Left to Die Read online

  They talked on, about how good it would be to get aboard their own ship, to get warm and dry and eat a hot meal, about Abram Kean and how callously he had ordered them away from his ship. None of it mattered now. Now that the outward path had been found, they would soon be safe and sound aboard the Newfoundland. They moved off again through the drifting snow, their steps lighter now. They were walking home.

  Tom Dawson called another halt. He and the others had lost the hard-won trail and couldn’t find it in the blinding snow. They were crestfallen. It was snowing harder now, even though the wind was still in the southerly quarter and the air still had a mild feel to it. Some of the more optimistic sealers thought the snow would turn to rain. They were wrong.

  * * * * *

  The turbulent air mass, which had its birthplace in far warmer climes, and which had been reaching toward the southwestern edge of the island of Newfoundland for days, had arrived. The warm and pleasant spring day that had heralded its coming was over. The confused depression of atmospheric movement had pushed the spring-like airflow out of the way to make room for a brutal gale.

  The storm came in eastward from the St. Lawrence Gulf. It raced across the sandy spit of the Port au Port Peninsula and surged inland toward the forested heart of insular Newfoundland. It swept south across frozen St. George’s Bay and up over the Anguille Mountains, which were cloaked with aging winter snow. It roared out past the southwestern end of the island at Cape Ray, where the sea was free of ice, engulfing all before it. It ripped over fallow fields and across frozen harbours. It slammed up against white clapboard houses and those with peeling coloured paint. It baffled down the red brick chimneys of the rich and the black funnels of the poor. It heaped more snow down on the cold white mounds of Elliston’s cellars.

  The wives of ice hunters all along the coasts listened to the howl and moan of the gale as it rattled single-pane windows and drifted snow through the seams under eaves. Though they fretted and stared with worried eyes and comforted their brood who sensed their concern, they were safe. But their absent hunters, some adrift and some stumbling in the storm’s path, were not. The gale raged seaward, and there its all-seeing eye found the first of its innocents—the SS Southern Cross. The ship was well burthen and fleeing for safety from the fury bearing down.

  The name carried so proudly across her broad stern was not the one of her christening. Built of thick hardwoods in Arendal, Norway, when it slid from its ways and floated free into the Skaw fjord in 1886, it was christened Pollux, after a star in the northern constellation of Gemini. The Pollux was a three-masted, barque-rigged vessel, 146 feet long and powered by coal-fired steam. For the next decade she hunted whales very successfully. Then the stout Norwegian whaler changed ownership and was fitted by Sir George Newnes for Antarctic exploration, with the explorer C. E. Borchgrevink as leader. On December 19, 1898, she sailed into the Southern Hemisphere with Captain Bernard Jensen, her new master, at the helm. Above her was one of the earth’s smallest and most distinctive constellations, the Crux or Cross of the southern nights. And under the glow of her namesake, the ship proudly wore her new name, the Southern Cross. The ship struggled through the Antarctic ice pack for weeks until February 11, 1899, when she broke through that formidable barrier into the Ross Sea. She was the first ship to do so. The Southern Cross had opened up the Antarctic sea roads for Ernest Shackleton, Robert Falcon Scott, and Roald Amundsen, the explorers who would discover and map earth’s southernmost land mass. This feat earned the Southern Cross her first page in the books of nautical history. On March 31, 1914, off the south coast of Newfoundland, the gale was sneaking up behind her. It would put the SS Southern Cross onto the pages of history books again.

  When she left the port of St. John’s, she headed for the Gulf of St. Lawrence hunt with 173 sealers and crew aboard. Her sealers were, for the most part, inexperienced men from the Conception Bay area. Most of them were young and unmarried, but what the young sealers lacked in experience they more than made up for with energy and zest for the hunt. They killed enough seals on the Gulf ice floes to load the vessel in record time. On March 29, her captain, George Clarke of Brigus, a veteran seaman in his mid-forties, ordered his vessel away from the hunt and sailed for home. Clarke figured his ship should enter port with a full load of pelts and claim the “silk flag” this year for being the first to do so.

