The Charles W. Morgan Whaling Ship

MARITIME PHOTO ARCHIVE FOR THE RESTORATION OF THE THE HISTORIC Charles W. Morgan at Mystic Seaport Museum – 1973-1974 Johnston, Waldo C.M. (Director); Bray, Maynard (Shipyard Supervisor); Libby, Ned?; Murray, Maurice & Haynes, Gordon W. (Photographers).

An outstanding archive of 124 photographs chronicling the 1973-1974 campaign by the Mystic Seaport Museum to re-float and restore the Charles W. Morgan, the last surviving 19th-Century whaling ship left from the vast whaling fleet, and the second oldest American sailing ship behind the USS Constitution. The successful efforts transformed the Mystic Seaport Museum into a major center of wooden boat building, as well as intertwined the museum into efforts to become more of a living museum. (Mystic Seaport, Hartford & Essex, CT: Maurice Murray, Hartford Courant, Gordon W. Haynes, 10 Mack Lane, n.p., ca. 1973-1974).

With 124 silver gelatin photographs, all preserved in archival mylar sleeves, sized from 5 x 7 in. to 6.5 x 10.5 in., a few 8 x 10 in., collection largely composed of 6.5 x 8.5 in. images, nearly all printed on glossy photo stock, some on matte finish, many w/ photographer’s imprint, or credit on verso, many w/ ink or pencil annotations on versos. A few over-exposed, or under-developed and a few w/ spotting on versos, many sepia tinted. Preserved in recent black cloth archival clam-shell 3-ring binder. An exceptional archive. 

This archive visually captures the efforts of volunteers, Mystic Seaport Museum personnel, wooden ship experts, divers, and the wooden tugboat “Chaco” and her crew, to re-float and restore the ocean-going integrity of the last whaling ship afloat in 1973-1974. The historic Charles W. Morgan, first launched in 1841 in New Bedford, CT, is the last American wooden whaling ship from a whaling fleet of over 2700 ships working the world in search of whales. The Charles W. Morgan was one of a dozen ships owned and operated by Charles Wain Morgan, a Quaker Abolitionist who owned a candle works, as well as textile mills, railroads, a paper mill, and banks. She was built at the New Bedford shipyard of Jethro & Zachariah Hillman, cost more than $ 50,000 in 1841, and the 105 foot long ship featured a rounded bow, false gun-ports, weighed 351 tons, and would sale 37 voyages to the North Atlantic, and then Pacific oceans. During her 80-year career she survived ice floes, the Civil War, storms, and would be featured in the silent movie Miss Petticoats, the 1921 film Down to the Sea featuring Clara Bow, and later the movie Java Head. Through the efforts of Harry Neyland, a New Bedford marine artist, and Col. Edward Green, son of Hetty Green she was refitted, and put in a sand berth near a reproduction whaling-era New Bedford wharf in the 1920’s. Eventually 30 days before the attack on Pearl Harbor, she was brought to Mystic Seaport Nov. 8, 1941 by a Coast Guard Cutter. 

In 1966, the Morgan was designated a National Historic Landmark by Secretary of the Interior Stuart Udall, and the Mystic Seaport’s new director Waldo Johnston, with Seaport Supervisor Maynard Bray, decided to restore and re-float the Morgan, intending “to provide a permanence to history, a tie with our past that is changeless.” These photos show the tremendous efforts involved, as a new dock was constructed; cranes installed and “Men from Seaport [began] pumping Morgan before we pulled it off the beach.” Several photos show the Morgan with masts, and no rigging; another showing volunteers and workers pushing the hull from the gravel, but “This didn’t work;” “Eddie Bach pulling with winch line attached to Morgan;” and finally the sup under tow sand drycock at the Museum. Still more show divers suiting up and diving below the hull to check integrity which remained remarkably sound, with very little needing to be replaced, workers caulking and replacing caulking along the hull; and finally afloat and with new rigging from the Seaport’s massive rigging loft, and sail loft which required 13,000 square feet of sails. Although no ownership markings are on versos of the images, and nearly all are  after being reed from the oblique references such as “Guess Who,” one annotation is signed with an “L” which could refer to Ned Libby, crewman, and later owner of the wooden tug “Chaco” used in the operation. 

The “Chaco” was originally built by the Essex Boat Works which concentrated on the building of working boats, including tugboats, and at least one lobster boat. Originally built for John G. Holbrook prior to World War II, the tug was 49 feet long, too small for Naval service, and powered by a D17 Caterpillar engine that propelled it up and down the Connecticut River building docks, driving pilings, retrieving sunken vessels, and served as a key player as evidenced by the many photos of the Chaco included here in the archive. In the 21st Century, there was a concerted effort by the Mystic Seaport to not only restore the Charles W. Morgan to sailing, trim, but in 2009, Stephen White, new president of Mystic Seaport proposed that she sail a 38th Voyage through New England seaport cities in July, 2014. Live oak was salvaged from trees felled during Hurricanes Katrina and Hugo, Douglas Fir from Washington State was used for the spars, and pine from New York, yellow pine from Georgia and Florida, and finally treasure in 2011 of 17 truck loads of antique live oak and white oak cut for use during the tall ship era, and preserved in mud from the 1860’s. In addition, the NOAA Office of National Marine Sanctuaries, Mystic Seaport, and other groups collaborated to set up the Morgan as ambassador to reflect the dangers to the World’s oceans, and its whales. Murray (d. 2006) was head photographer at the Hartford Courant for over 35 years, as well as a US Navy veteran, and several of these are stamped. Another image is stamped by Gordon Haynes of Essex, CT, near the shipyard which built the tug Chaco.

See: Jason Smith, Thou Uncracked Keel: The Many Voyages of the Whaleship Charles W. Morgan and the Presence of the American Maritime Past, The New England Quarterly, Vol. 89, No. 3 (Sept., 2016), pp. 421-456;

Frank J. Prial, Mystic is Bracing to Refloat Whaler, New York Times, March 1, 1973;

Sara Brown, Last of Her Kind, Whaleship Charles W. Morgan Has Strong Ties to the Vineyard, Vineyard Gazette, June 20, 2014.