Hartson Hallett Bodfish (1862-1945)
Hartson Bodfish grew up in West Tisbury on Matha's Vineyard. He first sailed with Captain Manter in 1880 on the Belvedere, the second steam whaler built in America. He signed up for a term not to exceed two years in the Arctic Ocean, by way of Cape Horn and some sperm whaling in Honolulu. Captain Manter was the ship's captain until Hawaii and then Captain Leander Owen, of Vineyard Haven, took over for the Arctic voyage. They arrived on the Arctic whaling grounds during May and June, after the other ships. Towards the end of June, they travelled to Point Hope to discharge their oil and bone and it was taken home by a tender. Whale men had been going into the Arctic for about thirty years by that point. Then they started to hunt walrus, a regular thing if whales were scarce. An average walrus makes three-quarters of a barrel of oil. The ship returned to San Francisco and the catch for the year totalled 1800 barrels of whale oil, 280 barrels of sperm oil, 34,000 pounds of whalebone, 2500 pounds of ivory, and about 450 barrels of walrus oil. Bodfish got a share of $250. They sailed again in December for the South Seas with a new captain and then went north again. The second voyage north was not as successful as the first. His third voyage was south, as a boat steerer. The fourth voyage yielded Bodfish just one dollar and he changed ships going to the Galapagos with the captain from his 2nd voyage, Capt. Adams, on the barque Mars - the only sailing ship he ever worked on. Again, he made a dollar. The next voyage was as a third mate on the steam barque Lucretia. The combined north and south trips made Bodfish $400-$500. After this he headed home for the first time in six years. He was twenty-three years old. 1)
Two months later he returned to San Francisco and shipped on the steam bark Grampus. He was second mate on the articles but third mate in practice. Bodfish left San Francisco in 1888 and this was the beginning of his term of strict Arctic whaling. To this point the whalers had not ventured into the waters past Point Barrow [Nuvuk]. In the summer of 1889, Bodfish was again on the Grumpas. They met a trader from the Mackenzie Delta who came over with a canoe and reported plenty of open water. Seven steamers started into that uncharted area. The Grumpas anchored by Herschel Island on 11 August with the Lucretia, Jessie Freeman, Orca, Narwhal, Thraser, and the William Lewis. When the Freeman ran aground and the whalers realized how shallow the Beaufort Sea was, many of the ships left the area. The Grumpas remained for about forty-eight hours before leaving, and the Orca and Thraser remained for a week or ten days to get two whales each. The catch was poor that season and Bodfish changed to the Mary D. Hume for his next trip. They started to fit out for their first winter in the Arctic.2)
The Hume was small, only ninety feet long, and could not carry all the supplies she would need for the winter. The boats were built with a very sturdy structure to withstand the ice and that meant even less stowage area. Most of the supplies were shipped on other boats and the crew expected to build a warehouse when they reached the Arctic. The Hume and the Grampus stayed that winter. Their ships were small and could stay well inshore to avoid the heavy ice in deeper water. They arrived at Herschel Island on 20 August [1890], sounded a channel and found the deepest water closest to the shore. The Belvedere came in with them but all the rest the boats, but Hume and Grampus, left on 13 September and the water began to freeze on the 14th. On the 18th, the Hume was frozen into Pauline Cove, about twenty miles from their storehouse. The Hume broke out of the ice on 17 May and two small boats were sent out to cruise the waters for whales.3)
The Hume was ready to sail into open water on 3 July. The two small boats returned, having been almost to the mouth of the Mackenzie. The Hume returned to Herschel on 24 September with twenty-seven whales, the biggest season ever made to that time. The Grampus had twenty-one whales. The fleet did not come north that year. Captain Norwood of the Grampus decided to sail back home, and they took what bone they could from the Hume.4)
When she reached port in September 1892 the Mary D. Hume profited $400,000; thought to be the most profitable expedition of whaling history. After that, Bodfish made many lucrative trips to the Arctic as captain on the Beluga. In 1901, he brought the first Musk Ox to San Francisco and it went to live in the Bronx Zoo. Bodfish documented his time in the Arctic through writing and photography. The Hartson Hartlett Bodfish Papers are housed in the New Bedford Whaling Museum.5)