  The Southern Cross left the Gulf and came in under the land at Cape Ray at an oblique angle. She was spotted by a wireless operator, who passed the word on that she was coming with all flags flying, indicating a full load. The loaded ship made her way south and east in open water, past the rugged south coast communities of Newfoundland. Her young crew was jubilant. Their bunks had been removed to make room for the bumper harvest of greasy sealskins, and some of them slept on these. It was a small price to pay for being first in port fully loaded. Another vigilant wireless operator saw her as she sailed past the islands of Saint-Pierre and Miquelon, one of France’s last claims in the western world. The Frenchman sent his sighting by using the telecommunication codes common to all operators in any language.

  Captain Thomas Connors saw her next on the evening of Tuesday, March 31, from the bridge of the SS Portia. The Portia was taking the first deep swells of an impending storm five miles west-southwest of Cape Pine and her skipper was pushing his ship hard for the safety of St. Mary’s Bay. The Portia was close enough to salute the Southern Cross with her loud steam whistle. She sounded back her proud acknowledgement. Connors noted the ship was so heavily burthen she rose but slowly on the deep rollers. He ordered his operator to pass on the news of her progress. He would have liked to congratulate Captain Clarke of the Southern Cross—they were old friends—but the Southern Cross, owned by Harvey’s, had no means of communication aboard.

  The Southern Cross was never seen again.

  Sealers who had sailed in her before said the Southern Cross was in need of repair. Others said she carried pound boards, made from Newfoundland softwoods, to keep the slippery pelts from shifting in her holds; they were thin and weakened by years of rotting seal fat and would break in heavy seas, causing her listing cargo to capsize her. Another old seaman said, “Maybe she simply sprung a leak and could have been saved—the Portia was close to her—if she had a wireless aboard, but her owners saw no need for it.”

  But for those who wait on shore, there are no reasons. There is only loss, sorrow, and pain. All that remained to mark the spot where brave men died was a silky-smooth patch of water. It widened and calmed the seas for a time, until the source of the viscous slick simply stopped rising up out of the grey depths. The careless brush of sea water smeared over it all and hid the calm place where so many men had died, until all was as everything and yet like nothing at all.

  * * * * *

  All of the Newfoundland sealers who had been put on the ice with a threat of a snowstorm clearly in the offing were now in serious trouble. Dawson had found the trail, as Tuff had hoped he would, but lost it again. The sealers at the front of the line were now searching for the path back to the Newfoundland, but no one could find it. Everything was against them. The coal smut from their boots when they had left their own ship, and which had clearly identified their path when they had first started, was somewhere far to the southeast. A few discarded flagpoles had been stuck by the path, but none were found. A howling wind and blinding snow were quickly covering the tracks of the 132 tramping men. Worse yet, night was nearly upon them.

  The ice where they had left the Stephano was relatively smooth, level ice where herds of seals had whelped. Birthing seals seemed to prefer this type of ice, which the sealers called true whelping ice. They left this area and bore to the southeast, where they believed the Newfoundland to be, and they came upon the same heavy, thick ice they had crossed in the morning. As rough as it was to walk on, this was the only place where they could hope to find shelter if they were to spend a night on the ice.
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  Taking up the rear, George Tuff had gotten a couple of volunteers to help him with the ailing William Pear. Pear was a stranger to Tuff. He needed assistance to walk, and when he had to jump across narrow rents between the ice pans, he fell in more often than not and had to be pulled out. Pear was pitiful to look upon. Each time his feet went into the icy water he fell forward to his knees, not having enough strength to pull himself free.

  When he was pulled out of the icy water, snow clung to his feet and calves, encrusting his lower legs in a plaster cast of snow and ice. Pear was suffering terribly. He couldn’t see, he was very sick, and he was soaked to the bone with icy sea water. Moans of pain and misery came from him every few minutes. Unable to go on without help, Pear just wanted to lie down and rest.

  William Pear lived by the side of the Thorburn Path that led through the stunted tuckamore forest leading into St. John’s. He had obtained a ticket to the ice as much to satisfy his curiosity as for any other reason, and right now he couldn’t believe he was here.

