?Final Price Realized includes Buyer’s Premium added to Hammer Price
Estimate: $ 400 - $ 600
(TRAVEL.) Sweetser, Samuel H. Diary of a sea captain in Portugal, England, Brazil, Burma, and at home in Maine. 140 manuscript pages. Folio (13 1/2 x 9 inches), disbound, original marbled boards detached but present; minimal wear to contents. Vp, 1 January 1862 to 31 August 1863
Samuel Hobart Sweetser (1825-1893) of North Yarmouth, ME begins his diary in Lisbon with a long report on the state of the Civil War, punctuated by fears of a war with England. His ship had been lost, and he was engaged in selling a large cargo of coal which had been salvaged. The two-month delay allowed him to enjoy Lisbon as a tourist, attending concerts and the circus. In conclusion he remarked that Lisbon "is the slowest of all slow holes to get anything done in. Good bye dirty town" (28 February 1862). He then spent two similarly idle weeks in England, attempting to settle a case relating to the lost ship, before returning to Maine on 31 March. He left on 18 June on a steamer for England, where he took command of the ship Portland to Rio de Janeiro, a journey delayed by "a week that towers head & shoulders above any of the many weeks that I have been master of a vessel, for squalls, calmness and headcurrent" (27 September 1862), not arriving in Brazil until 16 October. There a sailor named William Martin was "intoxicated yesterday, got into a row on shore and was put in prison. I spent the whole forenoon hunting him and visited every station house in the place before I found him in the last one and took him out" (27 October). Six days later, the same sailor "was mutinous and was in irons all day. At evening he promised good behavior and was released." Discharging coal was hazardous duty, mostly undertaken by black Brazilian stevedores, but one of his own men was a casualty: "John Regan fell down the fore hatch and I have been all day with 4, 6, or 8 men getting him to the hospital. Nearly killed him" (11 November). Regan died the next morning. Several desertions followed, and Sweetser spent the last three days in Rio "on shore hunting sailors" (18 November). Captain Sweetser had his wife aboard the vessel, noting at one point "My wife is looking over my shoulder and I can't write so well as I could if she would let mine ears alone" (1 January 1863). Next stop was the port of Akyab (now Sittwe in Myanmar), where he arrived 2 February 1863 to take on a cargo of rice. There, four of his men absconded with the ship's boat, prompting him to issue a 129-rupee reward (23 February 1863). Another of his men, Robert McKenzie, died on 2 February, and the same day Sweetser witnessed the ceremonial burning of a priest. The final leg recorded in this eventful diary was from Akyab back to England.
