The ground fish were fished in the late summer. They were sold by the bar- rel and shipped on schooners from the wharves of the area. Smelts and eels were also packed and shipped away for sale off the Island. Shellfish such as clams and crabs were also sold to supplement their incomes.

McFarlane’s Packet Ship

SHIPBUILDING

The Boughton River area, surrounded by good rich forest lands and situated so close to the Gulf of St. Lawrence, provided an ideal launching place for ves- sels. The shipbuilding trade flourished in the 1800’s. This created employment for carpenters and was the means of establishing a solid financial background for the families involved in the shipbuilding industry. The ships were owned by a share system with 64 shares being the required number. The ships built along the Boughton River were mainly classified as schooners, vessels with two or more masts and generally less than 150 tons. However, some brigantines were built here too, that is, vessels with two masts carrying square sails on the foremast

and fore and aft sails on the main mast. Generally those ships were of the 150- 200 ton capacity.

The shipbuilders were often financed by businessmen from Charlottetown who invested the money while the local shipbuilders did the actual work. This time in our history is aptly described as the days of "wooden ships and iron men”.

From the book Past and Present of Prince Edward Island, we have learned that the reason for the demise of the shipbuilding industry was brought about by the introduction of steam together with iron and steel ships, as well as the exhaustion of the timber once plentiful for shipbuilding purposes. The sea has

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