Chesapeake Requiem

by Earl Swift

  Among its early: Canaan’s settlement is described in Mariner, God’s Island. The quote is from Crockett, Facts and Fun, 23-24.

  Another family: The surname tally is from the demographic study.

  But in 1820: The population figure is from Hall, Tangier Island. The hurricane quote is from Crockett, Facts and Fun, 20-21.

  Then, around 1840: The Yankee invasion is described in Mariner, God’s Island, and David M. Schulte, “History of the Virginia Oyster Fishery, Chesapeake Bay, USA,” Frontiers in Marine Science 4 (May 9, 2017).

  The Yankee oystermen: The quote is from Crockett, Facts and Fun, 28.

  Indeed, it did: Mariner describes the island’s alignment with the Union and Civil War years in the Chesapeake in God’s Island.

  Or at least: This scene in the Situation Room unfolded on May 27, 2016.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Fifty yards beyond Uppards: I rode with Cook on May 25, 2016.

  Later, I’ll examine: The map is available for inspection at https://historicalcharts.noaa.gov/.

  Cook steers the boat: Ooker spoke of Hearn aboard Allen Ray Crockett’s Claudine Sue on December 14, 2016.

  We cross the state: The chimney’s origins are described in Jason Rhodes, Crisfield: The First Century (Charleston, Sc.: Arcadia, 2006), and Don Beaulieu, “Plain Janes,” Washington Post, June 12, 2002.

  It’s a reminder: Scott Dance, “At Blackwater Refuge, Rising Sea Levels Drown Habitat,” Baltimore Sun, December 31, 2016; DeJong et al., “Pleistocene Relative Sea Levels in the Chesapeake Bay”; and Daniel Strain, “The Future of Maryland’s Blackwater Marsh,” https://www.climate.gov/news-features/features/future-marylands-blackwater-marsh, January 14, 2015 (retrieved November 15, 2017).

  The northernmost: I visited Saxis during my 1994 kayak circumnavigation of the bay and again on September 28, 2016. I can recommend the coffee and company at Martha’s Kitchen.

  The region’s relative: The report I mention is Samuel S. Belfield, Sea Level Rise and Storm Surge Impacts to May 2016 Roadways in Hampton Roads, Hampton Roads Transportation Planning Organization, May 2016. Available at http://www.hrtpo.org/uploads/docs/Sea%20Level%20Rise-Storm%20Surge%20Impacts%20to%20Roadways%20in%20HR%20Final%20Report.pdf (retrieved November 11, 2017).

  Cook throttles back: Leon made his comment on May 26, 2017.

  We tie the boat: CBF’s history is described on the group’s website at http://www.cbf.org/about-cbf/history/ (retrieved January 3, 2018).

  At first inspection: Cook made his remark on September 27, 2016.

  But consider: Ibid. His experience at the sewage treatment plant was chronicled in Cyril T. Zaneski, “Island Cleans Up Its Waste Problem,” Virginian-Pilot, March 6, 1989.

  Erosion devoured: Jerry Frank’s quote is from the Situation Room session of March 14, 2017.

  This would have been: Wallace, The Parson of the Islands, 13.

  War’s end only intensified: Mariner, God’s Island; Hall, Tangier Island; and Rhodes, Crisfield. See also Maryland Historical Trust documents at https://mht.maryland.gov/secure/medusa/PDF/Somerset/S-517.pdf (retrieved November 11, 2017).

  That would soon: The cholera epidemic is described in Crockett, Facts and Fun; Mariner, God’s Island; and a brief item in the New York Times, October 27, 1866.

  “The people began to die”: Crockett, Facts and Fun, 35.

  The wonder is: Peggy Gordy’s remarks are from a September 2016 telephone conversation. See also Peggy Reynolds, “New Tide Washes Old Tangier Isle,” Washington Post and Times Herald, April 28, 1957, which includes the line: “Only half a dozen homes have bathrooms.”

  The situation wasn’t remedied: I witnessed the Situation Room exchange on March 15, 2017.

