Mariner's service, Oswego, 1896

Captain Nelson Palmatier's recollections

This article was published by the Picton Gazette's smaller Saturday paper of 1935, which was called The Quinte Loyalist. It is from page 6 of the 5 January 1935 issue. The Picton Gazette notes that it is basically a reprint from the Oswego Pulladium [sic ; Palladium] of 1896, but was closely related to Captain Nelson Palmatier, who was born 7 June 1854 at Point Traverse where his father both farmed and fished. He sailed the Lakes for more than fifty years (1874-1924) on thirty-eight different vessels, and lived most of his life in Cherry Valley. He suggested to the Reverend Walter Smart, pastor of Cherry Valley Methodist church, the idea of a Mariners' Service, the first of which was held in 1923.

He died on 30 December 1937: "(Canadian Press) Picton, Ontario. Capt. Nelson Palmatier, veteran Great Lakes vessel master and founder of the annual Cherry Valley Church service for mariners, died in a hospital here last night. He was eighty-three years old."

Capt. Palmatier Recounts First Mariners’ Service, 1896

Captain Nelson Palmatier ('Parliament' [sic]) attended his first Mariners’ Service in the year 1896 in Oswego. Incidentally it was the first ever held in that city. The year was 1896 and the West Baptist Church was filled to capacity. Dr. Halsey took as his text, Ezekiel 27: 29 -- “And all that handle the bars, the mariners, and all the pilots of the sea, shall come down from their ships and they shall stand upon the land:”

We quote from the Oswego Palladium of that date (1896):

At West Baptist Church last evening Rev. Dr. Halsey gave the first of a series of special services, the sermon on this occasion being addressed to sailors. The congregation included several well known captains. We give quotations from the sermon. (Text, Ezekiel 27: 29.) It is a pleasure to welcome to our church brave men who have faced danger upon the great lakes, and who perhaps more than do any other citizens stand as representatives of Oswego’s former greatness when captains were as common in the streets of this city as brigadiers are said to be in: the South, when Oswe- go’s sailors were a great company, when her vessels were seen in almost every harbor on the lakes.

That day of commercial prosperity has gone by—but I prophecy that it will return, that Oswego will yet see her quays rebuilt, wharfs loaded with merchandise, her harbor filled with shipping as in the good old days when one could cross the river from elevator to elevator by stepping from one vessel to another.

These times of prosperity are to return, and I trust that some of us who are here tonight may live to behold their return. When we shall see around Niagara Falls a shorter and better canal than the Welland (though that will yet be used for slow freight); when we shall hear no more of protection or of reciprocity, for the provinces of Canada will be states in the union, contributing to our greatness and opening a market for our manufactures; when the wealth of the West and of the North will seek its natural outlet to the ocean, not by railroads, or long canals, or by the ice-locked St. Lawrence, but by the great waterway from Oswego to the Hudson by the route of the Oswego river, Oneida Lake, the valleys of the Mohawk and the Hudson; when natural gas will move the wheels of Oswego's factories; when the hitherto unharnessed strength of the Oswego River, transformed into electric force, will work the locks and provide water for a ship canal which will bear the products of great groups of states upon its bosom:

Then will Oswego be, like Job, blessed tenfold more at the last than at the beginning, when her streets shall be paved with asphalt, her school buildings shall be noted for their magnificence, the traffic in intoxicating poisons shall no longer sap the foundations of her prosperity, a public park shall extend from the “Rural” to the river; when the Palladium shall publish more pages than the San Francisco Examiner and the Times will need a dozen columns instead of one to give the catalogue of Oswego’s advantages.

For the coming of that time we devoutly pray.

In the interim, let us do what we can to improve the present time, keeping everything taut and trim and snug on the good ship Oswego until the fast-fleeting clouds are overpast and we can once more shake out all the sails to favoring winds and to the sunshine of prosperity.

Dr. Halsey spoke of the attraction, the mystery, the magnificence of the sea.

“The sea has many moods. Now it reminds us of a beautiful maiden, her cheeks dimpled with smiles; now it rushes upon us like a wild beast ravenous for its prey.”

The qualifications of a good pilot were defined as strength, skill, courage, knowledge. The speaker complimented Captain McDowell, Captain Preston and other Oswego commanders, and referred in touching words to Captain George Blair and Captain John Blackburn.

In the text we find all the sailors coming at last to land. The longest voyage will come to an end; “There will be no more sea.” When the earth and the sea shall give up their dead and “The corruptible bodies of those who sleep shall be changed and made like unto His own glorious body.”

Not long ago those who looked out from Oswego upon Lake Ontario saw a beautiful mirage; just yonder was the city of Kingston with its beautiful Streets, its towers and its battlements. So, at times to the eye of faith, appears the vision of the new Jerusalem, the city of the great King.

The seamen shall all come to land. The ocean is not a home. Though the captain often says that he is married to his ship, as the painter is wedded to his art, the merchant to his business, the wheelman to his wheel, yet these are not, or should not be, the end of life. Each sailor has his desired haven -- his heart is with his distant dear ones, and he thinks of the light in the window at home.

Our Heavenly Father has given us His word to be our rule and guide, but some of our modern navigators have become so wise that they think that they do not need this chart and compass.

There is one voyage yet before us. We stand on the borders of an unknown sea.

A soul is worth more than a ship. If you have not taken on board the Pilot, signal for Him today.