The Whaleman and Other Sea-Songs: New Bedford History

Scarce pamphlet, large grey cover with black writing, staplebound. Contents: Photo of Spollon, Intro, photo of the statue, The Whaleman, and 13 other poems. Published as a souvenir for the 1913 unveiling of the statue of the Whaleman on the grounds of the Free Public Library to the City of New Bedford, on June 20, 1913. Illustrates the power of poetry. In 1903 Spollon published the poem 'The Whaleman' in the Boston magazine 'Fiber and Fabric', first suggesting the Whaleman statue: 'Yet I heartily wish his old shape could be seen, In marble or bronze, mounted here on the green...For in this town he'll soon be a stranger.' Though a popular idea, the city of New Bedford had other priorities for its expenditures. In 1913 private citizen William W. Crapo commissioned and donated the statue to New Bedford.
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World War II Naval History: The Altmark Incident

Altmark (Captain Heinrich Dau) was assigned to support Admiral Graf Spee during her raid in the South Atlantic between September and December 1939. Seamen rescued from the ships sunk by Admiral Graf Spee were transferred to Altmark. After Admiral Graf Spee was scuttled by her crew in the Río de la Plata in December 1939, Altmark attempted to return to Germany, steaming around the north of Great Britain and then within the Norwegian littoral. On 14 February 1940 Altmark, proceeding south within Norwegian territorial waters, was discovered by three British Lockheed Hudson Mk.II's, from RAF Thornaby and pursued by several British destroyers led by HMS Cossack. Late on 16 February 1940 in Jøssingfjord she was fired upon while the Norwegian Navy stood by and took no action save for raising a protest flag. The German tanker then received a boarding party from HMS Cossack. During an attempted escape across the ice, seven of the Altmark crew were shot down. During the skirmish Altmark was run on to the rocks. It had been the British intention to tow the ship back to a Scottish port, but the damage to the tanker's stern frustrated this idea. An attack by one belligerent upon its enemy in neutral waters is a breach of neutrality, in this case a breach of Norwegian neutrality by Britain. Because Hitler feared Norway would be insufficiently resolute to protect the German iron-ore traffic that passed legitimately along the Norwegian littoral, at Raeder's urging he decided on the invasion of Norway and Denmark in March 1940. The British justification for the attack on the Altmark was set out in a Note to the Norwegian Government from Foreign Secretary Lord Halifax dated 10 March 1940. The problem the British Government faced was the wording of The Hague Convention XIII of 1907 to which it was a signatory. Article 10 provides that: "The neutrality of a Power is not affected by the mere passage through its territorial waters of warships or prizes belonging to belligerents." This meant that the Altmark was within its rights to sail through Norwegian waters with prisoners aboard providing that it did not come to a protracted stop longer than 24 hours. In the diplomatic letter, the British Government confirmed that it was not contrary to the law of neutrality to sail a prison ship through neutral waters, and Britain often did this herself. In fact the British complaint had nothing to do with the prisoners. Altmark was a Fleet tanker assimilated to a warship and was proceeding to Germany from the Atlantic by the north-about route. Instead of sailing down the North Sea as he would do in peacetime, the master of the Altmark had elected to sail the entire leg of the voyage southwards within Norwegian territorial waters in order to attract immunity from attack there under international law. There was no other reason for him to want to voyage through waters so dangerous to navigation. This must be an abuse of international law, and since the Norwegians had declined to stop the voyage the Royal Navy had done so on orders from the British Admiralty. The question remains unresolved to this day as to whether, as the Hague Conventions stood in 1940, a warship could legitimately seek immunity from attack in neutral waters by widely varying its course to reach them.

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Fly Fishing in Maine

 Usually in a modern book, a gift note to a previous owner is considered a negative if the writer is not associated with the publishing of the book. However sometimes a gift note is so excellent that it actually enhances a book. Such is the case with the following prose poem:

"Christmas 1981

To Jack-
    It is December and the snow lies cold upon the fields. The wind roars through the pines and whistles around the corners of the house. It is time to put on another log and inch closer to the wood stove.
    But the eye of the mind sees what is hidden from the other senses. It sees the morning mist lifting from the quiet surface of a stream meandering through the back country of Maine. A canoe makes a sharp turn around an oxbow, heading upstream to where the water makes music on the hidden rocks. The man sitting in the stern thrusts his paddle deep into the water, holding the canoe on line just opposite an undercut bank overhung with bushes. The man in the bow lifts his flyrod. Line shoots back, forward, back, forward, and with the final thrust of the rod, a Royal Coachman lights easily upon the surface. A splash. A flash of yellow. A rod tip dancing in the morning light.
    The snow lies upon the grass, and icy pellets clatter against the window panes. But the heart is not hostage to the weather,nor to the calendar nor the clock.

P.S.  - I'll paddle first, and after the first fish we'll switch off...

                                                                                                      Lamar"

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While Cataloging: Finding the Author of a Poem

Posted: 26 Feb 2011

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While cataloging a children's book I noticed a fairly long gift notation on the front flypage. It is a rather nice poem:

                                                                         February 17, 1968
To XXX X XXXX:

              I cannot count the stars....
                                         nor touch them..
                 but in the magic of the night
                       I feel their calm and glory..
              The rhythm of the rolling waves...
                    winds that whistle  ...  roar  ...
                                            and whisper .....
                    are part of one great harmony
                          that plays within my heart...
               Swallows sweeping through the air ..
                    fireflies twinkling in the twilight ..
                        are all this soul of mine desires
                            to keep it dreaming ...
                                           dreams ......

                                      With Special Love
                                            XXXX X XXXX

Being naturally inquisitive, I wondered if this writer actually was the author of the poem, or was just quoting it. So I went to Google with the most distinctive line ("fireflies twinkling in the twilight") and got only 3 relevant results,  all containing this poem, but none mentioning the author:

1.) A 2001 Adirondack Youth Camp Newsletter
2.) A 2004 Blog for a Senior English class where a student posts this poem in the "Share your writing" section.
3.) A 2009 posting in a rural life forum by a man from Northern Ontario. He said "But those aren,t my words, just some notes i was sent,,,"

No help there. But the senior English student had also posted another "Share your writing" sample:

The woods stood shimmering ----- a delicate fantasy
---- The wind was still
The air was warm
A great phenomenon of life took place
The day the leaves came out…….

Google quickly revealed the author of this new snippet is actually Gwen Frostic. And analyzing the writing style of several Frostic poems proves she is the unmistakable author of the first poem! The presentation note in the book was merely quoting her.

Henry Mirrisa, TheBookScene.com

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A Bibliophile's Poem: Robert Louis Stevenson

Posted: 26 Feb 2011

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This is a poem found anonymously handwritten on a slip of paper in a turn-of-the-century book. Perhaps original and unpublished since my research cannot locate it anywhere:

Dingy was the book-stall
There in Holborn town;
All was rust and moth and dust,
Cobwebs hanging down.
In the darksome passage,
Dreary as a tomb,
From the frame, the sun in vain
Strove to quell the gloom;
Till the bookman's gentle voice
Sounded in my ear,
"Robert Louis Stevenson
Used to come in here."

All radiant was the book-stall
There in Holborn town;
Sunny breeze from summer seas
Swept the cobwebs down,
Filled the darksome passage
With sweet scent of bloom,
Charm and grace transformed the place
To a splendid room,
Garnished fit for king or queen
Princess or chevalier,
For the bookman's gentle voice
Had sounded in my ear,
"Robert Louis Stevenson
Used to come in here."

Henry Mirrisa, TheBookScene.com

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