John Kendrick (1740–1794) was an American sea captain during the American Revolutionary War, and was involved in the exploration and maritime fur trading of the Pacific Northwest alongside his subordinate Robert Gray. He was the leader of the first US expedition to the Pacific Northwest. He is known for his role in the 1789 Nootka Crisis, having been present at Nootka Sound when the Spanish naval officer José Esteban Martínez seized several British ships belonging to a commercial enterprise owned by a partnership of companies under John Meares and Richard Cadman Etches. This incident nearly led to war between Britain and Spain and became the subject of lengthy investigations and diplomatic inquiries.
Kendrick was the first American to try to open trade with Japan. He began the Hawaiian sandalwood trade. He was killed during an exchange of cannon salutes with the ship Jackal when one of the cannons was loaded, purportedly by accident. John Kendrick was instrumental in pioneering trade in the Pacific Northwest, the Hawaiian Islands, and China, as well as helping the young United States establish itself as global trade power.Ridley (2010), pp. 368–369
Early life Kendrick was born in 1740 in what was then part of the Town of Harwich, Massachusetts (now Orleans, Massachusetts), on Cape Cod. He was the third of seven children of Solomon Kendrick (or Kenwick) and Elizabeth Atkins. His family name was originally spelled "Kenwrick", later "Kenwick" and "Kendrick".
John Kendrick came from a long family line of seamen. Solomon Kenrick, his father, was master of a whaling vessel. John began going to sea with his father by the time he was 14 years old. By his late teens he was sailing with crews out of Potonumecut (today part of Orleans). The Potonumecut area was home to remnant native tribes such as the Wampanoag. Kendrick's friendly relations with these natives later helped him forge friendships and alliances with native peoples in the Pacific Northwest, excepting the Haida chief Koyah.Ridley (2000), pp. 4, 89
At the age of 20, he joined a whaling crew, working on a schooner owned by Captain Bangs. In 1762, near the end of the French and Indian War, John Kendrick served under his cousin Jabez Snow, on a militia mission in the frontier of western New York. Like most Cape Codders of the time, he served for only eight months and did not re-enlist.
During the 1760s, John's father, Solomon, moved to Barrington, Nova Scotia. John stayed in Massachusetts, in Cape Cod and Boston, where an atmosphere of defiance and dissent was quickly growing during the early years of the American Revolution. There was widespread opposition to the Stamp Act of 1765 and the Townshend Acts of the late 1760s. John may have been involved in the boycotts of British goods, riots over British impressment of American sailors, and other rebellious acts such as unrest around the Boston Custom House which led to the 1770 Boston Massacre.
In late 1767, John Kendrick married Huldah Pease, who came from a seafaring family of Edgartown on Martha's Vineyard.
American Revolution Kendrick was one of the "Sons of Liberty" who, disguised as "Indians", participated in the Boston Tea Party on December 16, 1773. He was an ardent Patriot. During the American Revolutionary War he commanded the privateer Fanny (also known as the Boston), an eighteen-gun sloop of the Continental Navy with a crew of 104, which Kendrick converted into a brigantine. He was commissioned May 26, 1777. The Fanny targeted British shipping and captured a few vessels, which won Kendrick a degree of fame and wealth. In August, 1777, the Fanny and another privateer, General Mercer, captured two West Indiaman ships full of valuable cargo, the Hanover Planter and the Clarendon, after a battle with two 28-gun frigates. The captured ships were taken to Nantes in mid-August, 1777, causing an international stir. France had not yet joined the war and the prizes tested France's neutrality. The incident helped expedite France's decision to join the war against Britain. Kendrick returned home in the fall of 1778 a hero. With the prize money he had received from Louis XVI Kendrick bought a house, wharf, and store in Wareham, Massachusetts, and built the first public school there. He lived there with his family through the winter.
In early 1779, he sailed to war again in command of the privateer Count d’Estang, which he owned in partnership with Isaac Sears. In April, southwest of the Azores, he was captured by the 28-gun British ship Brutus and its 10-gun tender. Brutuss captain impressed most of Kendrick's crew, eventually releasing Kendrick and the remaining 30 men in a boat. They traveled to the Azores and then Lisbon. In June, 1779, Kendrick and his remaining crew traveled to France, and then returned to America with the French fleet. Shortly after returning to America, Kendrick sailed for the Caribbean in command of the Marianne, where he captured at least one more rich prize. He returned home once again shortly before the Franco-American victory at Yorktown in October 1781. By this time, he had fathered six children during his sporadic visits home. When the war ended in 1783, Kendrick returned to whaling and coastal shipping until he became commander of the first American ships of discovery.
Columbia Expedition
Not much is known about what happened to John Kendrick between the Revolution's end and his voyage to the Pacific Northwest. A syndicate led by Boston merchant Joseph Barrell financed the Columbia Expedition in 1787. The vessels included were the ship and the sloop .William Lytle Schurz asserts that John Kendrick served the Spanish on the Manila galleon which sailed between the Philippines and Acapulco (New Spain) by way of California, but in this Schurz has erred: it was the son, John Kendrick, Jr. aka Juan Kendrick who sailed between Manila and New Spain, and the ship wasn't the galleon, he sailed ships of the Spanish navy based at San Blas, which often accompanied galleons, and sometimes sailed Manila/San Blas on their own.
