Silks, Velvets and Spices

Extract

The papers of “Israel Thorndike, Esq.” are the first manuscript collection arranged and mounted by Baker Library. They are fragmentary first hand tales of shipwrecks; of the capture and imprisonment of sailors and sea captains; of trading meat, metals and upland cotton for silks and spices (these were the early days of the American pepper trade), by bright, vivid young captains and supercargoes who were virtually agents of a wealthy house, and whose reports of the market and conditions in foreign seaport towns were a valuable portion of America's knowledge of foreign economic and political affairs.