Personal Memoir Of Daniel Drayton - Daniel Drayton
[Illustration: _Daniel Drayton_]
PERSONAL MEMOIR Of DANIEL DRAYTON,
For Four Years And Four Months
A PRISONER (FOR CHARITY'S SAKE) IN WASHINGTON JAIL
Including A Narrative Of The
VOYAGE AND CAPTURE OF THE SCHOONER PEARL.
We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men
are created equal; that they are endowed by their
Creator with certain unalienable rights; that among
these are life, _liberty_, and the pursuit of happiness.
DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE.
1855.
Entered according to Act of Congress, In the year 1853, by
DANIEL DRAYTON,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of
Massachusetts
ADVERTISEMENT.
Considering the large share of the public attention which the case of
the schooner Pearl attracted at the time of its occurrence, perhaps the
following narrative of its origin, and of its consequences to himself,
by the principal actor in it, may not be without interest. It is proper
to state that a large share of the profits of the sale are secured to
Captain Drayton, the state of whose health incapacitates him from any
laborious employment.
MEMOIR.
I was born in the year 1802, in Cumberland County, Downs Township, in
the State of New Jersey, on the shores of Nantuxet Creek, not far from
Delaware Bay, into which that creek flows. My father was a farmer,--not
a very profitable occupation in that barren part of the country. My
mother was a widow at the time of her marriage with my father, having
three children by a former husband. By my father she had six more, of
whom I was the youngest but one. She was a woman of strong mind and
marked character, a zealous member of the Methodist church; and,
although I had the misfortune to lose her at an early age, her
instructions--though the effect was not apparent at the moment--made a
deep impression on my youthful mind, and no doubt had a very sensible
influence over my future life.
Just previous to, or during the war with Great Britain, my father
removed still nearer to the shore of the bay, and the sight of the
vessels passing up and down inspired me with a desire to follow the life
of a waterman; but it was some years before I was able to gratify this
wish. I well remember the alarm created in our neighborhood by the
incursions of the British vessels up the bay during the war, and that,
at these times, the women of the neighborhood used to collect at our
house, as if looking up to my mother for counsel and guidance.
I was only twelve years old when this good mother died; but, so strong
was the impression which she left upon my memory, that, amid the
struggles and dangers and cares of my subsequent life, I have seldom
closed my eyes to sleep without some thought or image of her.
As my father soon after married another widow, with four small children,
it became necessary to make room in the house for their accommodation;
and, with a younger brother of mine, I was bound out an apprentice in a
cotton and woollen factory at a place called Cedarville. Manufactures
were just then beginning to be introduced into the country, and great
hopes were entertained of them as a profitable business. My
employer,--or bos, as we called him,--had formerly been a schoolmaster,
and he did not wholly neglect our instructions in other things besides
cotton-spinning. Of this I stood greatly in need; for there were no
public schools in the neighborhood in which I was born, and my parents
had too many children to feed and clothe to be able to pay much for
schooling. We were required on Sundays, by our employer, to learn two
lessons, one in the forenoon, the other in the afternoon; after reciting
which we were left at liberty to roam at our pleasure. Winter evenings
we worked in the factory till nine o'clock, after which, and before
going to bed, we were required to recite over one of our lessons These
advantages of education were not great, but even these I soon lost.
Within five months from the time I was bound to him, my employer died.
The factories were then sold out to three partners. The one who carried
on the cotton-spinning took me; but he soon gave up the business, and
went back to farming, which had been his original occupation. I remained
with him for a year and a half, or thereabouts, when my father bound me
out apprentice to a shoe-maker.
My new bos was, in some respects, a remarkable man, but not a very good
sort of one for a boy to be bound apprentice to. He paid very little
attention to his business, which he seemed to think unworthy of his
genius. He was a kind-hearted man, fond of company and frolics, in which
he indulged himself freely, and much given to speeches and harangues, in
which he had a good deal of fluency. In religion he professed to be a
Universalist, holding to doctrines and opinions very different from
those which my mother had instilled into me. He ridiculed those
opinions, and argued against them, but without converting me to his way
of thinking; though, as far as practice went, I was ready enough to
imitate his example. My Sundays were spent principally in taverns,
playing at dominos, which then was, and still is, a favorite game in
that part of the country; and, as the unsuccessful party was expected to
treat, I at times ran up a bill at the bar as high as four or six
dollars,--no small indebtedness for a young apprentice with no more
means than I had.
As I grew older this method of living grew less and less satisfactory
to me; and as I saw that no good of any kind, not even a knowledge of
the trade he had undertaken to teach me, was to be got of my present
bos, I bought my time of him, and went to work with another man to pay
for it. Before I had succeeded in doing that, and while I was not yet
nineteen, I took upon myself the still further responsibility of
marriage. This was a step into which I was led rather by the impulse of
youthful passion than by any thoughtful foresight. Yet it had at least
this advantage, that it obliged me to set diligently to work to provide
for the increasing family which I soon found growing up around me.
I had never liked the shoe-making business, to which my father had bound
me an apprentice. I had always desired to follow the water. The vessels
which I had seen sailing up and down the Delaware Bay still haunted my
fancy; and I engaged myself as cook on board a sloop, employed in
carrying wood from Maurice river to Philadelphia. Promotion in this line
is sufficiently rapid; for in four months, after commencing as cook, I
rose to be captain. This wood business, in which I remained for two
years, is carried on by vessels of from thirty to sixty tons, known as
_bay-craft_. They are built so as to draw but little water, which is
their chief distinction from the _coasters_, which are fit for the open
sea. They will carry from twenty-five to fifty cords of wood, on which a
profit is expected of a dollar and upwards. They have usually about
three hands, the captain, or skipper, included. The men used to be
hired, when I entered the business, for eight or ten dollars the month,
but they now get nearly or quite twice as much. The captain usually
sails the vessel on shares (unless he is himself owner in whole, or in
part), victualling the vessel and hiring the men, and paying over to the
owner forty dollars out of every hundred. During the winter, from
December to March, the navigation is impeded by ice, and the bay-craft
seldom run. The men commonly spend this long vacation in visiting,
husking-frolics, rabbiting, and too often in taverns, to the exhaustion
of their purses, the impoverishment of their families, and the sacrifice
of their sobriety. Yet the watermen, if many of them are not able always
to resist the temptations held out to them, are in general an honest and
simple-hearted set, though with little education, and sometimes rather
rough in their manners. The extent of my education when I took to the
water--and in this respect I was not, perhaps, much inferior to the
generality of my brother watermen--was to read with no great fluency,
and to sign my name; nor did I ever learn much more than this till my
residence in Washington jail, to be related hereafter.
Having followed the wood business for two years, I aspired to something
a little higher, and obtained the command of a sloop engaged in the
coasting business, from Philadelphia southward and eastward. At this
time a sloop of sixty tons was considered a very respectable coaster.
The business is now mostly carried on by vessels of a larger class;
some of them, especially the regular lines of packets, being very
handsome and expensive. The terms on which these coasters were sailed
were very similar to those already stated in the case of the bay-craft.
The captain victualled the vessel, and paid the hands, and received for
his share half the net profits, after deducting the extra expenses of
loading and unloading. It was in this coasting business that the best
years of my life were spent, during which time I visited most of the
ports and rivers between Savannah southward, and St. John, in the
British province of New Brunswick, eastward;--those two places forming
the extreme limits of my voyagings. As Philadelphia was the port from
and to which I sailed, I presently found it convenient to remove my
family thither, and there they continued to live till after my release
from the Washington prison.
I was so successful in my new business, that, besides supporting my
family, I was able to become half owner of the sloop Superior, at an
expense of over a thousand dollars, most of which I paid down. But this
proved a very unfortunate investment. On her second trip after I had
bought into her, returning from Baltimore to Philadelphia by the way of
the Delaware and Chesapeake canal, while off the mouth of the
Susquehannah, she struck, as I suppose, a sunken tree, brought down by a
heavy freshet in that river. The water flowed fast into the cabin. It
was in vain that I attempted to run her ashore. She sunk in five
minutes. The men saved themselves in the boat, which was on deck, and
which floated as she went down. I stood by the rudder till the last, and
stepped off it into the boat, loath enough to leave my vessel, on which
there was no insurance.
