File:Bark HESPER, Port Townsend, July 6, 1898 (WAITE 149).jpeg

English: Notes in inventory: Port Townsend, Wash. Bark Hesper of San Francisco. Port Townsend in distance.

The wooden bark HESPER (603 tons) was built by Halls Brothers of Port Blakeley, Washington, in 1882 for the Pacific Coast "triangle" trade (lumber to Australia, coal to Hawaii and sugar to California). Her name often appeared in newspapers in connection with bloody reports of mutiny, brutality and barratry. Her greatest notoriety occurred in 1893 following a voyage from Newcastle in command of Capt. Sodergren, during which her Liverpool Irish second mate was murdered by a seaman wielding a galley hatchet. A famous trial ensued at San Francisco, and three of her crew were convicted of mutiny and one hanged. She ended her career in 1912 after a harrowing journey to Peru, where her crew mutinied and she sank in shallow water. After a short time, she broke up completely. [Source: Gordon Newell, ed., The H.W. McCurdy Marine History of the Pacific Northwest (Seattle: Superior Publishing Co., 1966)]

PH Coll 291.285

• Subjects (LCTGM): Bays (Bodies of water)--Washington (State); Cityscapes
• Subjects (LCSH): Hesper (Bark : San Francisco, Calif.); Barks (Sailing ships)--Washington (State)--Port Townsend; Port Townsend (Wash.)