Ship Electric Spark at the Chincha Islands

Photograph taken on board the clipper ship Electric Spark at the Chincha Islands. In this group are four Searsport ship masters with their wives and children: John Pendleton, William Blanchard, Albert Nickels, and Nathan Carver, whose ships were at the Chincha Islands at the time. All of these vessels would have been waiting to load guano, a wait that sometimes took weeks. The 1190 ton Electric Spark was built in Medford, Massachusetts in 1855. Her master, Medford's R.F. D. Candage is second from the left.