By this unfortunate accident I lost everything except the clothes I had
on, and was obliged to commence anew. I accordingly obtained the command
of the new sloop Sarah Henry, of seventy tons burden, and continued to
sail her for several years, on shares. While in her I made a voyage to
Savannah; and while under sail from that city for Charleston, I was
taken with the yellow fever. I lay for a week quite unconscious of
anything that was going on about me and came as near dying as a man
could do and escape. The religious instructions of my mother had from
time to time recurred to my mind, and had occasioned me some anxiety. I
was now greatly alarmed at the idea of dying in my sins, from which I
seemed to have escaped so narrowly. My mind was possessed with this
fear; and, to relieve myself from it, I determined, if it were a
possible thing, to get religion at any rate. The idea of religion in
which I had been educated was that of a sudden, miraculous change, in
which a man felt himself relieved from the burden of his sins, united to
God, and made a new creature. For this experience I diligently sought,
and tried every way to get it. I set up family prayers in my house, went
to meetings, and conversed with experienced members of the church; but,
for nine months or more, all to no purpose. At length I got into an
awful state, beginning to think that I had been so desperate a sinner
that there was no forgiveness for me. While I was in this miserable
condition, I heard of a camp-meeting about to be held on Cape May, and I
immediately resolved to attend it, and to leave no stone unturned to
accomplish the object which I had so much at heart. I went accordingly,
and yielded myself entirely up to the dictation of those who had the
control of the meeting. I did in everything as I was told; went into the
altar, prayed, and let them pray over me. This went on for several days
without any result. One evening, as I approached the altar, and was
looking into it, I met a captain of my acquaintance, and asked him what
he thought of these proceedings; and, as he seemed to approve them, I
invited him to go into the altar with me. We both went in accordingly,
and knelt down. Pretty soon my friend got up and walked away, saying he
had got religion. I did not find it so easily. I remained at the altar,
praying, till after the meeting broke up, and even till one o'clock,--a
few acquaintances and others remaining with me, and praying round me,
and over me, and for me;--till, at last, thinking that I had done
everything I could, I told them pray no more, as evidently there was no
forgiveness for me. So I withdrew to a distance, and sat down upon an
old tree, lamenting my hard case very seriously. I was sure I had
committed the unpardonable sin. A friend, who sat down beside me, and of
whom I inquired what he supposed the unpardonable sin was, endeavored
comfort me by suggesting that, whatever it might be, it would take more
sense and learning than ever I had to commit it. But I would not enter
into his merriment. All the next day, which was Sunday, I passed in a
most miserable state. I went into the woods alone. I did not think
myself worthy or fit to associate with those who had religion, while I
was anxious to avoid the company of those who made light of it.
Sometimes I would sit down, sometimes I would stand up, sometimes I
would walk about. Frequently I prayed, but found no comfort in it.
About sun-set I met a friend, who said to me, "Well, our camp-meeting is
about ended." What a misery those few words struck to my heart! "About
ended!" I said to myself; "about ended, and I not converted!" A little
later, as I was passing along the camp-ground, I saw a woman before me
kneeling and praying. An acquaintance of mine, who was approaching her
in an opposite direction, called out to me, "Daniel, help me pray for
this woman!" I had made up my mind to make one more effort, and I knelt
down and commenced praying; but quite as much for myself as for her.
Others gathered about us and joined in, and the interest and excitement
became so great, that, after a vain effort to call us off, the regular
services of the evening were dispensed with, and the ground was left to
us. Things went on in this way till about nine o'clock, when, as
suddenly as if I had been struck a heavy blow, I felt a remarkable
change come over me. All my fears and terrors seemed to be
instantaneously removed, and my whole soul to be filled with joy and
peace. This was the sort of change which I had been taught to look for
as the consequence of getting that religion for which I had been
struggling so hard. I instantly rose up, and told those about me that I
was a converted man; and from that moment I was able to sing and shout
and pray with the best of them. In the midst of my exultation who should
come up but my old master in the shoe-making trade, of whom I have
already given some account. He had heard that I was on the camp-ground
in pursuit of religion, and had come to find me out. "Daniel," he said,
addressing me by my Christian name, "what are you doing here? Don't make
a fool of yourself." To which I answered, that I had got to be just such
a fool as I had long wanted to be; and I took him by the arm, and
endeavored to prevail upon him to kneel down and allow us to pray over
him, assuring him that I knew his convictions to be much better than his
conduct; that he must get religion, and now was the time. But he drew
back, and escaped from me, with promises to do better, which, however,
he did not keep.
As for myself, considering, and, as I thought, feeling that I was a
converted man, I now enjoyed for some time an extraordinary
satisfaction, a sort of offset to the months of agony and misery which I
had previously endured. But, though regarding myself as now truly
converted, I delayed some time before uniting myself with any particular
church. I did not know which to join. This division into so many
hostile sects seemed to me unaccountable. I thought that all good
Christians should love each other, and be as one family. Yet it seemed
necessary to unite myself with some body of Christians; and, as I had
been educated a Methodist, I concluded to join them.
