Saturday Snippet: Desperate men seeking brides

 

As part of my ongoing research for future books (in this case, the Annals of Ash), I've been looking into the history of mail-order brides in the far West.  Sadly, there seems to be very little authentic, accurate historical material available in modern reference works.  The vast (overwhelming!) majority of books out there appear to be romance novels on the subject, most of which are (from a factual and literary perspective) pure trash.  I'm thoroughly unimpressed.

However, there are contemporary accounts that sometimes make me laugh out loud.  Some are described in an article from "Canada's History", published in 2016.  I was sufficiently amused that I thought you might enjoy part of it this morning, instead of an excerpt from a book.  Here goes!

CRINOLINE CARGO

The arrival in 1862 of a ship full of single women eased the hearts of British Columbia’s lovesick bachelors — and lined the pockets of B.C.’s future premier.

* * * * *

“The girls are coming! The girls are coming! They'll be here any day!” So screamed the headlines of Victoria's British Colonist in September of 1862. The Tynemouth, forever after known as the “bride ship” was on its way. For Colonist publisher Amor De Cosmos — a man with a strong sense of the ridiculous who would eventually go on to become British Columbia's second premier — it was a perfect opportunity to attract male readers, not to mention advertisers.

The situation was this: To the horror of the British government, Queen Victoria, and the Anglican Church, the glittering-with-gold valleys of the mighty Fraser River were home to 30,000 people, of whom very few were women, or British, for that matter. Most were single, young American men drawn in by the gold rush. How to make them British? Thus the gift they were about to receive from London — a cargo of sixty young women from Britain.

Organized by the Columbia Emigration Society under the auspices of the Anglican Church, this was not the first shipment of brides to the nascent colony. At around the same time the Tynemouth was on its way from Britain, the Seaman's Bride, a ship from Australia with about twenty women on board destined for Victoria, docked at San Francisco. “And what did the young Yankees do?” De Cosmos complained in the Colonist. “Alas! They captured the affections of the girls.... The vessel came on to this port (Victoria) without even a petticoat aboard to delight the eyes and cheer the palpitating hearts of the Victorians.”

De Cosmos’s interest in the bride ship may not have been simply commercial. The Nova-Scotia-born future politician, whose original name was William Alexander Smith, had a keen interest in unifying what were then two British Crown colonies — one on Vancouver Island and one on mainland British Columbia — as well as the other British North American colonies, and joining them into a single nation. At the time, Americans dominated the West Coast colonies, and some saw it as inevitable that the United States would eventually take over the region. De Cosmos, a smart, dapper, if eccentric man, who stood out for always being well-dressed, perhaps perceived the introduction of the British women as one way of turning back that tide.

Vancouver Island’s stricken lonely hearts were in an uproar when the California bachelors raided the Seaman's Bride. Undaunted, De Cosmos tried to keep the fires burning until the next bride ship was expected to arrive. To titillate his male readers, the editor ran sentimental love poems and such lurid stories as, “A Mysterious Queen of Fashion,” stirring the minds of prospective suitors to the glories awaiting them “Trying on a Hoop Skirt” had a blushing young male clerk outwitted by a beautiful lady desiring to try on a fashionable underskirt. The salacious tale ended with the clerk discovering that instead of retiring to “rearrange her toilette,” the lady had made off with the merchandise.

De Cosmos also regaled his male readers with advice on choosing a bride. Beware, he wrote, “the girl with a romantic confidence in her Cinderella-like destiny,” who didn't appreciate “steady, good-looking, industrious young men.” Shouldn't she instead “anticipate marriage with one in the humbler walk of life?” No doubt his humbler readers agreed.

De Cosmos finally had some good news to report when, on September 11, 1862, the Colonist announced:

The Tynemouth's Invoice of Young Ladies: The screw steamer Tynemouth, from London, with sixty young ladies aboard, should be here in a few days, and bachelors both young and old must prepare to give fitting reception. A general holiday should be proclaimed; all the bunting waved from flagstaffs; salutes fired from Beacon Hill; clean shirts and suits of good clothes brought into requisition, and every preparation made to give this precious “invoice” a warm welcome. We are sorry to say that the Tynemouth will stop at San Francisco on her way up. ... The Immigration Board should send an agent to San Francisco to prevent “desertions” while the Tynemouth lies at that port.

