Frye Village Stories: John Smith's travel journal (part 1)
A Shawsheen Village 100 Story by Angela McBrien
Before Shawsheen Village Frye Village Stories: John Smith’s travel journal
Thanksgiving was very different this year. Many of us who normally travel home have been prevented from doing so.
While we missed not being together with family and friends, we probably did not miss the travel with all its issues: weather delays, missed connections, early departures and long waits, and finally, when you reach your destination the realization that your luggage hasn’t made it.
Today we're sharing the first part of the story of John Smith's (of Smith & Dove Manufacturing) trip home to Brechin, Scotland.
In the collection at the History Center is a diary written by John Smith in 1826 while he travelled from Andover to his home town of Brechin, Scotland. It contains great details about early 19th century travel.
John Smith left Andover on November 28th 1826, in light snow, travelling on the Haverhill stage to Boston, and from there to New London. In New London he boarded a steamboat, invented in 1807 by Robert Fulton, for New York, but bad weather delayed their departure until the following day.
ACHC #2018.043.3, John Smith's diary
Reaching New York later than planned John finds that he only has an hour to board his packet ship to Liverpool, including “moving his trunk nearly one mile”. Another steamboat takes him out to the packet “Britania” and he sets sail at 1 o’clock just 3 days after leaving Andover.
Packet ships were the first ships to depart from port on a regular schedule. Schedules were published in the papers such as this one for the packet ship “Silas Richards”, published in the Liverpool Mercury, which John would sail on for his return journey.
Packet ships were not designed for speed, like the clipper ships, but were an efficient way to cross the Atlantic. The first packet lines began sailing between New York City and Liverpool in 1818.
John remarked that they had very fine weather and good accommodations on board the “Britania”, that the cabin was “fitted up in a superior style”.He had a stateroom to himself and found it very pleasant.
He was not alone in his admiration of the packet ships. The Liverpool Mercury newspaper of 1826 reports on a packet ship currently at dock in the city and speaks of
“a most beautiful specimen of naval architecture -- her commodious and richly decorated apartments are replete with all that can contribute to the comfort, and, indeed, the pleasure of passengers; the farm yard upon deck, in which a cow and numerous domestic animals are kept, affords no trifling addition to the cook’s resources."
The ship arrived in Liverpool on December 23rd. On arrival they were boarded
“by one of His Majesty’s officers, and afterwards by two others of inferior rank, who rummaged our staterooms with a lantern in search of plunder, but met with nothing."
John Smith stayed in Liverpool for 3 nights but is not impressed with the city, he saw
“some shocking proofs of the depravity of human nature. Liverpool I take to be a very wicked place."
On the 26th December he departed Liverpool for Edinburgh on the Royal Mail Coach -- an expensive way to travel, but quicker than the other coaches. He had an outside seat, not good on the first night of the journey which was through thick fog, he expected that
“every moment we would either run afoul of some other carriage, or get out of the road entirely and upset.”
At Carlisle a change of coaches was required and at this point John realizes his luggage is missing, apparently claimed by a gentleman 44 miles back in Kendal. “What I was to do now I know not." His trunk contained not only his clothes but part of his money as well.
Luckily the inspector of mails was able to reunite John with his trunk and he continued his journey to Brechin, via Edinburgh, with “not so much speed as I have just been travelling” remarking that there were over 20 travelers in and on top of the coach.
ACHC #1946.024.1, Brechin, Scotland, the house second on the right was the birthplace of John and Peter Smith.
We'll cover the story of John Smith's time in Brechin and time spent in the cotton mills of Glasgow in another post, but let’s finish by looking at his return journey across the Atlantic - somewhat different than his arrival.
John found the Silas Richard to be a very fine ship. Her cabin was very handsome and convenient, and there were just 6 passengers on board. The first week of sailing went well, but then things take a downward turn with the whole voyage lasting 40 days.
“Three weeks of very bad weather, blowing hurricanes and squalls in succession."
Sails were split and the poultry washed off the deck. During this time there was sickness on board, the 2nd mate died and
“there was a scene, putting the body overboard, such as I never witnessed, and hope I never may again."
A particularly bad storm on the 24th February had
“hail stones as large as musket balls showering down on us, and the fine ship groaning under the load, our foretop mast stay gone and the sheet adrift, out foretop-sail split and flying in the wind, our masts bending as if one minute more would level them with the water. We were obliged to kill the cow and heave her overboard she was so much injured by the storm."
The journey was so rough that after his first night back in dry land John
“woke up holding the bedstead, thinking myself in the cabin of the Silas Richard, riding on a troubled sea."
Further steamboat and stage rides returned John Smith to Andover, arriving 9th March 1827, three months and eleven days after he left. And while the experience on the return journey left him thinking “I shall never desire to cross the Atlantic in the winter season again” he did return to Scotland a further 3 times before his death in 1886.
Many thanks to Andover Center for History & Culture Collections Manager Angela McBrien for researching and writing this series of posts on John Smith's travel diary.
Stay tuned for our next installment of John Smith's travels.