78 The Story of the New England Whalers 



one. Aug. 6th, Spoke with John Clasbery; he 

 had got 105 barrels; told us Seth Folger had got 

 150 barrels; spoke with two Nantucket men; 

 they had got one whale between them; they 

 told us that Jenkins & Dunham had got four 

 whales between them." 



The whale ships often cruised in pairs, work- 

 ing as partners. The vessels were then small, 

 and carried only one whale boat each. A single 

 whale-boat crew could and did kill many a whale; 

 but with two whale boats working together to 

 kill a whale, the chances of success were more 

 than doubled. Moreover, if the first boat to 

 strike a whale happened to be crushed by the 

 whale, the second boat would be at hand to rescue 

 the crew. The crew of a boat working alone 

 had to wait for the ship to come to the rescue. 



There is no record of a crew of a whale boat 

 being lost at that time through working alone, 

 but there are tales of tragedies among the whalers 

 from Buzzard's Bay. Thus in 1764, Jonathan 

 Negers, of Dartmouth, was so badly hurt when 

 a whale struck his boat that he died a few days 

 later. No details of the event are given. A 



