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Every significant U. S. Navy recruiting station was assigned a Receiving Ship (a.k.a. Guard Ship), a usually obsolete or unseaworthy ship moored at a navy yard and used for giving new recruits their first taste of naval life and discipline, or for housing men in transit between stations. At Boston, the receiving ship was the old 74 gun ship-of-the-line USS Ohio. Launched in 1820, she had served as flagship of the Mediterranean Squadron, on anti-slave patrol off the African coast, in the gulf during the Mexican War, and later in the Pacific. But, in 1851, she was moored at Charlestown Navy Yard, very close to the present mooring of USS Constitution. She served there as receiving ship until 1875.
USS Ohio in Boston, c.1870
This is an account of five weeks spent aboard "the Guardo," USS Ohio, during the summer of 1861.
George Edward (Ned) Clark was born in Salem Mass. about 1844. At the age of 15, he joined the crew of "an old-fashioned fore-and-after, bound on a lumber and coaling trip." It was the beginning of a seven year adventure at sea, in peace and war. During those first two years, young "Yankee Ned," as he was called, would sail halfway around the world, face storm and mutiny and shipwreck; he would cross the Equator four times, sail the far reaches of the Indian Ocean: Madagascar, Zanzibar, Aden; face hunger and captivity ashore on the Somali coast. After further adventures on land and sea in southern Arabia, and India, Clark finally made his way home, arriving early in 1861. All this is told in colorful detail in the first 16 chapters of Seven Years of a Sailor's Life, which was published in 1867. It is a well-written and entertaining narrative, with lots of "salty" detail.
[by permission, Ronald S. Coddington]
He begins Chapter XVII:
[Frank Leslie's Illustrated Newspaper, Feb. 22, 1862]
"Yankee Ned" Clark spent his one year enlistment aboard the armed barque USS Gemsbok, as part of the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron, which service he details in Chapters XVIII to XXV of Seven Years of a Sailor's Life. He tells of the pursuit and capture of blockade runners, and other operations off the Carolinas, including the bombardment and capture of Fort Macon. He was discharged promptly on August 14, 1862. The final ten chapters recount four more years as a seaman, first in coastal trade, but mostly fishing the Grand Banks in the North Atlantic. On his last cruise, he was shipwrecked, but picked up by a passing merchantman, en-route to Santiago, Cuba. Finally arriving home on the same vessel, he decided to say "Goodby to the Sea."
Yankee Ned's life thereafter, I have not been able to document, beyond that he traveled at least the northeastern United States giving lectures, telling tales and singing shanties all about the life of a sailor at sea -- always including a Temperance message. He was living in Rockland, Maine, in 1906, and apparently died in 1914, at the age of 71.
USS Ohio in Boston, c.1870
This is an account of five weeks spent aboard "the Guardo," USS Ohio, during the summer of 1861.
George Edward (Ned) Clark was born in Salem Mass. about 1844. At the age of 15, he joined the crew of "an old-fashioned fore-and-after, bound on a lumber and coaling trip." It was the beginning of a seven year adventure at sea, in peace and war. During those first two years, young "Yankee Ned," as he was called, would sail halfway around the world, face storm and mutiny and shipwreck; he would cross the Equator four times, sail the far reaches of the Indian Ocean: Madagascar, Zanzibar, Aden; face hunger and captivity ashore on the Somali coast. After further adventures on land and sea in southern Arabia, and India, Clark finally made his way home, arriving early in 1861. All this is told in colorful detail in the first 16 chapters of Seven Years of a Sailor's Life, which was published in 1867. It is a well-written and entertaining narrative, with lots of "salty" detail.
He begins Chapter XVII:
I … was at home, living in comparative ease, waiting for something to turn up, when our country was startled from a long repose in peaceful pursuits, by the boom of Sumter's guns, the echo of which made the loyal millions wake to the call of "to arms." Without any hesitation, I sought out a number of active young seamen, and we all shipped in the navy, at the North Square rendezvous, Boston [August 15, enlisted as able seaman]. The promptness with which we answered all the questions, much pleased the examining officer, and the doctor soon had us stripped, and after going through a variety of exercises to show off our strength and suppleness, we were passed, and directed to the outfitter, by whom we were soon arrayed in the suit of dark blue.
