Officials estimated in 1880 that captains earned $50/month and their crew of four $18/month plus board. Salem Avery was one of some 200 Marylanders licensed as a buy boat operator. Did he captain other waterman’s vessels? And then for five years (1877-1881) he owned two vessels. He also went for two long stretches (75) without registering a vessel. Avery owned most vessels for only a year. These records are as revealing as they are provocative.
With few exceptions, he was both the managing owner and the master (captain of the vessel). Salem Avery owned at least a dozen vessels-three sloops and nine schooners-over a 25-year period as a Maryland oysterman and buy boat captain. In one or two days she will be loaded and is at once off for a market.” “The runner (also known as the Buy Boat) will be anchored near some tonging ground, an empty basket or a small flag will be hoisted to the masthead as a signal that she is ready to receive oysters. Together, they created a large extended family. Lucretia Avery survived Salem by 13 years, dying at age 72 in 1900.
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Of Lucretia’s childhood we only know that she did not learn how to read or write. Her mother, Catherine Johnson Weeden, was left with six children under the age of 16. The fifth of eight children, her father, Eli Weedon, died when she was 10.
We don’t know much about Lucretia’s family and what support they may have provided each other. As a buy boat captain, he hauled the oysters he purchased from tongers to packing houses in Crisfield, Norfolk, and Baltimore.
Salem could be gone from home for a week at a time. Oystering season was especially hard for the family. Two died in infancy within 16 days of each other in July of 1864. Eight more followed over the next 14 years. Lucretia gave birth to her first child, Ella, at age 29. The Mayo native had already been married and widowed once before she married Salem. Lucretia Avery (1828-1900) raised seven children here while managing the household and farm property-often while pregnant.
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