Ship Cove
Paul-Emile Miot's 1854 photograph of Album Rock in Ship Cove
Today, the tiny hamlet of Ship Cove’s claim to fame comes mostly from a large rock on the shores of Sacred Bay, but over the centuries, several famous people have visited here. Ship Cove’s proximity to the Norse settlement at L’Anse aux Meadows suggests that 11th century Viking sailors were present in and around Cape Onion and Sacred Bay. The bay was heavily used by French fishermen throughout the history of the French migratory cod fishery. Jacques Cartier mentions Sacred Bay in his journal of 1534. It was also visited in the late 18th century by Captain James Cook who was in the area mapping the coast of Newfoundland.
In 1857, as part of a French survey of the area and fishing premises, the now famous rock at Sacred Bay was photographed by Paul-Emile Miot. (See More Info).
As with many places in this region, when the French downsized their fishery in the later part of the 1800s, English-speaking fishing settlers moved in. The Adams family was the first to live at Cape Onion, part of Ship Cove. They built a house there which over the years hosted visits from Dr. Wilfred Grenfell and other important persons passing through the region. The building remains today as an idyllic homestead and Inn, which looks across the water to L’ Anse aux Meadows.
Ship Cove Photos : ( Click each for full size )
Model of old Ship Cove buildings by local craftsman Brian Decker
One of the oldest houses in Ship Cove is now the Tickle Inn
Ship Cove : Paul-Emile Miot, 19th Century Documentary Photographer of the French Shore
Thanks to Paul-Emile Miot, a 19th century French naval officer and photographer, we have a visual record of the French cod fishery in Newfoundland between 1857 and 1860.
Miot was born in 1829 in the British West Indies and spent most of his adult life in the French Navy. After participating in several naval campaigns in the Crimea and Mexico, Miot sailed to Newfoundland in 1857 on the ship Ardent, under the command of Capt. George-Charles Cloue. It was primarily a voyage to do hydrographic surveys and document the French fishing premises on the politically contested French Shore. His pictures of fishing rooms – their stages, wharves, flakes, storage sheds and living quarters – help us understand the conditions under which the fishermen lived and worked.
Miot spent enough time in Ship Cove to record one image that has since been much reproduced. The image shows a well known landmark in the Ship Cove area, on which Miot had his crew pain the word Album. He planned to use this image as the title page for an album of his work. After more than a century, the painted word is gone but the rock looks virtually the same.To publicise the French fishery and issues surrounding political rights to the French Shore, some of Miot’s photographs were transformed into newspaper engravings, appearing mostly in French publications of that time.
After a number of naval assignments that took Miot to many parts of the globe, he retired from the Navy in 1892. In recognition of his important work, he was made Curator of the Musee de la marine et de el'ethnographie at the Louvre in Paris. He died 8 years later in 1900. Today his pictures appear in many articles and books about the history of the Newfoundland cod fishery and the French presence in the region. There is a small exhibit about Miot in Ship Cove and a trail to the site of Album Rock.
Photos : ( Click each for full size )
French fishing rooms at Cap Rouge, 1857
French fishermen row a chaloupe in Cap Rouge harbour.