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“hopeful immigrants to new continents. And they sometimes functioned as weapons of war. Some of these ships were built to serve as merchant vessels, and others were built to work as whalers. Frequently merchant ships were converted into whaleships and entered a much stranger, more dangerous world. Only a few, like the William Badger, managed to function as merchantmen, whalers, and naval vessels during the American Civil War. Many books have been written about the nautical world of the nineteenth century. Most of the best of these were written long”
― Peter Kurtz, Bluejackets in the Blubber Room: A Biography of the William Badger, 1828-1865