Page 40 - NS-2 Textbook

THE GROWTH OF AMERICAN SEA POWER 33

could be distilled into kerosene and used for lighting three days for the return trip. These packet ships gave
and heating. Later, lighting by natural gas dealt the final America world leadership in the building and operation
blow to whalers. The flexible whalebone used for hoop- of sailing ships. Not even the English could contest the
skirts, corset stays, buggy ·whips, and unlbrella ribs "vas American position. America held onto its transatlantic
replaced by other materials as dress styles and needs supremacy until the mid-lS00s, when steamships began
changed. During the Civil War, Confederate raiders at- replacing sails.
tacked and destroyed many Northern whaling fleets, As the numbers of well-to-do passengers declined
and the trade never revived. Weather and the Al"ctic ice and ships became bigger, the packets began carrying im-
claimed most of the sillviving American whaling fleet in migrants. Often fue living conditions were terrible. hnmi-
the 1870s. grants were packed in like sardines, without sanitilly fa-
cilities and with poor food. Sometimes up to 10 percent of
the immigrants clied in the "tween deck spaces," as they
THE MERCHANT MARINE
were called. Nevertheless, the packets brought hardy im-
The American colonists had designed and built ships migrants to the United States at a time when fuey were
since the earliest days of settlement. By the mid-lS00s, badly needed for the country's industrial development.
British investors were buying fishing vessels to hanrest This was probably the most lasting effect of the packets.
the huge schools of cod, haddock, and pollock along the The British had developed a profitable three-
New England coast and on the Grand Banks of New- cornered trade between Britain, North America, and the
foundland. Favorable tax rules encouraged the industry, British West Indies during the years immediately follow-
which soon became the largest in early New England. ing the War of IS12. British ships carried manufactured
TI,e cod was so important to Massachusetts that a huge products to America. There they loaded up with lumber,
wooden carving of the fish was made and hung in the salt fish, flour, and livestock and sailed to the Indies. Off-
state house in Boston in 1798. It is still there today. loading these trade goods, they reloaded with raw mate-
By the end of the eighteenth century, American mer- rials for British factories and sailed back to England.
chant ships had beglill the trade to Hawaii, China, and American ships were prohibited by British law to trade
the Orient. They explored the Pacific coast up to the Co- in the Indies, so this part of the British transatlantic trade
lumbia River and helped establish the later claim of the prospered, even with growing American competition in
United States to Oregon. other areas.
Soon after the War of 1812, American seaborne trade
began a rapid expansion. By the mid-lS20s American
THE SLAVE TRADE
ships were carrying most of the passengers and freight
that crossed the North Atlantic. By the late 1830s several Unfortunately, another much less praiseworthy and more
competing transatlantic passenger and freight compa- infamous trianglliar trade developed during the 1700s: the
nies were operating regularly scheduled service between slave trade. This persisted until the mid-nineteenth cen-
Europe and the United States. They used a type of sailing tmy, despite laws in both the United States and Britain to
ship developed in New England called topsail schooners, the contrary. Much of the wealth and prosperity of New
which combined speed, seaworthiness, and easy han- England in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centm·ies
dling with ample cargo space. TI,e ships engaged in this was founded on the slave trade. The rich businessmen
service became knuwn as packet ships. Also, a service con- and shipowners and their families never saw the loads of
necting New York, Charleston, New Orleans, and the human miselY for which they were responsible.
Mexican port of Veracruz had begun. Most of the freight In North America this triangular slave trade most
carried to Europe was raw TIlaterials, especially cottOll, often originated in the New England colonies, from
tobacco, indigo, and naval supplies from the South. From which the slave ships sailed, loaded with rum made in
Europe, the ships brought back English cutlery, hard- New England's distilleries from West Indies molasses.
ware, fine clothing, books, ,vines, hlX1UT goods, and The ships sailed to West Africa, where the rum was ex-
manufactured products. changed for slaves, and the slaves were taken to the West
TI,e packet ships were the most amazing vessels of Indies and sold. Then another cargo of sugar and mo-
their day. Captained by expert mariners and crewed by lasses would be carried back to New England. TI,e equa-
the toughest men ever to put to sea, these packets had lux- torial route across the Atlantic Ocean from Africa ,vas
ury features for rich passengers. Quarters were cramped called the Middle Passage. Many slaves died during this
but finely finished. Some even carried farm animals so voyage due to the terrible conditions on board the slave
that there were fresh meat, eggs, and milk at meals. Be- ships. Over 15 million black Africans were transported to
cause the prevailing winds between Anlerica and Europe slavery in the Americas over this route.
blow from west to east, it took about twenty-fom days to Following the War of 1812, the British made treaties
complete the nill to Emope and thirty-eight to forty- with most European nations that allowed Royal Navy