survey the Pacific coast in 1835;3 it arrived in Nootka Sound in October, 1837.3
              In 1839, under the command of Captain Edward Belcher, the Sulphur narrowly [escaped] destruction on what would later be named Peacock Spit, as it surveyed the bar in the Columbia River with its escort, the Starling.5 Captain Belcher would later admit he was given secret instructions to collect information on the dispute between the British and the United States over the Oregon Territory .6
              Beginning in 1841, the Sulphur participated in several naval engagements in China, before it returned to England,7 where it was used in harbour service until it was dismantled in 1857.8
              • 1. Sulphur, 1826, Index of 19th Century Naval Vessels.
              • 2. J. J. Colledge, Ships of the Royal Navy: An Historical Index (New York, NY: A. M. Kelley, 1969), vol 1, 532.
              • 3. Ibid.
              • 4. Sulphur, Ships of the Old Navy.
              • 5. E. W. Wright, ed., Lewis & Dryden's Marine History of the Pacific Northwest (Portland: The Lewis & Dryden Printing Company, 1895), 14-15. http://dx.doi.org/10.14288/1.0222484
              • 6. Sulphur, Ships of the Old Navy.
              • 7. HMS Sulphur, Index of 19th Century Naval Vessels.
              • 8. Ibid.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              Surprise
              The Surprise first plied west-coast waters in early 1858, as a miner-transport from Victoria to the Fraser River.1 This side-wheel steamer made almost thirty trips, with 500-600 miners aboard each time.2
              According to one account, it made the run, against a six-knot current, from Fort Langley to Fort Hope in roughly twenty hours.3 It was purchased from New York in 1852 by Captain Edgar Wakeman, who had a rather uncomfortable four-month journey to the west coast.4 Following its time in the Salish Sea, it worked for a short time in San Francisco until it sailed for China, where it ended its days.5
              This vessel is not to be confused with a second Surprise, a trade and sealing schooner built in Puget Sound in 1859, which wrecked off Sooke Harbour in 1874, on a reef to bear later its namesake.6
              • 1. E. W. Wright, ed., Lewis & Dryden's Marine History of the Pacific Northwest (Portland: The Lewis & Dryden Printing Company, 1895), 72. http://dx.doi.org/10.14288/1.0222484
              • 2. Ibid.
              • 3. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 120.
              • 4. Wright, Lewis & Dryden's Marine History, 72.
              • 5. Ibid.
              • 6. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 575.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              Susan Sturges
              According to Hamilton, George Alexander to Merivale, Herman 27 September 1852, CO 305:3, no. 8866, 269, Susan Sturges was an American Schooner that sailed from San Francisco to Haida Gwaii in 1852. From April 20th – May 11th of that year, Susan Sturges visited Mitchell Inlet in a quest for gold, but met with no success. It did, however, bring back a batch of spars, cut from Haida Gwaii timbers, which made Douglas bristle: here was a US ship taking liberties with what he considered British resources.1
              Greater drama ensued on another trip to the same region in Fall of the same year. The boat was plundered and burned by the Masset Haida, but accounts of the nature and details of the assault are divided.2 Captain Rooney, commander at the time, and his trade-contact Chief Edenshaw relate that the Masset swarmed the boat and that Edenshaw's wife came between Rooney and a musket barrel, thus preventing the assailant's shot, then Edenshaw ushered Rooney to a safe cabin.3 Then Edenshaw, to keep up appearances, joined in the looting, apparently to give back to Rooney the more critical objects Rooney would require, such as his chronometer.4
              The Masset version is that Edenshaw merely pretended to befriend the White traders in order to subdue their defenses, and that it was another Masset chief, Scowell, that rescued Rooney and his men.5 Neither story alters that fact that the Susan Sturges met its fiery fate that day.
              • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 576.
              • 2. Ibid.
              • 3. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 51.
              • 4. Ibid., 52.
