Description
Quartermaster and commissary clerk Charles W. Moss intended to keep a daily diary aboard the British cattle steamer Lennox,
under contract to the United States to transport 457 horses from Portland, Oregon to Manila Bay, Philippine Islands, from
8 March through 19 May 1900. He writes with the intention that his diary will be read by others, so he addresses his unseen
reader. He begins with handwritten entries in a bound ledger with numbered pages, but switches to pasted-in typewritten pages
after hitting open seas. Moss, who hailed immediately from New York City and originally from Clinton, Kentucky, describes
his sailing companions (p.13); the captain calling attention to a "lunar rain-bow" (a "moonbow" or "white rainbow", p.15);
vaccination of the entire crew against smallpox (p. 18); being compelled to take mustard plasters for his head-ache and neuralgia
(p.19); settling accounts for his government transport ship (p.36); fretting about how to pay men who lost a day's possible
labor by crossing the "Meridian Line" (International Date Line) (p.41-43); and eventually-futile efforts to save a single
ailing horse and thus set a record buy delivering a cargo of horses intact and healthy (p.38). Other crew include Captain
Butt, Dr. J. ("Jay Gould") McOwen, veterinary surgeon; Dr. John P. Kelley ("The Dr."), assistant surgeon, U.S. Army; and John
H. ("Bronco John") Sullivan, also called the "Freak" and the "Wonder", in charge of the transportation of the horses and men
attending them, a teller of tall tales. Moss reports arriving at "Hilo, Hawaiian Islands, U.S.A." on March 23rd to disembark
and rest the horses and replenish water and fresh food; he traces a map of the island from sailing master Captain Williamson's
chart and labels volcanoes, lava courses, and sugar mills; 9 "Kodaks" from the layover are laid-in. The Lennox arrived in
Manila Bay on April 19; the diary concludes with an entry on May 19, summarizing the previous month's activities. The diary
describes a voyage of 7,300 miles with calm seas, no storms, no accidents, and no other vessels sighted at sea.
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