well-boat

plural well-boats · alternative well boat · alternative wellboat

1. nauticalA fishing vessel designed to carry live fish in a tank or well.First known use early 17th c.

   In our way we overtook a great Jonk that came from Palimbam, a Town on the Iſland Sumatra: [...] This Veſſel was of the Chineſe make, full of little Rooms or Partitions like our Well-boats, [...]

   1699, William Dampier, chapter XIV, in A New Voyage Round the World. […], 4th corrected edition, volume I, London: Printed for James Knapton, […], →OCLC, page 401

   5 more examples

   They [the "Hollanders", that is, Dutch] have One Hundred Dogger-Boats, of One Hundred and Fifty Tuns a piece, or thereabouts: Seaven Hundred Pincks and Well-Boats, from Sixty to One Hundred Tuns a piece; which altogether fiſh upon the Coaſts of England and Scotland, for Cod and Ling only; [...]

   1695, [Company of the Royal Fishery of England], “A Collection, with Some Observations, Touching the Royal Fishery of Great Britain and Ireland. [First, Increase of Shipping.]”, in A Collection of Advertisements, Advices, and Directions, Relating to the Royal Fishery within the British Seas, &c. […], London: Printed for H.M. and are to be sold by J. Whitlock […], →OCLC, page 21

   [T]hough the people fiſhed ever ſo often, they could never find any ſigns of lobſters being in this part of the ſea: they were therefore continually brought in great wellboats from New England, where they are plentiful; but it happened that one of theſe wellboats broke in pieces near Hellgate, about ten Engliſh miles from New York, and all the lobſters in it got off. Since that time they have ſo multiplied in this part of the ſea, that they are now caught in the greateſt abundance.

   1748 November 10, Peter Kalm [i.e., Pehr Kalm], “October the 31st [1748; Julian calendar]”, in John Reinhold Forster [i.e., Johann Reinhold Forster], transl., Travels into North America; Containing Its Natural History, and a Circumstantial Account of Its Plantations and Agriculture in General, […] Translated into English […], volume I, Warrington, Cheshire: Printed by William Eyres, published 1770, →OCLC, page 241

   VIII. And it be further enacted by the Authority aforeſaid, That no Live Salmon, Salmon Trout, Turbot, Large Freſh Cod, Half Freſh Cod, Haddock, Seate, Freſh Ling, Soles or Whitings, ſhall at any Time after the Arrival thereof at the Nore as aforeſaid be put into any Well Boat or Store Boat from or out of any ſuch Fishing Ship, Sloop, Smack or other Fiſhing Veſſel or Veſſels as aforeſaid, in which the ſame ſhall have been brought to the Nore; [...]

   1759, “Cap. XXVII. An Act to Repeal so Much of an Act Passed in the Twenty-ninth Year of His Present Majesty’s Reign, Concerning a Free Market for Fish at Westminster, […]”, in [Owen Ruffhead], editor, The Statutes at Large, from the Thirtieth Year of the Reign of King George the Second to the End of the Second Year of the Reign of King George the Third. […], volume VIII, London: Printed for Mark Basket, […], and by the assigns of Robert Basket; [a]nd by Henry Woodfall and William Strahan, […], published 1764, →OCLC, page 474

   And the rivers are moſt of them very full of fiſh, eſpecially in the back country, to which parties are made in boats with nets; in which excurſions ſhooting is joined: the fiſh they take are brought home alive in well-boats, and put into their ſtores: [...]

   1775, “an American” [pseudonym; John Mitchell or Arthur Young?], chapter XIII, in American Husbandry. Containing an Account of the Soil, Climate, Production and Agriculture, of the British Colonies in North-America and the West-Indies; […] In Two Volumes, volume I, London: Printed for J[ohn] Bew, […], →OCLC, page 187

   Where circumstances permit, they [the fish] are in general used in a fresh state; and even in large cities, where the supply must be brought from a distance, various expedients are resorted to, to prevent the progress of putrefaction. By far the best contrivance for this purpose is the well-boat, in which fish may be brought to the place of sale even in a living state.

   1822, John Fleming, “Fishes”, in The Philosophy of Zoology; or A General View of the Structure, Functions, and Classification of Animals. … In Two Volumes, volume II, Edinburgh: Printed [by P[atrick] Neill] for Archibald Constable & Co. […]; London: Hurst, Robinson & Co., →OCLC, page 371

   Synonyms: live fish carrier