Chesapeake Bay Pirates & the 19th Century Oyster Wars

08/23/21 • 33 min

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In Chesapeake Bay in the late 19th century, oyster harvesting was a big business. There were so many oyster harvesters harvesting so many oysters that the legislatures of Maryland and Virginia had to start regulating who could harvest oysters and how they could do so. Creating the regulations was the easy part; enforcing them was much harder. The illegal harvesting of oysters by oyster pirates continued, even after the creation of the Maryland State Oyster Police Force in 1868 and a similar force in Virginia in 1884.

The first of the Oyster Wars was in Virginia in 1882 when Governor William E. Cameron himself joined the expedition to raid the pirates. The first raid was a success, but Cameron quickly learned that pirates wouldn’t stay defeated for long, and the oyster wars continued. By the late 1880s the Oyster Wars turned deadly.

The Oyster Wars remained an important part of Chesapeake Bay history all the way until the “official” end of the Oyster Wars in 1959, although even that may have not truly been the end.

In this episode, Kelly briefly tells the story of the Oyster Wars and (with a little help from her son, Arthur, interviews Jamie Goodall, author of Pirates of the Chesapeake Bay: From the Colonial Era to the Oyster Wars.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. Episode image: “The oyster war in Chesapeake Bay,” Drawing by Schell and Hogan. Harper's Weekly, Mar. 1, 1884, p. 136. Library of Congress.

Sources:

Pirates of the Chesapeake Bay: From the Colonial Era to the Oyster Wars by Jamie L. H. Goodall
National Geographic Pirates: Shipwrecks, Conquests & Legacy by Jamie L. H. Goodall
The Oyster Wars of Chesapeake Bay by John R Wennersten
The daily dispatch. (Richmond, VA), 04 March 1883. Library of Congress.
"Oyster Wars," Baltimore Sun, February 10, 2015.
Oyster Question: Scientists, Watermen, and the Maryland Chesapeake Bay Since 1880 by Christine Keiner
"An Evolving Force: Natural Resources Police Celebrates 150th Anniversary," Maryland Department of Natural Resources, March 30, 2018.
“Landscapes of Resistance: A View of the Nineteenth-Century Chesapeake Bay Oyster Fishery” by Bradford Botwick and Debra A. McClane. Historical Archaeology, vol. 39, no. 3, 2005, pp. 94–112.

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The Oyster Wars remained an important part of Chesapeake Bay history all the way until the “official” end of the Oyster Wars in 1959, although even that may have not truly been the end.

Sources:

Pirates of the Chesapeake Bay: From the Colonial Era to the Oyster Wars by Jamie L. H. Goodall
National Geographic Pirates: Shipwrecks, Conquests & Legacy by Jamie L. H. Goodall
The Oyster Wars of Chesapeake Bay by John R Wennersten
The daily dispatch. (Richmond, VA), 04 March 1883. Library of Congress.
"Oyster Wars," Baltimore Sun, February 10, 2015.
Oyster Question: Scientists, Watermen, and the Maryland Chesapeake Bay Since 1880 by Christine Keiner
"An Evolving Force: Natural Resources Police Celebrates 150th Anniversary," Maryland Department of Natural Resources, March 30, 2018.
“Landscapes of Resistance: A View of the Nineteenth-Century Chesapeake Bay Oyster Fishery” by Bradford Botwick and Debra A. McClane. Historical Archaeology, vol. 39, no. 3, 2005, pp. 94–112.

Advertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brands

Previous Episode

Prohibition in the 1850s

Popular depictions of prohibition in the United States usually show the speakeasies, bootleggers, flappers, and bathtub gin of the Roaring Twenties, but earlier attempts at prohibition stretch back far into the 19th century.

In 1851, Maine passed the first statewide prohibition law, and 12 other states quickly followed as temperance societies preached the evils of alcohol. Anti-prohibitionists, especially liquor dealers and hotel owners, decried the “tyranny of the majority” and fought back with their own PR campaigns and legal challenges.

Many of the methods that the anti-prohibitionists used and that were used by other moral minorities of the day (such as those fighting against Sunday Laws and those working toward racial equality) were precursors to the methods used in the Civil Rights Movement in the 20th century.

In this episode, Kelly briefly tells the story of the 1850s Maine Laws and interviews Kyle Volk, Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of HIstory at the University of Montana, and author of Moral Minorities and the Making of American Democracy, which discusses these early attempts at prohibition.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. Episode image: “The drunkard's children. A sequel to The bottle” by George Cruikshank, 1848, Wellcome Collection.

Sources:

Moral Minorities and the Making of American Democracy by Kyle Volk, 2017
“When Maine went dry,” by Kelly Bouchard, Portland Press Herald, October 2, 2011
The Maine Liquor Law: Its Origin, History, and Results, Including a Life of Hon. Neal Dow by Henry Stephen Clubb, 1856.
“Throwback Thursday: Maine Becomes the First State to Outlaw Alcohol,” by Madline Bilis, Boston Magazine, June 2, 2016
“What if the Fourth of July were dry?” by Kyle Volk, Oxford University Press Blog, July 4, 2014
An inquiry into the effects of ardent spirits upon the human body and mind: with an account of the means of preventing, and of the remedies for curing them by Benjamin Rush, 1784.

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Next Episode

Phrenology & Crime in 19th Century America

In Nineteenth Century America there was a strong reformist push to know and improve the self. One key tactic Americans used to learn more about themselves was phrenological readings. They would pay practical phrenologists, like Orson Squire Fowler and his younger brother, Lorenzo Niles Fowler for readings of their skulls or their children’s skulls.

In Lorenzo Fowler’s reading of Emily Sawyer, he concluded a thirteen-page analysis by saying: “Cultivate as much as you can the organs marked smallest in your Chart + properly guide and exercise the stronger ones + thus produce a harmony of mental and physical action.” By using the phrenological readings of themselves or their children, Nineteenth Century Americans could apply the advice to become the best version of themselves.

Practical phrenologists weren’t interested only in reform of the self, but in larger societal reform as well. For practical phrenologists, prisons were the site of both research and reform; they argued for the elimination of capital punishment and the reform of prisons to include re-education instead of punishment.

Despite the reform impulse of phrenologists, phrenology was also used as a scientific reason to justify racism and gender stereotyping. American phrenologists were sympathetic to liberal causes including the antislavery movement, even while claiming the superiority of the European brain.

By the early 20th century phrenology had been largely discredited in the public, but some of the concepts of phrenology, including propensities and physical localization in the brain of different characteristics have persisted.

In this episode, Kelly briefly tells the story of phrenology in 19th Century America and interviews Courtney Thompson, Assistant Professor of History at Mississippi State University, and author of the February 2021 book, An Organ of Murder: Crime, Violence, and Phrenology in Nineteenth-Century America.

Our theme song is Frogs Legs Rag, composed by James Scott and performed by Kevin MacLeod, licensed under Creative Commons. Episode image: “A head marked with images representing the phrenological faculties, with a key below. Coloured wood engraving, ca. 1845, after H. Bushea and O.S. Fowler.” Wellcome Collection. Public Domain.

Sources: