Background

John Codman was born on October 16, 1814 in Dorchester, Massachusetts, United States. He was the son of John and Mary (Wheelwright) Codman. His father, son of a prosperous Boston merchant of the same name, was pastor of the Second Parish in Dorchester from 1808 till his death in 1847 and a sturdy upholder of the old orthodoxy against Unitarians and other schismatics. His hospitable mansion was a favorite gathering place for clergymen, who would stop there on their way to Boston and furnish the children of the family with an extensive though disorderly theological education by arguing doctrinal questions hot and heavy from dinner till bedtime, the while making devastating inroads into their host’s supplies of rum and smoking tobacco. To them young Codman listened with interest, but with even more interest to the reminiscences of his maternal grandfather, a Newburyport sea captain.

Education

John studied at Amherst College from 1832 to 1834.

Career

About 1834 Codman went to sea in a clipper ship. His nautical career lasted till the close of the Civil War. He made numerous trips to China and the East Indies, during the Crimean War commanded the William Penn, which carried troops from Constantinople to the Crimea, and during the Civil War was captain of the Quaker City, which transported stores to Port Royal, South Carolina. Once, when his ship had been run down in mid-ocean by a larger vessel, he nevertheless succeeded in bringing his command safely to New York; for this feat the underwriters presented him with a silver service.

In December 1864 he took the steamer Cotopaxi to Rio de Janeiro and sold her to the Brazilian government. The next year he returned to Brazil and for a few months engaged in the coastwise trade. He died at his daughter’s home in Boston after a short illness.

Achievements

• John Codman was best known for his writings. He wrote vigorous English, his books being Sailors’ Life and Sailors’ Yarns (1847), "By Captain Ringbolt, ” Ten Months in Brasil (1867), The Round Trip (1879), describing a tour of the western states, Winter Sketches from the Saddle (1888), and An American Transport in the Crimean War (1896). He was also the author of numerous pamphlets in favor of free ships and shipbuilders’ materials and against subsidies for the merchant marine.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Free Ships the Restoration of the American Carrying Trade

    (This collection of literature attempts to compile many of...)

  • Sailors' life and sailors' yarns

    (This book was originally published prior to 1923, and rep...)

  • Winter Sketches From the Saddle

    ( This work has been selected by scholars as being cultur...)

  • The Round Trip: By Way Of Panama Through California, Oregon, Nevada, Utah, Idaho, And Colorado

    ( This work has been selected by scholars as being cultur...)

  • Ten Months in Brazil

    (In the XIX Century, in a world without Internet, radio or...)

  • AN AMERICAN TRANSPORT IN THE CRIMEAN WAR (New Edition)

Interests

• Throughout his active life John was an enthusiastic horseman, sometimes traveling from Boston to New York on horseback. At one time he owned a ranch in Idaho.

Connections

Codman married Anna Day of New York on November 03, 1847.

Father:

John Codman

Mother:

Mary (Wheelwright) Codman

Spouse:

Anna Day

References

• A Herman Melville Encyclopedia:
• Good old Dorchester. A Narrative History of the Town, 1630-1893