Hudson

Henry, a distinguished English navigator. Nothing is known of his boyhood or youth. His known history begins with 1607. In that year he was sent out by a trading firm, the Muscovy Company, with a ship of sixty tons, the Hopewell, and a crew of ten men and a boy, in search of a passage to Asia by way of Greenland. The next year he made another attempt to reach Asia, that is to say, China, sailing this time around Norway by way of Nova Zembla. As the natural result of these voyages, the Muscovy Company established a profitable trade with Spitzbergen, and the foundation of the English whale fisheries was laid.

Hudson was not satisfied that it was impossible to reach China by a northern pass. He went to Amsterdam. In 1609 the Dutch East India Company sent him out with the Half Moon and a crew of twenty men. May 5th found him in the Arctic Ocean. Failing to find passage, he sailed south along the coast of North America, using a map sent him by his friend Captain John Smith. He was in mind to explore the Chesapeake, thinking that it might lead through North America to the Pacific Ocean. September 3rd, he entered what is now known as New York Harbor and sailed up the Hudson River as far as Troy, until he became satisfied that there was no outlet to the China Sea in that direction. He traded with the Indians and started for home. On his way to Amsterdam he put in at Dartmouth, England, where his ship and crew were seized by the English government.

In 1611 he was sent out by England. With a ship of seventy tons he attempted the northwest passage again. He entered the long straits that lie between Greenland and the main continent, discovered the great bay that bears his name, and wintered at its southern extremity. In the spring of 1611 he started home. A rumor having gone abroad among his men that, owing to shortage of provisions, Hudson intended to leave a part of the crew at some convenient point, a mutiny arose. Hudson, his son, and seven of his men were put into a shallop and sent adrift. The ringleaders and many of the crew perished miserably, but the ship finally reached London. The following season a ship was sent out in vain search for Hudson. Without doubt he and his companions found their graves in the vast body of water that bears his name. He was evidently an enthusiast, not unlike Columbus. His life was lost in trying to carry out a great idea. The passage he sought was not traversed until 1905.

In 1909 a Hudson-Fulton celebration was held at New York. The opening day was marked by a Hudson River pageant. Faithful copies of the Half Moon and the Clermont were escorted by a line of ships fifteen miles long. The column included 1,000 vessels, varying in type from the one-man catboat to the mighty British cruiser battleship, Inflexible. There were fifty-seven warships, representing the navies of the United States, Great Britain, Germany, France, Italy, Holland, Mexico, and Argentina--450,000 tons of steel, bearing 28,000 officers and men and armed with 1,897 guns; 120 steamboats and ferry boats, seventy-five steam yachts, seventy-five motor boats, 300 tugs and steam lighters, 400 sailing craft and small launches. It is believed that 5,000,000 persons viewed the parade from the shores of Brooklyn, Manhattan, and New Jersey.