An Arctic Whaling Journal of 1791

• Published in: Polar Record
• Main Author: Savours, Ann
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: English
• Published: Cambridge University Press (CUP) 1959
• Subjects: General Earth and Planetary Sciences; Ecology; Geography, Planning and Development; Arctic; Greenland; Kerr; Greenland Sea; Polar Record; Spitsbergen
• Online Access: http://dx.doi.org/10.1017/s0032247400066717; https://www.cambridge.org/core/services/aop-cambridge-core/content/view/S0032247400066717

In 1956 the University Library of Aberdeen acquired a journal written by one George Kerr, surgeon aboard the Aberdeen whaling ship Christian , during a voyage to the whale fisheries in the Greenland Sea, west and north-west of Spitsbergen. The voyage, which was in 1791, took them as far north as lat. 81° N. The journal is seventy-nine pages long, on quarto-sized paper, and written in brown ink in a good, clear hand. A number of whalers' log books exist, recording winds and tides and noting extraordinary events, there are also published memoirs covering several voyages or giving a picture of whaling in general—like William Scoresby's book which includes an exciting narrative of the voyage of the Esk , under his command, to Spitsbergen waters, and of her preservation under most difficult circumstances. Kerr's journal is a spirited day-to-day account of an eventful though profitless voyage—the ship returning “clean” with no catch.