Mary Hayden Russell
1784–1855
March 18th (1823): The weather being unpleasant had confined me to the cabin all day, but the evening proving fine I had a chair placed on deck to see the sun set. My whole mind was engaged in contemplating the magnificence of the sun, when I heard a scream from my dear little Charles …
Mary Hayden Russell went to sea in the days when few women left home and women on board ships were considered bad luck. Even women raised in seafaring families on Mary’s home island of Nantucket did not normally become sailors. It is hard to guess what gave her the gumption to set out across the ocean, where she encountered ferocious storms, pirates, astonishing islanders, and over forty whales.
Mary’s husband was Captain Laban Russell. Her second voyage with him was on the whaling ship Emily. Her older son, William, was a boat-steerer on the same vessel. In January 1823, two months before this journal entry, Mary had embarked with her five-year-old son, Charles, the first child to be taken along on such a voyage. What compelled her to exchange a comfortable home for many months in tight quarters with a crew of coarse-talking men? They must have been superstitious about having her with them, and she likely disrupted the rough-and-tumble ways of ship life. In the above entry, Mary used the revealing phrase, “I had a chair placed on deck …” reminding us that she did not move the chair herself, being a lady, even under difficult circumstances. And why did she choose to bring a small boy on board a ship that faced daily peril in pursuit of the world’s largest mammal?
On that March day when Mary heard her son scream, it turned out that “dear little Charles” had fallen and “snapt” his wrist. “Such an accident on the land would have been distressing,” she wrote. “But what were my feelings when I saw the child writhing in agony and no surgeon on board?” Luckily for Charles, his father remained calm, taking him “immediately below and with a man to steady the arm set it and splintered it up.”
What we know of Mary’s life is only what can be pieced together from this one sample of writing, an extended, journal-like letter that she composed for her married daughter, Mary Ann, aware that her travels would keep her far from a post office. Her account is now part of the collection at the Nantucket Historical Society. Officially recorded dates—of her birth, her marriage, and the births of her children—along with the letter and some guesswork, give us a blurred picture of this unusual woman.
In writing, she never once referred to her husband, Captain Russell, by name, but instead called him either “Captain” or “your dear father.”
The first entry was made early in February 1823. The ship was sailing past the Canary Islands shortly after a harrowing gale during which two men were lost overboard. Also torn from their fastenings were the small boats that were essential to the chase and capture of whales.
After pronouncing merely “Alas!” over the drowned men, Mrs. Russell reported with relief that damages to the ship’s hull were reparable, and then went on: “The remainder of this eventful night was spent by me in adoring the sparing mercy and goodness of God, who amidst our severe chastenings still had compassion and spared us, tho utterly unworthy, for a little longer. The sea continued to rage with indescribable violence …”
Not surprisingly, it is the weather that Mary mentioned most frequently, since shipboard life was entirely dictated by the force and direction of the wind, and the roughness of the sea.
Why were men, let alone women, eager to risk their lives on raging waters in order to hunt whales?
In 1823, when Mary was scribbling her letter, neither electricity nor gas was yet used in homes to provide light or heat for cooking. These essential resources, now taken for granted, were then supplied by whale oil, gathered through the perseverance of a few brave men. From the vantage point of the twenty-first century, the slaughter of many thousands of whales may seem horribly barbaric, but at the time it was a vital contribution to the everyday life of millions of people.
Oil was the main object of the whale hunt; it was used for household lamps, for cooking, and for soap, as well as providing a lubricant for sewing machines and other industry. City streetlights and the enormous lamps in lighthouses were also fueled with oil. Other parts of the whale had functions, too. Whalebone was used to make umbrellas, canes, and corsets—then a fundamental item in every woman’s wardrobe. Whale meat was eaten by humans in some areas of the world and by animals elsewhere. A thick substance called ambergris, from the digestive system of the sperm whale, was the most valuable product of all—the crucial ingredient in fine perfume.
As European and American sailors traveled farther from home in search of rich hunting grounds, they encountered ports and islands that they had never dreamed of. They became explorers and ambassadors as well as whalers. Some thought of themselves as conquerors, too, assuming the right to impose the values of home on distant cultures. Or, in some cases, to abandon those values and behave in ways they would not normally have considered. There were stories of sailors getting very drunk, or finding sweethearts halfway around the world from their wives. There were even tales of island women trading themselves for some of the white man’s stock of wonderful items made of iron, like cooking pots and knives.
