The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1900-12-13

of the old-time square-rigged, deer
water skipper.
In the year 1877 was launched al
Brewer a big ship, the Llewellyn j
Morse, named for Captain l.. j. Morse
of Bangor, and it might be mentioned
that in the same year the schooners
Empress, Lester A. Lewis and the brig
Halviah were also launched on the riv-
er, the latter from a Bangor yard.
The name of the Llewellyn j. Morse
does not appear in the shipping reports
these days. One might haunt the docks
of the Atlantic coast from Passama-
quoddy to Corpus Christi and speak
every incoming craft. but none could
give any tidings of a shiL called the
Llewellyn j. Morse, built at Brewer,
Maine in 1877, 1875 net onnage, and
who would show the signal letters j..
S. L. " The famous old ship has
dropped out of society. Many who
noted her comngs and goings have lost
all track of her Her old chums are
nearly all out of sight, wrecked or
Worse-coal barges.
The fact is that the Morse and a doz-
en- other fine Yankee-built craft who
! were UllcG Ill the dIlSlOGldlIC llduCS VI
Hong Kong, Manila, Singapore, Mel
bourne and The River. form little
fleet Of old timers, who to escape from
the poor-house, as it were, have hiddtn
themselves away in trade where they
are seldom heard from or reported
Many an old-time skipper will tell you
that he thinks the George Skoield the
St. Nicholas, the Sterling, Eclipse and
others that might be named-and the
Llewellyn J. Morse were dead" long
ago.
| But they are still afoat.
Scattered along almost the entire
coast of Alaska are long, low, rough
buildings on shaky piles, salmon can
neries, In most cases the wild and bar
rem wilderness grudgingly allows but a
strip of beach barely wide enough for
the buildings and the rougher shacks
in which the operatives live for time.
The Alaskan coast Is something like
that Of Maine with many Islands, in
let's and bays. These are alive with
salmon and reddish. But coarse fish
when compared with the Penobscot
article but red of flesh and nice to look
at and eat by those who know nothing
better.
A score or more of syndicates operate
these canneries in the season but the
exigencles of the business require that
they bring their employees with them
for where the salmon are most plenti-
full they are no inhabitants except
few lazy, half-civilized Indians. The
canning companies for the most part,
have headquarters at San Francisco.
Here in the early spring they fit out
their transports for the canneries.
Some own and some charter good sized
craft, FOR they must carry from 200 to
400 people. including the Chinese, who
make the cans and pack the fish as we'll
as the fishermen, engineers for the
seine steamers, and supplies Of all
kinds. S4
And this is what the solid old Maine
ship the Llewellyn ]. Morse has come
to. For few months she is tied UP
at San Francisco then with miscella-
neous cargo she heads for the north
ward for Chicknick bay, where all sum-
mer, high and light. she swings at her
moorings in the sheltered bay in which
receives the waters Of the Chilkoot riv-
er. In the fall when the season Is
over she is locked, and case upon case
and ton upon ton Of he canned salmon
are stored away in her spacious hold,
the doors and windows of the canneries
are nailed up, the boats housed and
with he last man on board the old /
Yangkee craft heads down the coast |
once more.
Her skipper probably never heard of |
Llewellyn j. Morse of Bangor or Bath, /
or the Penobscot river, but the craft is
considered a pretty good ship yet. The |
Chlknik Bay Packing company, who |
now own her, put down her value as
s25, 900.
But the Llewellyn J. Morse is not the
only Maine built craft that is lodging |
the coal barge fate UP towards the Be
ring sea. The bark Nicholas Thayer,
built at Thomaston in 1868 carries the
supplies of the Alaska Salmon Pack
ing and Fur company to Loring on
Naha bay and has as consort the bark
NeIectrlc, built at Boston in the same
year.
When the ship George Sheffield, 1876
tons, was built far up the Kennebec at
thirty years ago the Bow
1oin class prophet did not foretell that
the beautiful craft to which he alluded
by way of a very pretty and convenient
smile in connection with the class Of
20, would ever be freighting Chinese
aborers up the Pacific coast, but that
S what the Glacier Packing company,
who can salmon at Point Highfieldo,
island, use the one time pride
If the Kennebec for. And there are
;till others. The ship Invincible built
1t Bath in 1878, runs to Pyramid Har-
)or, Philkoot inlet; the bark Prussia,
Bath, built in 1868, goes to Kadiak is
and for the Arctic Packing comptny,
llso the ship Santa Clara, built at Bath =,
n 1876, and the st. Nicholas, built at
he same port in '6S are in the same
business. OF others of the salmon fleet :
which years before sailed in the Allan
ic waters on the Maine coast is the
hip Meron, built at Phippsburg in 1870;
,ark Kate Davenport, Bath, 1866, re-
igged for ship; ship Sterling, Bath,
1913; ship Eclipse, Bath, 1878; ship Bo-
lema, Bath, 1875; ship B. p. Cheney
Bath, 1874; and the bark Coryphene,
'uilt at Millbridge in 1873.
Several large ships and barks built in
Massachusetts, help make up a consid-
rable fleet which head northward for