Technology and the end of the old system of whaling

From the 1903 fishing season, Lubbock writes:

"The truth was that the old system of whaling from boats was past, being replaced by the modern one of small powerful steamers with harpoon guns in their bows. These had been invented and brought to perfection by the Norwegians. The Norwegian steamers did not attempt to penetrate the ice, but fished in the open sea, and even the fastest, strongest blue whale, the largest and most powerful mammal in the world, could not contend against their bomb guns." (p. 443)

In the final paragraph of his book, Lubbock places modern whaling in perspective from its origins:

"Though there is still much hardship to be faced in the whaling trade, the thrill of the fight is no longer enhanced by the leviathan's threat to the life and limb of his attacker. Science has taken the romance out of the old fishing and made it into an abominable slaughter, which the old-timer must view not only with amazement but with a very considerable amount of contempt. But the age is a scientific one, and the human being tends more and more to become just a cog in the machinery. However, the one law of life that even Einstein cannot get away with is that the old must make way for the new: in the words of the sea shanty, life is a case of "Get up, Jack, let John sit down." (p. 453)

From "The Arctic Whalers" by Basil Lubbock

The 1890s: Expanding the hunt to any species that offered any value

In his book 'The Arctic Whalers' Basil Lubbock uses the logs of whaling vessels to describe the hardships, adventures, and varying catches of whaling from the late 1700s through the early 20th c. The conclusions that Lubbock draws from his research draw a clear picture about Arctic whaling. The weather made the hunt highly variable, and even in the earliest whaling logs, some ships came home 'clean,' having caught not a single whale. Secondly, the "prodigious slaughter" of such whales, especially in their calving grounds led to the decline and disappearance of the Greenland whale from the historical fishing grounds where whalers knew to find them. Advances in technology, such as the introduction of steam powered whaling ships, the reinforcement of hulls for penetrating ice, and rocket- or gunpowder-powered harpoons all increased what was soon becoming an ever dwindling catch. By the 1890s whales were scarce and whalers increasingly turned to other arctic species, from seals and walruses to reindeer, beluga, and even bottlenose dolphins, many of which were hunted for pelts or for their blubber, which was boiled down into oil.

This slaughter of Arctic species may have had an adverse effect upon Eskimo communities native to these arctic regions and dependent upon some of the same animals for food and materials. The introduction of novel infections, through close contact, and the wholesale destruction of the food web, perhaps may have caused local extinctions of Eskimo communities. As this description demonstrates:

"Again this year, a number of dead Eskimos were discovered; the mate of the Terra Nova came across about 30 skeletons in Dexterity Bay, the women and children lying separate to the men, alongside of whom lay their fishing and hunting gear, while the children's toys and tiny weapons were beside their bodies" (p. 421). 

The expansion of arctic hunting and the institutional momentum defined by ship investments, a specially trained labor force, and markets where arctic oil, pelts, and ivory provided a perennial demand ensured that whaling expeditions would turn a profit by hook or by crook.

Lubbock writes:

"At the beginning of the 'nineties a new form of whaling had been started at Whangamumu in the Bay of Islands, New Zealand. This was the netting of humpbacks, caught passing north between May and August, and south between October and December" (p. 431). 

The 1896 fishing season reveals this from the whaling logs: "Captain Milne, seeing no chance of whales, made up a cargo of anything he could catch, his total bag being 1 whale, 5 narwhals, 21 walruses, 37 bears, 74 seals, 20 reindeer and 3 wolves. The Esquimaux returned with 80 seals, 21 walrus, 12 bears and 2 narwhals, and the Nova Zembla managed to kill 2 small whales. The Alert brought back 45 tons of whale oil, 45 cwts. of bone and 20 tons of seal oil, the produce of 3 good whales and 3890 seals" (pp. 432-433).

As with whaling, many years of sealing, in addition to weather-based catastrophes, led to diminished numbers of seals. The whalers turned to walruses, or 'sea horses.'

Lubbock writes:

It may be asked why this sudden rush to kill sea-horses The answer is a curious one: the hides of the walrus were selling at 1/6 per pound to the makers of bicycles; that is to say, the best bull hides, which were much thicker than those of the females and young. Walrus tusks were fetching 2/6 per pound, and the oil about £18 per ton.' (p. 434).

One can attest to how markets defined what was worthy of hunting and even then the margins were slim. But in economic terms, whaling vessels, harpoons, and skilled seamen and hunters were all durable investments wanting of the opportunity to return year after year for what could be gotten. But the salad days of large whale catches, equally large bonuses, and short seasons were all but over. Instead, whaling had to expand its opportunities to what in the arctic could fetch money in European and American markets. When the whaling or sealing was poor anything went.

