OCEAN GHOSTS.

Taranaki Herald, Volume LXVII, Issue 16521, 23 August 1919, Page 11

OCEAN GHOSTS.

WEIRD TALES OF THE SEA. PHANTOM SHIPS AND SAILORS’ SUPERSTITIONS. On a February morning nearly 800 years ago the wild fisher-folk living on cite roeKbound coast of Kerry beheld a ship, mastlcss and deserted, thrown by ' the mighty waves of the storm on to ! the roc-KS. This was, indeed, a welcome ' sight for these rough folk. Eagerly they launched their boats and rowed off to the wrecked vessel. They found her laden with much rich spoil, and quickly filled their boats. As they were preparing to pull back, However, a miguty wave rolled up from the ocean’s depths, and tho watchers on the shore —mothers, wives and sweethearts —saw their kinsfolk engulfed and swallowed up. On every anniversary of this day, it is said, this grim calamity is reenacted. With hundreds of vessels at tho present time lying beneath tho green waters of many an ocean through the deadly work of torpedo or mine, it is highly probable that efforts will be made to raise and salve some (says a writer in the Glasgow Herald). A common belief, however, among sailors is that a ship which has been sunk and raised again is haunted by the ghosts of these who were drowned in her. About the year 1837 a fine emigrant ship was lost in negotiating a narrow but intricate passage, and COO passengers wore drowned. Some time afterwards the ship was raised, taken to a home port, and refitted; but after the first voyage tho owners found it impossible to get a crow. The sailors declared that every night the ship resounded with tho erics and groans of the poor emigrants who had been drowned. Eventually the vessel was sold to the shipbreakers. | THE FLYING DUTCHAIAN. Perhaps the best known of all sea ' ghosts is the Flying Dutchman. The tradition goes that a .Dutch sea. cap- | tain, Cornelius Vanderdckcn, was homeI ward bound from Batavia. In endeavj during to round the Capo of Good Hope ; ho mot with such batfling head winds that after nine long, weary weeks he hardly shifted his position. In a tit of passion Vanderdckcn cursed God', and 1 vowed by heaven and hell he would round the Gape if it took him till the day of judgment. , For his impiety he was doomed to heat to and fro for all time, and tho phantom ship has been reported many times, certain misfortune being expected on any vessel who sights her. AVhon our present King was crossing in the Bacchante the following curious entry was made in the log: “The Flying Dutchman crossed our hows. A strange, red light, as of a phantom ship, all aglow, in the midst of which light tho masts, sails, and j spars of a. brig 200 yards distant I stood up in strong relief. Thirteen persons altogether saw her, but whe- ■ thor it was Van Diemen or tho Flying '■ Dutchman must remain unknown.” | Strange, however, to relate, six hours 1 later the able seaman who was the first . to sight: the phantom ship, fell from a : mast and was killed. : A motor boat which during the war j had to patrol a. certain stretch of water j in the Bristol Channel reported, only a : few months ago, that the apparition of the type used to convey fruit from the AVest Indies to Avonmouth had been encountered nob far from Lundy. The ghostly vessel appeared to rise, up from the sea. and stand' out in misty, white relief, right in the track of the motor boat, which, unable to stop, drove right through the. spectral ship, to bo immediI ntely shrouded in mist. AVhon this had ; disappeared the phantom was nowhere* to be seen. AMERICAN GHOSTS. On stormy nights the Gnlf of St. Lawrence is haunted by the flagship of a fleet sent by, Queen Anno against the French. No sooner had the vessels reached a dangerous part of the gulf than a groat storm arose and drove them on the rocks, whore they wore smashed to pieces. Tho flagship mot her doom on the rocks near Capo d’Espair, and here, it is said, on the anniversary of tho wreck, when tho storm waves rush up tho gulf and tho winds howl from the Atlantic, the great warship reappears, her decks thronged with redcoated soldiers, and her wide ports ablaze with light. Suddenly the vessel gives a violent lurch and drives on the rocks. Great waves break over her, .and the shrieks and cries of those about to perish are plainly heard. Tho ghost ship Palatine haunts the waters about Long Island Sound on the American coast, and fishermen recognise in her appearance a warning of coming storms.. The Palatine was a trader which, in 1752, was lured ashore by wreckers. They plundered her of all the goods she carried, then irnprisoncr her crew under hatches, and set her on fire. In tho olden clays Devon and Cornwall wore notorious for their wreckers, who tricked many a gallant vessel ashore on the rock-encircled coast by false lights. In many places tho spectres of ships wrecked in this manner arc said to reappear. At Priest Cove, in Cornwall, tho ghost of a notorious wrecker who was wont to lure ships ashore by moving lights in lanterns, which lie hung round the neck of a lame horse, is said to appear on stormy nights clinging to the fragments of a wreck, which is dashed violently on to tho rocks, eventually disappearing with the wrecker in a cloud of foam.

That shallow, dreary, yet romantic stretch of waters, the Solway Firth, has many a legend of ghost ships connected with it. A hundred years ago, on the eve before Christmas, a merry bridal party set out in one of the small crafts peculiar to the Solway to he ferried across to the Scottish side. All went well until midstream, when a sailing vessel came beating down the Firth and crashed into the boat, throwing the party into the water. Despite their cries for help, the vessel continued its course, and the bride and bridegroom with their friends met a watery grave. It is said that the sailing vessel was manned by a rival of the bridegroom, who so revenged himself. Anyhow, the apparition of the boat is said to appear at times manned by the fleshless ghost of the murderer.