What's not to love about the BBC2's "The North Water"! - Read about Hull's own Arctic Epic - The Diana Whaler and her valiant crew

 In this third part of a four part blog, inspired by the fabulous BBC2 drama, “The North Water”, starring Colin Farrell and based on a novel by Hull-born Ian McGuire, the Unlocking the Treasures team look at how the scurvy, rationing and homesickness all impact on the health and morale of the stricken crew on the “Diana” which became trapped in ice over the Arctic winter in 1886-1887 [photo 1 – Greenland's Icy Mountains].

                               

Photo 1 - Greenland's Icy Mountains - sketch by Dr Smith

On January 8^th, 1867, scurvy makes its first appearance on board. The entry in Smith’s diary for that day:

“But to-day my worst fears are realised…Fred Lockham, the fireman, and Magna Grey (senior) show unmistakable signs of scurvy!  They complain of pain in and tenderness of the gums, which are swollen, livid, and spongy, and bled to the touch, whilst the hard and soft plates are inflames and the teeth loosening.

There is no mistaking this peculiar disease, and, in our situation, there is no curing it!  We have some 3 gallons of very inferior lime-juice, which with twenty-seven tins of bouilli soup, are our only fresh provisions. Medicine is of no use, and, if it were, there is very little left now in the medicine chest. I am very much cast down when I reflect upon the inevitable fate of our poor fellows, and also of myself, should scurvy become general, as in all probability it will, before we can expect to escape from the pack”

Smith and George Clark, agreed to keep this disturbing development from the crew in order to protect staff morale and persuaded them that their sore mouths or aching gums were as a result of smoking dried tea leaves [which they had employed once the tobacco supply had run out].  However since scurvy soon become so prevalent amongst the crew, it became impossible to conceal this outbreak.

Smith continued to keep his diary and photos 2 and 3 are some of the illustrations that he sketched during the vogage.

Photo 2 - sketches from the Doctor's Diary

Photo 3 - more sketches by Dr Charles Smith

It seems unbelievable that Smith, despite knowing he was going to the Arctic, seemed to have underestimated the amount and type of clothing to bring with him, but in his defence, it was supposed to have been “a summer voyage”. An entry in his diary for January 3, 1867 noted that:

“Happy is the man on board who has an abundant supply of underclothing.  In this particular respect I am woefully deficient, having made provision only for a short summer voyage, and consequently am about the worst off in the ship’s company for articles of dress.  I am really ill provided for struggling through an Arctic winter, especially upon such hard terms as our, with barely sufficient food to support life and no fuel hardly to afford artificial heat”

The remaining crew were now existing on oatmeal porridge, rice scraps and ship’s biscuits.  Perhaps, understandably, some of the men took matters into their own hands.  Smith, in mid-January 1867, wrote that –

“There has been rather an unpleasant commotion on board, consequent upon the discovery that one of the bread casks has been robbed systematically.” 

This resulted in a further reductions in rations and as Smith pointed out –

“Two biscuits a week less is a serious loss, and, as you may suppose, there has been a good deal of unpleasantness amongst the men, who are suspecting and accusing one another.”

However some culprits did then confess to their crimes and they took the brunt of the reduction in rations.  However, as Smith commented in his diary, it was likely that there were more crew members involved in the stealing of the stores.

Another factor that Smith had to contend with was that of “homesickness” especially amongst the Shetland islanders -

12 Jan 1867 – “The Shetlanders are singularly attached to their islands, and are ever disposed to yearning and home-sickness.  With scurvy on board, and quite enough in our present circumstances and prospects to depress us, this will not do, and must be actively combated and dispelled if possible.  I have hard work to keep up heart in the Shetlandman, but it won’t do to let them get “down in the mouth””

Join us for the final instalment of the “Diana” blog where we learn the fate of both the crew and the ship itself.

Caoimhe West, Reader Assistant, Unlocking the Treasures

Hull's Own "Deep Waters" Arctic Whaler - The Diana

In the second part of the four part blog, inspired by the fabulous BBC2 drama, “The North Water”, starring Colin Farrell, Jack O’Connell and Stephen Graham and based on a novel by Hull-born Ian McGuire, the Unlocking the Treasures team look at how the weather conditions had a devastating impact on the whaling ship “Diana” and her crew during a whaling and seal hunting trip in 1866-1867 [photo 1- Map of Baffin Bay and Davis Strait showing the course of the Whaler Diana].

Photo 1 - Map of Baffin Bay and Davis Strait showing the course of the Whaler "Diana"

The voyage took a turn for the worse on 30 March, 1866 when Smith learnt from Bill Clarke [in charge of the watch] that Smith should put on his sea-boots as they might have to take to the ice at any moment.  Smith learnt that “the ship was in the greatest danger of being shove in by the immense masses of old ice which, in violent motion, surrounded us on all side”.

