Unidentified New York ship chandlery daybooks

Daybooks kept by an unidentified ship chandler from New York City, 1811-1815. Entries include the names of ships outfitted and firms dealt with as well as a rather comprehensive list of commodities and prices. An estimate of this particular business would be difficult to make, for no summary of profit and loss seems to have ever been made; and all purchases, sales, receipts, payments, loans and merchandise borrowed are a series of detached chronological entries.

Some famous customers of this firm were Messrs. Fulton and Livingston, who bought cables for their steamships; and the United States government, which purchased (July 12, 1814) cables and hawsers for the ship Man of War for $770.39. "Purchase price to the dealer as well as unit and extended price to the customers may be ascertained for such articles as: Russian hemp ($300 per ton), duck, spun yarn (Scotch thrum), tar, pitch, rosin, turpentine, white lead, varnish, black paint, hooks, needles, thimbles, lanterns, signals, ensigns, utensils (iron spoons, ladles, pans), tinder box flints, hand pumps, anchors, cables, hawsers, wooden compass, harpoons, marlin spikes, caulking irons, Quaker guns, black jacks and sperm oil.