Kingsport 1844: Sleet, Baker & Blood

26) Sleet, Baker & Blood
106 Hawthorne Street, The Panhandle, South Shore. Est. 1811

A) Sleet, Baker & Blood
This firm is one of the many heads of the Black Macy/Tuttle hydra. Founded in 1811 by New York lawyer Benjamin Sleet, Kingsport sea captain Benjamin Tuttle Baker, and Philadelphia insurance broker Samuel Blood, the firm was established to manage the legal and financial affairs of the Tuttle dynasty, and by extension the Covenant. Sleet, Baker & Blood is also united by an incestuous tangle of bloodlines. Benjamin Sleet’s (illicit) children by Eliza Illsley Tuttle are Rachel and Gideon Sleet; a sister and brother who married another pair of siblings: their cousins Obediah Macy and Elizabeth Macy, the children of Anna Tuttle Macy—herself the daughter of Eliza Illsley Tuttle through her marriage to “Mad” Franklin Tuttle! Meanwhile, Samuel Blood’s eldest son Samuel Blood II married Gideon Sleet’s daughter, Asenath. Confused? Check out the Macy-Tuttle Family Tree! Or just accept that these folk ain’t quite right.

B) The Tuttle Fleet
Sleet, Baker & Blood owns the majority portions of nine active Kingsport whalers: the Quiddity, Virgin, Electra, Persephone, Pleione, Eudora, Tethys, Spindrift, and Celaeno. They also owned the Anna, wrecked off Ross Island in 1824; the Janus, capsized off Mocha Island in 1832; and the Polaris, crushed by ice near Greenland in 1840. Other bygone whalers include the Phebe Ann, Languedoc, and Alcyone, decommissioned after years of profitable service; the Ascension, Eliza, and Lobelia, sunk by the British during the War of 1812; and the Taurus, destroyed in a shipyard fire three weeks before its completion. The firm has controlling interests in numerous merchant ships, including the Kraken, Dragonspark, Prospero, Corinthian, Bathsheba, and Aethusa. The Kraken and Dragonspark frequently transport mid-voyage oil from whalers calling in at Honolulu or Maui. The Prospero, Corinthian, Bathsheba, and Aethusa are traders that work the East Indies, and are owned and operated in cooperation with the Marsh family of Innsmouth. Sleet, Baker & Blood are currently building a “flagship” whaling vessel, the Aldebaran. Nearing completion, the Aldebaran is scheduled to sail on New Year’s Day under the command of newly-appointed Captain Nathaniel Coffin Warnock. The ship may be visited in the Tuttle Shipyard (Encounter 7).

C) Personalities
Since the death of Benjamin Tuttle Baker in 1838, Sleet, Baker & Blood has been run by Captain Gideon Sleet. He’s assisted by his youngest son Addison, who manages the firm’s lawyers, accountants, and legal clerks; and by his nephew Jacob Macy, who oversees the docks. During the time the player characters are in Kingsport, Captain Sleet and Jacob Macy may be found at the wharves, overseeing the fitting-out of the Quiddity (see Encounter 11). Addison Sleet presides over the office, sometimes shadowed by his nephew Jason Blood, or harassed by the boy’s mother, his sister Asenath.

Captain Gideon Sleet
Captain Sleet is detailed in his own NPC profile.

“Captain” Jacob Macy
Jacob Macy is detailed in his own NPC profile.

Addison Sleet
Gideon’s 26 year-old son Addison is pale and sharkish, with unnaturally smooth skin and slanted, almond-shaped eyes. A shrewd lawyer and a pitiless capitalist, he was educated at Yale, and has never been to sea. Referred to as “Mr. Sleet” to differentiate him from the Captain, Addison is the financial brains of the firm. Cold and aloof, he is unkind, unmarried, and unloved. Local rumor claims that his mother disavowed Addison shortly before her suicide, claiming “Gideon may have lain with me, but his seed did not produce that child.” Addison also oversees Sleet, Baker & Blood’s concerns in the East Indies.

Asenath Sleet Blood
Civil in manner but distant and strained, Gideon’s 29-year old daughter has a character permanently stamped by sorrow. She lost her husband Samuel on the Polaris, and is worried their impetuous son will follow his father to a similar doom. An avowed Congregationalist, the Widow Asenath turns a blind eye to the Covenant, and her genuine devotion to Scripture is a source of constant amusement to the family. Certainly young enough to remarry, Asenath seems morbidly content to fossilize her youth in perpetual viduity. She may be seen in the office every day at noon, dressed in widow’s weeds and carrying a basket of treats for the firm’s harried clerks.