I have given the account of my religious experience exactly as it seemed
to me at the time, and as I now remember it. It corresponded with the
common course of religious experiences in the Methodist church, except
that with me the struggle was harder than commonly happens. I did not
doubt at the time that it was truly a supernatural change, as much the
work of the Spirit as the sudden conversions recorded in the Acts of the
Apostles. Others can form their own opinion about it. I will only add
that subsequent experience has led me to the belief that the reality of
a man's religion is more to be judged of by what he does than by how he
feels or what he says.
The change which had taken place in me, however it is to be regarded,
was not without a decided influence on my whole future life. I no longer
considered myself as living for myself alone. I regarded myself as bound
to do unto others as I would that they should do unto me; and it was in
attempting to act up to this principle that I became involved in the
difficulties to be hereafter related.
Meanwhile I resumed my voyages in the Sarah Henry, in which I continued
to sail, on shares, for several years, with tolerable success.
Afterwards I followed the same business in the schooner Protection, in
which I suffered another shipwreck. We sailed from Philadelphia to
Washington, in the District of Columbia, laden with coal, proceeding
down the Delaware, and by the open sea; but, when off the entrance of
the Chesapeake, we encountered a heavy gale, which split the sails,
swept the decks, and drove us off our course as far south as Ocracoke
Inlet, on the coast of North Carolina. I took a pilot, intending to go
in to repair damages; but, owing to the strength of the current, which
defeated his calculations, the pilot ran us on the bar. As soon as the
schooner's bow touched the ground, she swung round broadside to the sea,
which immediately began to break over her in a fearful manner. She
filled immediately,--everything on deck was swept away; and, as our only
chance of safety, we took to the main-rigging. This was about seven
o'clock in the evening. Towards morning, by reason of the continual
thumping, the mainmast began to work through the vessel, and to settle
in the sand, so that it became necessary for us to make our way to the
fore-rigging; which we did, not without danger, as one of the men was
twice washed off.
About a quarter of a mile inside was a small, low island, on which lay
five boats, each manned by five men, who had come down to our
assistance; but the surf was so high that they did not venture to
approach us; so we remained clinging with difficulty to the rigging till
about half-past one, when the schooner went to pieces. The mast to which
we were clinging fell, and we were precipitated into the raging surf,
which swept us onward towards the island already mentioned. The men
there, anticipating what had happened, had prepared for its occurrence;
and the best swimmers, with ropes tied round their waists, the other end
of which was held by those on shore, plunged in to our assistance. One
of our unfortunate company was drowned,--the rest of us came safely to
the shore; but we lost everything except the clothes we stood in. The
fragments saved from the wreck were sold at auction for two hundred
dollars. The people of that neighborhood treated us with great kindness,
and we presently took the packet for Elizabeth city, whence I proceeded
to Norfolk, Baltimore, and so home.
I had made up my mind to go to sea no more; but, after remaining on
shore for three weeks, and not finding anything else to do, as it was
necessary for me to have the means of supporting my increasing family, I
took the command of another vessel, belonging to the same owners, the
sloop Joseph B. While in this vessel, my voyages were to the eastward. I
was engaged in the flour-trade, in conjunction with the owners of the
vessel. We bought flour and grain on a sixty days' credit, which I
carried to the Kennebec, Portsmouth, Boston, New Bedford, and other
eastern ports, calculating upon the returns of the voyage to take up our
notes. I was so successful in this business as finally to become the
owner of the Joseph B., which vessel I exchanged away at Portsmouth for
the Sophronia, a top-sail schooner of one hundred and sixty tons, worth
about fourteen hundred dollars. In this vessel I made two trips to
Boston,--one with coal, and the other with timber. Having unloaded my
timber, I took in a hundred tons of plaster, purchased on my own
account, intending to dispose of it in the Susquehanna. But on the
passage I encountered a heavy storm, which blew the masts out of the
vessel, and drove her ashore on the south side of Long Island. We saved
our lives; but I lost everything except one hundred and sixty dollars,
for which I sold what was left of the vessel and cargo.
