The Mudcat Café TM
Thread #170027   Message #4182027
Posted By: Lighter
19-Sep-23 - 06:42 PM
Thread Name: Whalers and chanteys?
Subject: RE: Whalers and chanteys?
Ornithologist Robert Cushman Murphy sailed on a whaling voyage in 1911. In his account of the voyage, "Logbook for Grace" (1947), he includes the following diary entry for August 19, 1912:

"On the deck of the Daisy, at the other end of the cutting tackle, no less heavy work was going on. Double hawsers ran through the great blocks to the windlass on the top-gallant fo’c’sle, and there, under the eye of the Old Man himself, the greater part of the crew rocked the windlass and hoisted the strip of blubber as it was loosened from the whale. This was at least the cheery part of the business, work that could not be done without song, and, to the accompaniment of squeaking bearings and clicking pawls, the husky chorus rang out:

        Come all ye brave sailors who’re cruising for sparm.
        Come all ye brave seamen who sail round the Horn –
        Our Captain has told us, and we hope it proves true,
        There’s plenty more whales ‘long the coast of Peru.”

A forebitter used as a chantey. Note that the windlass work "could not be done without song."