19th Century Cork Sutton Mariners, Sailing Ships and Crews

by a steamship (this Appendix: Sirius ). Engineering refinements led to the high-pressure triple expansion engines of the late 1880s, which were ten times more fuel efficient, nullifying the cargo advantage of the sailing ship (Greenhill 1980). Prior to that time steamships achieved much success on the shorter cross-channel routes.

Medical Profession

( Nineteenth-century Cork Sutton mariners )

While Captain George Sutton (b.1804) had mariner grandchildren: three Suttons and Captain Robert Reynolds b.1854, a greater number of his descendants were associated with medical practice. Dr Robert Vincent Sutton (b.1862), Dr Joseph William Sutton (b.1874) and Dr William Vincent Sutton (b.1879) were brothers who each spent some time in Newport, Wales. Another brother, John Sutton (b.1865), died while in medical school. Dr Charles Sutton b.1870 and Dr Abraham George Sutton (b.1872) were brothers who remained in Cork, but Charles died at an early age, while Abraham practiced at the Fever Hospital in Cork. Dr Daniel Michael Donovan (b.1877), son of Margaret Sutton (b.1848) practiced at the North Infirmary in Cork. Elizabeth Gertrude Sutton (b.1881) married Dr William Irwin (b.1881) of Limerick and they too moved to Newport. John Frederick Sutton (b.1877) became a chemist and opened a pharmacy in St Pancras, London.

Murder at Sea

( Mary Russell )

Mary Russell was infamous for the murders at sea of seven crewmen by the acutely psychotic Captain William Stewart, en route from Barbadoes to Cork with sugar, in May 1828. Captain Callender of the Mary Stubbs , an American schooner trading between Barbadoes and Belfast, spotted a distress signal 300 miles out from Cove and on boarding the Mary Russell , found the captain behaving bizarrely, claiming to have averted a mutiny, and the bodies of seven mariners tied up in the captain’s cab in with heads stove in from a crowbar. On arrival in Cove Captain Raynes, a Lower Harbour Master, discovered that his brother, Captain James Gould Raynes, was one of the victims. Daniel O’Connell was engaged for the prosecution but was unable to appear on that day. Captain Stewart had always been considered a gentle soul and a verdict of ‘ Guilty but Insane ’ was returned; he lived for another forty-five years in an asylum and in a mostly coherent state. However, in a less coherent moment he did kill an asylum attendant (many sources exist for further information). Another Captain Raynes, Henry C Raynes of the next generation, would become the Cork Harbour Master on the retirement of Captain Thomas Tooker Clarke in 1873 and on his death in January 1877 he would be replaced by Captain Edward Byrne (b.1817, Dundalk).

Naval Stores

( Reward )

Resin, or crude turpentine (the sap from pine trees), is the raw material from which naval stores are produced. The term originated from their use by the British Navy in the construction of wooden sailing ships in colonial times and included turpentine, rosin, pine tar and pitch. Turpentine was used for paints, varnishes and wood preservatives, rosin as a wood sealant, pine tar as a preservative for sailing ship ropes and for caulking when mixed with hemp or jute fibre and pitch.

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