30 July 1661: John Ray encounters the effigy of a tragic Inuit in his canoe at Hull Trinity House
John Ray and William Derham. 1760. Select Remains of the Learned John Ray, With His Life. London: George Scott. Get it:
.Unedited excerpt
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[There are] two rooms above stairs, one very fair, where the brethren of the society meet, in which hang many tables of orders for the society’s government; another large chamber where they make sails: In the middle whereof hangeth the effigies of a native of Greenland, with a coat of skins upon him, sitting in a very small boat or canoe, covered with skins. He hath, in his right hand, a pair of wooden oars, wherewith he rows his boat; in his left a dart, with which he strikes fish. On his forehead a thing like a trencher, which serves as a bongrace [OED: A projecting brim or shade attached to the front of a bonnet or headdress, protecting the wearer’s face from the sun], to fence his eyes from the sun, and it may be too, from the dashing of the water. Behind him lies a bladder or skin-bag, in which we suppose he bestowed the fish be caught. (Some told us it was a bladder full of oil, with which he used to allure the fish to him). The boat iş covered over with the same it is made of, excepting one hole wherein he sits, just fitted to his body; so, that when he sits in it, his legs, and lower part, are under cover or deck; the boat is thus contrived, that when it shall be plunged by a wave, it may rise again, no water getting into it, This was the same individual canoe that was taken, with all its furniture or remex, anno 1613, in the sea, by Andrew Barker of Hull. The Greenlander taken, refused to eat, and died with hunger and sullenness, in the space of three days.
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In 1613 Andrew Barker, an Elder Brother of Hull’s Trinity House & the captain of the Heartsease, took aboard an Inuit in a kayak off Greenland. The Inuit died 3 days later, but the 12-ft skin-covered kayak & its contents were brought home to Hull & are displayed in Trinity House. pic.twitter.com/7HsFqlTpj5— Former Lord Mayor of Kingston Upon Hull (@LordHull) July 16, 2020
Capt. Henry Watson, of the ship True-love, having brought a native of Davis’s Straits to Hull, he has exhibited his canoe, in the Old Dock, where he displayed his wonderful art in the management of that boat, so peculiar to his country, and his dexterity with the harpoon and lance (Phillips 1816).
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- Canoe (2) W/G ·
- Davis Strait (3) W/G ·
- Greenland (6) W/G ·
- Greenlandic Inuit (1) W/G ·
- Hull Trinity House (4) W/G ·
- International trade (17) W/G ·
- 📌Kingston upon Hull (74) W/G ·
- 📌Port of Hull (19) W/G ·
- Ray, John (1627-1705) (6), one of the earliest of the English parson-naturalists W/G ·
- Whaling in the United Kingdom (11) W/G ·
- Whaling (10) W/G ·
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Here’s an image:
In 1613 Andrew Barker, an Elder Brother of Hull’s Trinity House & the captain of the Heartsease, took aboard an Inuit in a kayak off Greenland. The Inuit died 3 days later, but the 12-ft skin-covered kayak & its contents were brought home to Hull & are displayed in Trinity House. pic.twitter.com/7HsFqlTpj5— Former Lord Mayor of Kingston Upon Hull (@LordHull) July 16, 2020
Capt. Henry Watson, of the ship True-love, having brought a native of Davis’s Straits to Hull, he has exhibited his canoe, in the Old Dock, where he displayed his wonderful art in the management of that boat, so peculiar to his country, and his dexterity with the harpoon and lance (Phillips 1816).
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Similar
3 July 1837: The Swan, a Hull whaler, returns from the dead (the ice of the Davis Strait) bearing three whales
19 February 1866: The Diana, Hull’s first steam-assisted whaler and its last of any nature, leaves on its fateful voyage to the Arctic
30 June 1866: The crew of the Diana of Hull kill and process two right whales – a small fortune – in Melville Bay, off northwestern Greenland
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Smeaton’s scheme did not prosper. John Timperley:
Various schemes had been suggested for cleansing the dock of the mud brought in by the tide; one was by making reservoirs in the fortifications or old town ditches, with the requisite sluices, by means of which the mud was to be scoured out at low water; another by cutting a canal to the Humber, from the west end of the dock, where sluices had been provided, and put down for the purpose, when it was proposed to divert the ebb tide from the river Hull along the dock, and through the sluices and canal into the Humber, and so produce a current sufficient, with a little manual assistance, to carry away the mud. Both of these schemes were however abandoned, and the plan of a horse dredging machine adopted; this work began about four years after the Old dock was completed, and continued until after the opening of the Junction dock. The machine was contained in a square and flat bottomed vessel 61 feet 6 inches long, 22 feet 6 inches wide, and drawing 4 feet water: it at first had only eleven buckets, calculated to work in 14 feet water, in which state it remained till 1814, when two buckets were added so as to work in 17 feet water, and in 1827 a further addition of four buckets was made, giving seventeen altogether, which enabled it to work in the highest spring tides. The machine was attended by three men, and worked by two horses, which did it at first with ease, but since the addition of the last four buckets, the work has been exceedingly hard.
There were generally six mud boats employed in this dock before the Humber dock was made; since which there have been only four, containing, when fully laden, about 180 tons, and usually filled in about six or seven hours; they are then taken down the old harbour and discharged in the Humber at about a hundred fathoms beyond low water mark, after which they are brought back into the dock, sometimes in three or four hours, but generally more. The mud engine has been usually employed seven or eight months in the year, commencing work in April or May.
The quantity of mud raised prior to the opening of the Junction dock, varied from 12,000 to 29,000 tons, and averaged 19,000 tons per annum; except for a few years before the rebuilding of the Old lock, when, from the bad and leaky state of the gates, a greater supply of water was required for the dock, and the average yearly quantity was about 25,000 tons. As the Junction dock, and in part also the Humber dock, are now supplied from this source, a greater quantity of water flows through the Old dock, and the mud removed has of late been about 23,000 tons a year.
It may be observed, that the greatest quantity of mud is brought into the dock during spring tides, and particularly in dry seasons, when there is not much fresh water in the Hull; in neap tides, and during freshes in the river, very little mud comes in (Timperley 1842).
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