Ah! many a young heart that was thumping under the gay suits of blue that day, was soon stilled forever, while others, like myself, guarded by the same Providence, survived, and left the service in as good condition as they entered.
The wagon was at the door; the men tumbled in with their luggage, and away we went through the winding, crowded streets, and into the Navy Yard at Charlestown, where we found a huge hulk [USS Ohio] moored fast near the docks. The port-holes were crowded with men watching for friends, and endeavoring to inhale a bit of pure air, and feel the sunshine. There were sixteen hundred men confined between those wooden walls, and as hard a set as one would care to be among.
We stepped into the floating ark with our luggage, and beheld a sea of faces, and forms clad in navy blue. Our traps were stowed away, and again we stripped for an examination by the surgeon. Dozens of half-naked men were waiting their turn to be examined, and we were glad when the ceremony was over. We elbowed our way through the crowd, who were pushing, swearing, jostling, and mauling each other, and among whom the weak had to go to the wall. What a collection of men was there, — the gambler, the thief, the clerk, the landsmen, sailors and men of all grades had met; and the low-browed, prowling roughs were plenty in that atmosphere of crime and vice. The odor of bilge-water, cooking, tobacco, and bad air, was constantly assailing our nostrils. No wonder the spar-deck was crowded with decent men, who could not endure the reeking, putrid atmosphere of the berth and gun-decks.
But we were to get used to all this, sooner or later, for we were on the "Guardo." One could easily recognize the thorough-bred seaman, — he was quiet and wary of everybody, while the landsman jumped at every bait that was held out to him, and was lost in amazement at everything he saw and heard.
We could scarcely find a hammock-hook empty, and not fancying the crowded lower deck, we ascended to the spar-deck.
The visitors now began to arrive in large numbers. Fathers and mothers, brothers and sisters, friends and sweethearts crowded upon the after-deck. Among these were our parents and friends, who were somewhat astonished to see the ship and men. We passed many hours in their company, and almost wished ourselves in their place, to walk quietly away, with no sentry at hand to order us back. As ferry boats passed near the ship, we could see many familiar faces, and often saluted them, as the boats ploughed their way from one shore to the other. We ate but little of the navy rations; the hard-tack, tea and pork were the only articles we cared about, and having a fair supply of money at our disposal, we purchased such other food as we wanted.
We were not long in learning that these ships, like many others, present broad fields for the labors of temperance lecturers. … I have seen sailors trying every way to keep liquor about them, and when "Grog oh" was piped, their eyes would glisten as they took their regular nip. A great blessing was bestowed upon the sailors, when the whiskey rations were discontinued on government vessels. One step more in this direction is called for, and that is a law forbidding an officer, high or low, to take liquor to sea.
Recruits were constantly arriving in companies of eight to thirty a day, and though the "Fear Not" [USS Fearnot, coal supply ship] and "Cambridge" [armed steamer] took three hundred at one draft from our vessel, there seemed to be as many on board as ever. Men for the Gemsbok were called for, and my chum and myself were lucky enough to be drawn together. We had been five weeks in the "Guardo," when we left the old, clumsy Ohio for the jaunty, neat, clipper barque which was anchored in the stream. "She is a beauty," "I wish I was going in that boat," and "My turn will come soon," were the expressions we heard as the one hundred and twenty-five picked men shouldering their hammocks and bags betook themselves to the boats, and were quickly set aboard the craft that was to be their home, for how long they knew not.
"Yankee Ned" Clark spent his one year enlistment aboard the armed barque USS Gemsbok, as part of the South Atlantic Blockading Squadron, which service he details in Chapters XVIII to XXV of Seven Years of a Sailor's Life. He tells of the pursuit and capture of blockade runners, and other operations off the Carolinas, including the bombardment and capture of Fort Macon. He was discharged promptly on August 14, 1862. The final ten chapters recount four more years as a seaman, first in coastal trade, but mostly fishing the Grand Banks in the North Atlantic. On his last cruise, he was shipwrecked, but picked up by a passing merchantman, en-route to Santiago, Cuba. Finally arriving home on the same vessel, he decided to say "Goodby to the Sea."
Yankee Ned's life thereafter, I have not been able to document, beyond that he traveled at least the northeastern United States giving lectures, telling tales and singing shanties all about the life of a sailor at sea -- always including a Temperance message. He was living in Rockland, Maine, in 1906, and apparently died in 1914, at the age of 71.
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