In
the summer of 1886, the ship returned to New England. After a
cruise to the Gulf Stream Slope in July, Baird assigned the Albatross
to investigate possible uncharted shoals near the cod and
halibut banks off Nova Scotia and Newfoundland. Those banks were
not confirmed. In September and October 1886, the Albatross
deployed from Woods Hole to once again explore the deep waters
stretching seaward of the Continental Shelf. Research stations
were established in waters as deep as 1,867 fathoms where Zera
Tanner reported that a “vast amount of material” was
collected. The ship returned to the Washington Navy Yard in late
October (Tanner, 1888:622–623, 668; USFC, 1892: xi–xii).
Figure 16. - Interior of the pilot house, steam steering
room.
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Another event in 1886 had a major impact on the future of the
Albatross. In obtaining Congressional approval for the
Albatross 5 years earlier, Spencer Baird specified that
his ship could be useful in expanding American fisheries in the
Pacific, as well as in the Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico. Following
up on this suggestion, the Commissioner requested funds for the
ship’s transfer to the U.S. west coast, especially to study
the area from “California northward to Alaska,” where
Baird noted that the fisheries were almost “totally undeveloped.”
Congress approved this proposal in August 1886. At the same time,
Congressional funds were provided for the replacement of the defective
boilers that had plagued Commander Tanner and his crew since 1883
(U.S. Congress, 1887:2, 23).
The Albatross remained in a prolonged repair status throughout
the first 9 months of 1887 in preparation for her cruise to the
Pacific. The ship was at the Washington Navy Yard until May when
she shifted to the Columbian Iron Works in Baltimore for the boiler
work. The ship’s naval engineer, George W. Baird, personally
designed the replacement boilers and supervised their installation.
The challenges so often involved in ship maintenance are revealed
in Engineer Baird’s official report. He was deeply frustrated
when the Columbian Iron Works took twice as long as originally
estimated to complete its job. The engineer’s anxiety was
heightened by the tense labor relations at the shipyard. The unionized
Columbian Iron Works workers, resentful that naval crew members
undertook some of the work associated with the installation of
the new boilers, constantly threatened to strike. Nevertheless,
a work stoppage was avoided, and to Engineer Baird's intense relief,
in September 1887 the boilers were finally in place and tested
(16).
One month earlier, Spencer Baird had died in Woods Hole, and in
November 1887, the Albatross took her own departure from
the Atlantic. In a 7-month, 16,000-mile voyage, she sailed from
Norfolk, Va., cruised down the South American east coast, transited
the Straits of Magellan, shaped a northerly course for the Galapagos
Islands, and finally reached her destination in San Francisco,
Calif., on 11 May 1888.
It is fitting that, during her long transoceanic voyage, this
pioneering research vessel carried a scientific party led by Leslie
A. Lee, who, with his associates, established more than 125 dredgeing
and hydrographic stations (Hedgepeth, 1945:18). This work was
a preamble to the distinquished scientific contributions made
by the ship in the Pacific Ocean for the next 30 years.
After being taken over by the Navy during the Spanish American
War and again in War World I, the Albatross once again
served as a research vessel in the Caribbean and Atlantic until
finally decommissioned in 1921; Mooney (1991:135-138) provides
an overall history of the Albatross.
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