John Mashow

OBMG honored John Mashow (1805-1893) in 2004. He was born to a slave mother and rice planter father in South Carolina. He was the first black man to establish a prominent ship building business in the 1830’s.

Somehow, he found his way out of slavery and made his way to Massachusetts. There, in 1818, he apprenticed to a local shipbuilder, Laban Thacher, a master shipbuilder in New Bedford.

At 21, he found a partner and went into business for himself. In 1851, he began building whaling ships.

The names of John Mashow’s vessels are part of maritime history. They include the Cape Horn Pigeon, The Morning Light, the Sea Queen, the A.R. Tucker, the Benjamin Tucker, the Elliot C. Cowden, and the Matilda Sear. He built a total of 15 whaling ships until 1857, when his last ship was built. He designed over 100 vessels and supervised the construction of over 60 between 1831 and 1860. About one third of the ships he built were ships that cruised the world in pursuit of whales.

Shipbuilders in those days usually retained, as partial payment, a share in the vessels they built. By doing so Mashow not only became a successful businessman but a wealthy one as well. Records show that Mashow held shares in at least seven vessels at one time.

For an unknown reason, Mashow and his partner were forced to declare bankruptcy in 1858. 28 leading whale merchants signed a testimonial in praise of Marshow’s abilities as a “skillful naval architect, excellent builder and most worthy and respected citizen”.

For the rest of his life John Mashow was a carpenter and shipwright in New Bedford and Fairhaven, Connecticut.

It was a productive life; beyond his shipbuilding, he and his wife, Hope (both listed as “people of colour”) were parents of five sons (all whale men) and three daughters.