Drugged, made drunk, or tricked: these and other techniques were used to force thousands of common merchant seaman into involuntary servitude on board ocean-going merchant sailing ships. Called shanghaiing, this form of slavery plagued the seafaring world between 1849 and 1915. Navies and pirates, too, compelled men to work on their ships against their will, a technique called impressment. Shanghaiing had a particular notoriety on the Chesapeake Bay upon which oystermen went as far as Boston to snatch men for their dredgers. Only whale ships had worse conditions: few professional mariners willingly sailed on one of these “hell ships.”
Americans have always had a bit of an addiction to collecting souvenirs both during memorable events and tragedies. This article explores the history of this.
Hardly a romantic figure, this robber and murderer terrorized the seas and no one at the time had anything good to say about him. It took an ambitious colonial governor to do something about him.
This explores the many myths about Commodore Oliver Hazard Perry and the Battle of Lake Erie, including the fact he neither held the rank of commodore nor did he win the battle because of great seamanship or strategy.
In which we learn how the Yellow Peril (the fear that China or Japan or both would take over the West) inspired one of the most famous and successful science fiction comic strips of all times, Buck Rogers.
Henry Ford once bought his own railroad to serve the Ford Motor Company. Yet he found it a difficult venture because of the draconian Interstate Commerce Committee, which made it nearly impossible for him to make a profit.
In the months before the U.S. Civil War ended, a desperate Confederacy decided it would end slavery in exchange for economic and military aid from Europe, an idea first proposed and later represented by Duncan Farrar Kenner.
This tells the story of one the most successful American privateers during the American Revolution, Gustavus Conyngham, who received his first commission and orders from none other than Benjamin Franklin.
An article containing suggestions for family genealogists who would like to bring a bit more life to their family histories and give more details about their ancestors.
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Shanghaiing, the kidnapping of mariners and forcing them to sail against their will, occurred all around the world and peaked from about 1850 to 1915. No class of men could escape its grip, and U.S. laws made sailors wards of the state--legalized indentured servants!
