Looking Beyond Nantucket for the Early American Whaling Industry
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| A view of Hudson, New York illustrates the importance of river access to the prosperity of the city. Credit: Public Domain. |
Despite the global reach of eighteenth- and nineteenth-century American whalers, they operated from a small number of ports. As historian Lisa Norling writes, “nearly all of them hailed from southeastern New England.”[1] The dominance of the American whaling industry by a handful of large New England whaling ports is treated as a given by many historians, but exploring the local histories of communities in New York suggests that smaller whaling outposts outside the New England region also contributed to the early commercial development of the United States. These smaller outposts have for the most part been neglected by maritime historians, but as with the case of Hudson, New York, a closer look reveals many of the same characteristics shared with the major whaling centers in places like Massachusetts.
The Dutch settled Claverack Landing in present-day Hudson in 1662. [2] Due to its strategic geographic location, high-quality farmland, and access to the Hudson River, Claverack Landing attracted many Dutch settlers. As historian Margaret B. Schram writes, “sloops—originating in the Netherlands as canal boats—became the carrying vessel of choice for Hudson River skippers.”[3] By the end of the eighteenth century, more than 100 sloops plied their trades along the Hudson River.
As Claverack Landing flourished, Nantucketers found themselves embroiled in the war for American independence. A British tariff on all incoming oil devastated the economy of the small island. After the Revolutionary War, Nantucket leaders argued for establishing their own community, independent of the United States. However, the Massachusetts Legislature denied such an action. As a result, some Nantucketers became disgruntled and infighting overtook the community—a pattern consistent with doctrinaire Quakerism, which led to the saying “five Quakers, six opinions.”[4] Infighting intensified as the population of the small island grew; bloodlines became too close and suitable partners for marriage decreased. As a result of these pressures, prominent young Nantucketers, well versed in whaling, decided to leave.[5]
Nantucketers had known about Claverack Landing for decades and routinely used the Hudson River to traffic in oil, rum, and other commodities. When the Revolutionary War came to an end in 1784, a Nantucket schooner sailed up the river carrying fish, whale oil, rum, and most importantly a crew of Nantucketers looking for a new home.[6] These businessmen were attracted to the “great forests of hard woods suitable for shipbuilding—something that Nantucket lacked.”[7] As word of the opportunities available at Claverack Landing reached Nantucket, disgruntled Quakers seized their chance to leave and start afresh in New York.
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| Credit: Amazon.com |
After arriving in Claverack Landing “these Nantucket Navigators” invested between $100,000 to $500,000 into the whaling and commercial businesses on Claverack Landing. In November 1784, they bought a piece of land from Dutch farmers and carved out their own settlement called Hudson. Fourteen of the original twenty-nine founding fathers of Hudson came from Nantucket, the rest from New England. The town of Hudson quickly developed into a medium-sized city. By 1785, Hudson boasted twenty-five whaling vessels owned by the city. As Schram writes, “Just two years after its founding, Hudson ranked second in shipping in the state, with New York City being first.”[8]
Hudson profited from the dual businesses of whaling and commercial shipping. In September 1785, ships like the Dolphin, Prudence, Liberty, and Juno all embarked on whaling missions supervised by native Nantucketers who knew the whaling routes in the Canary Islands, Trinidad, and Brazil. They even ventured as far afield as the Galapagos Islands, where they hunted tortoises for fresh meat.[9] As a result, Hudson became a competitor to the whaling island of Nantucket.
Similar to the Nantucket whaling industry, Hudson whalers operated as floating factories with the sole purpose of killing as many whales as possible. Hudson whalers were not all Quakers, but they were all incentivized by either sustaining their families or the prospect of starting a family and buying a small farm. However, unlike Nantucket, the Hudson whaling industry’s prosperity only lasted a short time. Resentment toward the city’s comparatively high taxes, which subsidized the whaling industry and provided for the maintenance of city roads, lights, and the construction of municipal buildings, fostered resentment from farmers who in 1830 established the town of Greenport. As a result, the whaling industry lost revenue, forcing many whalers to leave.
The price of whale oil skyrocketed in the late 1830s and the whaling industry made a brief comeback in Hudson. Businessmen began to buy whaling stock at record high prices and eleven new whaling ships were constructed. Hudson looked as if it would once again host a successful whaling industry. However, in the mid-1840s, Hudson’s whaling industry died for good. A popular myth attributes the discovery of petroleum as the main culprit for the demise of the whaling industry in Hudson, yet petroleum wasn’t drilled until 1859, in Titusville, Pennsylvania.[10] In fact, as many as 731 American whaling vessels were on separate voyages in 1846, scouring the oceans for whale oil. Whaling industries in Nantucket and New Bedford, Massachusetts were enjoying record highs, yet the Hudson whaling industry ended abruptly in 1847—just five years before Britain finally removed its Revolutionary-era tariff on whale oil, making the industry even more profitable. The real reason that Hudson’s industry failed was not the result of discovering petroleum, but Hudson’s native Nantucket merchants failed to invest in the steamboat enterprise and instead tried to revive the whaling glory days of the 1700s.[11]
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| The official seal of Hudson, New York, featured here on a silver half dollar commemorating the city's sesquicentennial. Credit: The Red Book, whitman.com. |
Although big whaling ports like Nantucket and New Bedford lasted longer and were much more successful than Hudson, historians should not forget the little guy. Nantucket whalers did not confine themselves to New England and branched off in search of new homes where they sought to replicate their way of life. The whaling industry effectively built the city of Hudson and created a robust whaling business, even if for only a short amount of time. Brief though it was, the Hudson whaling industry deserves a place in the wider history of American whaling. When we think of Nantucket whalers, we must also account for their activities and impacts outside of New England for a fuller picture of whaling’s place in the economy of the early republic.
About the author: Matthew Hitchen is a first-year M.A. student studying early United States history with Dr. Lawrence B.A Hatter. His research interests include education, republicanism, and intellectual history in the formation of the early republic. His thesis is tentatively titled, “A Republican Education: The Politics and Ideology of rural Education in New York and Massachusetts, 1770-1812.”
[1]Lisa Norling, "Ahab's Wife: Women and the American Whaling Industry, 1820-1870," Iron Men, Wooden Women: Gender and Seafaring in the Atlantic World 1700-1920, Margaret S. Creighton and Lisa Norling eds. (Baltimore and London: The John Hopkins University Press, 1996), 72.
[2]The Claverack Landing place-name remained until Nantucket businessmen purchased and renamed the site Hudson.
[3]Margaret B. Schram, Hudson’s Merchants and Whalers: The Rise and Fall of a River Port, 1783-1850, (Hensonville, NY: Black Dome Press, 2004), 13.
[4]Ibid., 17.
[5]Ibid., 16.
[6]Ibid., 18.
[7]Ibid.
[8]Ibid., 30.
[9]Ibid., 39.
[10]Ibid., 145.
[11]Ibid.
[12]Ibid., 147.
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