Was it rumors of that kind of behavior that prompted Mary to join Captain Russell on this journey?
In March, after many days of sailing in “a heavy sea,” the Emily arrived at the South African port of Simon’s Bay, to make repairs and to replace its lost boats. Mary described the town as looking like “something built for the amusement of children.… There is very little to interest or amuse the mind here …”
Whenever the Emily reached port, Mary sought out any European (white-skinned, English-speaking) female she might find, usually the wife of the local colonial governor. The hostess might not have realized that Mary was paying close and critical attention to everything—her home (often an elegant estate), her clothing, gardens, servants, and her manners.
By the middle of May, “we are once more embark’d on our voyage.… The winds continue to blow strong, the sea runs high. This I am assured is the worst part …” With true New England backbone, Mary went on, “I must therefore endeavor to bear it with patience, however unpleasant it is for the present.” But with some pride she claimed, “I shall certainly become a good sailor at last.”
Early in June, the Emily arrived at the remote Isle of St. Paul’s, about halfway between South Africa and Australia. Shortly after sending off two boats full of sailors to catch fish, the main ship was approached by a small sloop. “It was evident from the number of men that they were Pirates. They passed close under the stern. The Capt’n called to them to keep off or he would fire into them.” The pirates passed again, so close that Mary could clearly see their faces, “which bore the stamp of villains.” But the sight of the Emily’s muskets scared them off. Without even beginning a new paragraph, Mary continued, “The two boats returned loaded with some of the finest fish I ever saw. They resemble the American Shad, but fatter.”
Six months after starting the journey, Mary could finally report: “June 12: The long wished for, long expected cry of ‘There she blows’ was heard this morning. It set every one in motion. What a bustle! The first idea it produc’d was the ship is sinking, unacquainted as I was with such scenes.” Men stood on watch day and night throughout a sea voyage. The cry “There she blows!” was a welcome signal that a whale had been sighted; the water spraying up through its blowhole was usually visible first.
Instantly, everyone on board became part of a high-speed and efficient machine. When the call was heard, the crew immediately loaded the small whaleboats with sharpened harpoons and tubs of harpoon line. Once the ship was within a mile of the quarry, the small boats were launched, each carrying a mate, a boat-steerer, and four oarsmen, who would then row as hard and fast as they could. The mate egged them on with cheers and threats, always in a low voice so as not to alert the whale. Hearty competition flourished among the men, each boat tearing across the waves to be in place to throw the first harpoon.
It must have been a terrifying prospect, to face a beast whose tail alone was wider across than the boat the men were steering into position. The harpoon, connected to hundreds of feet of line, was hurled into the side of the whale, not to kill just yet, but simply to attach the boat to its prey. Now, the whale would be injured and angry. It might swim frantically for an hour or more, dragging the tiny whaleboat along behind, as it dove—called sounding—deep below the waves, or thrashed about in panic.
Finally, if the men were lucky, the whale would tire enough that they could row close again, this time throwing harpoons for the kill. The dead whale was towed back to the waiting ship, where the tired men still had many hours of hard work ahead of them—slicing the blubber from their prize, cooking it over fires on the ship’s deck to reduce it to oil, and storing it safely in dozens of barrels in the hold. The whole ship would be slippery with oil and awash in blood, but the crew would have captured another few gallons of what, to them, was as precious as gold.
Mary gave no details about the quest on that day, only that there was no whale captured, nor would there be for many more weeks. A whaling voyage might last as long as three years, with only a few dozen days actually spent chasing and harpooning whales.
Mary wrote next about Tower Island, “so called for its peculiar shape.” The shore “was strew’d with red and white coral,” but “The long grass prevented my going far from the beach.” She was probably wearing the long skirts and heeled boots that were currently fashionable at home—not the best clothes for exploring deserted islands. “The weather threatening rain we left this pleasant spot with regret. I believe I was the first European female that ever set foot on it.”
After pausing at several ports, the Emily arrived at Copang Harbor, and was surrounded by several canoes full of local people wanting to trade. “Their appearance is grotesque and singular in the extreme, to one who has not been us’d to see nature in its roughest form.”
That was Mary’s way of informing her daughter that these men were nearly naked.