Having returned to my family, with but little disposition to try my
fortune again in the coasting-trade, one day, being in the horse-market,
I purchased a horse and wagon; and, taking in my wife and some of the
younger children, I went to pay a visit to the neighborhood in which I
was born. Here I traded for half of a bay-craft, of about sixty tons
burden, in which I engaged in the oyster-trade, and other small
bay-traffic. Having met at Baltimore the owner of the other half, I
bought him out also. The whole craft stood me in about seven hundred
dollars. I then purchased three hundred bushels of potatoes, with which
I sailed for Fredericksburg, in Virginia; but this proved a losing trip,
the potatoes not selling for what they cost me. At Fredericksburg I took
in flour on freight for Norfolk; but my ill-luck still pursued me. In
unloading the vessel, the cargo forward being first taken out, she
settled by the stern and sprang a leak, damaging fifteen barrels of
flour, which were thrown upon my hands. I then sailed for the eastern
shore of Virginia, and at a place called Cherrystone traded off my
damaged flour for a cargo of pears, with which I sailed for New York. I
proceeded safely as far as Barnegat, when I encountered a north-east
storm, which drove me back into the Delaware, obliging me to seek refuge
in the same Maurice river from which I had commenced my sea-faring life
in the wood business. But by this time the pears were spoiled, and I was
obliged to throw them overboard. At Cherrystone I had met the owner of a
pilot-boat, who had seemed disposed to trade with me for my vessel; and
I now returned to that place, and completed the trade; after which I
loaded the pilot-boat with oysters and terrapins, and sailed for
Philadelphia. This boat was an excellent sailer, but too sharp, and not
of burden enough for my business; and I soon exchanged her for half a
little sloop, in which I carried a load of water-melons to Baltimore.
By this time I was pretty well sick of the water; and, having hired out
the sloop, I set up a shop, at Philadelphia, for the purchase and sale
of junk, old iron, &c. &c. But, after continuing in this business for
about two years,--my health being bad, and the doctor having advised me
to try the water again,--I bought half of another sloop, and engaged in
trading up and down Chesapeake Bay. Returning home, towards the close of
the season, with the proceeds of the summer's business, I encountered,
in the upper part of Chesapeake Bay, a terrible snow-storm which proved
fatal to many vessels then in the bay. In attempting to make a harbor,
the vessel struck the ground, and knocked off her rudder; and, in order
to get her off, we were obliged to throw over the deck-load. We drifted
about all day, it still blowing and snowing, and at night let go both
anchors. So we lay for a night and a day; but, having neither boat,
rudder nor provisions, I was finally obliged to slip the anchors and run
ashore. I sold my half of her, as she lay, for ninety dollars, which was
all that remained to me of my investment and my summer's work.
Not having the means to purchase a boat, my health also continuing quite
infirm, the next summer I hired one, and continued the same trade up and
down the bay which I had followed the previous summer.
My trading up and down the bay, in the way which I have described, of
course brought me a good deal into contact with the slave population. No
sooner, indeed, does a vessel, known to be from the north, anchor in any
of these waters--and the slaves are pretty adroit in ascertaining from
what state a vessel comes--than she is boarded, if she remains any
length of time, and especially over night, by more or less of them, in
hopes of obtaining a passage in her to a land of freedom. During my
earlier voyagings, several years before, in Chesapeake Bay, I had turned
a deaf ear to all these requests. At that time, according to an idea
still common enough, I had regarded the negroes as only fit to be
slaves, and had not been inclined to pay much attention to the pitiful
tales which they told me of ill-treatment by their masters and
mistresses. But my views upon this subject had undergone a gradual
change. I knew it was asserted in the Declaration of Independence that
all men are born free and equal, and I had read in the Bible that God
had made of one flesh all the nations of the earth. I had found out, by
intercourse with the negroes, that they had the same desires, wishes and
hopes, as myself. I knew very well that I should not like to be a slave
even to the best of masters, and still less to such sort of masters as
the greater part of the slaves seemed to have. The idea of having first
one child and then another taken from me, as fast as they grew large
enough, and handed over to the slave-traders, to be carried I knew not
where, and sold, if they were girls, I knew not for what purposes, would
have been horrible enough; and, from instances which came to my notice,
I perceived that it was not less horrible and distressing to the parties
concerned in the case of black people than of white ones. I had never
read any abolition books, nor heard any abolition lectures. I had
frequented only Methodist meetings, and nothing was heard there about
slavery. But, for the life of me, I could not perceive why the golden
rule of doing to others as you would wish them to do to you did not
apply to this case. Had I been a slave myself,--and it is not a great
while since the Algerines used to make slaves of our sailors, white as
well as black,--I should have thought it very right and proper in
anybody who would have ventured to assist me in escaping out of bondage;
and the more dangerous it might have been to render such assistance,
the more meritorious I should have thought the act to be. Why had not
these black people, so anxious to escape from their masters, as good a
light to their liberty as I had to mine?