The men of the colony were abuzz with anticipation. Was it true? Were they really coming? On September 17, De Cosmos's Colonist passed on more hot news from San Francisco:

The Tynemouth at San Francisco: How many hearts will beat with pleasure as this paragraph reaches their eyes, we do not dare think; but we are sure that pleasurable emotions will pervade every bachelor heart in the “great” metropolis when we state that the good steamer Tynemouth, with sixty select bundles of crinoline, arrived at San Francisco on the 10th... and was to sail in a few days for this port with her precious freight — that is, if the Yankees don't steal their affections. The local editor of the San Francisco Herald must himself have been smitten with the fair damsels, to judge from the following: “Colonization of British Columbia'... their rosy cheeks and embonpoint [full-figured bodies] show that they will be valuable accessions to the Colony.”

Next morning’s Colonist reported: “The ship had left San Francisco on the 12th... and is now fully due here.” And, De Cosmos noted in a column, “She was very fast — steaming at fifteen miles an hour.” He added, “It may be consoling to those of our citizens who have expressed a fear that the young women might be stolen by the Californians, that they are under the charge of an agent, whose duty it is to see that they do not leave the vessel.”

De Cosmos, however, had been fooled. The ship had in fact arrived the previous night and was anchored a few kilometres away in Esquimalt Harbour.

On September 20, the Colonist made the official announcement:

Arrival of the Tynemouth: This fine, iron steamship... cast anchor in Esquimalt harbour at 8 o'clock [the] night before last. As a matter of course, we went aboard the steamer yesterday morning and had a good look at the lady passengers. They are mostly cleanly, well-built, pretty-looking young women — ages varying from fourteen to an uncertain figure; a few are young widows who have seen better days. Most appear to have been well raised and generally they seem a superior lot to the women usually met with on emigrant vessels. Taken altogether, we are highly pleased with the appearance of the “invoice,” and believe that they will give a good account of themselves in whatever station of life they may be called to fill.

Bedlam erupted at the news of the ship’s arrival. Anything that floated was hired to get eager young swains out to the ship. Others, said the Colonist “...toiled along primitive roads to the port, hacking miles through the heat and dust… arrayed in their best, down to polished shoes and delicately perfumed handkerchiefs.”

For the next few days, De Cosmos gleefully reported on the antics. Hoping to inspect the ship’s “lovely freight,” some respectable notables “hove in sight.” Despite their “protestations of honorable intentions,” the newspaper reported, the boatload found the gangplank pulled up against them, and were forced to return to shore “like baffled birds of prey.” Chortled De Cosmos in a column: “A large number of citizens visited Esquimalt ... and were generally ordered off and returned from their fruitless errand with heavy hearts.”

It had not, however, been fruitless for the newspaper. Eager advertisers bought space to promote products for the lovelorn. A large ad for toiletries suggested, among other delights, “Essence Jockey Club” for men, a product called “Kiss Quick,” and de rigueur castor oil pomade for gentlemen’s hair. Other advertisers bypassed the courtship stage altogether and went directly to flogging crockery and blankets.

. . .

Some days after the women’s arrival, the Colonist reported a “SHOCKING DEPRAVITY” — apparently two clergymen and a naval officer had made “a melancholy discovery.” They had come across one of the girls in the act! She was talking through the barracks fence — to a man!

In his newspaper, De Cosmos warned: “What will become of a young lady who exhibits such extreme depravity ... who would allow ... converse with that most dangerous of all animals — a young man. ...To guard against a repetition ... we respectfully recommend a file of marines drawn from among the oldest men ... with especial reference to their ugliness, be stationed around the barracks in future with strict instructions to bayonet every young man who may have the audacity to approach.”

There's more at the link.  It highlights the very, very different moral standards and relationship styles in force more than a century and a half ago.

Peter