"Though 12 Norweigans and 2 Dundee ships, the Polar Star and Balaena, went to the Greenland sealing, the days of this trade were nearly finished, the two Dundee vessels failing to kill 1000 seals between them. Both ships went on to the whaling, but not a single fish was seen. Captain Davidson of the Polar Star gave up the whaling in June, and headed up the Greenland coast in search of walrus, going as far as Lat. 74° N. Besides killing 70 old walrus bulls, Davidson had a very successful musk ox hunting, his bag being 24 head. In these days, when the musk ox was becoming scarce, it is interesting to read that large herds were seen browsing on the main land, most of those killed being straggling animals found on the islands and the shore of the mainland." (p. 435)

Lubbock solidifies this point in writing:

"After bagging 10 musk ox, Robertson sailed for Davis Straits, where he killed 2 whales off Coutts Inlet, the Balaena returning with a cargo of 3 whales, 7 walrus, 3 narwhals, 11 bears and 10 musk oxen. It will be noticed from these different cargoes that the whaling captains were doing their best to make up for the difficulty in killing whales by turning every mammal, bird and fish in the Arctic to account" (pp. 437-438). 

Once, again, the expansion of markets led to a spike in the price of oil, which encouraged more expeditions to the arctic in search of whatever species could offer its blubber for it. Lubbock writes of the 1900 fishing season:

"Owing to a new market for oil being found in Italy, the price of that commodity had increased to £23 per ton. During the past ten years, 2,442,125 seals had been taken off Newfoundland by 181 steamers, but this does not represent anything like the total number of seals slaughtered, for there was tremendous wastage of seals killed and afterwards lost on the ice. Besides this, the sailing fleet of stout-hearted Newfoundland schooners accounted for a large total, reckoned at about 10,000 seals in 1900; then, again, the sealing from the shores of Newfoundland and Labrador also took toll of the seals. When, in addition to this slaughter, one remembers the numbers which had been killed at the Greenland fishing, it is surprising that the seals still seemed to be as plentiful as ever." (p. 438)

The Fishing Season 1892: The demise of the Biscay right whale and the hunt of a blue whale

"Though the Greenland whale was scarcer and harder to catch every year, it is interesting to note that the Norwegians had been killing a few of the almost extinct Biscay right whales during the past year or two to the southward of Iceland. In 1889, 1 was caught; in 1890 6; and in 1891, 10. During 1892, every whaler was on the lookout for them, but none were seen, and it seemed likely that the Norwegians had killed off the only school in existence.

Discouraged by their want of success in the Arctic, the four Dundee whalers, Active, Balaena, Diana, and Polar Star, sailed in September, 1892, for the Antarctic in search of the southern right whale, but their voyage was an absolute failure, and they had to cut their loss by filling up with seals. Their most interesting adventure was the Active's endeavour to kill a blue whale. The fish towed the whaler and her three boats, with 6 lines out, for 14 hours; the ship then put her engines astern and the lines broke."  (p. 426)

From The Arctic Whalers by Basil Lubbock

Of note in this passage is a reference to the enterprise of whaling and how it spawned various other arctic expeditions. Some led to better mapping and naturalistic examination of the Arctic landscape. Some led to the expansion of the hunt to include seals, porpoises, bears, foxes, narwhal, and beluga as the correct, or 'right,' whales were all hunted to scarce enough numbers to make whaling for them alone a financial loss. The majority of Arctic produce was the blubber found on the various large mammals there, which was boiled down into oil. In addition, some were also hunted for their beautiful white skin, in the case of the beluga, or pelts, in the case of walruses, seals, bears, and foxes. Finally, their bone, chiefly the whale's baleen and jaw bone, the walruses' tusk, and the narwhal's 'unicorn' were all prized by markets in Europe eager to turn these into various fine and useful products for homes that could afford them.

The fishing season 1891: Speculation about the over-hunting of a species

"By this date, Peterhead owners were seriously losing heart in the Greenland fishery. What few whales were seen had become so wild that it was almost impossible to approach them, and it was contended that the noise of the screw could be heard by whales for a tremendous distance and gave ample warning" (p. 423).

