Page 24. MAINE COASTAL NEWS May 2015 HISTORY FROM THE PAST - Bangor Daily Commercial - Early 1900s Continued from Page 24.


words, that the steamer had reached a point somewhere between Boon Island and Cape Elizabeth when the storm, which was working slowly up the coast, tightened its grip upon her and dragged her back across the Gulf of Maine and the entrance to Massachusetts Bay. It is the theory that the big steamer was kept head to those big seas for nearly 12 hours, if not more, and that she fi nally went to pieces off the northeast end of the Stellwagon Bank, one last breaker sweeping her clean above the main deck. The ebb ride that was running out of Massachusetts Bay that Sunday afternoon was suffi cient to keep Cape Cod Bay, while the gale drove it to the southward and littered the backside of the Cape from a point half a mile east of Race Point to that portion of the beach south of Chatham, with fret work, life preservers, barrens and the bodies of 40 of her unfortunate passengers. To substantiate such a theory it is necessary to study the big storm of 1898 from Sunday morning, November 26, when two distinct disturbances appeared, one over the Lakes and the other in the Gulf of Mexico, until late Sunday night the 27th


, when the hurricane which was the


joint effort of the two lesser storms was disappearing over Nova Scotia on its way to that haven of most North American storms, the permanent low pressure over Iceland. The morning of Saturday, November 26, 1898, broke “fare and brite” as the fi shermen used to enter it in their logs. There was a light air from the west, the last breath of a storm far up to the northward over the St. Lawrence. The weather chart, however, showed the presence of a distinct storm over northern Ohio, and the wind along the Gulf coast indicated another disturbance in that region. Before dark that night the two storms had united some hundred or two hundred miles southeast of Nantucket, and at 6 o’clock snow was falling as far north as Long Island, and the wind in Boston had hauled into the northeast and was breezing up rapidly. The fi rst intimation of the approach of the hurricane was a whiff or two of salt air and a fl ake of now about dark, but at 7 o’clock, the sailing hour of the PORTLAND for her one-hundred-mile run down the coast, the weather was not bad, nor had the weather experts discovered, as they did a couple of hours later, that the Lage and Gulf storms had united and had commenced a destructive descent upon New England shipping.


For some reason the skipper of the


PORTLAND, Captain Blanchard, hesitated to sail and it was nearly an hour after the usual time that he gave the order to cast off the lines, and the PORTLAND started on her last voyage. It is now believed those 40 or 50 minutes delay spelt destruction to the steamer and death to those on board. Snow was beginning to fall in Boston as


the PORTLAND steamed down the harbor and it was blowing fresh but not strong from the northeast.


Rounding Deer Island Light she headed


for Cape Ann 25 miles away, and made such good time running down Broad Sound that she was abreast of Bass Rocks or within three miles of Thacher’s Island, at 9:45 o’clock. It was there that the Gloucester fi shing schooner MAUD S., inbound from the fi shing ground, passed the PORTLAND and her skipper, Capt. William Thomas of Bailey’s Island, Maine, claims to be the last person who saw the PORTLAND on top of water. It is a coincidence that the crew of the MAUD S. hauled on board bed springs and electric fi xtures believed to have come


from the PORTLAND, while trawling off the Stellwagon three months later. According to Capt. Tarr of the Cape Ann lights it was blowing a moderate breeze at 10 o’clock or about the time the PORTLAND rounded the Londoner Ledge and headed northeast by north for Cape Elizabeth, 58 miles away.


In the meantime the storm was making


up rapidly, but moving slowly, that is the big hole in the atmosphere was deepening, while the whirlwind had a movement of its own also northeast. Great masses of moist warm air were being sucked in from the southward and swirling around met blasts of cold dry air from the north, the radius of the storm’s activity being between 200 and 400 miles, with the winds blowing around the center in a spiral, and in the opposite directions to the hands of a clock. As the storm center was 50 or 75 miles off Cape Cod, the winds were northeast and north along the Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Maine coasts, northwest in New York, while warm southwest gales were raging three or four hundred miles off shore as was afterwards shown by the logs of many steamers.


