HEROES OF THE DEEP.

Lyttelton Times, Volume C, Issue 11724, 31 October 1898, Page 2

HEROES OF THE DEEP.

V (By HERBERT D. WARD.)

... (ijentury Muyazine.) V Heroism is easily tired out, drowned out, starved out. The extraordinary spirit that suffers all these things, and still has hope and nerve enough left to fight to the finish, while companions despair—that being is as much a demigod to the commonalty to-day as he would have been three thousand years ago. While customs and people change, prowess is the same yesterday, to-day, and forever. ■ On Thursday, Jan. 21. 1897, the fishmggchoonei; Yosemite, John M’Einnon, othervwise known as-“ John Shortscope, skipper, ■ was somewhere off Cape Sable. About noon it began to breeze up from the east-south-east, gradually changing to west by north, ‘ and later to west. It was freezing, and tfie vessel was icing up badly. By four o clock in the afternoon it began to blow strongly, " and to snow; At -six the jib was tnced up and the foresail reefed, and the log was hauled' in. By dead reckoning, Ragged ’ Island light was twenty miles to the north-north-west. At a quarter to seven a white fixed light was sighted on the lee bow. This ; was supposed to be a schooner at anchor, . riding out the increasing gale. To make sure, the skipper “ hove ” the lead, and found ten fathoms of water. He then gave ' the order to haul her off to the south-west hky south, and to set the ridmg-sail. By ■ ■’ this time it was a fast and axmiotrs gale of wend and blinding ; t • * • snow. - Suddenly the lookout cried, “WeTe ift the breakers!” • The shout had scarcely left his throat ■'when the sea made a clean breach over the doomed vessel. The Yoseinite-was loaded with herring, even to her cabin and her bunks, ah hands being stowed in;the fore- • ; castle. .“.Take to the rigging!” howled the • skipper. It was in the dog-watch, and all : the men were oiled up.- -Eight of them 1 .jumped for the . main rigging The' -cook ■' took to the fore, as ho had to come tip the forward gangway. In a momentary lull ' the skipper “ grabbed the chance ” to go ‘ forward to get money out of his chest. He , got as far as the fore rigging, and had to join ■, the cook. . The vessel began to break up immediately. The mainmast went first, carrying down, the foremast. All hands were hurled into the water, each one looking out for himself. Close by, to leeward, with the sea breaking clean over it, could be seen ' the shoulders of a rock. Captain M’Kinnon was washed into the belly of a sail; and therein, like Jonah of old, he prayed for his life. The next sea tossed the sail, like a bit of seaweed, away from him, and thrust him on the rock. At the same time it flung the mast across his leg, and pinned him down. But just in time to save him from immediate drowning, a breaker lifted the mast, and brought within reach of his hand a bit of wire rigging, and then fetched the most end up on the rock. In his own words, that ’ need no interpretation, he “ scrabbled up.” It was now black, and fiercely snowing. The cook never came np. Another man was saved, with both legs broken. The rest had managed to make the rock. And now . the .sea cast at them bits of wreckage—• •' bolts', from the bow, splinters from the keel; . and the slimmy bodies of frozen fish slapped • them like hail in the face. The rock was - -- not over twelve feet; in circumference. -Tire nine men held their grip by clawing the clefts. At last a plank was washed up betide them. This they put endwise into the crevasse, and with flotsam rope lashed themtelves, TP?™ by man, to it. There they lay

