The Bark Canoes and Skin Boats of North America

by Tappan Adney; Howard Irving Chapelle

John Gay, a member of the Company of Newfoundland Plantation, wrote in 1612 that Beothuk canoes were about 20 feet long and 4½ feet wide "in the middle and aloft," that the ribs were like laths, and that the birch-bark cover was sewn with roots. The canoes carried four persons and weighed less than a hundredweight. They had a short, light staff set in each end by which the canoes could be lifted ashore. "In the middle the canoa is higher a great deale, than at the bowe and quarter." He also says of their cross section: "They be all bearing from the keel to portlesse, not with any circular, but with a straight, line."

Joann de Laet, writing about 1633, speaks of the crescent shape of the canoes, of their "sharp keel" and need of ballast to keep them upright; he also states that the canoes were not over 20 feet long and could carry up to five persons.

The most complete description of the Beothuk canoe was in the manuscript of Lt. John Cartwright, R.N., who was on the coast of Newfoundland in 1767-1768 as Lieutenant of H.B.M. Ship Guernsey. However, some portions are either in error or the description was over-simplified. For example, Cartwright says that the gunwales were formed with a distinct angle made by joining two lengths of the main gunwale members at the elevated middle of the sheer. This hardly seems correct since such a connection would not produce the rigidity that such structural parts require, given the methods used by Indians to build bark canoes. The three grave models show that the sheer was actually curved along its elevated middle. It is possible that Cartwright saw a damaged canoe in which the lashings of the scarf of the gunwales had slackened so that the line of sheer "broke" there. Cartwright is perhaps misleading in his description of the rocker of the keel as being "nearly, if not exactly, the half of an ellipse, longitudinally divided." The models show the keel to have been straight along the length of the canoe and turned up sharply at the ends to form bow and stern. Cartwright also states the keel piece was "about the size of the handle of a common hatchet" amidships, or perhaps 1 inch thick and 1½ inches wide, and tapered toward the ends, which were about ¾ inch wide and about equally thick. The height of the sheer amidships was perhaps two-thirds the height of the ends.

Figure 86

A 15-Foot Beothuk Canoe of Newfoundland with 42½-inch beam, inside measurement, turned on side for use as a camp. It gives headroom clearance of about 3 feet, double that of an 18-foot Malecite canoe with high ends. When the ends were not high enough to provide maximum clearance, small upright sticks were lashed to bow and stern. The shape of the gunwales would permit the canoe to be heeled to an angle (more than 35°) which would swamp a canoe of ordinary sheer and depth. (Sketch by Adney.)

Nearly all observers, Cartwright included, noted the almost perfect V-form cross section of these canoes, with the apexes rounded off slightly and the wings slightly curved. From an interpretation of Cartwright's statements, it appears that after the bark cover had been laced to the gunwales, the latter were forced apart to insert the thwarts, as in some western Indian canoe-building techniques. The three thwarts are described as being about two fingers in width and depth. It is stated that the gunwales were made up of an inner and outer member and all were scarfed in the middle to taper each way toward the ends, the outer member serving as an outwale or guard. Cartwright also states that the inside of the bark cover was "lined" with "sticks" 2 or 3 inches broad, cut flat and thin. He refers also to others of the same sort which served as "timbers" so he is describing both the sheathing and the ribs as being 2 or 3 inches wide. He does not say how the thwarts were fitted to the gunwales, how high the ends were, how the ends of the gunwales were formed, nor does he give any details of the sewing used. However, the grave models suggest the form of sewing probably used and the approximate proportions of sheer.

An old settler told James Howley that the Beothuk canoes could be "folded together like a purse." Considering the construction required in birch-bark canoes, this is manifestly impossible; perhaps what the settler had seen was a canoe in construction with the bark secured to shaped gunwales, ready for the latter to be sprung apart by thwarts, as in opening a purse. Howley also obtained from a man who had seen Beothuk canoes a sketch which shows a straight keel and peaked ends, confirmed in all respects by the grave models or toys.

The toy canoes so often referred to here were found by Samuel Coffin in an Indian burial cave on a small island in Pilley's Tickle, Notre Dame Bay (on the east coast of Newfoundland), in 1869. Among the graves in the cave, one of a child, evidently a boy, was found to contain a wooden image of a boy, toy bows and arrows, two toy canoes and a fragment of a third, packages of food, and some red ochre. With one of the canoes was a fragment of a miniature paddle. One of the canoes was 32 inches long, height of ends 8 inches, height of side amidships 6 inches, straight portion of keel 26 inches and beam 7 inches, as shown by Howley.