Thousands of lives have been lost in the wrecks that have taken place
along the shores of Cape Cod since the _Mayflower_ cast anchor in the
harbor at Provincetown in 1620. There is no record of the disasters
previous to the establishment of the United States Life-Saving Service
in 1872, other than mention in town records and histories of the dates
and circumstances of the most memorable, or those attended by great
loss of life.
The first shipwreck on Cape Cod, of which there is any record, occurred
in 1626, when the historic ship _Sparrowhawk_, Captain Johnson, from
England, with colonists bound for Virginia, stranded on the shoals near
Orleans, and became a total loss. The story of the wreck is told by
Governor Bradford in his diary of the Plymouth Colony. The ship’s bones
were discovered in a mud bank in 1863, the washing away of the shore
line disclosing them to view.
[Illustration: BRITISH FRIGATE SOMERSET.]
[Illustration: AN OLD WRECK.]
Another historic wreck was that of the British frigate _Somerset_,
which stranded on Peaked Hill Bars, Nov. 2 or 3, 1778. The _Somerset_
was one of the fleet of British men-of-war, whose guns had stormed the
heights of Bunker Hill, and terrorized the commerce of the colonies.
She was at anchor in Boston Harbor the night that Paul Revere made
his famous ride. When she met with disaster she was in pursuit of a
fleet of French ships, which were reported to be in Boston Harbor. The
_Somerset_ had been at anchor in Provincetown harbor for some time,
leaving there a few days before she was lost, to go in search of the
French ships. She struck Peaked Hill Bars during a northeast gale,
while trying to round the Cape, and enter the harbor at Provincetown.
She had a complement of four hundred and eighty men, and is supposed to
have carried sixty guns, thirty-two, twenty-four, and twelve pounders.
She struck on the bars with terrific force, and instantly the seas
began to pound her to pieces. She was finally thrown up on the beach
by the tumultuous walls of water, and Captain Aurey and the few of the
crew who had not perished reached the shore.
[Illustration: MATILDA BUCK.]
The residents of Provincetown viewed the wreck from High Pole Hill,
and summoned Capt. Enoch Hallett, of Yarmouth, and Colonel Doane, of
Wellfleet, who, with a detachment of militia, made Captain Aurey and
the survivors prisoners.
Captain Hallett took charge of the prisoners, marching them up the Cape
to Barnstable, and later to Boston, Colonel Doane being left to look
after the wrecked craft. There was much jubilation on Cape Cod and in
Boston over the disaster. The bones of the _Somerset_ remained buried
for a century, when the shifting sands exposed them to view. Relic
hunters soon carried away nearly all of the wreckage that could be
obtained, and the shifting sands have again entombed what remains of
the famous old frigate.
Another historic wreck was that of the pirate ship _Widdah_, which was
lost near the site of the Cahoon’s Hollow Life-Saving Station in 1718.
The ship was commanded by Captain Bellamy, and carried twenty-three
guns and a crew of one hundred and thirty men. Captain Bellamy had
captured seven vessels off the shores of Cape Cod, and on one of them
had placed seven of his crew. The captain of the captured ship ran his
vessel close to the shore, and the seven pirates were taken prisoners.
Later six of them were executed in Boston. The _Widdah_ soon after was
driven ashore during a gale, and all hands, save an Englishman and an
Indian, were lost.
[Illustration: A BAD WRECK.]
A scene of awful terror occurred when the _Josephus_, a British ship,
was wrecked on Peaked Hill Bars in the year 1842. She had a cargo
of iron rails. Her crew had been driven to the rigging as soon as
the vessel struck, and one after another they were seen to fall into
the raging sea. Those who had gathered on the shore could hear the
despairing cries of the imperiled crew, but were powerless to aid them.
At last two of the spectators, Daniel Cassidy and Jonathan Collins,
procured a dory, and against the earnest pleadings of their friends,
and in the almost certain assurance that they were going to their
death, pushed off from the beach, saying as a last farewell, “We
can’t stand this any longer; we are going to try and rescue those poor
fellows if it cost us our lives.” Half-way out to the wreck the two
heroes successfully battled with the sea, then a giant comber, catching
their frail boat, carried it along and buried it under tons of tumbling
water. The gallant men were seen to rise and struggle desperately
to reach the overturned boat, but perished in the attempt. The men
remaining in the rigging of the _Josephus_ were soon after swept to
death by the monstrous waves that tore the ship to pieces.
In 1848 the brig _Cactus_ was lost on the bars along the back of the
Cape.
[Illustration: WRECKERS AT WORK ON KATIE J. BARRETT.]
Along the shore near the Cahoon’s Hollow Station the immigrant ship
_Franklin_ was deliberately run ashore in 1849, and many of her poor,
helpless passengers perished in the disaster. This was one of the most
appalling disasters that ever occurred on Cape Cod. Speedy retribution
came to the officers of the ship for their terrible crime, the captain
and nearly all the others losing their own lives in the wreck. The late
Capt. Benjamin S. Rich, afterwards of the United States Life-Saving
Service, was the first to discover the wreck, and also found a box
containing some papers that subsequently proved that the disaster was
intentional.
[Illustration: KATIE J. BARRETT BREAKING UP.]
