THE WOOD USED IN SHIP-BUILDING

One of the most important uses to which the island’s timber resources were put in the nineteenth century was the building of wooden sailing ships. The ship-building industry on the island developed as an offshoot of the trans- Atlantic timber trade: given the abundant supply of suitable ship timber on the island, a greater profit was to be had for British entrepreneurs (including both those moving to the island from Britain and those entering the industry on the island) by building the ship that carried the timber on the island, and then selling both the ship and its cargo after it arrived in Britain.670 The detailed chronology and the local geographic pattern of the ship—building industry on the island has been fully documented by De Jong and Moore (1994) in their Shipbuilding on Prince Edward Island. However, they give very little consideration to the role played by the island’s timber resources in supplying the industry, and even less to the effect that the industry had on the forests of the island. Because of limitations in the documentation, and also because there is much primary research yet to be done, firm conclusions on these topics are also beyond the reach of this report, although some general points will be made and some lines of possible research suggested.

The chronology of ship-building on the island — Figure 7 shows a gradual and irregular increase in the number of ships built on the island in the nineteenth century: from a very low level in 1800, when only three vessels were built, numbers rose to a peak in 1866, when 132 vessels comprising 33,186 tons were built.671 However, at almost regular intervals there were periods when the annual output fell due to economic factors external to the island, only to be eventually followed by a rise toa new high. A very high proportion of the vessels constructed on the island were built for sale — mostly in Great Britain, which throughout the period provided a market for vessels of all sizes. Also, up to the 18403, there was a market in Newfoundland for the smaller- sized vessels, i.e. schooners and brigantines. After the peak year of 1866 there was another depression in the ship market, which lasted about five years, followed by a rise to a second though

67° See Sager & Fischer (1986) for a review of the factors that led

to the establishment of a ship-building industry in Atlantic Canada.

671 In descending order of size, the 1866 output comprised one

ship, 8 barques, 25 brigs, 60 brigantines, and 38 schooners.

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lower peak in the 1870s, with a high of 89 vessels built in 1874, shortly after which the British market for wooden sailing ships collapsed completely. By 1880 annual production on the island fell to only 21 vessels most of which were schooners built for use in the local coasting trade. A major factor in this sudden collapse of the market were improvements made to the compound steam engine in 1865, which meant that wooden sailing ships were no longer able to compete economically in international trade with steam— powered vessels.672 Even so, in the fifty years before its collapse the industry had given a tremendous boost to the island’s economy, bringing in a large amount of money, some of which had worked its way down to the level of the working shipwright, as well as to tenant farmers and other landowners who cut and sold wood from their land to the builders.

Some of the comments recorded in the extracts included in this report give us glimpses of the ups and downs of the industry. From the 1770s onward there are the first mentions of the island’s potential to support a ship-building industry on account of the ready supply of suitable timber.673 Then, in the late 1790s and in the first decade of the nineteenth century we have comments indicating the beginnings of a small-scale industry, especially geared to the building of schooners for sale for the Newfoundland fishery.674 After that, further comments refer to the expansion of the industry (with occasional depressions), when, as each year passed, increasing numbers of vessels were built all over the island, many of them

672

Greenhill 1980, p. 32. See also Sager 8 Fischer (1986) (pp, 15-18) for other factors contributing to the decline.

673 DesBrisay (1770-1772) commented that there was "timber very fit to build vessels" (seemingly along the shores of Lot 33); [Clark] (1779) noted that “there is in every part of this island great quantities of valuable timber fit for building vessels", as well as “bays in every way convenient for building of Ships”; while [Cambridge] (1796?) also noted the presence of "good timber for ship-building". Two decades later, James B. Palmer (1815), as the agent for Lot 13, wrote to the landlord in England that the lot was “well calculated for ship building".

67‘ [Cambridge] (1796?) noted the presence of “a very few Shipwrights" on the island; Selkirk (1803) said that “many schooners [are] built in the Island [and] sold in Newfoundland“; Stewart (1806), that “a few people are engaged in ship-building which are generally sold in Newfoundland: this is a business which will probably be carried on to a great extent, should the Newfoundland fisheries revive on the restoration of the peace, as the great plenty of timber in several districts will enable us to build at a much cheaper rate, than they can do in Newfoundland." Also, Anon. (1808) said that ‘ship-builders‘ were one of the ‘pursuits‘ that would “answer well" on the island.