This document states that the shipping agent is providing "Five hundred Chinese emigrants all being in very good health and condition" and that he is not being responsible for the mortality."
A daily log of the voyage of 500 indentured Chinese laborers aboard the ship Forest Eagle, was kept by John O. Shaw. As “Coolie Master,” his sole charge was to prevent revolution and disease at sea among the Chinese emigrants.
Note: “Coolie” is a derogatory and dated term that now is considered a racial slur.
Chinese export ceramic tea bowl and saucer, with scalloped blue and white border and enameled decoration. Design has Mandarin man and his lady at the tea table and a boy at the window.
Chinese tea box, decorated with two horses on front. Bottom reads "Per Mails Steamer, Choicest Specialty Selected First Crop Lap Sang Souchong." By the time this tea was exported, the fastest way to get tea from China was by fast steamship, the same steamship that carried the mail. The days of racing to England with the fresh tea crop under sail were gone.
The Belle of Bath was launched in May, 1877 in Bath, Maine, by Goss & Sawyer; 1418 tons; length 203.9 ft, beam 39 ft., depth 24.3 ft. She was built for Parker M. Whitmore et al. and sold to Searsport parties in 1883 for $47,500. She was destroyed by fire in June, 1897, while bound from New York to Hong Kong loaded with case oil (kerosene). The Belle of Bath was captained by William G. Nichols and Henry G. Curtis of Searsport. This painting, done by an unknown Chinese artist, was given to Penobscot Marine Museum by the Nichols family.