In 1787, command of the larger Columbia was given to Captain Kendrick, then 47 years old, and 32-year-old one-eyed Robert Gray was given Washington. Overall command of expedition was given to Kendrick. The combined crews of the two ships numbered about 40 men, most hailing from Cape Cod, Boston, Rhode Island, and the North Shore of Massachusetts. Many were veterans of the Revolutionary War.Ridley (2000), pp. 20–21
The first officer of the Columbia was Simeon Woodruff, the oldest man on the voyage. Woodruff had sailed as a gunner's mate with James Cook aboard the consort ship on his famous third voyage around the world. As such, Woodruff had already been to the Pacific Northwest, Hawaii, and China.
The second officer of Columbia was 25-year-old Joseph Ingraham, a veteran of the Massachusetts State Navy and POW during the Revolution. Later, Ingraham became captain of the , which sailed in 1790 to compete in the fur trade. Unlike Gray and Haswell, Ingraham was an admirer and supporter of Kendrick. Ingraham kept a journal of the voyage, but it has been lost. He wrote a separate journal describing Nootka Sound in 1789, which has survived.
The third officer of the Columbia was 19-year-old Robert Haswell, who kept an account of the voyage that came to serve as the main chronicle of the first two years. He also kept a journal during Gray's second voyage without Kendrick.
The first officer of the Lady Washington was Robert Davis Collidge. Kendrick also brought two of his sons: Eighteen year old John Kendrick Jr, as fifth officer of the Columbia, and sixteen year old Solomon Kendrick, as a common seaman.
Outward voyage 1787–1788 The Columbia Expedition set sail from Boston Harbor on the morning of October 1, 1787, after a brief party with family and friends. The vessels reached the Cape Verde Islands on November 9, where Simeon Woodruff, after a dispute with Kendrick, left Columbia and went onto the islands with all his baggage. Kendrick was unhappy with the way Columbia handled, and felt that the hold had not been well packed, which Woodruff had been responsible for. When Kendrick ordered the hold broken up and repacked, Woodruff refused to help and after continued bickering Kendrick removed Woodruff from his position as first officer, after which Woodruff opted to leave the expedition entirely.Ridley (2000), pp. 30–31 A Spanish captain passing by the islands offered to take Woodruff to Madeira. He eventually returned to America and lived in Connecticut most of the remainder of his life.
This incident deepened Haswell's dislike of Kendrick, as Haswell had been friendly with Woodruff and held him in high esteem. In his journal Haswell complained bitterly, describing Woodruff as "an officer under the Great Captain James Cook on his last Voyage". Haswell was mistaken: Woodruff was a gunner's mate under Cook, not an officer.Ridley (2000), p. 31
While at Cape Verde Kendrick unpacked and reorganized the hold of the Columbia, hoping to improve its handling under sail. The hold of Columbia contained most of the expedition's provisions for the next two years, as well as a large assortment of trade goods hoped to be useful for acquiring sea otter pelts on the Pacific Northwest coast. These trade goods included such things as tin mirrors, beads, calico, mouth harps, hunting knives, files, and bar metal that could be worked into chisels or other tools. Despite the reorganization of the hold, Columbia continued to handle poorly.Ridley (2000), pp. 25–26
Kendrick continued the journey on December 21, 1787, and reached Brett Harbour on Saunders Island in the western Falkland Islands on February 16, 1788. Here they collected water and made final preparations for the voyage around Cape Horn.
While sailing to the Falklands tensions between Kendrick and Haswell increased. One day Haswell struck a sailor named Otis Liscomb, who had failed to respond to Haswell's order to come on deck. When Kendrick saw Liscomb's bloody face he became angry and slapped Haswell and had him removed from his cabin to the common quarters. Haswell requested that Kendrick let him leave the expedition and Kendrick agreed, saying he could take the next vessel they encountered. But no other ship appeared. At the Falkland Islands Haswell was transferred from Columbia to Washington to serve under Gray. Haswell's dislike for Kendrick and Gray's ambition to be free from Kendrick's overall command reinforced one another.Ridley (2000), p. 32
Kendrick considered wintering in the Atlantic, but decided to leave the Falklands on February 28, 1788. They sailed south toward Cape Horn. Five days later they passed Isla de los Estados (Staten Island), the eastern extremity of Tierra del Fuego. A storm was approaching from the west. Kendrick continued south, trying to skirt the edge of the storm. Other ships had escaped storms near Cape Horn by sailing farther south, a plan that Kendrick used. He evaded the worst of the storm by sailing to nearly 62° south latitude, about south of Cape Horn. Through March the ships struggled through cold and heavy weather, dealing with frost, sleet, twenty foot swells, high winds, and icebergs. About a month later William Bligh tried rounding Cape Horn in but was forced back.Ridley (2000), pp. 26–30
On March 22, the ships were about south-southwest of Cape Horn. They had passed west of the cape and so changed course toward the northwest. But during the night of April 1 the winds shifted, indicating dangerous weather. Kendrick had the Columbia adjust course in an attempt to race ahead. A signal gun was fired and the Washington followed. But in the morning light, with the storm still approaching, the two ships had lost sight of each other. Over three more days of heavy seas and blizzard-like conditions, they were entirely lost to one another. The Columbia, badly damaged, was driven back eastward, while the crew made what repairs they could.