all that night, expecting every moment to go; for every wave drenched them, and it was only THE CLUTCH THAT SAVED THEM. . Next morning found them all there. Across a channel only seventy-five feet wide there seemed to be the mainland. In reality it was an island. But the tide swept fiercely past the rock, carrying wreckage far out to sea; and betides that, the surf itself was such as not one of those experienced sailors had, ever seen. At ten o’clock the man with the broken legs died, and each one wondered, as he looked into bis mate’s cold, calm face, how soon the same fate would befall him. Not a soul was visible on the bleak shore. In the meanwhile, a log-line, caught somewhere, tantalizingly swished near the rock, but would not be seized. With it some one might get across, and so save the rest. Without it, the attempt to swim even that narrow channel seemed the sheerest suicide. By afternoon despair set in. The little strength left after that terrible night of exposure was rapidly sapped by the loss of hope. Each one of them knew that not one of them could survive another night, when the thermometer came to its depth and the tide to its height. At four o’clock in the afternoon it was low water. No man spoke. The fate that could not be escaped cast a sullen • silence upon all except the skipper. He knew that it was now or never. But what could he do, with his jammed legs? Asjt was he was nearly 1 dead. But he called Pat Rose to his side, and whispered to him : “ Another night means death, Pat; you know that.” Pat nodded solemnly. He did not say a word, but he crawled to the edge of the rock, carefully noting ! the action of the waves, the eddies of the tide, and the possibility of a landing-place on the other side of the leaping water. Then he arose, took off his oilskins, and stripped himself to his underclothes. He stood straight up, shaking with the result of twenty hours of exposure. His freezing legs scarcely supported him. His face was fiercely resolute. He gathered the last remnant of his courage, and held it in hand. “ It’s no use, boys,” he said simply, “ to stay here and die. I’ll take the chances for you. If I get there, I reckon we’ll pull through all right.” The men roused 1 themselves from their fast-increasing stupor, and watched their hero with fearful anxiety as, without anther word, he.’ leaped into the waves and struck out for the opposite ledge. Now he was on the top of a breaker, now be was swirled under, and disappeared. Twentyfive yards do not appear to be much, but it seethed to the poor frozen watchers on that . rock that it took the actor ages of effort to play bis part to the triumphant end. When' his mates, whose lives absolutely depended, upon this supreme effort, saw Rose hurled upon the reck, clutch it,, and then drag himself beyond the ravenous breakers, they gave a feeble shout of joy.- With a houeful wave of his hand, Roso started, in his now freezing underclothes, to run for "help. He ran fully half a mile, and then came bacii in despair. No living creature was to be seen, and it was fast darkening. HE HURRIED BACK TO THE LEDGE. “I can’t find help !” he shouted. “ You’ll have to swim for it. Come on, and I’ll swim out and help you all!” These were his brave words. It would take much freezing to daunt such a man. Carlyle would have loved him. Now Providence stepped in, and helped the huddling group on the rock. Peradventure, for the sake of one man’s pluck, the ten were saved. For suddenly came within their reach the logline, that had evaded these hapless men all day. John Hickey era sped it, made it fast . to the rock, and tied the other end around himself. Rose’s example had fired him ; he needed just that to put him on his mettle. With a shout, he plunged in, and struck out. 1 As he neared the ledge, Rose met, him, and helped him UP. , ; It now took only a few minutes to haul over a stouter rope and. made it .fast. On this the men came, hand over hand, and all were saved. - • It was afterward known that the people on shore had seen the signal 1 of the shipwrecked men upon the rock; but as it was impossible to launch the boat, they could not go to the rescue. Too rough to launch a dory; and yet Rose, exhausted, freezing, hungry, plunged in. and Hickey, too! The Spartans are not all dead. It honours our

whole land that our Gloucester fishermen do such deeds so grandly, so uncomplainingly, so naturally, and so often.

Talking about it on the wharf, one day, when fish were scarce, John M’Kinnon told the writer, with tears furrowing his sad face, and in a voice toned to the deepest emotion : “I can’t imagine a more heroic act. If there’s a man who’s one of a hundred thousand, Pat Rose is that man. If it wa’n’t for him, we’d have all gone, sure.” COOL-HEADED INVENTIVENESS when others are paralysed with terror is no less a mark of heroism than the instinctive acceptance of personal risk. The real hero in a great conflagration may be the one who, at the instant of panic, keeps his head, and orders the crowd, imparting to it his own imperturbability. Such a one might have saved . scores of lives in the horrible Parisian bazaar disaster. Add to this rare quality of calmness in danger the ability to devise' instantaneously the unusual and only means of rescue, and you have a man indeed.