  On an afternoon: I made this trip to Uppards on June 27, 2016.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  Tangier found itself: The passage on steamboat service was informed by Mariner, God’s Island; Hall, Tangier Island; Shores, Tangier Island; C. P. Swain, “Tangier Island: A Protest Against a Recent Letter in Relation to It,” Richmond Dispatch, July 30, 1899; and letter from the chief of engineers, Transmitting Report of the Board of Engineers for Rivers and Harbors on Review of Reports Heretofore Submitted on Tangier Channel, Va., with Illustration (H.R. Doc. No. 51, 72nd Congress, 2nd Session), which I found in the library of the corps’ Norfolk District headquarters.

  They had one now: The passages on the border dispute were informed by Report and Accompanying Documents of the Virginia Commissioners Appointed to Ascertain the Boundary Line Between Maryland and Virginia (Richmond, Va.: R. F. Walker, 1873), and Final Report of the Virginia Commissioners of the Maryland and Virginia Boundary to the Governor of Virginia (Richmond, Va.: R. F. Walker, 1874). The documents make fascinating reading for their description of bay erosion. Much discussion centered on the location of a point of land cited in seventeenth-century documents delineating the boundary—a place called Watkins Point—Maryland commissioners arguing that the point had moved in the two centuries since. “It is scarcely necessary to remark,” they wrote, “after the many proofs we have seen and heard of the great changes in the ‘[P]oints,’ shores and islands of the Chesapeake bay and its tributaries, which have taken place especially in that vicinity, and within the memory of living witnesses, and which are still going on, that the place called Watkins point, in the charter to Lord Baltimore, has long since been washed away, or does not now exist as it then was.” It was “proved that the main land originally extended in one unbroken point to Watts island,” they continued, so “as to confirm the implication that Watkins point was at the southern end of what has since become known as Watts island.” They offered as evidence that “very many large stumps of trees are in the waters and marshes adjacent” to Watts, which surely suggested the existence of a “continuous neck of land as far south as that island.” Needless to say, this argument did not prevail—Watts and Tangier islands would otherwise be part of Maryland. Still, it recognizes the effects of sea-level rise in the bay more than 140 years ago, before it had shifted to overdrive.

  The arbitrators: “Appendix C: Opinion of Arbitrators—1877 Opinion Regarding Boundary Line Between Virginia and Maryland,” http://www.virginiaplaces.org/pdf/mdvaappc.pdf (retrieved November 11, 2017).

  The oyster industry: The figure is from Mariner, God’s Island. It was confirmed by Dave Schulte, author of “History of the Virginia Oyster Fishery,” in a June 16, 2017, email exchange with the author.

  That worry, quickly realized: Schulte describes the decline of harvests in “History of the Virginia Oyster Fishery.” The oyster wars are described in John R. Wennersten, The Oyster Wars of Chesapeake Bay (Centreville, Md.: Tidewater Publishers, 1981), and Mariner, God’s Island.

  Tangier had been transformed: The quote is from “Tangier Island Colony: Poverty and Crime Almost Unknown in the Community,” a New York Times report published in the Washington Post of June 7, 1903.

  An hour before one June: The scene in Ooker’s shanty occurred on June 13, 2016.

  This is a reality: Leon delivered this quote to me on October 30, 2016.

  Some nicknames: The quotes are from the Situation Room session of March 15, 2017.

  That was Half-Ass: Author interview with Kim Parks, November 7, 2016. The back-and-forth in the Situation Room is from the session of February 15, 2017.

  During another Situation: This exchange occurred on March 14, 2017.

  One evening at Swain: This scene unfolded on September 26, 2016.

  We fish up Ooker’s pots: The crabbing described in this section occurred on June 25, 2016.

  “Bad,” Leon declares: Situation Room session, June 27, 2016.

  Aging is a topic: Situation Room session, February 15, 2017.

  More often, he introduces: Situation Room session, March 12, 2017.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Mary Stuart Parks: I hung around the kitchen at Fisherman’s Corner on September 2, 2017.

  It’s also a family business: Ooker told me of his contributions on A
ugust 20, 2016.

  Stuart also scoops: My passage on the hepatopancreas was informed by Rob Kasper, “To Cut, or Not to Cut, the Mustard,” Baltimore Sun, June 21, 1992.

  Down the road: Denny Crockett explained the sourcing of the Chesapeake House’s crabmeat in a September 2017 telephone conversation.