              • 5. Ibid.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              HMS Sutlej
              The Sutlej, a 75m-long, 3470-tonne steam vessel that boasted an armament of 35 guns,1 served as the flagship of the Royal Navy's Pacific Fleet from 1863 to 1866.2 Originally a sailing vessel at the time of its launch in 1855, and switched to steam power in 1860,3 the Sutlej left Plymouth on 11 December 1862, and reached Esquimalt in June of the following year.4
              The Sutlej saw its first major action in the Pacific during the “Chilcotin Uprising”, which arose from the alleged murder of 14 men at work on Waddington's Road at the hands of a group of Chilcotin First Nations individuals.5 On June 18, 1864, the Sutlej ferried Kingcome, Governor Seymour, Brew, and a rifle corps to Bentinck Arm, where the search for the culprits began.6 On September 29, Begbie tried and executed Chilcotin Chiefs Klatsassin and Telloot, along with three other individuals found guilty of the murders.7
              The Sutlej played a larger role in the “Ahousat Incident” that took place in August of 1864. The “Ahousat Incident” was the search for a group of Ahousat First Nations individuals who allegedly pillaged the sloop Kingfisher, and murdered its crew near Matilda Creek. The Sutlej, along with the Devastation, was responsible for much destruction of First Nations villages and property in the search that would ultimately be unsuccessful.8
              The vessel, after which Pender named several British Columbia features, including Sutlej Channel, Sutlej Point, and Sutlej Reef,9 was broken up in 1869.10
              • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 576.
              • 2. John T. Walbran, British Columbia Coast Names (Vancouver: Douglas & McIntyre, 1971), 478.
              • 3. Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names, 576.
              • 4. Walbran, British Columbia Coast Names, 478.
              • 5. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 297-300.
              • 6. Ibid., 300.
              • 7. Ibid., 305.
              • 8. Barry M. Gough, Gunboat Frontier: British Maritime Authority and Northwest Coast Indians, 1846-1890, (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1984), 114.
              • 9. Walbran, British Columbia Coast Names, 479.
              • 10. Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names, 576.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              HMS Swift, 1835-1866
              HMS Swift was a Packet Brig of the Royal Navy; it was commanded in the Pacific by Commander William Cornwallis Aldham.1
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              Swiss Boy
              According to this despatch from 1859, a sodden and unfit-for-sea Swiss Boy, a US merchant brig mastered by Mr. David K. Welden, entered Barclay Sound, and was, as Douglas relates, abandoned and thought to be plundered by the natives.
              The Swiss Boy had set off from Puget Sound, bound for San Francisco, with shipment of lumber, when, after taking on water, the ship was beached for repairs.1 On February 1st 1859, while beached, the Swiss Boy was boarded by Huu-ay-aht, and Tseshaht First Nations peoples; the masts, rigging, and sails were damaged, and the cabins and sailors were plundered.2 The crew was only able to survive and escape by the assistance of a highly intelligent and widely respected Makah or Cape Flattery chief, pilot and interpreter called Swell.3
              The so-called Swiss Boy affair was investigated by Prevost, from the HMS Satellite, who was able to recover some of the missing material, and question those involved in the incident, who asserted that they had believed the Swiss Boy to be their property due to its location and disabled state.4
              • 1. Barry M. Gough, Gunboat Frontier: British Maritime Authority and Northwest Coast Indians, 1846-1890, (Vancouver: University of British Columbia Press, 1984), 111.
              • 2. Ibid.
              • 3. Ibid.
              • 4. Ibid.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              Sybil
               
              Information is not yet available for this vessel.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              HMS Tartar
              HMS Tartar was a Cossack class sail and steam powered corvette that had 20 guns when launched in 1854. The ship was being built in England for the Russian Navy when it was seized during the Crimean War.1 On 27 October 1860, Tartar left Portsmouth carrying £6900 in coin from the British Treasury for use in British Columbia, arriving in Victoria on 2 April 1861.2
              • 1. David Lyon and Rif Winfield, The Sail & Steam Navy List: All the Ships of the Royal Navy 1815-1889 (London: Chatham Publishing, 2004), 208.