Perhaps the best instance of this rare gift that I have heard of occurred in February, 1862. The schooner J, G. Dennis was running home to Gloucester with a full fare from Georges, when she met a heavy gale of wind right in her teeth. Her master. Thomas D. Dench, one of those elemental souls whom nothing could daunt, made up his mind to drive her right through. In a February gale the wind and the sea are about as cheerful opponents as a madnjan and a razor. In this struggle the Dennis had the worst of ths encounter, and she was razed. She lost her sails —all but the jumbo, I believe —and her boats, and, besides, was blown offshore into the Gulf Stream. There she found a favourable southerly wind, and so pointed her nose again, for home, having set her staysail and an old" mildewed summer foresail. The sea was still very heavy and the breeze was not a- zenhyr. Just at daylight on the 2nd of March the look-out out sighted a water-logged vessel, and bore down upon it. The skipper came on deck, and soon spoke the Wreck, which’ proved to be the schooner Lifeboat, of Shelburne; Nova Scotia, loaded with lumber, and bound to the West Indies. The only thing that preserved her name from travesty was the lumber that kept her afloat, most of the deck-load of which had been washed off. Her masts were gone, her boat was gone, and her caok and one man had been Washed overboard. When the, Dennis came within hailing distance, the captain and the three hands left were lashed on top of the after deckhouse, EXPECTING TO GO DOWN ANY MINUTE. “ For Heaven’s sake,” they begged, “ don’t leave us! Three big vessels have spoken us, and deserted’us. For God’s sake, save us!” they cried ,in desperation. “Cheer up!” Captain Dench called back. “ This time you’re dealing with men, not cowards. Wo’ll stand by.” . Then came the problem of rescue. It was a ■wreck saving a wreck. It was the blind leading the blind. For neither vessel had a boat to put off, and to approach near in that sea was to risk a fatal collision. Besides, the wind was beginning to rise again, and the icy sea was running vic’ously. So Capiain Dench, handing lik vessel, with her flimsy sail, as best he could, lav to leeward, and ordered the men on the sinking wreck to throw overboard all the lumber left upon lbs dock. He then picked up what loose boards he wanted, and wrenched his gurry-kid from the deck. A gurry-kid is a big box, without bottom or top, that is fitted in the deck, in winch fish is thrown. He then sawed the boards with his own hands, and made a bottom to the kid. This he calked with rope-yarn and pieces of rope. Then he patched up the seams with canvas junk. He then lashed two empty water-casks to each end of the box, and tnck two reaches to windward. This brought the wreck under his lee. Then the men on board the Dennis launched their nondescript boat, and attaching to it a strong line, paid if out until it reached the water-logged schooner. They saved the men, of course ; and besides that, they took off a gaff-topsail that was washing about the deck. This ihev bent for a jib, using their own jib for a mainsail. Bv this time their own foresail was pretty well exhausted. The rescue and the patching up took nil of that day. That night, instead of making for Gloucester, Captain Dench decided to take the shipwrecked men home, and so “ make a good job of it.” So they turned their prow to Shelburne, which they reached after a hard tussle. The firm who owned the Lifeboat gave Captain Dench a suit of sails with which to come to Gloucester, and later the British Government presented him with a splendid marine glass, which his son uses on board his sloop to this day. The spTit that passes no one by in distress’, and is undismayed by impossibilities, L one not too common, even among mariners. We instinctively look upon the hero as one who in moments of emergency or danger has manifested the maximum of 3 DON - HE A F. TED ACTIVITY. The readiness to endure suffering, the contempt for luxury, the willingness to court risk or death—this is courage, indeed, but rather of the buli-dog variety, and none the less tenacious. Soldiers say that the sure test of courage is to rest on one’s arm?, motionless, silent, unanswering, while the enemy is. spattering you with shot and shell. . Heroism rises to its greatest height when from a noble motive one endures the danger from which one might easily escape. “ In other words,’ quoting Thomas Hughes, “may we not say.that,iin the face of danger, selfrestraint is, after all, the highest form of self-assertion?” England can never forget Mr Birkenhead, and she recalls with equal Saxon pride her Victoria. Nanier would have been a good judge of the following incident: This began with an accident. It was no joke to be caught off Cape Sable in a December hurricane. It was what happened to the Fredonia in 1886. : The Fredonia was a historic vessel. . She ■was.built by Burgess for Commodore Forbes, and made a cruise across the Atlantic; She. was then sold to Gloucester,- and became a fisherman, the handsomest, proudest, andfastest of the fleet. She was noted for her race with the crack Boston pilot boat Hosper, in which she was easily victorious. She was. the best-known fishing vessel on the Atlantic coast. But in 1895 the Fredonia .was seven years old, and she had never been sparred. On tho.t fatal morning a hurricane came up from the north-east. Captain Morgan had a crew of twenty-threo men on board, and at half-past four in the morning it was blowing so wildly that he hove ths vessel to under a double-reefed foresail. Without warning, a curling monster, cross-trees high—so tall and toppling that one could see right under it, much as, in the case of the Cave of the Winds, one can look under the avalanche of Niagara—boarded the Fredonia, and swept her clean. No one but a fisherman knows what this means. Take the difference between one hundred and nine tons, the burden of the Fredonia, and three thousand, the average of our ocean steamers. A wave that might not even stagger the City of Paris might be, if it assaultetd just right, the deathblow of a fisherman. ‘The - Fredonia was easily “ hove down/’and she was swept as clean as if a plane had been run over her. The dories were demolished, masts gone, chain-lockers gone, sails gone ; ; the new road was snapped eff clean, and gone; cat-head and windlass torn right out, fore-rigging not to be seen at all, fore-boom and fore-gaff in splinters, backstay all tangled up with the jib-stay; checker-boards, trawl-tubs, gurry-pens, top-ping-lift, God knows where; bulwarks all gone, hatches gone, rudder and wheel-box gone, and even the ring-bolts on the deck were cut off as by a chisel. Only the pumps were left. One man had gone overboard, and another was literally blown to pieces. This was Olaf Olson. HE LIVED ABOUT SIX HOURS. All this happened in less than a minute, between four and five in the morning, when vitality is at its lowest ebb. Fortunately, only three men were on deck when the catastrophe happened ; otherwise the fatality would have been multiplied. As it was, the plight of the crew was desperate ; for it was soon discovered that the schooner’s “grub-beam” had started, and that she was leaking badly. All hands immediately manned the pumps to keep her above water. This they were scarcely able to do. The deck was almost flush with the sea. Every wave boarded the wreck, and the men were exhausted and disheartened. If the sea had not moderated by nine o’clock at night, and made the task easier, the crew would have given, up the for the Fredonia was fast sinking, and the men were losing courage and becoming numbed. At half-past four next morning, just twenty-four hours after the disaster, the earner Colorado hove in sight, and notic ing the frantic signals of distress, bore down,