One could surmise that several hundred years of hunting a large cetacean had thinned the numbers of the breeding population that were less likely to startle awake and flee while being hunted. Likewise, those that were relatively calm in demeanor among a population that had no real predator at adult size other than the newly arrived whalers were the first among this population to perish as were those whales that chose to bask in the open, away from floes. Contrast that to the one instance of the 'unsuspicious fish' that circled a whaling vessel a few times and even nudged it along as if it were a fellow whale before being harpooned point-blank. The rare few in a Greenland whale population that could be perceived as its ambassadors among humans, those that felt no fear or animosity toward them, were the first to perish as they were the easiest to harpoon, flench, boil down, and sell to markets in Europe and the Americas in the form of oil and baleen products.

Quote above from The Arctic Whalers by Basil Lubbock

An account of stalking a Greenland whale

From the 1889 fishing season:

"Most of the Greenland whales were caught near a very large floe; one of these, which was harpooned by Mr. Robert Gray, the eldest son and chief officer of Captain David Gray, was seen from the crow's nest of the Eclipse, about a mile away with only its crown and part of its back showing--it was fast asleep. The boat pulled up behind it as quietly as possible and, when near enough, was allowed to drift silently upon the whale, and Mr. Gray did not fire until the boat was over the whale's tail with its bow almost touching its back. This whale had over 10 ft. of bone" (p. 421).

From The Arctic Whalers by Basil Lubbock

The Fishing Season, 1888: How Belugas were slaughtered

"The black and white whales were caught in Prince Regent Inlet, the latter in Elwin Bay. The lancing of white whales as the tide receded was exciting work, for the fish lashed out violently with their tails in their struggles to get afloat, and threw the mud and water in every direction, whilst the men, waist deep in the churned-up sea, plied their lances wildly" (p. 420)

As a note of reference the black and white whales, also called "swordfish" or "grampus" by some whalers, were Orcas or Killer Whales, the chief predators of the Beluga whale. Whaling vessels would often take note of these pods as indication that they were hunting Beluga and follow signs to find similar pods of distressed Belugas chased into a sound or against a beach. Captain Adams gives the following account to the Zoologist:

The white whale is very shy and easily scared, quick in its movements, and very keen-sighted; it is consequently very difficult to capture in deep water. It is generally taken in the shallow bays after the ice breaks away from the land. The grampus is a great enemy of the white whale, and great numbers of the latter are found driven by them into the shallows. The fishermen are on the watch for such a chance, and when it occurs all boats are sent in pursuit; they are placed in a cordon around a school of fish, the boats being about equal distance apart and to the seaward of the fish; the boats gradually advance, driving the fish on shore at the most convenient place they can. When tide recedes the white whales are left aground, or nearly so, and then the slaughter commences, the men jumping into the shallow water and dispatching the fish with lances. Sometimes the fish turn and make a desperate rush seaward, great numbers escaping. Nets have occasionally been used in endeavouring to enclose the fish, but I cannot say that on the whole the use of nets has been a success. It has sometimes helped to secure a good result, but at other times the fish in a rush seaward have carried nets and all before them. (p. 414)

Furthermore, Lubbock writes:

"White whales feed on the salmon and, when they followed them up narrow fiords, it was sometimes possible to net the entrance behind them. A white whale drive was a noisy affair, with much firing of rifles and beating of tin cans. It took place at high water, so that the ebbing tide should strand the scared whales. Their value consisted mostly in their skins, which were worth about 1/6 per lb., and when dressed were sold as porpoise hide. From 6 to 7 of these whales boiled a ton of oil." (p. 414)

 From The Arctic Whalers by Basil Lubbock

Disasters among foreign ships at the sealing in the Arctic

"There were some terrible disasters amongst foreign ships during the sealing, and the Orion discovered 70 men frozen dead upon the ice, the crews of a foreign barque and brig, which had been wrecked. These men were all upon one piece of ice, and as they had died the survivors had piled up the bodies to make a breakwater on the weather side of the ice to prevent the sea from breaking over them. In this way a solid wall of dead men, cemented together by the frost, was made, behind which only two or three men were found to be still living.

The three Hull brigs, Germanica, Hebe and Violet, were all stove in and wrecked in the ice this year at the sealing. The Violet previously rescued a Dane, who was found on a piece of ice with a piggin hoisted on a boat hook as a distress signal beside him. He was found on his hands and knees, almost frozen stiff and unable to speak, whilst laid out alongside him, were five dead shipmates. These man had lost their ship in a gale. The surgeon was compelled to amputate both the Dane's legs, but he only lived for another six weeks." (p. 360)

From The Arctic Whales by Basil Lubbock