“The captain fully corroborated the alarming statements of the officers, and added that, from what he saw of our position and considering the size of the ice, the unprecedentedly heavy swell, the fearful gale, and the distance we were from the open sea, he had very little hope of saving the vessel, less still of our saving our lives in the event of our having to take to the ice”.

“We had to run the gauntlet through innumerable dangers, through interminable masses of stretching ahead as far as we could see, hour after hour, expecting every moment to be crushed, despairing of escape.  The excitement, the state of mind, was intense. It was one long agony of danger, a protracted mental torture, almost more than I could bear.”

Smith had nothing but praise for the crew:

“There was no skulking: no appearance of fear, faint-heartedness, or despair; no unmanly croaking or prophesying the worst (though all expected it) among them. Every man kept up with his own spirits and cheered his fellows”

The event, like so many of the future trials and tribulations of the “Diana” are brought to life in harrowing detail by his accounts-

“One’s ears were filled with the roar of the wind tearing through the rigging, the scream of escaping steam, the monotonous clash of the pumps (with the men lashed to the decks to enable them to keep their feet while working them), and the cries of the officers in command. The sea rolled around us in gigantic billows crested, not with foam, but with masses of old ice, which bore down upon us in incessant streams as though determined upon our destruction. Through it all the ship staggered along, rising and falling and reeling to and fro like a living thing conscious of its danger and struggling for dear life.  Add to this the terrible consciousness that, if the ship were crushed, we must perish inevitably from cold and exposure in open boats or upon the floating masses of ice.”

This was just the start of the hardships and misfortunes that the crew on the “Diana” were to endure.  They managed to catch two whales in Lancaster Sound.  The appalling weather conditions and ever-increasing ice floes were a growing concern to the Captain. By September 1866, the weather became harsher and ice formed around the “Diana” making a path to the open sea impossible. 

Captain Gravill realising the gravity of the situation issued instructions to ration the food.  Provisions were already running low.  They tried to attract the assistance of other ships by burning oakum, pitch and oil slung at the yard arm, but without success.  By August 1886, the ship was still seeking a route out of the ice with the additional problem of a shortage of coal.  They thought they had struck lucky when another whaler, “Intrepid”, managed to reach them and promised to lead them out of the ice.  Unfortunately, this was not to be the salvation they thought – the “Intrepid” sailed further and further from the “Diana” leaving them still trapped.  Captain Deuchars of the “Intrepid” later defended his actions by saying he thought the “Diana” would be able to clear the ice safely.

The harsh Arctic winter became even worse and the icy conditions caused pressure on the fabric of the ship.  In the Frobishers Straits, the “Diana” started to leaking water as a result of the ice pressure on all sides of the vessel.  Despite the crew’s best efforts with manning the pumps [this included Charles Smith], Captain Gravill gave the order to abandon the ship and make camp on the ice [photo 2 – On the Ice Floe – sketch by Dr Smith].

Photo 2 - On the Ice Floe - sketch by Dr Smith

The ship hadn’t taken on as much water as originally feared so the crew were able to return to the craft.  Understandably, morale amongst the crew was at an all- time low, – as well as fatigue, hunger, poor diet and hygiene conditions and weak physical health amongst the sailors, meant that Doctor Smith was working flat out – treating all their ailments such as frost-bite and lice as well as trying to raise the spirit of all those on board. 

Christmas Day, 1866 was celebrated as best it could in the trying conditions.  Most of the men had saved up their rations and as Smith noted –

“Joe, the cook, was up at three o’clock this morning, busy as a bee making plum puddings for the different messes.  Every man and boy on board had a large slice of very good plum pudding serves to him at twelve o’clock in honour of Christmas Day”

Smith spent the much of Christmas attending to Captain Gravill who died the following day.  His was the only body that would be returned to Hull, all the other dead crewmen were buried in Shetland.  George Clark was elected as Master of the ship.

Join us for part three of a four part blog where the crew face further suffering and hardship when scurvy makes its first appearance on board.

Caoimhe West, Reader Assistant, Unlocking the Treasures

Hull's link to 9/11: Christine and Michael Egan

The tragedy that occurred in New York on 11 September 2001 – forever known as 9/11 – was an international tragedy with a local element. Two people born in Hull lost their lives that day. They were sister and brother Christine and Michael Egan.

Christine and Michael were born in Hull in 1946 and 1950 and went to local primary schools. Christine then went to St Mary’s Grammar School and Michael to Marist College. When Christine left school she trained as a nurse at the Hull School of Nursing, graduating in 1967 and soon after emigrating to Canada. She established a distinguished career in nursing, both in southern Canada and amongst residents of Inuit hamlets throughout Nunavut (then part of Canada’s North West Territories), and in First Nations communities in Manitoba.  She pursued advanced study in anthropology and nursing, and researched livelihood, nutrition and environmental health among the Inuit. This culminated in a doctorate in community health sciences from the University of Manitoba and lifelong dedication to service in health care and research.