The year 1853 was a memorable one in the history of Cape Cod, there
being twenty-three appalling disasters along its shore during that
period. Among the vessels lost were many ships and brigs well known in
shipping circles in Boston and on Cape Cod. The weather was bitter cold
and violent storms swept the coast when most of the vessels were lost,
so that nothing could be done to assist the imperiled crews, and those
who did reach the shore perished from exposure on the desolate uplands
and beaches.
In 1866 the _White Squall_, built for a blockade runner, while on her
way home from China, struck on the bars along the back of the Cape and
became a total loss.
The wreck of the _Aurora_ is known to Cape Codders as the “Palm Oil
Wreck.” The vessel was loaded with palm oil from the west coast of
Africa. She struck on the bars off the back of the Cape, and was a
total loss.
Another terrible disaster was the wreck of the schooner _Clara Belle_,
coal laden, which stranded on the bars off High Head Station, on the
night of March 6, 1872, at the height of a fearful blizzard. Captain
Amesbury and crew of six men attempted to reach the shore in their
boat. The craft had gone but a few yards when she was overturned,
throwing the men into the sea. John Silva was the only member of the
crew that reached the shore. He found himself alone on a frozen beach
with the mercury below zero. He wandered about during the night trying
to find some place of shelter, and was found the next morning by a
farmer standing dazed, barefooted, and helpless in the highway three
miles from the scene of the wreck. His feet and hands were frozen, and
it was a long time before he recovered from the effects. The schooner
was driven high and dry on the beach, and when boarded the next day a
warm fire was found in the cabin. The haste of the crew to leave the
vessel had cost them their lives.
[Illustration: KATIE J. BARRETT JUST BEFORE HER FOREMAST FELL.]
The first fearful disaster after the life-saving service
reorganization, took place on Peaked Hill Bars, March 4, 1875, when the
Italian bark _Giovanni_ became a total loss and her crew of fourteen
perished. The bark stranded too far from the beach to be reached by the
wreck ordnance used in those days, and the surf was pounding on the
shore with such fury that a boat could not be launched, much less live,
in the sea. No assistance could be rendered the poor sailors, and one
by one they dropped into the sea and were lost.
The most appalling disaster in the history of the life-saving service
on Cape Cod was the wreck of the iron ship _Jason_, on the bars at
Pamet River, Dec. 5, 1893. Twenty-four lives were lost. The ship was
bound from Calcutta, India, for Boston, with a cargo of jute. Captain
McMillan, who was in charge of the ship, had a crew of twenty-four
men, including an apprentice, Samuel J. Evans, of Raglan, England.
Thick weather prevailed off the coast for several days preceding the
disaster, and Captain McMillan, not being in possession of reliable
information as to his position, obtained it from a New York pilot boat.
When about one hundred miles off the coast he unfortunately shaped his
course to the westward for the purpose of raising some landmark. When
the _Jason_ approached the Cape, the wind was blowing a gale from the
northeast, and the atmosphere was thick with rain, which soon turned to
sleet and snow.
[Illustration: AT THE MERCY OF THE SEA.]
The life savers along the shore at Nauset first saw the _Jason_, and
word that a ship was in dangerous proximity to the shore was sent
along the Cape to all the stations. The _Jason_ was last seen just
before five o’clock by the day patrol of the Nauset Station. The life
savers, knowing that she could hardly weather the Cape, kept a sharp
lookout for her, and at all the stations the horses were hitched into
the beach carts and every preparation made to go to the assistance of
the ship without a moment’s delay. It was a fearful night along the
shores of Cape Cod, the coast guardians having all they could do to go
over their patrol. Nothing was seen or heard of the doomed ship up
to seven o’clock in the evening, and the life savers hoped that she
had managed to work offshore or around the Cape. At half-past seven,
however, Surfman Honey, of the Pamet River Station, burst into the
station, and shouted, “Hopkins (the north patrol) has just burned his
signal.” A moment later Hopkins rushed into the station and reported
that the _Jason_ had struck on the bars about a half mile north of
the station. Keeper Rich and his crew were ready for the emergency,
and, with the beach cart, rushed to the scene. The shore was then
piled with wreckage, and the slatting of the sails of the wrecked ship
sounded above the roar and din of the storm. A careful lookout for
the shipwrecked seafarers was kept by the life savers as they hurried
to the scene, and Evans, the sole survivor of the disaster, was found
clinging to a bale of jute. He was clad only in his underclothes, and
was almost totally helpless.
[Illustration: SHIP JASON THE MORNING AFTER SHE WAS WRECKED.]
The wrecked vessel was sighted through the storm and a shot promptly
fired over the craft, but the crew had perished almost as soon as the
ship struck, and the efforts of the life savers were of no avail. The
ship (it was afterwards learned from young Evans) broke in two almost
as soon as she struck, and the members of the crew perished shortly
after. Evans told the author that as soon as the ship struck he put on
a life-preserver and took to the rigging. The captain ordered the boats
launched, but they were smashed as soon as they struck the water. While
clinging to the rigging, considering what was best to do, Evans says
that he must have been hit by a big wave or wall of water, as the next
that he knew he was on the beach and the life savers were taking him to
the station. The bodies of twenty of the crew were found and buried in
the cemetery at Wellfleet. Evans soon recovered from the effects of the
buffeting he received by the seas, and returned to his home in England.
Part of the ship is now visible at low tide, and is an object of much
interest to visitors to Cape Cod.
[Illustration: SAMUEL J. EVANS, SOLE SURVIVOR OF WRECKED SHIP JASON,