"Two Years Before The Mast"

On a recent trip to San Diego we had the pleasure of visiting with Shirley who, in my opinion, is the best cook in the whole world and the person who motivated me to learn more about the craft.  Shirley’s son, cousin Charles, introduced me to a book that I had heard about for many years, but never had the opportunity to read.  The book is titled “Two Years Before The Mast” and was written in the late 1830’s by Richard Henry Dana Jr.  “Before The Mast” refers to the position on the ship where all new inexperienced sailors were required to berth.  It is in the forecastle, in front of the Foremast, in the bow.  “Two Years Before The Mast” is about Dana’s adventures sailing from Boston, around the "Horn" to the California Coast in 1836 and his experiences along the West Coast while he and his shipmates collected 40,000 cowhides from the local missions.  Cowhides were the medium of exchange between the Spanish Missions and the sailing ships that brought manufactured goods from the East.

Full Rigged Ship

While the tale is well written, with detailed descriptions of the ports Dana visited, San Diego, Capistrano, San Pedro, Monterey, San Francisco, etc. much of it is written in the jargon of the seafarer and can be difficult to follow.  Description of the daily chores aboard ship were especially difficult but I had the advantage of a large scale drawing of a “Full-rigged ship” at my disposal and made good use of it.  I learned the difference between a “Fore, Main, and Mizzen” Mast and the names of the 29 or more sails that can be “Clewed,” “Reefed,” or “Furled” upon them.  Other terms such as “Close hauled,” “Reeving,” and “Larboard” required some outside research, but sometimes I just used my imagination.  To try to understand all the terminology would have taken more time than I wanted to invest in a single book, and it really wasn’t necessary to benefit from the saga.

One of the best parts of the book is in the final chapters when Dana revisits the West Coast twenty four years later in 1860 and compares what he sees then with his previous visit.  He notes that San Pedro, a place that he and most of his shipmates detested, has doubled in size and now has two houses, that San Francisco has grown from a small Mission and a small Presidio to a city of over 100,000 inhabitants, and the islands in the bay that were once covered from top to shoreline with trees were all now devoid of vegetation!  What Dana describes as the most beautiful place on the coast, Monterey, has ceased to be a port of call and has not changed much, but in his melancholy description of San Diego he finds that much changed.  The storage warehouses are gone as cowhides are not a big business anymore and Steamers, not Sail Ships dot the harbor.

As a footnote to Dana’s adventures, his ship was captured by the Southern steamer “Alabama” on his return to the East Coast and he was a prisoner-of war for a short while.  Overall, “Two Years Before The Mast” is a fascinating window into a time of dramatic change in America and I thank Chuck for introducing me to the book.