Journal of Edwin Mitchell, ship IVANHOE, 1866-1867

Journal of Edwin Mitchell, ship IVANHOE, 1866-1867

Journal of Edwin Mitchell of Belfast, Maine, ship's boy, aboard the ship IVANHOE, Captain E.H. Harriman.  Ship IVANHOE, built Belfast, Maine, 1865, was on the passage from Chincha Islands, Peru, to New York.  This is the second of two journals by Edwin, the first (MS 9) written on the voyage from New York to San Francisco and Peru.  Entries record the life of a young man before the mast in the Cape Horn trade.  Watches, duties ashore and at sea, notes about the officers and crew, his pay, and personal activities such as mending, reading, and letter writing. Final entry: [after giving the decks one final sweep] "Tonight we take the cars [railroad] to Boston. So ends my great voyage in the ship IVANHOE."  Last few pages includes birth dates for girls, presumably his daughters, in 1870 and 1871, along with school exercises and poetry from a child.