on the sinking vessel. With great danger, a life-boat was* lowered ; for the seas were very high, and rescue was a feat of great difficulty.

Indeed, President M’Kinley awarded Captain Whitten, of the Colorado, a gold watch and chain “ for heroic service in effecting the rescue of the crew of the schooner Fredonia on Dec. 18, 1896.” The names of the mate and the sailors who did the deed are probably forgotten, if ever known at all.

At last only five were left aboard the Fredonia. She was sinking rapidly, and the seas were, washing heir with increasing malignity.

“ Wo can’t leave him behind,” said Captain Morgan, pointing to their crushed and silent mate, whose body was lashed to prevent it washing overboard. For to leave a .shipmate to go down with a vessel is a discourtesy to the dead that sailors will not allow.

“ But she’s likely to go down at any moment,” suggested one of the crew. “ You’d better get out of her while you can. Any one of these seas might bear her under. ” But Morgan shook his head. In the black before the dawn, outlined before a background of white sun rr»e, he could 1 sees the lifeboat labouring back to save the remnant of the crew.

“ I ain’t going to leave until wd give him a decent burial,” said the captain, firmly.

“ We’re with you, skipper!” ths men cried as with one voice.

Then began a scene that is not so rare at sea as one might suppose. By tMs time the Fredonia was hardly able to keep her water-logged nose up. “ Keep off until we holler!” cried the skipper, motioning the -wondering lifeboat off.

Tenderly the men unleashed Olaf Olson, and tied him in a blanket. Then, in order that everything might be done shipshape, they lashed some wreckage together, and made a raft. Upon this they bound their dead. And all the while they silently prepared their mate for burial the ttfemendous seas rose upon (hem, and whipped them with icy spray, and, chased, them with curling tentacles. And all ihe time the gallant, vessel, throbbing with punishment, and groaning in her last efforts to keep, alive, - THREATENED TO SINK FROM UNDER THEM. Theu, when the corpse was prepared, Captain Morgan said: “We’ve got to have a prayer, boys. It won’t do to Send him over without one.” Then Ms voice broke. “I can’t,” be stammered. “ Let someone else.” Then up spoke Bob Diggins. “ I’ll try my best, skinper!” So, while the rest held the raft at the stern, Bob uncovered his head, the others doing likewise, and made such a prayer as he could. “It wa’n’t much of a prayer,” the fisherman would say, i? you asked him ; “ it wa’n’t worth mentioning.” But 1 we may think that the requiem of the gale and the tumultuous dirge of the waves were not sufficient to drown that prayer before it reached the throne of the Almighty, Then, with faces wet with salt of the sea. and.with their tears, the crew shoved Olsen • over the stem into a toppling wave. Every moment had been a risk to their own lives ; but they did their duty by their mate, and they buried Mm with that religious instinct and respect for thei Christian hope which survives in wilder hearts than those of Gloucester .fishermen.

By this time the Prcdonia_was at her last gasp “ Hurry the lifeboat up ! Jump! Haul Mm in! Next!” Captain Morgan was, of course, the last to leap for safety. , He had scarcely been hauled into the lifeboat by willing bands when the Fredonia, in final agony, tossed her head proudly on high, hung iii the air for a thrilling .instant, and then plunged forward into the ocean, adding, one more tally against the deep which will be paid at the last day. Thus the noblest vessel of the fleet met her end, witnessing in her last throes a loyal courage which deserves to be classed high among onr modem instances’ of heroism.