              • 2. Rogers to Douglas, 30 October 1860, LAC RG7:G8C/9, 338. B607058.html; Arrival of Naval Vessels, Daily British Colonist (Victoria), 3 April 1861. http://n2t.net/ark:/13960/t7qn82s8t
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              Tepic
              According to Hamilton, George Alexander to Merivale, Herman 27 September 1852, CO 305:3, no. 8866, 269, Tepic was an English brig that sailed from San Francisco to Haida Gwaii in 1852. From April 21st – May 15th of that year, Tepic visited Mitchell Inlet in a quest for gold, but met with no success.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              HMS Termagant, 1847-1867
              The HMS Termagant was 64 m long wooden screw-frigate with 24 guns.1 According to this despatch, the screw frigate Termagant was to accompany two gun boats, presumably the Forward and the Grappler, from St. Vincent to the service of West Coast waters, in 1859. The Termagant, however, was destined for the general service at the Station at the River Plate, or Río de la Plata, on the eastern coast of Argentina.
              Akrigg and Akrigg write that after the Termagant delivered the HMS Forward, and HMS Grappler to Esquimalt, it was dispatched for a tour of the Gulf Islands to Burrard Inlet with HMS Plumper, when it was caught in the tiderips and damaged its copper sheathing, and planking, and was freed from the rocks with several trees still caught in its rigging.2 The damage was so severe that it could not be fully repaired in Nanaimo and was forced to head for a dry dock at San Francisco, still leaking rather badly.3
              In this despatch, the Termagant is mentioned as being moored in Esquimalt Harbour, along with the vessels Ganges, Satellite, Topaze, Alert, and Plumper, as well as the gunboats Grappler and Forward.
              • 1. Peter Davis, HMS Termagant (1847), The Victorian Royal Navy (website). http://www.pdavis.nl/ShowShip.php?id=95
              • 2. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 202.
              • 3. Ibid.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              HMS Termagant, 1822-1824 [renamed Herald, fate: 1862]
              HMS Herald was launched at Kochi, India, in 1822 as HMS Termagant, at which time it was a 28-gun, 454-tonne fighting vessel.1 In 1824, it was transformed into an 8-gun survey ship and renamed Herald.2
              As Herald, it was commanded by Kellet for survey work off Central America in 1848 until, suddenly, Kellett was ordered to sail it to the Arctic Ocean as part of the search party for the missing Franklin expedition; indeed, Kellett would make three attempts to rescue Franklin, from 1848-50, but to no avail.3 In 1851, Kellett returned the Herald to England, whereafter, Captain Henry Denham employed it to survey the Fijian Islands until it was decommissioned in 1862.4
              Pelly, Sir John Henry to Grey, Right Honorable Second Baronet Sir George 11 December 1846, CO 305:1, no. 1666, 83, from 1846, mentions that the Herald, along with the Pandora, was to provide a Survey of the Southern Shore of Vancouvers Island.
              • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 259.
              • 2. Ibid.
              • 3. Ibid.
              • 4. Ibid.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              Thames City, 1856
              According to this despatch, the Thames City left from England for British Columbia, in 1858, with 119 men of the Expedition, presuambly these were Royal Engineers. Wymond Ogilvy Hamley, customs collector, was also aboard, as indicated in Richards, Charles to Merivale, Herman 29 September 1858, CO 60:2, no. 9929, 15; Reverend James Gammage was aboard, too, as indicated in this despatch.
              Thames City rounded Cape Horn successfully and arrived at Esquimalt Harbour on 12 April 1859, according to this despatch. Corry, Henry Thomas Lowry to Merivale, Herman 5 October 1858, CO 60:2, no. 10184, 21 finds the ship, as well as the Briseis, entangled in a brokerage dispute, which forced the ship to port at Fraser River, rather than Victoria. An enclosure in the same despatch argues that the brokers at Victoria—Shaw, Savill and Company—could not accept lower terms for service to Fraser River due to risks of crew desertion and added insurance costs.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              HMS Thetis, 1846-55
              HMS Thetis, named for the Greek sea nymph,1 was a 5th-rate frigate of the Royal Navy. From 1851-53 it was commanded on in the Pacific by Captain Kuper.2
              HMS Thetis gave its name to many places on and around Vancouver Island including Thetis Island, Lake, Cove, and anchorage.3 It was part of a force, led by Douglas, that went to Cowichan Bay to arrest Peter Brown's murderers, an incident that features in several despatches.
              • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 588.
              • 2. Peter Davis, HMS Thetis (1846), The Victorian Royal Navy (website). http://www.pdavis.nl/ShowShip.php?id=2176
              • 3. Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names, 588.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              HMS Topaze, 1858-1884
              HMS Topaze was a 72 m long British steam frigate.1 According to various despatches, the Topaze was a gunboat, but served also as a survey vessel. In Hammond, Edmund to Merivale, Herman 14 October 1859, CO 305:12, no. 10175, 348, from October 1859, the Topaze was ordered to the Pacific Station at Valparaiso, along with the Clio.
              In this despatch, the Topaze was ordered to join British naval forces on the North West Coast of America. HMS Topaze appears to have remained in service at Esquimalt Harbour in several capacities, until at least November 1866.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              Tory, 1834
              According to this despatch, Tory sailed from England to Vancouver Island, arriving in June, 1851. On board were aproximately 120 people, mostly employees of the Hudson's Bay Company and their families. Included in this group were Edward E. Langford, James Cooper, and Mr. Blenkhorne.
              Parker, John to Peel, Sir Frederick 28 November 1851, CO 305:3, no. 10075, 215 notes that the Tory's journey to Victoria took seven months. According to Moresby, the colonists, the greater part being servants of the Hudson's Bay Company, were brought to the island to establish farms in Victoria, Esquimalt, and Metchosin.
              This Tory is not to be confused with the barque of the same name that carried settlers to New Zealand in 1841. This latter ship was owned by the New Zealand Company and was wrecked in the Philipines on January 23rd, 1841.1
              • 1. A. H. McLintock, Ed., An Encyclopedia of New Zealand, Volume 3 (Wellington: R. E. Owen, Government Printer, 1966), 249.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              Traveller
              According to Shepherd,John to Labouchere, Henry 19 February 1856, CO 305:7, no. 1679, 254, Traveller brought ammunition and guns to CH Mason, acting governor of Washington Territory, from Governor Douglas in 1855.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              RMS Trent, 1841-1865
              The RMS Trent was part of the first Royal Mail fleet, and was launched on October 2, 1841; it weighed 1856 tons.1
              It was hardly an efficient craft: it was once reported to have made only 119 miles on 33 tons of coal in one day.2
              The Trent was involved in the “Trent Affair”, which began on November 8, 1861, when the USS San Jacinto removed two Confederate agents from the Trent on the open sea, a day's sail from Havana, Cuba.3
              Douglas mentions the dramatic incident in this confidential letter. He writes that the Trent was boarded some time last month, on the high seas by an armed party from the United States Corvette Jacinto under the Command of Commodore Wilkes. Douglas recognizes the political gravity of the boarding, and warns that complications may grow out of so rash and insolent an act, Endangering our friendly relations with the United States, who were roughly seven months into their Civil War.
              • 1. T. A. Bushell, Royal Mail, 1839-1939 (London: Trade and Travel Publications Ltd., 1939), 253.
              • 2. Howard Robinson, Carrying British Mails Overseas (London: George Allen & Unwin Ltd., 1964), 228.
              • 3. Ibid., 228-30.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              HMS Tribune, 1853-1866
              HMS Tribune was a 2,034-tonne steam frigate of the Royal Navy.1 It was involved in both the Second Opium War and the Crimean War.2 In 1858, HMS Tribune and HMS Pylades were sent, as confirmed in this despatch, from China to Victoria in order to strengthen the local naval presence, in light of the increasing population and US tensions over the boundary dispute.3
              As confirmed in this despatch, Tribune arrived in Esquimalt Harbour on February 13th, 1859. This depatch reports that it transported seven officers and one hundred and sixty non-commissioned officers and privates of the Royal Marines.
              Later that year, under the command of Captain Geoffrey Thomas Phipps Hornby, Tribune was involved in the diplomatic clashes of the San Juan Island's “Pig War”, evidence for which can be found in this despatch, from August 1st, 1859, and this despatch from August 8th of the same year. Tribune returned to the Pacific Station for a second commission from 1864-66, after which it was dismantled.4
              • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 602.
