Otter (1795 ship)

For other ships with the same name, see Otter (ship).
History
United States
NameOtter
OwnerCaptain Ebenezer Dorr was owner and captain[1]
BuilderAmesbury, Massachusetts[2]
Launched1795[2]
In service1795-1798
FateCaptured by French and lost in 1798[3]
General characteristics [2]
Tons burthen168 (bm)
Length77 ft (23.5 m)
Beam22 ft 5 in (6.8 m)
Depth11 ft (3.4 m)
PropulsionSail
Complement14-31 men[4]
Armament6 guns
NotesThree masts & two decks

Otter was a maritime fur trading vessel. Between 1795 and 1798 it visited the Pacific. It was most famous for the rescue of Thomas Muir, a famous Scottish political exile.

Muir was convicted of sedition before the High Court of Justiciary at Edinburgh in 1793. He was sentenced and transported to the convict settlement at Sydney Cove for the space of fourteen years on 31 August 1793.[5]

Otter, commanded by Capt. Ebenezer Dorr, was fitted out at Boston, and despatched for Sydney. The Boston register of clearances, Treasury Department archives, dates her clearance 20 August 1795.[6] She anchored in Sydney Harbour on 25 January 1796.[5] On 11 February 1796, Muir escaped from the convict settlement on board Otter.[7][8]

Captain Dorr took Muir and other escaped political prisoners onboard and sailed to the Pacific Northwest Coast. There the Otter cruised for furs in the spring and summer of 1796.[3] Some sources say that the ship struck a chain of sunken rocks near Nootka Sound, on the west coast of North America, and was wrecked. Every person on board perished except Mr. Muir and two sailors.[1] This is unlikely. Other reliable sources state that when Muir parted from Otter at Nootka in June 1796, Otter continued north to Bucareli Bay, on the west of Prince of Wales Island and then sailed into the harbor of Monterey on 29 October 1796, the first United States vessel to enter a Californian port.[6]

The voyage of Otter across the Pacific was famously chronicled by Pierre François Péron.[9]

  1. ^ a b Bret Harte (1917). Overland monthly, and Out west magazine, Volume 70. Overland Monthly. p. 38. Retrieved 31 July 2010.
  2. ^ a b c Earnshaw (1959), p.83.
  3. ^ a b Malloy, Mary (1998). "Boston Men" on the Northwest Coast: The American Maritime Fur Trade 1788-1844. Limestone Press. ISBN 978-1-895901-18-4. Retrieved 22 August 2017.
  4. ^ Cite error: The named reference Ogden2 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  5. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference Notes and Queries was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  6. ^ a b Cite error: The named reference Odyssey was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  7. ^ George Pratt Insh (April 1951). The Voyage of the Otter, 1795-1797. Vol. 67. Scottish Geographical Journal. pp. 10–19. doi:10.1080/00369225108735469. {{cite book}}: |work= ignored (help)
  8. ^ Dorr, Ebenezer (September 14, 1791 – March 2, 1792). A Journal of a Voyage from Boston round the World (Ebenezer Dorr Papers). Burton Historical Collection (Detroit Library). John Carter Brown Library, (Providence, RI).
  9. ^ Cite error: The named reference Capitane Peron was invoked but never defined (see the help page).