Rowing was spreading into the West and the South ; in 1857 a large regatta was given at Charleston, South Carolina, and many of the fast New York crews and scullers, such as Lee, Thomas, and Decker, went down for the cash prizes. There were crews from Georgia and North Carolina, and several from South Carolina, and in the race the craft varied in style from the four-oared Berry of New York to the fourteen oared Wrecker's Daughter of Wadmalaw Island, and a St. Andrew's, South Carolina, barge of six teen oars. The Becky Sharp, eight-oars, of Da rien, Georgia, won the race. The races extended over two days, and the Southern men showed speed, taking a majority of the prizes.
In the West were already a number of boat clubs, and in Chicago the Lady Putnam was a famous boat that defeated all comers; in 1855 there were two clubs formed in Milwaukee, Wis consin, the Wenona and the Milwaukee, and in the next year the Lady Putnam was beaten by the Wenona. Regattas were fairly numerous.
The spirit of the old Whitehallers had almost gone from New York, and from 185o until the Empire City Regatta Club was formed in 1855 there was practically no rowing. Then some of the former rowing men, together with many pro fessionals, organized this regatta club with old Stephen Roberts as president, and for the next nine years they gave annual regattas that brought the best professionals of the country to New York waters, and gave many a stirring race, and made famous many a waterman. The New York Re gatta Club came up in this period, but they did not give a regatta until 1859.
The great crews of this time are nearly all pro fessional, and the more important races were those for money ; it is now that the Wards and the Big lins, and those other family names that have ever since been synonymous with oarsmanship, begin to appear in the races at New York, Boston, and on the Hudson. The J. D. R. Putnam of New York, with Stephen Roberts, P. Lynch, J. Mathie son, and H. Larson, was for some time a crack four, and after winning at the Boston regatta in 1855, they beat the Neptune four of St. Johns,
New Brunswick, and began the rivalry with St. Johns. The Maid of Erin and the T. F. Meagher, both eights, were rivals in Boston for a long time ; but in a match race over nine miles the Meagher won easily, and the Maid was again beaten a few weeks later in a twelve-mile race for Poo° by an eight from St. Johns. The Dan Bryant, George J. Brown, and Frank G. Wood fours were famous ones in the Hudson regattas, the two former coming from New York and the last from Newburgh ; they met in nearly every regatta, and now one and now the other would win, while in the match races for large amounts there were likewise no satisfactory re sults. Joshua Ward, better known as " Josh," won his first race in single sculls on October 15, at Newburgh, when he beat John Hancon in a two-mile race ; Hancon was then one of the best of the scullers, but Ward beat him again, to gether with Andrew Fay, another of the best men of the time, in the following year off Staten Island, and started on his career as a sculler which was not broken by defeat until 1862. He had al ready been rowing for a year or more in doubles with George W. Shaw, and also in the Dan Bryant; but this Staten Island race gave him the undisputed title of champion, with the great silver belt that was then offered. The belt was stolen a few days after Ward won it. The entries were Ward, Fay, Hancon, and Daw ; Ward won easily, going the five miles in 35.m, which for many years was a record. A race that drew much at tention in the West was that in 1858 between the Shakespeare Rowing Club of Toronto and the Metropolitan Rowing Club of Chicago, over a five-mile course for $1000. The Canadian crew won by a long distance. W. B. Curtis was a member of the Chicago crew, and later had his amateur standing questioned on this race, but it was decided that it had not made him a pro fessional.