Sea Captains: San Francisco 1800s

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Captain Douglass Ottinger

Douglass Ottinger was captain of the United States Revenue Cutter Frolic between 1852 and 1853 along the Pacific Coast between Oregon and San Francisco. As such, he was up against aggressive waterfront villains, including sailor thieves.

May 20, 1852, Daily Alta California, San Francisco
Arrived. May 20. United States Revenue Cutter, Frolic, Douglas Ottinger, commander. Left San Diego May 7th. 

Daily Alta California, San Francisco, January 8, 1853 

OPERATIONS OF THE SAILOR THIEVES

REVENUE CUTTER FROLIC.--

The recent outrages committed by this combination of scoundrels are again calling the attention of the mercantile community to the subject. When our now flourishing and populous city first commenced its wondrous career, the shipping interest of foreign nations, as well as our own, was much injured by the operations of this gang of desperadoes: Their manner of acting and the object intended to be achieved by them was as follows:

San Francisco Bay. 1899.

The moment a ship comes into port, the gang visits her in boats, and the men are immediately incited to revolt. In some cases, they have broken in on the cargo. Masters of vessels have frequently found themselves abandoned by their crews, while the ship was in the stream, with sails hoisted and anchors at the cat heads. Several of our fine clipper ships were, on coming to this port, deserted in the manner above stated.

The Sword Fish, when she arrived, immediately sent to request protection from Capt. Ottinger of the revenue cutter Frolic, which was promptly afforded, Captain Ottinger himself going on board and staying there until the ship was moored alongside the wharf. She was the first vessel that kept her crew until those duties were performed. So bold and daring were they that they openly made threats to board land take the revenue cutter Frolic. Captain Ottinger immediately ordered the round shot to be drawn from the 32 and 12 pounders on board, and loaded them with canister. The guns were then depressed, so that the heavier ones should strike the water at seventy-five yards and the lighter at fifty; small arms were prepared, matches lit, and the crew kept at their quarters. The great pity was, that the scoundrels did not undertake to carry their threat into execution.

Several times Capt. Ottinger has been sent for to protect British vessels in their rights and has always afforded the protection demanded. On one occasion he boarded an English ship, which had been visited by these sailor thieves, and left the crew so panic stricken by their murderous threats, that, although willing to perform their duty, they had not the courage to lower their boats, when ordered to do so by their officers. Captain Ottinger established a code of signals, for both night and day, with the masters of merchant ships, which will at all times bring an armed boat from the cutter to their relief. By hoisting the colors in a "with" at the peak by day, or two lanterns about six feet apart, one under the other by night, captains can at any moment command such aid as they may desire. An offer is at all hours of the day and night on the deck of the cutter, and she is when in port, always anchored at some point which will afford a view of all parts of the harbor.

The combination of sailor thieves is formed for the purpose of plundering and robbing ship owners, by stealing their men from them after they are on board and have received their advance pay. The pay of seamen in California averages from thirty to forty dollars a month, two months wages being paid in advance. The men receive this, go on board, and the ship is streamed. During the night she is boarded by a gang of sailor thieves, who take the men away and convey them on shore to a new boarding house ready prepared for them, and they are as soon as possible re-shipped again, to be again stolen, thus carrying on one of the most nefarious systems of robbery that can be conceived. Not only do ship owners suffer from the actual loss of the money, but also, and sometimes much more, by the detention consequent upon shipping a new crew, and with no better prospects of keeping them than they had the first. The subject is one which has excited the attention of the foreign consuls in this city to a considerable extent, and is a fruitful source of much anxiety and pecuniary loss to our mercantile society. Some merchants, both in England and France, as well as in the Atlantic States, will not send their ships here for the very reasons above stated, and we are of opinion that the legislative powers of the proper authorities could be very usefully employed in furnishing a suitable remedy for this evil.

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The U.S. Coast Guard issues all Captain Licenses for U.S. Ports.
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