198 THE AMERICAN WHALEMAN 



ship Awashonksy of Falmouth, was attacked by a group of 

 natives who had come aboard on a "friendly" visit. The 

 result was a bloody fray in which the decks were cleared only 

 after several members of the crew and a number of attackers 

 had been killed. 



But savage hostility was most feared in case of shipwreck. 

 Seamen who contrived to escape from a wreck, only to be cast 

 upon unfriendly shores, were sometimes led to consider for- 

 tune's smile a sneer. For their reception often resulted in 

 death, torture, or a period of captivity which continued for 

 years. The mere titles of the occasional records of such ex- 

 periences strongly suggest the strange, barbaric sufferings. 

 Witness one account, published in Boston in 1836, which was 

 entitled: "A Narrative of the Shipwreck, Captivity, and Suf- 

 ferings of Horace Holden and Benj. H. Nutej who were cast 

 away in the American ship Mentor, on the Pelew Islands, in 

 the year 1832." 



With mutiny the list of whaling misadventures described 

 a full circle. Such uprisings were brought about either through 

 half-justifiable resentment wrought by inhuman treatment 

 and unbearable conditions, or through the machinations of the 

 criminal and irresponsible individuals often found in whaling 

 crews. During one voyage, for example, the captain and 

 mates had been unreasonable in their demands, which were 

 stubbornly resisted by the crew. At length the men became 

 mutinous. Upon arriving at Payta, they drove overboard a 

 number of Spanish soldiers who had been sent on board to 

 furl the sails and to deal with the mutineers, and then left 

 the ship in a body. So strongly did the seamen from all the 

 other vessels in the harbor sympathize with the deserters that 

 the authorities dared not arrest themj and in the end the cap- 

 tain was compelled to ship a new crew. 



The mutiny on board the ship Junior, which took place on 

 Christmas night, 1857, "^^s far more tragic and bloodthirsty. 

 Shortly after midnight five members of the crew, headed by 

 a certain Cyrus Plummer, crept into the cabin and attacked 

 the sleeping occupants with guns and whaling weapons. All 

 of the officers were brutally murdered except the first mate, 

 who, though seriously wounded, managed to escape into the 