As the steamer was making from 14 or 15 knots, midnight must have seen her past the Isles of Shoals and well up to Boon Island. Captain Williams, who was keeper of that tall gray beacon that marks the solitary ledge called Boon Island, says that the wind was heavy at midnight, but that the gale did not become intense until an hour or two later. Surely the Portland must have passed Boon Island.


How much farther she went we can only conjecture, although the weather records at the city of Portland, 35 miles beyond Boon Island, show that at midnight it was blowing only 20 miles an hour, 26 miles at 4 o’clock, or about the hour that the PORTLAND was due at her dock. The extreme wind velocity in Portland throughout the storm was only 44 miles at seven o’clock on the morning of the 27th


, or a moderate gale. Under these conditions it will be seen


that the PORTLAND had a chance of getting at least within sighting distance of that glow in the northeast which marks an approach to the city of Portland. Somewhere off Kennebunkport or perhaps Biddeford Pool, at about two or three o’clock on the morning of the 27th


while the last one was not found on the Chatham beach until ten days after the storm.


6 December 1913 Object to Bill on Maine Coast Bangor and Other Steamship Lines


Here Hard Hit by La Follette Seaman’s Law


All Passengers Must Have Life Boat Seats


The International St. John River Commission is Finishing its Labors Early in 1914


(Special Correspondence of Commercial) Washington, DC, December 6.


Maine representatives in Congress have been asked to interpose in behalf of steamship lines along the coast, which, it is claimed, would be hard but by the LaFonette seamen’s bill, that passed the Senate a few weeks ago. A provision which is especially objectionable, requires all ocean going steamers to carry suffi cient (?) to provide a seat for every passenger. This is going far beyond all previous requirements. Late (?) under the terms of the Senate but, will no longer surface. Neither with life preservers. Furthermore, with a fl otilla of life boats, which would require the reconstruction of most steamers that ply along the coast, there must be (?) seamen to man every one of them.


Representations against this provision of the numerous coastwise lines between Boston, Bangor, Portland, Rockland, Eastport and Portland. The bill is before the House Committee on merchant marine and fi sheries, of when Rep. (?) is a member. There will probably be hearings on this particular provision before the bill is reported to the House. Many steamship owners (?) are aroused and have added their protest against the bill. Ex-Mayor Josiah Quincy of Boston, has been here this week, taking the matter up with Massachusetts members of the House.


9 December 1913


Stefansson Has Missed His Ship The KARLUK, Fast in Ice Pack


Drifts Away and Explorer’s Party is Marooned.


, the PORTLAND probably ceased to make headway, although by that time the snowstorm had shut in so thick that very likely even her offi cers did not know that she was being dragged to the southward. One can scarcely picture the next 12 hours on that fated vessel. Probably her coal supply was exhausted in the forenoon, and the cargo and interior fi ttings were being used to keep the paddlewheels turning, when the upper works, racked and torn by the 12 hours of hammering, succumbed and went by the board. We do know that at 7:20 o’clock on the evening of the 27th


or within a few minutes


of 24 hours after the PORTLAND sailed from Boston. Surfman John J. Johnson of the Race Point station, picked up a life belt marked “PORTLAND” on the beach half a mile east of the station. Twenty minutes later he found a big creamery can and from that time until nearly midnight every breaker carried dumb messages from the steamer, until there was several tons of wreckage piled on the beach between Race Point and the High Head stations. The heavy fl oating portions from the


PORTLAND were slower in reaching the beach, although the fi rst body was recovered at 8 o’clock. Others did not come ashore until midnight and the following morning,


Somewhere within the confi nes of the Arctic circle drifts Vilhjalmar Stefansson’s staunch little vessel, the KARLUK, safely frozen in an icepack. But the leader of the vessel is not with his vessel and is unaware of its whereabouts, according to a dispatch received at Ottawa from the explorer Monday by J. H. Desbarats, deputy minister of naval affairs and acting minister of marine and fi sheries.


