At the back of the world

by George Pugh; Jennie Pugh

We arrived in Newcastle that evening and the barque was moored at Bullock Island Dyke. The following day the crew were paid off. None of us had any inclination to make another trip in the leaky old basket. A few days afterwards she was being overhauled for repairs when a discoloured patch was noticed under the spider band, on the main mast where the mizzin stay sets up. It was tested with a sheath-knife and found to be completely rotten. How it had stood the strain of that last trip was a mystery, for on the mast being condemned it was found unsafe even to lift it out whole, and it had to be cut in two for safety, and half of it hoisted out at one time, and a fine new pitch pine lower mast was put into its place before the vessel sailed again.

Now Newcastle, New South Wales, in those days was a busy thriving little seaport. The harbour was full of large sailing vessels, loading and waiting to load coal. They were bound, principally, for China, San Francisco, and Pacific coast ports. Very few of these ships had their full complement of seamen on board, for most of the sailors had deserted during the ship’s stay in port, and one could not blame them, when we consider that the pay in these ships from the British Isles was two pound ten shillings per month, and the poorest quality of food that it was possible for the ship-owner to buy, and then only just sufficient to keep body and soul together. The pay out of the Australian ports was five pound ten shillings for homeward bound ships, and seven pound per month in the coast and intercolonial trades, with a sufficiency of good, nourishing food. In addition to this, there was plenty of work to be found ashore, for the Queensland, Victorian, and South Australian gold fields were in full swing. The consequence was there was great difficulty in getting men for the ships when they were ready for sea.

Like most seaports in those days of sailing ships, the town was full of sailors’ boarding-houses. Their tactics and methods of procuring men were not such as could stand the light of day, but, nevertheless, they did a thriving business.

One of the most noted characters in the town was a boarding-house keeper, named Dan Slagan a thorough scoundrel to the backbone. He was notorious for the number of men he had “shanghaied” out of the port, but, strange to say, he had gained a certain amount of power in the town, and shipmasters requiring men were, under the circumstances, compelled to deal with him, although at the same time many of them had the utmost contempt for the fellow.

Slagan kept a low-class drinking saloon with a free-and-easy dancing-room attached to it. The boarders lived in the rooms overhead. This was the only dancing saloon in the town, and was thronged with sailors every night. Needless to say that the liquor sold there was vile stuff, but men who have been living for months on “salt horse” and weevily biscuit have very little taste left in their mouths, and, as long as the decoction was hot and came out of a bottle, it passed muster.

Slagan was an adept at drugging liquor, and he always kept materials at hand for that purpose. Just a little tobacco ash dropped in the glass when pouring out the drinks, and the thing was done. When he required a few sailors for a ship ready to sail, he picked out the likeliest men in the room—usually strangers—and when the seamen, hot and thirsty with dancing, ordered drinks through the women, who acted as waitresses, these Delilahs would bring the prepared stuff, and very soon the men would feel muddled and sleepy and would go into the side room and sink down on the benches. Slagan would then slip in among them:

“Halloa, mates! What’s the matter? Feel queer, eh? Ah, it’s the dancing and the hot weather. I’ll send you a good tot that will put you all right.” He would then send one of the girls in with a good glass of hot whisky, drugged, of course, and that would be all the men would know for some time. When they came to their senses they found themselves in a strange ship, out of sight of land, without a stitch of clothes beyond what they stood up in. Of course, there was generally a row, but it invariably ended in their turning to work and making the best of a bad bargain.

One day in February, 18—, it happened that there were three British ships lying at the buoys, loaded and ready to sail, but each in need of a few seamen to make up her complement. Not a man could be got at the shipping office for love or money—the news of a fresh gold field on the Barrington had reached Newcastle that morning, and all the disengaged had made tracks for that district, so the only possible way to get hands for the vessels ready to sail, was to obtain them from the ships that had lately arrived, and which would have some time to wait for a loading berth.

The captains of the ships at the buoys sent for Slagan, and arranged with him to supply them with four men each that night, as the trio would sail at the turn of the tide. When Slagan got back to shore he sent some of his runners to quietly let the crews of the ships in the harbour know there was to be a free concert and dance at his place, with plenty of whisky into the bargain.

When night came the saloon was packed with seamen, and among them six fine young American sailors from the ship “Jeremiah Crawford,” of New Bedford. Now, New Bedford ships are very often “family ships,” that is to say, the captain, officers, and seamen are related to each other. Of the six young fellows who went to this dance, two were nephews of the captain, one was a relative of the mate, and the others were related to members of the crew.