As James Monroe Buddington approached the Connecticut shoreline on Christmas Eve, 1855, he noted that New London “didn’t make a dot much bigger than my hand … but it was a dot I was glad to see.” After a harrowing voyage through violent storms, he’d sailed the HMS Resolute, an abandoned British barque, from the Davis Strait near the Arctic circle into New London harbor. It was a feat that surprised everyone, including himself. The next day, excited crowds walked out on the frozen Thames River for a look at this unexpected arrival.

In May, James had sailed out of New London on the whaler George Henry. The trip was plagued by severe weather, damage to the ship by ice, and a scarcity of whales. When the crew caught sight of the Resolute, unmanned but in surprisingly good condition, James decided to curtail the disappointing whale hunt and salvage the ghost ship. He divided his crew so both the George Henry and the Resolute could be sailed home. It was an achievement that’s still remembered. After the Resolute was returned to England and later decommissioned, Queen Victoria had several desks crafted from the timbers and sent one to President Hayes.

James was born on a farm in Center Groton in 1817. He was named for President Monroe, who’d visited Groton earlier that same year. As a kid, James had little enthusiasm for farm chores; one day while wrestling rocks into place for a stone wall, he decided he’d had enough. By the time his parents realized he was missing, the teenager was at sea aboard a whaler.

James rose quickly through the ranks to captain, whaling for years for several agencies including Perkins & Smith, N. & W.W. Billings, and Charles Mallory. He interrupted his maritime career twice to try farming in Illinois, but — perhaps predictably — both attempts ended in his return to the work he seemed born to do.

In 1871, the United States hired him to carry supplies to Greenland, where Charles Francis Hall was leading the Polaris Expedition, trying (unsuccessfully) to reach the North Pole.

The government hired him again in 1876 to sail to Hudson Bay with a party scouting for minerals. On this voyage, James’ jealous first mate tried to kill him, but a quick thinking crew member grabbed the mate’s pistol just in time. After that episode, James worked locally as a watchman at the Groton navy yard (today the site of EB). It seemed that his sailing days might be over, but no.

In 1887, he shipped out as first mate under his son, Captain James Waterman Buddington, on a sealing expedition to the South Shetland Islands. A few years later when he was nearly 80, he took his final whaling voyage, again with his son. It must have been a sentimental journey.

James W.’s own distinguished career began in 1855, serving as cabin boy under his father on the George Henry. Like his dad, he had a number of challenging adventures in the Arctic. For example, in 1861 he was on a whaler that became trapped in ice in Cumberland Sound. The vessel had to be abandoned, and the crew was rescued by a couple of New Bedford whalers. In a different crisis, another whaler he was on became ice bound; this time, the crew was able to free her, but it required sawing through 10 miles of pack ice to do so. The Arctic was brutal to ships; once, he sighted a British ship aground on an island in Hudson Bay. She couldn’t be salvaged, but casks of wine and barrels of port were liberated. The spirits sold briskly back home.

In the late 1890s, perhaps anticipating life after whaling, James W. bought a steamer, and made runs between New London and Groton’s Bushy Point, a popular resort replete with concessions, a carousel, and a pavilion. But he still wasn’t quite finished with wind power. In 1908, he sailed the last whaling ship, the Margarett, out of New London. It was the end of an era.

Both father and son lived out their sunset years at Sailors Snug Harbor, a retirement home for seamen on Staten Island. You can imagine old mariners spending cozy evenings telling stories that only they could truly appreciate, and reminiscing about the glory days of wooden ships and iron men.

“For Oil and Buggy Whips” by Barnard L. Colby, published by the Mystic Seaport, was a major source of informaton for this column.