“Their dress is very simple, consisting of a strip of cloth tied round their middle.” Their faces were “very open and pleasant,” but “they are notorious for pilfering whatever comes in their way that is made of iron. The natives of Timor are of middling stature, of a dark copper colour, their hair straight and black … they have no beards and owing to this peculiarity and the smallness of their feet and hands I thought the greater part of them were women.” The Emily traded knives for “fowls, sweet potatoes, bananas, cocoa-nuts, etc. etc.”
Mary jumped at the chance to go ashore and then discovered that she was a celebrity: “Crowds of people had assembled on the beach to witness the uncommon spectacle, the sight of an English woman. As it is a place where the whale ships touch for refreshments, a white man was no novelty, but a female created a wonderful commotion.” The road was lined with onlookers, as if waiting for a parade.
Following custom, the Russells were invited to visit at the home of the governor and his wife. Mary recorded the details with particular eagerness. She was surprised to find an instant friend in Madam Hazart, despite her mixed heritage: “Her father [is] a French physician, her mother a Creole of the country. She is consequently nearly white. She was carefully educated by her father, who had good sense and generosity enough to think that women have souls (quite contrary to the prevailing idea in this part of the world) …”
Mary must have been delighted to have been served food other than the shipboard standard of salted pork, and to have spent time in women’s company after so many weeks alone with whalers.
“Towards evening visitors began to collect and we soon had the drawing room filled with all the rank and fashion that Copang could boast. Some of the ladies were very handsome and, having their faces well Chenan’d (rubbed over with slaked lime), might well pass in the evening for white women.” Mary was forced by circumstance to socialize with women of color, and surprised herself by liking them!
Entertainment in the garden was “a band of music formed entirely of the governor’s own slaves” playing tambourines, drums, and violins. “It was surprising to see how well they understood time. There was not a discordant sound throughout the band, composed mostly of children from seven to twelve years old.”
Mary continued to visit the governor’s wife nearly daily while the Emily was in port, and recorded a new tidbit of knowledge that must have been useful in the long months at sea with no supply of fresh milk: “They have a method here of preserving milk by boiling it down with a proposition of lump sugar. It is then made into small cakes and exposed in the sun when it hardens and will keep a long time in this state. A small piece in a cup of tea serves both purpose of sugar and cream.”
When Mary expressed curiosity about some children among the servants, Madame Hazart explained that they’d been sent to her in payment of a debt, but really she had more employees than she needed already.
Her principles and feelings would not allow her to sell human beings, but she had frequently given them to such of her friends as she was assured would use them well.… Madam Hazart said if I would accept one of them I might have my choice. They were three fine looking child girls, apparently about nine years old. I accordingly selected one that from her intelligent countenance I thought would answer. When we ask’d her by signs if she would go in the ship with me, appear’d highly delighted.
What Mary felt about receiving a human being as a gift, and how the arrangement worked out, we’ll never know; she never mentions the child again in her diary.
When Mary said her farewell on July 31, Madame Hazart gave her a diamond ring as a parting memento, “saying, ‘My dear Mrs. Russell, this ring I had made for you. It is set with my own hair. When you look at this think sometimes of your friends at Timor who will never forget you.’ ”
As Mary’s voyage continued, the ports of call became more and more exotic, both in their names and in their offerings: “For the first time I saw the China orange in perfection, they are small but have a flavor that I think preferable to the large kind.” She must have been tasting what we know as clementines, which would not have been exported as far away as Nantucket in those days.
The Emily was now sailing in the Far East, and “have pass’d Pulla Dama, Banda, Amboyna (where your dear Father in a former voyage had the misfortune to bury his Mate, Hezekiah Coffin, and where he only escap’d the jaws of death himself), Manippa, Ceram …” and later in August, “We are now steering for the Geba Passage, saw the Islands of Boo and Joey. Saw Raib Island … saw Pidgeon Island which is inhabited …”
Mary wrote of the Pacific Ocean, “The weather here is extremely variable and squally, but it is consider’d good ground for whaling.”
On August 30, they “saw whales and after a toilsome chase succeeded in taking two.” On September 3, “This morning early saw whales, when four boats are lower’d in pursuit.… The whales were so near that I could distinctly view the whole scene with a glass [meaning a telescope]. My terror was extreme …”
Why did Mary never describe what happened to the whales after capture? We do not hear of them getting hauled on deck or being cut up or processed into oil. There is no mention of blood or blubber or stench. Did her husband insist that she remain safely in her cabin during these scenes, to avoid the gruesome sight? Or did she not think an eyewitness report would be suitable reading for her daughter?
