Cornelia Schmid (1843-1902)
Cornelia Schmid (1843-1902) sailed as a wife with her husband for two and a half years on board the two-masted schooner Poseidon, a cargo ship that sailed on the Baltic Sea, the Mediterranean Sea, and to the Americas. She married Captain Evert Deddes (1836-1920) in early 1865.
He wrote in his memoirs: “[we] now [after their marriage] naturally went on a journey together. That was a completely different life on board; and very soon I could no longer imagine how I could ever have spent my time alone”.
Even after the birth of their eldest son Henry in January 1866, they remained together. “But oh, how spoiled that boy was! Everyone considered themselves his nanny; and it was nice to see how patiently the sailors were with him”, according to Deddes. Only after the ship had been shipwrecked and the family had returned to the Netherlands after all sorts of wanderings, did Cornelia Schmid remain on shore.
Nevertheless, she also sailed regularly later: “But it eventually became too difficult with two children, and especially when the number kept growing”, Deddes sighed later. In 1872, Schmid christened one of the first two ships of the N.A.S.M. (Holland-America Line), the Maas.
