THE REGISTER, BERWICK, NOVA SCOTIA
Thursday, April 6, 1972
A LONG LIST OF
Harbourville’s Sea Heros
The following story is a reprint of a clipping kindly loaned The Register by Randolph Clem, of Weston. The clipping is reprinted from the Morning Chronicle of 50 years ago. The writer’s name was not given. This is only part of the story. We have a continuation for which it is hoped there will be space in a future issue.
The terrible murder of Captain Joseph N. Chute, an old Harbourville boy, as told in the columns of The Morning Chronicle, reminded me of the many stories I have heard in Harbourville, during the past fifteen years, of the tragedies of the sea, that had staged men and women who were born and raised at Harbourville, as well as a lot of others who at the present time are holding responsible positions in the merchant navies of the world. Taking them all in all, I am certain that Harbourville-by-the-Sea has offered up more lives to the catastrophes of the sea, than any other village of its size on the coast of the Dominion of Canada.
More men have left Harbourville, "To Go Down to the Sea" in ships, who never came back, than any other community of its size. I am not going back more than a decade or so in this story. A few years ago the tern schooner King of Avon, commanded by Captain Jimmie Morris, as his neighbours called him, left Harbourville for Mobile to load lumber for the West Indies. He left Harbourville with his family, consisting of wife, three children and sister aboard. Right here there was a pathetic incident that afterwards developed into tragedy. One of the little girls pleaded with her uncle "Bloom", Capt. I. B. Morris, still living at Harbourville, "to taker her home with him as she was sure she would die if she went." But her mother would not permit it, and so they sailed.
It was towards the end of the beautiful month of August that they sailed, and they had a charming trip down the coast to Mobile, and reached their harbor safely and anchored, expecting the next morning to be towed to their loading place. That evening a southern hurricane struck into Mobile Bay, and the ship was broken from her anchorage, upset and every life lost, including the crew. Long afterwards the body of a woman was discovered buried in the sands of the harbor and was identified as Mrs. Morris, by her wedding ring.
Then there was Captain John Charlton, another Harbourville boy, who while still a youngster reached command of a ship. He sailed from an American port in ballast for the south, accompanied by his wife. They encountered heavy gales. His ship, the Windermere, turned turtle and all hands were lost excepting three of the crew, who lived for nine days marooned on the bottom of the hulk before they were rescued.
Then there was Captain Charles Morris, who went to sea in the barkentine Glenora, and that was the very last ever heard of him or his ship or crew. Captain Will Kenneally, one of three brothers, all of whom were deep sea captains, and born and raised in Harbourville went out with his ship and he and his ship and crew are still among the missing.
Captain John H. Aker, another Harbourville boy, left Sydney one night some years ago in the Dominion Coal Company barge "Rembrandt," and all that was ever heard of him, his crew or ship was the finding of a hatch off Louisburg.
Captain Frank Curry, a nephew of Senator Curry, sailed away in the tern schooner Louis K. Cottingham, and his aged mother is still waiting to hear something of him, his ship or crew.
So recent is the loss of the ship Tremanda, commanded by Captain Richard Lee, another Harbourville boy, that most readers will recall it. He had been for some years master of the ship Pass of Baltimore, afterwards captured by the Germans and turned into a raider to work destruction on our coasts. When the Tremanda, a sister ship to the Pass of Balmaha, was ready for sea, Captain Lee was transferred to her and taking his wife with him sailed. That was the last ever heard of the ship or its valuable lives.
That is the story of Harbourville Captains, who have in the last decade laid down their lives in the performance of duty but there is quite a string of men before the mast, who were also born and raised at Harbourville, who also made the supreme sacrifice. Here they are in brief: Delmonte Cook, a sailor before the mast, on the schooner Bonafore, commanded by Captain Chute, who was murdered last week, lost overboard.
Willie McNeil, lost overboard from the schooner W. H. Baxter, then commanded by Captain Charles McBride, also an old Harbourville boy, still in active service, but now a resident of Waterville.
Everett Spicer, lost overboard, off the schooner Sunshine commanded by Captain Melbourne Cook, also a Harbourvillian, now sailing in Southern waters.
John Ray, lost overboard in New York harbor.
Thomas Carey, perhaps better known as Thomas Coonan, who lost his life in Boston Harbor, while painting his ship.
That comprises a partial list of what Harbourville has contributed to the tolls of the sea, but it is not discouraged.
It has still numbered among its native sons, gallant sea captains, in active service, among them Captain Will McBride, now residing in Kentville, who is enjoying a brief rest now from the terrors of the sea, as well as his brother, Captain Charlie, residing at Waterville, where in Old Harbourville, the breeding place of worthwhile deep sea captains, there still remains Captain I. B. Morris, who doubled the Cape the good Lord knows how many time and who is still, like Barkus, willing, when ever he is needed. With the kind of sires mentioned in the foregoing it will not be surprising that Harbourville at the present time has a bunch of some twenty young kids, growing up, that took to the sea as soon as they were weaned, and who will in a very few years be ready to fill the gaps made by the ones that "Have Gone Over." As long as Nova Scotia can raise that kind of kids, Gloucester and other American ports will have to come to Nova Scotia for their captains, whether for commercial or racing purposes.