Christine and Michael at her PhD convocation, 1999 [Picture courtesy of Ellen Judd]

She came to Hull to see family and friends almost every year for 30 years.

Michael joined his sister in Canada in the 1970s and worked in insurance, firstly in Montreal where he met his wide Anna. They lived in Bermuda where their sons were born. Michael eventually became Vice-President of multinational insurance company AON, moving to New Jersey when AON opened new offices in the World Trade Centre in New York. Michael and his family regularly visited Hull too.

In early September 2001, Christine flew from Winnipeg to New Jersey for Michael and Anna’s 20^th wedding anniversary. She was to look after their younger son for the couple to celebrate their anniversary back in Bermuda. Michael was going to take his sister to look round the new offices in the South Tower on 10 September but Christine hurt her knee playing with her nephew, so the visit was rearranged for the following day, 11 September. They were in Michael’s offices on the 104^th floor in the South Tower when it was struck. Michael saw to the evacuation of as many people as possible but he and Christine tragically lost their lives.

In Spring 2002 Christine and Michael’s families and friends from Canada and around the UK gathered in Hull for a memorial service in St Charles’ Church. There was a procession to Queen’s Gardens where two memorial stones were inaugurated in the Peace Garden there. Afterwards speeches and tributes were given, remembering both of them, including one from a colleague of Michael’s whose life he had saved.

The Dr Christine Egan Memorial Scholarship Fund was established by her estate, family, friends and colleagues to perpetuate her values of generosity and caring by supporting the Inuit of Nunavut in pursuing university study in nursing. Following in his father Michael’s footsteps, Jonathan Egan who lives in New York, is now a partner in Lockdon, the biggest independent insurance broker in the world, and is involved in a number of charities related to the impacts of 9/11.

The memorial stones stood in the Peace Garden until 2016 when a ceremony took place in Queen’s Gardens on the 15^th anniversary of the tragedy. In 2017 Hull City Council moved the stones to the grounds of Hull History Centre, where they are placed in a small garden.

The memorial to Christine Egan is inscribed with words expressing a portion of the love and vision of her life: “Her roots were in Hull and her heart embraced the world.” These are followed by ‘Dearly Beloved’, written in Inuktitut -- Qatangutiga Naligimaliktara. Michael’s memorial is dedicated to his wife Anna and sons Jonathan and Matthew, and is inscribed “The bridge between the land of the living and the land of the dead is love.”

 

Christine's and Michael's memorial, Hull History Centre, September 2021

Martin Taylor
City Archivist

The "Diana" Whaling ship - Arctic voyage, 1866-1867

The BBC 2 drama, “The North Water” [which starts tonight], starring Colin Farrell, Jack O’Connell and Stephen Graham is based on a novel by Hull-born Ian McGuire, is a four-part series which tell the story of Sumner, a disgraced ex-army surgeon, who signed up as a ship’s doctor on a whaling expedition to the Arctic in the 1850s.  It recalls the days when Hull was one of the world’s busiest whaling ports.

It immediately brought to mind the wealth of information on the Whaling industry held within the Local Studies Whaling collection [L(WHA)], and in particular, an amazing book by C. E. Smith, titled “From the Deep of the Sea: Being the Diary of the Late Charles Edward Smith, surgeon on the Whaleship “Diana” of Hull”  at L(WHA).639.281.  In the first part of a four part blog, the Unlocking the Treasures Team set the scene by giving the background to the history of whaling and the start of the “Diana’s” voyage from Hull.

Charles Edward Smith’s diary of an epic voyage undertaken in 1866-1867 by the crew on the “Diana” was edited by his son, Charles Edward Smith Harris, who himself was a surgeon with the Cunard Steamship Company [see photo 1 – Front cover]. 

Photo 1 - Front cover of Dr Smith's Book

In the preface, the Editor acknowledged the assistance and encouragement of Thomas Sheppard, who was the curator of the Hull Museums, in his endeavours.  Smith’s son bequeathed the original journal to Hull Museums in 1953, partly as a debt of gratitude for Mr Sheppard’s support, and as it gave so much detail into life on a Hull whaler at this time.