Stefansson’s message states that believing the KARLUK safe in the ice in longitude west 147, 15 miles off shore, he took a party ashore with him to hunt. The next day heavy gales sprung up and then a fog. When the weather cleared the KARLUK was not in sight and had undoubtedly been carried away by the wind which drove the ice pack off shore. So far, the search for the KARLUK has been unsuccessful, but as there is a crew of 25 men on board and plenty of provisions no anxiety is felt for its welfare. The message received Monday was dated October 30, from Point Barrow, Alaska, and was not overland from there to Circle, from where it was dispatched December 5. The message reads: “The KARLUK, beset by heavy ice


on August 12, in longitude west 147, 15 miles off shore. Ship frozen in on August 17, and drifted with the ice until September 10, when the drift stopped. September 20, believing the ship fast for the winter and as it was necessary to secure fresh meat, I


took Jeness, McConnell, Wilkins and three Eskimos ashore to hunt. North gales sprang up September 22 with snow and fog. When the storm cleared on the 24th


the ice had


gone and the KARLUK with it. The ice undoubtedly went west before the wind. The KARLUK may possibly have broken free and steamed east, but she probably remained fast and drifted west with the ice. I followed the coast west to Barrow, but the KARLUK has not been sighted. The schooners SACHS and ALAKS with southern party are safe at Collinson Point.


The schooner BELIDERE with cargo of freight and provisions is wintering near the international boundary. I am planning an ice expedition from the 145th


meridian to the


Mackenzie delta, making survey and taking soundings for steamer route. The KARLUK has on board a company of 25, including Beuchat, Mackay, Mamen, McKinley, Murray and Malloch, with the members of the crew and fi ve Eskimo. (Signed) “Stefanssohn.”


The last message previous to Monday’s was received from Stefanssohn early in August. At that time he reported that the KARLUK had behaved well in a heavy storm and had rounded Point Hope on July 31.


Those ashore with Stefanssohn now


are Dr. Jenness of Wellington, N. Z., B. McConnell, Los Angeles, California, assistant to Stefanssen and meteorologist and a Montreal photographer. The other scientifi c men who remain on board the KARLUK are Henry Benchat, anthropologist; Alister Forbes-Mackay, Edinburgh, Scotland, surgeon; Bjarme Mamen, Christiania, Norway, assistant geologist; L. McKineley, Glasgow, Scotland, expert in terrestrial magnetism; James Murray, Glasgow, Scotland, oceanographer; George Malloch, Ottawa, topographer. The power schooner MARY SACHS which Stefanssohn on October 30, said in his message was safe at Collinson Point was wrecked in the ice off the Arctic coast of Alaska some time previous to November 28, the date on which a letter was received at Nome, Alaska, from Peter Barnard, captain of the vessel, telling of her loss. The ice crushed the schooner into small bits and all provisions and scientifi c instruments were lost. The letter from Captain Barnard gave no details of the accident. As nothing was said of any injury to the men on the MARY SACHS, it was presumed they were safe.


11 December 1913 Stmr. TREMONT to the Rescue Belfast, December 11.


The steamer CASTINE, which runs between this city and CASTINE, broke her sea cock as she was nearing the Lime Kiln landing at Islesboro on Tuesday with passengers and freight on board. The water rushed in through the aperture in a huge stream and soon she began perceptibly to settle lower in the water. Capt. Coombs, realizing that his craft was in a sinking condition, blew his whistle for help and the steamer TREMONT, which happened to be near, quickly responded to his call for aid. So rapidly was the CASTINE sinking that Capt. Coombs decided to transfer his passengers to the TREMONT. The latter steamer came alongside and the transfer was accomplished without confusion and in a comparatively short time. Then, with the water mounting well up toward her rail, the CASTINE put in for the Islesboro landing which she made in a sinking condition. Temporary repairs were made there and she was later towed to Camden where the steamer is being placed in condition to once more resume her route.


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