Memorials of the Sea: My Father: Being Records of the Adventurous Life of the Late William Scoresby, Esq. of WhitbyScoresby, William
History
Memorials of the Sea: My Father: Being Records of the Adventurous Life of the Late William Scoresby, Esq. of Whitby
Scoresby, William
Fathers and sons -- England -- Whitby; Scoresby, William, 1760-1829; Whaling
Future results clearly indicated the source, under a favouring Providence,
of my Father’s prosperity. These first fruits of adventure were justified
by the subsequent harvest, as the legitimate proceeds of superior
management. Merely accidental circumstances may yield, for an occasion or
two, or for several occasions, felicitous results; but where adventures
involving mind and talent for their conduct, prove, through a long series
of repetitions, under all the diversities of times and seasons, unusually
successful, they give evidence of a master-mind directing the operations.
During the subsequent five years of my Father’s enterprises in the same
ship—from 1793 to 1797 inclusive,—the Henrietta’s cargo stood generally,
I believe, at the head of the list of successful voyages amongst the whole
fleet of Greenland whalers. The least successful voyage was liberally
remunerating to the owner—the most successful, unprecedentedly so. The
total captures in whales, during the six successful years, including that
of 1792, was no less than eighty; and the produce in oil, (considered as
wonderful for that day,) 729 tuns.
Before the introduction of this species of energetic enterprise, the
adventurers, as a class, were content with small things. We have the
commendatory record concerning Captain Banks, of the Jenny, of Whitby, who
was esteemed a talented and successful fisherman, that he brought home
sixty-five whales in ten years, or six and a half per year; whereas the
average captures by my Father, during the period referred to, was thirteen
and one-third whales, or more than double the number of this successful
predecessor.
The catch in his fifth year of command reached the then extraordinary
amount of twenty-five whales; and in his last year, the proceeds in oil
were greater, being 152 tuns, than had before entered the port of Whitby
in any one ship.
Whilst giving the first detailed and authentic records of a Father’s life
and enterprises, it may be permitted, I trust, in the son, to dwell still
further on these comparisons, whereby the enterprises referred to may
obtain their just estimation in their bearing on the commercial prosperity
of the nation.
The comparison of my Father’s successes with those accustomed to be
realized by the northern whale-fishers in general, will afford to him, as
may have been anticipated, a highly commendatory result.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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