The Emily arrived at the St. David’s Islands on September 17, 1823. On a previous voyage, Captain Russell had hired two natives of St. David’s to help his crew during the whaling season. One, named Lorei, was the second son of the king, “but it seems his two wives, fearful that he would take another voyage, had prevented him by force from coming on board” to greet his old shipmates.
The Russells did meet with Lorei and his family when they disembarked to pay their respects to royalty:
Your dear Father dressed the king in a white shirt and a new straw hat and presented him with knives, fish hooks, iron hoops, etc. The dress of these natives is a strip of cloth made from the rind of the cocoa-nut, but they have a frightful way of frizzing their hair which serves to protect them from the sun as well as a hat. As we were two hands short, the Capt’n agreed to take the king’s third son, a fine looking lad, apparently about twenty, and another of the same age by the name of Bookalap Boohoo.… These people have not a warlike weapon among them, not so much as a bow and arrow. When Lorei was ask’d if they ever fought at St. Davids ‘Oh, yes, plenty fight,’ he said. ‘But how do you fight, Lorei?’ ‘Oh plenty pull hair.’ This was all the idea they had of war.
Nor were they as God-fearing as Mary might have wished: “They do not appear to have any religious ceremonies among them, except dancing in a ring at the full of the Moon.” But they did know about taxes: “The king claims the head of every fish that is taken, as his undisputed property.”
Later in September, the Emily encountered another ship, off the coast of New Guinea. Captain Barker of the Nearchus came aboard to share news. Without realizing that Mary and her husband were Americans, he had some strong words to say: “ ‘Had you been a Yankee, Capt’n Russell, you would not have seen me on board here, for I detest and despise those Yankees!’ ” Mary was quite smug. “Little did he think at the moment that he was conversing with two of those detestable beings. I think when he finds it out (which he certainly will, as he has a man on board that had known your father many years) it will cause him to discard such useless prejudices for the future.”
Mary was defensive when she herself became the object of “useless prejudice,” but she always failed to notice her own condescending assumptions. She visited a local mosque, and was “impressed with the architecture,” but faintly offended that she, as a Christian, was not welcome beyond the row of pillars and “sentries who marched to guard their sanctuary from the footstep of any other persuasion. As far as I could see of the interior, its construction was simple and extremely neat. When we turn’d to leave it, I gave a sigh for the delusion of so many thousands of my fellow beings who thus live and thus will die, ignorant of the glorious light of truth …”
Several days later, the Emily was still within sight of Papua–New Guinea, “so near that cultivated spots were very perceptible and with a good glass we could plainly perceive large villages … with their adjoining plantations, which show’d that the Pappua’s possess’d the knowledge of agriculture however ignorant they might be in other respects …”
They encountered a proa (boat), full of natives, who threatened Mary’s husband with a spear. Captain Russell quickly aimed his musket, causing the spear-holder to drop his weapon and make a salaam, or deep bow, of apology. The chief then came aboard wearing “a gay chintz dressing gown with a cotton handkerchief folded narrow and knotted in front, leaving the crown of his head uncovered with the hair standing up eight or ten inches. Add to this gay appearance a savage countenance, much scar’d, and you will form some idea of our guest.… He gazed at me and your little brother Charles with marks of astonishment. Beckoning Charles who went to him, he pass’d his hand several times over his face and then examined his light glossy hair to ascertain if it really was flesh and substance.”
The next day, the Emily was approached by a fleet of large proas, rowed by men wishing to trade their exotic fruits. “After exchanging these articles for tin pots, handkerchiefs, iron hoops, etc. they took up a kind of scuttle and display’d about a dozen children of both sexes, apparently from six to twelve years, which they held up for sale. These wretched objects look’d as if nearly starv’d, and were offer’d for two fathoms of cotton cloth, which was bought in England for six-pence a yard.” Mary regretted that she could not rescue “these little objects from their wretched condition, but … saw the children laid down again in the bottom of the boat and cover’d over with a sensation that I shall never forget as long as I live.” In the very next sentence, she shifted her priority: “Inquiry was made for different kinds of vegetables which we heard they had at the time, but this was not the right season …”
It was the season for turtle, however. Over the next couple of weeks they were found “in abundance” along with land crabs, “which after feeding them with corn a few days, I am told are equal in flavor with a lobster.”