  “Leave me bide, b’ys, I’m done fer,” he pleaded.

  But the brave men who had chosen to stay with him dragged him on. They were now alone in a fierce vortex of wind and snow. George Tuff didn’t carry a compass, and on that naked plain without contrast, and with dusk falling, the wind could be coming from any direction. They held their hands above their eyes, below the bibs of their hats, but they couldn’t see. To look windward, into the snow, was mesmerizing. The roar of wind was frightening. It howled and tore over, through, and around the upper edges of the ice pinnacles. It hissed and whistled through ice canyons and over pressure ridges.

  A shout came out of the blizzard, muted and muffled as if from a great distance.

  “Hark, b’y’s, the men in the fore ’ave found our ship,” said George Tuff, staring into the shroud of snow. “Sounds like Bungay and Jones. Ahoy dere! Where ’ave ye found the ship?” He yelled the last at the top of his lungs.

  Silence followed for a while, then a baffled reply to Tuff’s anxious query: “No ship. We’ve lost the trail.”

  “Bide steady, men, till I comes upon ’e. Keep bawlin’ out to keep us fair to ye.”

  Shortly after 5:00 p.m., Tuff led off toward the shouts and the others followed, dragging William Pear with them. Tuff’s small group joined the others, who were bunched together on a large pan. He talked with the master watches. Their conversation was grave, their prospects dire. The sealers drew close to their master watches. The weight of so many men on a single pan was dangerous, so they moved around to other pans, distributing their weight. There were few decisions to be made. Without landmarks or direction, there was nowhere to go. They knew the ships were just beyond the blinding snow, but they may as well have been a continent away.

  Then, from out of the storm, bearing its sweet music from windward, came the hoarse sound of a ship’s whistle. It was the unmistakable sound of their ship, the SS Newfoundland: a groaning, distant sound over the howling wind. It was a lifeline, a peal of hope coming out of a steeple hidden by darkness and snow.

  “The Newfoundland’s own whistle, b’ys! Not far, either, no more’n a mile, I ’lows!”

  “Aye, Skipper Wes is lookin’ fer we fellers. Comin’ towards us, she is!”

  “Hush, b’ys, and listen, won’t ’e?”

  The sound of the wind rose and fell on the flaws while the snow scudded all around them. Men listened in absolute concentration. They cuffed their ears to the might of the wind, listening, straining for that sound of hope to come again. And come again it did, a long, mournful arrummp! from the southeast.

  Instinctively, they started to march toward the sound. They would be guided all the way to safety by the sound of their ship’s horn. They walked a few yards before they were ordered to stop again and listen for the next one. It should be louder, more distinct, and give them clearer direction. They waited without talking, their ears straining, bursting, longing for the next blast to come out of the storm.

  But it never came.

  There was nothing save for the sound of wind and driven snow. Why had their captain stopped blowing the ship’s whistle? they asked aloud. Why had it sounded at all, if not for them? Why were there no shots fired from the sealers’ rifles? Why weren’t their fellow sealers lining the gunnels of the Newfoundland and bawling out to them? As to get an answer to their own question, the stricken sealers began to shout into the wind with all their might.

  18

  Bo’sun john tizzard had asked Captain Wes Kean for permission to sound the Newfoundland’s whistle a couple of times, just in case there were men astray on the ice. Kean told him to go ahead and do so if he wanted to. Shortly after 5:00 p.m., Tizzard sounded the whistle twice. With his mind at ease, he left the bridge and turned in for the night.

  Charles W. Green’s log:

  Wind force six. East south east. Barometer 29.80, falling. Strong gale and drifting snow. Ship burned down for the night. Lookout carefully attended to. So ends this day.

  Kean had spent almost all day aloft in the barrel. Only for short breaks did he allow his bo’sun to take his place. He had watched his men leave the ship. He had seen thirty-four men return. He had studied the sealers who went on through the thickening snow until they boarded his father’s ship. He was still in the barrel at noon when the cook called him down to dinner. When Wes stepped down from the ratlines, he had ordered his bo’sun up to take his place.

