John R. Jewitt
John Rodgers Jewitt (21 May 1783 – 7 January 1821) was an English armourer who entered the historical record with his memoirs about the 28 months he spent as an enslaved captive of Maquinna of the Nuu-chah-nulth (Nootka) people on what is now the British Columbia Coast.
The memoir, according to the Dictionary of Canadian Biography, is a major source of information about the indigenous peoples of the Pacific Northwest Coast.
Accordingly, from the age of 12, John attended an academy at Donington in Lincolnshire that provided an "education superior to that which is to be obtained in a common school" (p. 6).
After two years, his father withdrew him from school in order to apprentice him to a surgeon at Reasby, in the neighbourhood of the great traveller and naturalist Sir Joseph Banks.
About a year later (c. 1798) the family moved to Hull, then one of the main ports and trading centres of Britain, where the Jewitt business picked up a lot of custom from the ships.
Jewitt read the voyages of explorers such as Captain Cook and became acquainted with sailors; both of these sources of stories made him wish to travel.
The crew, tired of subsisting on salt meat, caught porpoises, which they called "herring hogs" (p. 19), and sharks, which they considered fishes.
Maquinna allowed Jewitt to undertake other work when not employed by him, and he used this privilege to make bracelets, fish-hooks, and so on, to trade with the chiefs of the village and other visitors.
He explains the household implements (baskets, bags), simple furniture (wooden boxes, tubs, trays) and food, describing it as constantly either feasting or fasting.
Jewitt had metal cooking pots from the ship, but was forbidden from preparing his own food—Maquinna insisted that his captives lived and ate as the Nootka did (p. 51), i.e. boiling and steaming their food (p. 69).
Jewitt found a box of chocolate and a case of port wine (p. 47) from the ship's stores, which gave him much comfort, as the Nootka did not like these delicacies, although they did appreciate molasses, rum, and other spirits.
The men became completely intoxicated when they had access to alcohol, but the women drank only water (p. 48), and Jewitt feared for his safety when his captors were drunk.
Pages of the memoir are devoted to descriptions of activities such as music, dance, and song (which was used to keep time in their ocean paddling); hospitality and gift-giving (the famous potlatch); their customs regarding sex, cleanliness, illness, healing, and death; system of government and punishments; religious beliefs and ceremonies (including the treatment of the parents of twins); and even the manner of sitting and eating.
Jewitt introduced a new sort of harpoon, enabling more successful whale hunts, and various other weapons and implements that Maquinna reserved to himself as king.
Jewitt gives a thorough description of the village of Nootka in Friendly Cove, the appearance and construction of the longhouses, and the geography of the surrounding terrain (starting p. 59).
The Spanish had occupied the area a generation before, forced the people to migrate a few miles away, and built a garrison called Fort San Miguel.
Jewitt spent the spring and summer at that village, the autumn (beginning of September to end of December) at Tashees, ideally situated for the salmon, and the midwinter months at Coopte, 15 miles (24 km) nearer Nootka, for herring and sprat fishing.
Both Captain Barclay and a later British ethnologist in the mid-19th century reported meeting older witnesses who said Jewitt had been involved in a very passionate love affair with the daughter of a neighbouring chief.
Jewitt resented the imposition of this dress code, finding the loose, untailored garments very cold, and attributed to them a subsequent illness of which he almost died.
Jewitt wrote a letter of rather different meaning, asking the captain to hold Maquinna securely, and expressing the hope that he and Thompson would then be free within hours.
When Jewitt got on board the Lydia he looked very wild, painted red and black, wrapped in a bear skin and with green leaves through his topknot.
Jewitt negotiated for the return of what property remained of the Boston: its cannons, anchors, and remnants of its cargo, and especially the ship's papers, which he had secured in a chest all those years ago.
The Lydia left China in February 1807 and 114 days later was in Boston, USA, to Jewitt's huge relief, where he found a letter from his stepmother congratulating him on his escape.
This material, combined with his earlier and more terse Journal, culminated in the 1815 publication of A Narrative of the Adventures and Sufferings of John R. Jewitt, only survivor of the crew of the ship Boston, during a captivity of nearly three years among the savages of Nootka Sound: with an account of the manners, mode of living, and religious opinions of the natives.
