Newhook, Jonas Newell

Notes:

Newhook, Jonas N.

(1823-1901). Shipwright. Born New Harbour T.B., son of Martha (Penny) and Charles Newhook qv. Married Rachel Knight. From a long line of renowned shipbuilders, Newhook asa young man settled in Jackson's Cove, Green Bay, where he continued the family tradition. His barque Fleetwing, a 249-ton vessel, was described in the Telegraph of St. John's:

...coppered high to the bends, of a very superior build, all juniper frame, topsides, rails and covering boards of Baltimore white oak, keelson of white oak and Demerara greenheart with greenheart treenails. This vessel will bear the strictest examination and is, without exception, the fastest vessel in the trade.'' In his sailing autobiography, Wh en Ships Were Ships, Captain William Morris Barnes termed the barque

the fastest thing ever sailed salt water''. It apparently made numerous trips from Harbour Grace to Pernambuco in record time. Newhook also built the Tasso, another vessel of legendary speed. J.R. Smallwood (1937), ET (June 17, 1965), Newfoundland Historical Society (Newhooks; New Harbour).

 

 

(10) Jonas N. Newhook, 1823-1901

Born at New Harbour in 1823, second child of the secon d marriage of Charles Newhook (second). He married Rachel Knight of St. John's. Early in adult life, he settled in Jackson's Cove, Green Bay, where he was a master shipbuilder, and where he died in 1901 and is buried. His grandson, Mr. Chesley Ra lph Newhook of that place only recalls the name of one of the vessels he built, the Fleetwing.

 

In his salty autobiography "When Ships were Ships," sea-captain William Morris Barnes, born in St. John's in 1850, tells on pag e 9 of the building of this vessel for his family firm of supplying merchants and shipowners, and of her first foreign voyage. He writes, "...... this beautiful bark, the Fleetwing ...... she was the fastest thing ever sailed salt water. She was built down in a place called Green Bay, built by a man called Newhook; he was a smart carpenter ......" Of her first voyage, Barnes writes, "She started out for Brazil and she made a very quick run down, thirty-two days to Pernambuco from St. Jo hn's ...... the captain said that he saw nothing on the whole trip that he didn't come up with and pass, and nothing ever came up and passed him."

 

In his article "Storms and Ships," page 270 of volume one of Smallwood's "B ook of Newfoundland," captain John P. Horwood writes, "The barque Fleetwing, 249 tons, was built at Green Bay by Jonas Newhook and launched in 1856 ...... she is said to have made three different passages from Harbour Grace to Pernambuco in twent y-one days each passage. An average passage would be about thirty days."

 

Messrs J. B. Barnes & Co., Captain Barnes' family firm, advertised five vessels for sale by auction in "The Telegraph" of St. John's on 22 September 1858. The advertisement thus describes this vessel: "The well-known Barque Fleetwing, 248 tons, coppered high to the bends, of very supierior build, all juniper frame, topsides, rails and covering boards of Baltimore white oak, keelson of white oak and Demerara greenheart, with greenheart treenails. This vessel will bear the strictest examination, and is, without exception, the fastest vessel in the Trade."

 

She came to be owned byPunton and Munn, and a newsitem in "The Star" of Harbour Grace, 10 December 1872, reads as follows: "Messrs. Punton and Munn's barque the Fleetwing arrived here yesterday from New York. This fine vessel, now under command of Captain James Pike, made the passage in six days and four hours; the quickest run we believe on record made by any sailing vessel from thence to this port. Captain Pike has of late made some very fast voyages ......"

 

In the 1934 obituary quoted in section (5) above, Shortis states that the Newhooks also built the Tasso for the firm Stabb, Row and Holmwood, St. John's, the great rival of Kearney's barque Rothesay (meaning that Michael Kearney was the master-builder of that vessel).

 

In his boo k "Sea Stories from Newfoundland," Michael F. Harrington devotes most of a chapter to a neck-and-neck race between the Rothesay and the Tasso from Demerara, British Guiana, to Cape Spear, Newfoundland. Both barques left Damerara the same day. On the fourteenth day out, August 27th, the Tasso sighted Cape Race and soon afterwards saw another ship nearby, which proved to be the Rothesay and which won the race to Cape Spear by a very few minutes. The author states that the Tasso was then a bout three years old, being "the crowning achievement of the lifework of Jonas Newhook, of New Harbour." This is, of course, Jonas N. Newhook, and he evidently built the Tasso in his native place before moving north to Jackson's Cove.

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Captain Barnes also writes that there was only one bark that "ever did anything with the Fleetwing," and that was the Tasso. He goes on to say that the captain of the Tasso said that the Fleetwing was the only thing that could ever b eat the Tasso.

 

To sum up, the credit for producing these two masterpieces of shipbuilding art, the Fleetwing and the Tasso, belongs to Jonas N. Newhook of Jackson's Cove.

 

No names or particulars are known to me of other vessels that Jonas N. Newhook master-built or repaired.

Family/Spouse: Knight, Rachael R.. Rachael was born on 4 Aug 1832 in Jackson Cove, Newfoundland; died on 23 Oct 1914. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]