The Ann Maria was a packet boat, primarily in the business of transporting immigrants to North America. This was a time when the first passenger lines were being established across the North Atlantic, with the Black Ball Line and the Red Star Line, both establised around 1817/18, offering competing services between New York and Liverpool. Both sailed on fixed dates, typically twice a month, at fares of around 35 guineas.
The Ann Maria doesn't appear on the list of ships of either line, and there was certainly other competition. Nevertheless, she seems to have sailed on a reasonably frequent scheduled service and probably made a couple of North Atlantic crossings every year. It certainly wasn't her first crossing. Courtesy of the Immigrant Ships Transcribers Guild we can see the Ann Maria docking in New York from Liverpool on 9th March, 1820 and again on 3rd July that same year, so a pretty quick turnaround at both ends of the voyage. She was in New York from Liverpool again on 12th July 1821 and of course on the 3rd August 1823 with Douglas.
So Douglas is sailing on a ship which is part of a well-established transatlantic passage. Steamships are on the horizon, so to speak, but most travel is still by sailing vessel. So what was the Ann Maria like? Well, first of all she was a packet boat not a luxury liner, not that luxury liners existed back in 1823. Courtesy of On the Water, from the Smithsonian National Museum of American History, we see that she was an immigrant ship, carrying mail, cargo and people.
Courtesy of the Mariners Museum
For most it wouldn't have been a pleasant journey; most people travelled below decks in steerage, one deck up from the hold in conditions which were dark, crowded and poorly ventilated. Most had to fend for themselves with a limited diet, and sanitary conditions were poor.
Courtesy of Smithsonian Institution Libraries
As the Smithsonian tells us "Steerage passengers slept, ate, and socialised in the same spaces. They brought their own bedding. Although food was provided, passengers had to cook it themselves. On rough crossings, steerage passengers often had little time in the fresh air on the upper deck." And the food available, and included in the cost of the passage, wasn't generous although it was not uncommon for there to be a cow, or possibly a couple of goats, on board to supply milk:
These people were making the conscious choice to leave their old lives behind and travel rough to America in the hope of making another, better, life in the New World. For them a few weeks hard travelling on the North Atlantic, which may not have been much harder than the life they were leaving behind, was a discomfort worth bearing, although deaths 'en voyage' were not unknown.
But there was another class of traveller and I suspect it was into this group that Douglas fell. Again from the Smithsonian "Travelers with enough money purchased “cabin passage” and slept in private or semiprivate rooms."
Courtesy of Smithsonian Institution Libraries
Douglas wasn't buying his own ticket. The Horticultural Society would be paying for their employee's travel while he was on a job of work for them and I suspect he had a small cabin, certainly not the gloriously mis-named stateroom! "Staterooms, although tiny, normally came equipped with a mattress and linens, a washbasin, and some drawers. Their ventilated doors opened directly into the cabin or saloon, a common area for eating and socialising. On many ships, the captain dined with the cabin passengers." I think this is the onboard environment Douglas would have found himself in. It wouldn't be luxurious but would be reasonably comfortable by the standards of the day and the all-in-it-together nature of the saloon would have meant no shortage of people to talk to and who may have been interested in his mission. No doubt too there was a cook (it's unlikely the Captain would have been doing his own cooking!), so Douglas would be spared the necessity of cooking his own meals and may have eaten slightly better fare than the poor souls in steerage.
Nevertheless it would have been a long and demanding journey for one who had never made any sort of sea voyage before. Douglas was fortunate that he had a clear goal ahead of him, explicit instructions and introductions and plenty of 'reading up' to do to keep him occupied.
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