Practical Boat Owner - July 2018

ALFRED ‘CENTENNIAL’ JOHNSON

Amazingly the mast and spars have also survived. Gaff-rigged, the boat’s full

canvas was a mainsail, two jibs and a square sail. The mast could also be lowered,

which Alfred had to do during storms

When Alfred died in Gloucester at the

age of 82 his indomitable dory

Centennial was away from home.

After touring food fairs, she sat on a

wharf for many years before enduring

the humiliation of becoming a

flowerbed in a hotel! Eventually she

returned to Gloucester for an arts

festival in 1955.

Thankfully the residents were not

going to let her go, and the dory was

finally put on permanent display at the

Cape Ann Museum where she can still

be seen today.

Traditionally the

Gloucester fishing dories

were open, but Alfred

had the deck boarded

over on the boat he had

built for his Atlantic

crossing. He had a tiny

cockpit area towards the

stern and a midships

hatch to access his

stores. Although

Centennial is small, he

clearly must have had

faith in his well-built craft

could at last replace the hard boards of
his boat. He’d made it.
Over the next few months a modest
publicity tour followed and provided
enough money for Alfred to pay the
passage fees home for him and his boat.
They left Liverpool aboard the steamer
Greece, ironically one of the ships that
had offered him assistance in the middle
of the Atlantic, arriving back in New York
on 20 February, 1877. For a short while he
enjoyed fame at home and naturally
enough spurred on others to take on
Atlantic crossings. However it is no
surprise that a man like Alfred had a
greater hunger for life than feeding off his
fame. He toured with his boat for a while
but turned down an offer from PT Barnum
to turn his celebrity into a sideshow.

Return to the sea
Finally the limelight was eclipsed by the
sun shining on the sea and he returned to
his hometown fishing community of
Gloucester. He worked his way up to
become a wealthy, successful skipper and
owner of fishing schooners. When he
retired from the sea he became a
successful businessman. For a large part
of his life he’d remained a bachelor but in
1900, at the age of 53, he married
30-year-old Amelia Neilson. The following
year, the couple had a daughter, Mildred.
Happily, this meant there were
descendants of the great man to return to
Alfred’s landfall on the Pembrokeshire
coast. After the publication of Rob Morris’s
book, Alfred Johnson finally got some
permanent recognition for what he’d
achieved. A plaque carved from Welsh
slate was placed in his honour on the
small slipway on Abercastle beach. His
grandson, Charlie Dickman, with his wife,
Maryline, was there for the plaque’s
unveiling. Without Rob Morris’s efforts
there’d have been no book, no plaque
and no descendants to track down and
unveil it. But without Alfred, of course,
there would have been no story to tell –
and what a remarkable story it was.

■ With thanks to Cape Ann Museum,
Gloucester, Massachusetts

Cape Ann Museum

Cape Ann Museum

Cape Ann Museum

Cape Ann Museum

CENTENNIAL’S FATE

In later life Alfred owned a fleet of
fishing schooners and became a
successful businessman