According to Mary’s account, nothing too notable happened after that:
… until the 27th of November, when whales being seen, all the boats were instantly man’d and went in pursuit. It was five o’clock when the boats left the ship, the weather squally and threatening. With an anxious heart I watch’d all their motions with the glass, tho so distant were they that to the naked eye they could only be discover’d in the horizon as they rose with the swell which ran high. Directly one of the boats which prov’d to be your brother’s was rapidly approaching the ship, the whale to which he was fastened running with all the strength expiring nature lent her. As they approach’d near the ship, exhausted by loss of blood, the unwieldy object slackened her pace and in a few minutes died close by the ship. By this time it was past sunset …
Not until after nine o’clock did the other boats come limping home.
… and how happy to see your dear Father arrive once more, owing to the roughness of the sea and anxiety of mind at being out so late. He had not a dry thread in his clothes and this, thought I, is the way that these “sons of Ocean” earn their money that is so thoughtlessly spent at home. Could some of the ladies whose husbands are occupied in this dangerous business have been here this few hours past, I think it would be a lesson they would not forget.
Mary imagined that anyone knowing the effort it took to keep lamps burning would be more thrifty with the oil.
Interspersed with her descriptions of islands and of whaling, Mary continued to record frequent incidents of shipboard drama:
“December 13th: [While] little Charles was amusing himself with his playthings on deck, the man at the helm seized him by the arm which had been lately broken and threw him several feet … with such force as nearly dislocated his shoulder. I heard him scream and ran to him …” The man “ran to the gangway and jumped overboard. A boat was immediately lowered and went in pursuit of him. They soon return’d with the Gentleman, who was sentenced to receive three dozen stripes for his pains. I could not plead much in his favor, for he was a most audacious character, having by his own account escap’d from a neighboring country jail in Female apparel, previous to joining the ship at Gravesend …”
The whaling began in earnest, and many whales were taken during the following weeks, including upon Christmas Day. A month later, Mary wrote a report off the Traitor Islands. The small boats had “put off in high glee in the pursuit” of several large whales seen at a distance. But after sunset, the boats were no longer visible from the deck of the Emily.
As they always carry a lantern in the boats, we hop’d as soon as it was dark to discover their lights, but in vain.… My terror was such that it seem’d to me I should lose my senses, but seeing the ship keeper too much frighten’d to do anything I order’d a large fire to be lit on the Cabboose and to fire guns as a direction for the boats. This I had heard spoken of as proper to be done in such cases. To my inexpressible joy about nine o’clock word was brought me that they could at intervals discover the lights heave up with the swell. They continued their torching with fresh courage and in two hours more they came alongside, bringing two whales which they had tow’d six or seven miles …
Mary’s quick thinking had saved boatloads of tired men, as well as their prize prey.
The remainder of the letter, through January, February, and March 1824, consisted of a tally of the whale hunt, sometimes with as many as five killed in one day! There are brief entries, such as “William cut his hand” or “Tremendous weather” or, on March 5, “No land in sight, tho we are passing over the ground where the Carolines Isles are laid down in the charts. This creates anxiety.” That whole week must have been wretched on board the creaking Emily, with comments like “squally tremendous sea,” and “split the sail all to pieces.”
At last, in the final entry on March 11, Mary wrote, “Looking out for Guam, towards night saw the Isle, sounded in and came to anchor off Port Aprur. 45 whales recorded to date.”
There ends Mary’s account. Did she mail the letter to her daughter, Mary Ann, or deliver it by hand when she next saw her?
Captain Laban Russell died in 1842 when he was sixty-two years old. Mary lived thirteen years as a widow in Rye, New York. Later on, “dear little Charles,” now all grown up, disputed his mother’s interpretation of his father’s will and took her to court.
Mary died when she was seventy-one years old, with several grandchildren. Did she ever gather them around the fire and tell stories of her life upon the waves? Or were her moments of adventure recalled only on paper?
Mary Hayden Russell’s adventure may have caused her peers to think her slightly scandalous.
Harriet Jacobs’s behavior, however, was beyond scandalous; it was illegal.