Autobiography of Francis Asbury Wardwell

Autobiography of Francis Asbury Wardwell

Autobiography written by Francis Asbury Wardwell for his family towards the end of his life. This volume covers Wardwelll's life from birth to his career as a merchant sailor in the early 1860s. He describes his family history, including adoption; life in Eastport and its herring fishery; boyhood in the shipbuilding town of Searsport; education at rural Maine schools; prayer meetings and sabbath days; the travails of being a minister's son; his impressions of New York City, which he visited in the early 1860s to join a ship; and his first experiences at sea on the schooner BRILLIANT and ship FREE TRADE. Wardwell occasionally interrupts his narrative with retrospective discussions of the state of the U.S. shipping industry and the causes of the Civil War. He also describes, at some length, the living arrangements and food provided aboard American merchant ships, and the design and purpose of various types of vessels. Diary (autobiography) of Francis Asbury Wardwell--a child’s perspective of growing up around the Searsport shipyards