              • 2. Ibid.
              • 3. Ibid.
              • 4. Ibid.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              HMS Trincomalee, 1817 - present
              Trincomalee served on the Pacific Station from 1853-56, but its fame was rich enough that a fourteen-year restoration project finds it preserved today in Hartlepool, England, where it is a tourist attraction.1 Physically, it was impressive: a 24-gun, 1,312-tonne frigate sailing ship built of Malabar teak at Mumbai—2then Bombay—under the supervision of master shipbuilder Jamsetjee Bomanjee Wadia.3
              It is mentioned in several despatches, most notably perhaps in its capacity as an imposing presence during what Douglas describes as a very large assemblage of the native tribes at Victoria, who were, in his view, well armed and equipped for war.
              This same despatch goes on to report that, in light of Douglas's concerns, Captain Houstoun, commander at the time, agreed to waylay the Trincomalee's eventual departure for San Francisco until the threat of hostilities subsided.
              • 1. Andrew Scott, The Encyclopedia of Raincoast Place Names (Madeira Park, BC: Harbour Publishing, 2009), 603.
              • 2. Ibid.
              • 3. HMS Trincomalee 1817, HMS Trincomalee—Construction, HMS Trincomalee Trust.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              Triumph, 1861-1869
              This vessel had several lives and political allegiances. It was built in Scotland in 1861 as the merchant steamship Fingal.1
              As Fingal, it ran a blockade at Savannah, Georgia in November of 1861, during the American Civil War, and was captured and converted into the CSS Atlanta: an ironclad ram built to attack Federalist warship blockades at ports and rivers along the same coast.2
              As CSS Atlanta, it was forced to surrender after running aground during a battle in Wassau Sound, whereafter it was taken into Union service as the USS Atlanta.3
              It was decommissioned at Philadelphia in June, 1865; however, it was apparently sold into service again in 1869 as the Hatian warship Triumph, a name it carried to its fate when it disappeared somewhere off Cape Hatteras, North Carolina, in December of that year.4
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              True Briton
              According to this despatch, from Douglas to Newcastle on 28 May, 1862, the True Briton sailed for Vancouver Island from London in August 1860. Douglas notes that the Ship however met with a series of disasters and did not reach Vancouver's Island until more than Twelve months afterwards.
              Further drama found the ship after it arrived. According to the British Colonist for Tuesday morning on September 17, 1861, three men were arrested on suspicion of being concerned in the extensive robbery of goods from the bark True Briton at Esquimalt.1
              Two days later, the Colonist reports details on the case,2 and notes that a spar, 185 feet long, is to be sent to England by the True Briton for display in the Worlds' Fair of 1862, in London.3 This article provides the length, at least, of the True Briton, as it reports the spar to be 40 feet longer than the vessel.4
              So, this True Briton is not to be mistaken for two others. The first of which was built as a passenger frigate, of three masts, in 1861 in Blackwall Yard, London.5 The second was built in Quebec in 1865; it was a sailing ship, 62 m long, which was lost on the Marquesas Shoal, Florida Reefs in January of 1889.6
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              SS Una, 1849-1851
              Una was a 135-tonne brigantine bought in London by the Hudson's Bay Company in 1849, for £950, roughly $90,000 CAD in current money.1
              In 1851, as recounted in this 1852 despatch, and another in 1853, Una traveled to Mitchell Inlet, Haida Gwaii where it discovered gold. On its return, it was wrecked during a storm in Neah Bay, near Cape Flattery. The Indigenous people in the area plundered the ship and then set fire to it. The US schooner Susan Sturges rescued Una's crew as well as part of its cargo.
              Staines recounts, with Gothic flourish, the sack of the Una, as part of a letter to his uncle, Boys.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              Vancouver
              The Vancouver was a HBC owned barque that operated between London and the Northwest Coast.1 In 1845 it became the first ship to enter Victoria Harbour direct from England.2
              • 1. Hubert Howe Bancroft, The Works of Hubert Howe Bancroft: History of British Columbia 1792-1887, vol. 32 (San Francisco: The History Company, 1887), 120.