Whaling is often portrayed in a very romantic way but the reality was the antithesis of this – it was a dirty, grimy, violent business with many hardship endured by the crews and often resulted in loss of life.  The diary is an enthralling read with an incredible descriptive prose which captures the dangers and sufferings of all the crew on the “Diana”.  The “Diana” was a whaling ship that failed to return from Arctic waters before the Arctic winter in 1866-1867 – when she did get free the following spring, less than half her original crew of 52 men survived. In addition to the natural hazards of the sea and weather – Iceberg, huge waves, howling winds – the crew also had to endured extreme temperature which froze medicines in their vials, beef provisions were cut with saws, helmets froze to men’s beards and bedding and clothing became blocks of ice [Photo 2 – The Whaler steaming through the Ice floes].

Photo 2 - Charles Smith's sketch of the Diana steaming thorough the ice-floes

Although the first Hull whaler sailed to Greenland in the 1590s, the full scale industry did not take place until the second half of the eighteenth century.  Whaling provided employment for nearly 3,000 people in Hull during 1820, when 8,000 tons of oil and 403 tons of bone were brought back to Hull.  The “Diana” was going to the Baffin waters for whale oil and whale bone. The oil was valued at £30 a ton, but the bones were worth much more in France, fetching up to £700 a ton.  The French used the bones for making “Ostrich feathers”.  The whale was killed with a lance and the blubber stripped off alongside the ship.  After chopping it into small pieces the blubber was packed into barrels, brought back to Hull in its natural state and extracted for oil in the factories along the river Hull.  This explains why, alongside the crew comprising harpooners, engineer, carpenter, boat steerers and cook, there was a cooper, Joseph Allen.  He was also responsible for the barrels of salt meat and ships biscuits.

The seal fishing was normally up to the east Greenland coast and in the region of Jan Mayen Island.  At the end of the sealing season, they would return to their homeports to fit out for the whaling season and engage crews for the next voyage, to hunt for whales in the Davis Straits.  With ever-diminishing returns caused by over-fishing, ships sailed even further north into the Arctic.  To reach these waters, the whalers would have to navigate through drifting ice floes and icebergs which often resulted with long periods being trapped in the ice or more deadly consequences with many whaling ships being lost with all the crew.

The screw steamship, “Diana”, left Hull under the command of Captain Gravill on Monday 19 February 1866 with a multitude of well-wishers cheering her departure.  The “Diana” had been built in Germany in 1840 and the steam engine had been equipped by Hull’s Earles Shipyard in 1858 making her the first British steam-powered whaler.  After a stop at Lerwick in the Shetlands to augment the crew with men who were naturally adept as small boat handling and boat work.

Born in Essex, with Quaker roots, Doctor Charles Smith was a man of 28 when he signed up for the voyage, and it is intriguing to note that he had not yet completed his medical training. He had enrolled as a student at Edinburgh University but became distracted from his studies by long walking tours through the Highland where he discovered an interest in natural history which would remain with him for the rest of his life. This along with writing humorous verses led to him neglecting his education.  He was keen to fund the rest of his degree himself since he didn’t want to put his father to more expense so Smith decided to sign up as surgeon on a whaling ship. It would give him practical experience as well as an income to fund the rest of his medical training.

On a whaling ship, the ship’s surgeon was responsible for the health of the crew, attending to illness and injury.  Preventing and treating outbreaks of lice, disease and scurvy was a priority, as whaling ships would be at sea for months at a time and the crew needed to remain healthy to maintain the smooth running of the ship as well as the morale of everyone on board.  However the role of surgeon also included keeping the ship’s log and acting as a clerk.

Smith makes it clear from the outset that this diary will not just be a “Mere log”, but an omninim gatherum of all sorts of miscellanies.

The Doctor was a keen naturalist so the original diary contains notes on the bird and animal life of the northern regions.  He also sketched some of the topographical and animal life [See photo 3 – Whitney Seal and photo 4 – Pintail Duck].  

Photo 3 - Whitney Seal

Photo 4 - Pintail Duck

He pointed out that:

“My poor drawings, through rude and contemptible, will serve to remind me of my Arctic travels”

Smith was also very poetic and descriptive in his diary, bringing the entire trip to life including the hardships and heart-ache – on the first sighting of the Island of Jan Mayen, his entry reads -

“Purple clouds lost across and around it, while its deep ravines and gorges stand out in beautiful relief…..The sunlight caused its snowy sides to glitter and gleam against the dark clouds behind it till one imagined oneself gazing upon some terrestrial similitude of “the great white throne” in the Revelation.”

The crew seemed to have tried to make the whaler a more “homely” place – Dr Smith bought his dog, Gyp, on-board whilst Captain Gravill was accompanied by his pet canary who had already made several trips to the arctic!  The engineer brought his linnet on board.  During the course of the tragic voyage, Gyp had to be shot as there was no food to spare to feed the dog.  The Captain’s canary survived but unfortunately the linnet was accidentally killed.

Join us for part two [17 September] when the Whaling ship begins to feel the full force of the Arctic conditions.

Caoimhe West, Reader Assistant, Unlocking the Treasures