Jason Blood
A lad of twelve years with a tangle of ginger hair and the curious air of an intellectual, the “Young Master” is studying to become a maritime lawyer, but has expressed a desire to “taste the salt air before I drown in ink.” The only person attached to the firm actually liked by sailors, Jason will serve as the Aldebaran’s cabin boy on her maiden voyage. Although he rejects his mother’s religiosity, he remains—thus far—ignorant of the Covenant.

D) The Office
Sleet, Baker & Blood occupies a three-story building facing Hawthorne Street. The somber interior is decorated by paintings of the firm’s ships, along with a few daguerreotypes chronicling the building of the Aldebaran at the Tuttle Shipyard. A scale model below these silvery images presents the idealized vessel—a majestic ship with a black bull figurehead, its right eye blazing scarlet. (Information about Aldebaran and its occult associations are discussed in Encounter 7. If this is the first time a player character has become aware of the ship, these “Aldebaran associations” may be rolled here.) During most days, the office is a warren of productivity: clerks scribbling in ledgers, coins ringing on counting room scales, runners scraping the mud from their boots and delivering fresh issues of the Whalemen’s Shipping List or the Essex County Compass. Visiting bankers, stockbrokers, and insurance agents are customarily offered a cup of tea upon entering the office; captains are called out by name and given a glass of brandy; but common sailors are treated like livestock who’ve found their way from the farm to the manor house.

E) Programmed Events
Most player characters meet Captain Sleet and Jacob Macy on the Quiddity when they sign the ship’s articles (Encounter 11). An average sailor is unlikely to visit Sleet, Baker & Blood; but Beckett has been charged with investigating the firm by his uncle, and Dr. Lowell has a scheduled appointment. Of course, Mr. Coffin may also pay a courtesy call, and risks no suspicion by doing so.

October 28, 2:00 pm: Interview with Professor Lowell
Dr. Montgomery St. John Lowell has an appointment to meet Captain Gideon Sleet at the Sleet, Baker & Blood office at 2:00 pm, October 28. This is essentially a formality, attended by Gideon and his son Addison, who incorrectly pronounces “St. John” as “Saint John.” (British pronunciation slurs “St. John” together as “Sinjin,” as would Lowell himself.) Miskatonic University has agreed to pay Sleet, Baker & Blood $1500 for Lowell’s passage ($750 of which is being put up privately by Lowell), with the agreement that the Professor serve the Quiddity as surgeon when required. In return, Lowell will be provided with a decent berth and will “mess” with the officers. He’s also been granted use of the captain’s cabin for a minimum of two hours each day—at the captain’s discretion, of course! This is perfectly fine to Gideon, who doesn’t give a fig about Joab’s protestations, and has already ordered Mr. Pynchon to prepare an extra bunk in the mate’s cabin.

October 28-30: Tobias Beckett Snoops Around the Office
Another possible encounter at Sleet, Baker & Blood involves Tobias Beckett, who may consider doing research while posing as a curious sailor. As long as he remains polite, he’s given the proud history of the agency and shown sketches and daguerreotypes of the Aldebaran. Any further requests are met with suspicion; even though Sleet, Baker & Blood have copies of their ships’ deck plans, manifests, and articles, they certainly won’t produce them for a common sailor! Forcing this issue raises a red flag; see “Cult Pushback.” Better luck may be had at the Custom House (Encounter 10).

If Beckett decides to take a more surreptitious approach, he may break into the office at night. A Stealth roll and a Locksmith roll are required to remain undetected. A failure on the first roll attracts the notice of a night watchman, while a failure on the second roll damages the lock. A divination spell discovers the culprit the next morning, and a state of “High Alarm” is declared—See “Cult Pushback” for details. (The Keeper is encouraged to inform the player about these stakes before Beckett attempts to pick the lock.)

Once inside the building, the offices may be searched with impunity. An hour of snooping permits a Library Use roll. A Regular success is awarded with Handout: Quiddity Articles, which may or may not be complete depending on the timing of the break-in. If the Keeper wishes to relocate Hans Kleiter’s letter from Lady Jezebel’s safe (Encounter 6) to Gideon Sleet’s desk, Handout: Letter from Kleiter to Sleet may also be discovered, with or without Sleet’s cover letter. The intruder may also research the Quiddity and her officers. Obtaining each of these three handouts: Quiddity Voyages, Joab Voyages, or Pynchon Voyages requires one hour of snooping followed by a successful Library Use roll. Each hour of investigation past the first requires another Stealth roll, with a failure risking detection through some indiscretion: perhaps some papers are left out of place, or a cup of tea is knocked over? As described above, detection triggers a state of “High Alarm.”

White Leviathan > Chapter 1—Kingsport 1844
[Back to “South Shore” | White Leviathan TOC | Forward to Encounter 27, Professor Riddle’s Cabinet of Curiosities]

Author: A. Buell Ruch
Last Modified: 9 March 2024
Email: quail (at) shipwrecklibrary (dot) com
White Leviathan PDF: [TBD]