Maritime

Many readers are familiar with Herman Melville’s novel Moby Dick, in which a great white sperm whale stoves a New Bedford whaling ship. Readers may also be familiar that the …
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Throughout the churning tides of 1776 and 1777, John Brown, a prominent merchant from Providence, amassed a fortune by investing in privateers. Through reviewing a comprehensive list of his privateers …
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In my prior article, “Newporters Catch Gold Fever, Sail to California in 1849,” the story of the Audley Clarke’s voyage to San Francisco was detailed. When Newport mariners heard about …
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Newport never fully recovered as a thriving maritime port following the American Revolutionary War. Its merchants did well in the trade with India and China in the times around 1800. …
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My last article was on the story behind the recent identification of the remains of the wreck of a vessel off the coast of the Patagonia region in Argentina, which …
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Wooden ribs are found barely exposed from the sand on a beach at low tide in the Patagonia region of Argentina. With the combination of marine archeology, historical research and …
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Rhode Island’s first lighthouse was constructed in 1749 on Beavertail Point, the southern tip of Conanicut Island (better known as Jamestown). Initially named Newport Light, Beavertail followed Massachusetts’s 1716 Boston …
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Before 1830, travelers from Boston to New York rode by stagecoach down the old Post Road, or sailed around stormy Cape Cod, down along the unpredictable waters of Point Judith …
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[From the editor: This article’s author, Rachel Chase Boynton, was born in December 1894, the daughter of Captain Halsey Chase, the founder and long-time operator of the Prudence Island-Bristol ferry, …
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Point Judith is a small point of land located about midway between the eastern and western borders of the state. To the east and north of the point the waters …
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