              • 2. Ibid.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              Venture
              The Venture, later named Umatilla, was a stern-wheel steamship built by Thompson & Co at Five Mile Creek, near the Columbia River; it was 34 m long and 7 m wide.1
              Its trial trip on the Columbia was indeed rife with trials, as it went over Cascade Rapids stern first and, eventually, caught up on a rock.2 Of the forty passengers, one man jumped overboard in a panic, and was lost to the frothy wash. It was floated off of its perch and bought by Ainsworth, Leonard & Green, who repaired its hull, renamed it Umatilla, and had it towed by the Columbia up to Victoria.3 From there, Ainsworth captained it on the Fraser for one trip only, before trading it for the steamer Maria, which had been barged up from San Francisco—upon which the Umatilla was loaded and towed to the same city.4
              Among its more notable exploits, Umatilla was the first steamboat, on July 21st, 1858, to drive all the way up the Fraser River to Fraser Canyon,5 which it did once only due to the strain of the journey, and it was the first steamer to go over the Cascade rapids.6
              In this 1858 despatch, Douglas mentions that he transferred to the Umatilla during an expedition, which carried a force of Thirty-five non-commissioned officers and men, to report on the state of affairs at Fraser River.
              • 1. E. W. Wright, ed., Lewis & Dryden's Marine History of the Pacific Northwest (Portland: The Lewis & Dryden Printing Company, 1895), 72. http://dx.doi.org/10.14288/1.0222484
              • 2. Ibid.
              • 3. Ibid.
              • 4. Ibid.
              • 5. G. P. V. Akrigg and H. B. Akrigg, British Columbia Chronicle, 1847-1871 (Victoria: Discovery Press, 1977), 121.
              • 6. Wright, Lewis & Dryden's Marine History, 72.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              Victoria and Albert
               
              Information is not yet available for this vessel.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              Victoria Packet
              A schooner captained by John Dolholt.
              Information for this vessel is not yet complete.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              HMS Virago, 1842-1876
              HMS Virago was a first-class paddle sloop of the Royal Navy. It was part of the 1854 Anglo-French squadron during the Crimean War.1
              Virago is described in several despatches, and from these, it appears it was sent to further Colonial coal interests, particularly at Haida Gwaii. It served, also, as a temporary prison to one “Seakai”, a man described in this despatch as a minor Chief, who was, apparently, involved in the sack and plunder of the Susan Sturges.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              Wellington
               
              Information is not yet available for this vessel.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents
              Wilson G. Hunt, 1849-1890
              Wilson G. Hunt was a steamer built in New York in 1849; its original purpose was to ferry passengers and wares to Coney Island.1 However, it made its way to San Francisco in 1850 and was put immediately into river trade, much to the delight of its owners, who cleared one million dollars in a single year.2
              It moved North to Victoria in 1858, and ran the New Westminster route for a time, afterwards, it replaced the Constitution, which plied the Puget Sound.3 This 1869 despatch, for example, describes the Wilson G. Hunt as a a regular trader between Victoria and the Ports on Puget Sound.
              From there, it was bought by the Oregon Steam Navigation Company and placed on the Columbia, or Cascade, route under Captain John Wolf, where it ran until 1869, lucrative all the while.4 In the Autumn of its exemplary service, it was purchased by Captain John Irving, who had it brought back up the coast to work the Fraser River region, in unabashed competition with the HBC's Enterprise, but in 1881, it was sold to J. Spratt, and then back to Irving in 1890, its final year.5 It was dismantled and its iron parts sold to Cohn & Co. in San Francisco, and its hull burned, which would have taken considerable time as it was 56 m long and nearly 8 m wide.6
              • 1. E. W. Wright, ed., Lewis & Dryden's Marine History of the Pacific Northwest (Portland: The Lewis & Dryden Printing Company, 1895), 73. http://dx.doi.org/10.14288/1.0222484
              • 2. Ibid.
              • 3. Ibid.
              • 4. Ibid., 74.
              • 5. Ibid.
              • 6. Ibid.
              Mentions of this vessel in the documents