To the eastward of Narragansett another bay is thrust far up into the land of Massachusetts, Buzzard's Bay, which almost bisects the great defensive forearm of Massachusetts, Cape Cod. This bay is thirty miles long and about seven miles wide. Between it and Narragansett are the tree-clad hills of the sparsely-settled regions which the Indians called Aponigansett and Acoaksett, out of which the Acushnet River runs down to its broadening estuary, now the harbor of New Bedford. Originally this city was peopled by Quakers of the English Russell family, of which the Duke of Bedford is the head, so that the colony was named from his title. A numerous Portuguese migration to the early settlements has caused one of the suburbs to still retain the name of Fayal. New Bedford stretches two miles along the western river-bank and far back upon the gradually ascending surface, and the population, including the opposite suburb of Fairhaven, numbers seventy thousand. Early a shipping port, it grew into celebrity with the advance of the whale fishery, which became its chief industry, and it was then said to be the wealthiest city in the country in proportion to population, having in 1854 four hundred and ten whaling ships, with ten thousand sailors, its fleets patrolling the remotest seas. When this fishery died out, the people went to manufacturing, and now they have numerous large mills busily spinning cotton, its noted product being the Wamsutta muslins. There still remain a few of the little bluff-bowed and flush-decked old whalers rotting at the wharves, with huge overhanging davits, and still redolent of oil--the relics of an almost obsolete industry. The ample fortunes originally gathered in the fishery enabled the marine aristocracy of the town to build their stately and comfortable old mansions which now enjoy an honorable repose in ample grounds along the quiet streets on the higher plateau back from the river.
When Samuel de Champlain came into the St. Lawrence River, he wrote that whales were killed by firing cannon-balls at them, and later explorers described how the Indians captured them. The colonists early began the fishery along the New England coasts, and New Bedford sent out its first ships in 1755. The period of greatest success in whaling was between 1820 and 1857. The advent of gas and petroleum, financial reverses, the gradual extermination of the whales, which had been pursued to the remotest regions, the substitution of steel for whalebone, and the use of hard rubber, all contributed to the decline of the business, and it was given its death-blow by the ravages of the Confederate privateers among the Pacific whaling fleets. Its memory is kept alive, however, by many romances of the sea, it having furnished an extensive and interesting literature. Not long ago it was related that the unfortunate sculptor who had carved the figure-heads for the whaleships was since compelled to earn a precarious livelihood by chopping out rude wooden idols for the South Sea islanders. Acushnet River is dammed in its upper waters, making an immense reservoir, furnishing power to the extensive mills. The harbor gradually broadens as it opens into Buzzard's Bay, and Clark's Point stretches far into the bay, having on the extremity an old-time square stone fort, with bastions at the corners, formerly the trusted defender of the harbor and the town, Fort Taber. Now, its only use is to furnish, on the outer corner, a foundation for a lighthouse lantern. The whaling fleet it formerly guided is all gone, but now it is the beacon for an enormous trade in coal, landed here for distribution by railway throughout New England. Another little stone fort is also built on the opposite side of the harbor, on a rock at the lower end of Fairhaven. Outside is the broad surface of the bay, a noble inland sea, with irregular and generally thinly populated shores, but with attractions that have drawn to it, in various localities, a large summer population, with many ornate villas of modern fashion. Just below Clark's Point is villa-studded Nonquitt, upon an upland among the undulating hills, where lived General Philip Sheridan, and to which he was brought home in a United States warship to die, in July, 1888. They tell us that when the venturesome Norsemen came along here, the bay was given the name of the Straum Fiord, but the antiquary is at a loss to find a satisfactory derivation for the present name of Buzzard's Bay. Far over its waters, as seen from Clark's Point, is the low, dark, gray forest-clad eastern shore, stretching down to the distant strait of Wood's Holl, leading out of the bay into Vineyard Sound. Spread across the bay entrance to the southward, and protecting it from the open sea, are the Elizabeth Islands.