  “My men are safely aboard the Stephano,” Kean said to Green, who was seated at the table. Green looked up in surprise. It was one of the rare times Kean had spoken to him. Kean sounded relieved.

  “Good news indeed, sir,” said Green, sharing the captain’s mood. “Just in time, too, sir. The glass is dropping. A blow comin’, I fear.”

  “Yes, sir. No matter, though. Father will look out fer my men now.”

  “Very good, sir.”

  Kean left the table and walked outside again. Green finished his meal, went out on deck, and lit his pipe before looking up into the rigging. Wes Kean was in the barrel again, his glasses glued to his eyes. The Newfoundland was lurching back and forth, trying to butt through heavy ice. Kean had given the order to move as close as they could to the Stephano and his men. The sky was thick with snow and there was little to be seen beyond a few hundred feet. Soon, the wind breezed up and the snow fell heavier. Though it was still mild, the wind sometimes carried cold gusts from the north. The masts on the windward side were plastered with snow and the scarred hull of the Newfoundland had a white coat of snow painted to her exposed flank. Inside the bridge, the blinding snow came at the warm windows like swarming white moths.

  When Wes came down out of the barrel, his eyes were burning from using his powerful binoculars all day. He walked onto the bridge, where Green and the bo’sun were on duty. Kean looked tired, but he was in a good mood.

  “I ’lows the b’ys will be up all night cufferin’ wit’ the crew on Father’s ship. A treat fer the men to spend a night on a modern vessel, eh, Green?”

  “Indeed it will, sir, indeed it will.”

  Night came, thick with snow, and the Newfoundland was hopelessly jammed again. Kean ordered his engine burned down for the night. With the night lanterns hung and the night watches in place, he left the bridge and went to his cabin.

  * * * * *

  George Tuff ordered the four watches to group their men on pans of ice large enough to bear their weight. He also ordered them to take shelter from the cut of the wind behind snowy hummocks, to fortify them with snow and ice, and to try and get fires going with oily gaffs and flagpoles. If they could find seals they were to kill them, burn their hides, and eat their flesh. They scattered to their respective groups and began preparing for the night sweeping down upon them. The storm intensified and the sky filled with snow. It piled up and made walking difficult even as the wind began banking in col
der flaws from the north.

  On the pan where George Tuff stood with his men, William Pear was getting worse. Tuff asked him if he was hungry, and when he said that he was, Tuff pulled a tin of sardines from his own pocket.

  “You will have to cheer up, Pear, and do the best that you can, b’y. ’Twill be every man fer himsef, I ’lows, before dis night is done.”

  Tuff opened the tin of oily sardines and handed them to Pear, who was sitting on the ground. He walked around the perimeter of his men, inspiring them as he went. With trembling fingers, Pear pushed the sardines into his mouth one at a time. Oil poured down over his chin and inside his coat collar without his notice. The tin empty, Pear put it to his mouth and poured the coagulated grease into his mouth. Then he curled into a fetal position and coughed a few times.

  When Tuff returned, he asked the others about Pear. They told him he was sleeping. Tuff prodded Pear gently with his foot; when he got no response, he bent down and spoke his name aloud. Pear remained silent, tucked into a tight ball and facing away from him. Tuff pulled on Pear’s shoulder and turned the man toward him. His face was covered with snow and his eyes were wide open and staring. William Pear was dead.

  If there was a man among them who knew what was to come, it was Tuff. William Pear was the first of the blank faces of Tuff’s dream. Horrible images now came into focus in his head.

  “We will all die! We’ll all be smuddered!” he heard himself saying.

  George Tuff sat on the ice with his head in his hands and wept. He didn’t weep out of fear. He wept for the terrible responsibility that had been thrust upon him, for the senselessness, the futility of it all, and for the first of many more blank faces waiting to come into focus.

  * * * * *

  The Stephano lay crouching like a great grey beast on the white-shrouded field of ice. The latest falling snow was quickly covering her from stem to stern, and with no water to be seen anywhere near the vessel, she looked out of place. Hard by her hull, the sound of the storm thrummed through her rigging. On her deck, which was slowly suffocating with the snow, her steel stays whined and whistled and vibrated.