  Off the island, however: For an interesting study of imported crabmeat, see Michael Paolisso, “Taste the Traditions: Crabs, Crab Cakes, and the Chesapeake Bay Blue Crab Fishery,” American Anthropologist 109, no. 4 (December 2007): 654–65.

  I’m not alone: Author’s phone interview with Sydney Meers on November 10, 2017.

  Such nuance is lost: Ed Charnock made the remark during an interview in March 2000.

  Irene and Ooker: Leon’s remark is from an October 30, 2016, conversation.

  The orphanage also: Devi Eskridge’s adoption, and the details of her life before and after, are from my interview with her in North Garden, Virginia, on August 23, 2017.

  Irene homeschooled: Devi told me about the Post-its in our August 23, 2017, interview. Nina Pruitt made her comment to a group of visiting mainland principals on July 14, 2016.

  Once she had tentative command: Both Devi and Ooker explained the sequence of events—Devi on August 23, 2017, and Ooker during a conversation at Lorraine’s on October 7, 2017. The Alabama couple’s experience is related at “An Adoption Gone Wrong,” Morning Edition, NPR, July 24, 2007, https://www.npr.org/2007/07/24/12185524/an-adoption-gone-wrong; and “Adoption Victim Meets Her Mother After 9 Years,” ACT, December 25, 2005, http://www.againstchildtrafficking.org/2005/12/6160/ (both retrieved November 14, 2017).

  And so it was: Leon made this comment on October 30, 2016.

  So, yes: Devi supplied me with the graduation dates via text message on September 18, 2017.

  Nowadays, all the girls: Ooker described his daughters’ lives and locations in a February 25, 2016, telephone conversation.

  And Devi, who visits: Author interview with Devi Eskridge, August 23, 2017.

  When I ran this: Ibid. Annette Charnock’s quote is from our interview on October 6, 2017.

  CHAPTER TEN

  To a point: I approached Ooker after the church service of June 12, 2017.

  No, it’s the weather: Mark Crockett and I watched the distant storm on June 30, 2016.

  Storms like that: The squall that hit the Eastern Shore occurred on July 1, 2016.

  “A squall can blow”: This exchange took place on July 25, 2016.

  Some violent storms: Ooker was uncertain about the year, let alone the date, of his close encounter with the waterspout. He told me the same story during my 2000 stay, so it was evidently before then.

  I can attest to the power: I camped on Honeymoon Island on the evening of July 3, 1994.

  Heavy weather: My description of William Henry Harrison Crockett’s death draws from Mariner, God’s Island. See also “Four Men Drowned,” Peninsula Enterprise (Accomac, Va.), February 29, 1896, preserved at http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn94060041/1896-02-29/ed-1/seq-3/ (retrieved November 13, 2017).

  “She sank at once”: Ibid.

  Tangier felt “its loss”: “Resolutions of Respect,” Peninsula Enterprise (Accomac, Va.), February 29, 1896.

  Another hard loss: Mariner, God’s Island, and “Dies After Rescue,” Richmond Times-Dispatch, February 23, 1914, preserved at http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn85038615/1914-02-23/ed-1/seq-4/#date1=1900&index=0&rows=20&words=Asbury+Crockett+Tangier&searchType=basic&sequence=0&state=Virginia&date2=1920&proxtext=asbury+crockett+%2B+tangier&y=11&x=16&dateFilterType=yearRange&page=1 (retrieved November 13, 2017).

  The years since: Several islanders told me of Puck Shores’s death, among them his daughter-in-law, Carlene Shores; Leon McMann; and Jerry Frank Pruitt. Harry Smith Parks’s disappearance was documented in “Officials Halt Boat Search,” Daily Press (Newport News), April 7, 1989; and “Watermen’s Bodies Found After Separate Accidents,” Daily Press (Newport News), May 2, 1989.

  And then there’s: My re-creation of Donnie Crockett’s sinking relies on Joshua Partlow, “Tangier Island Aches for Lost Waterman,” Washington Post, March 14, 2005; and Joanne Kimberlin, “An Island Waits for Its Lost Soul,” Virginian-Pilot, March 16, 2005.

  By the time: Author interview with Leon McMann, October 30, 2016.

  Indeed, the mailboat’s: Beth Thomas, Rudy’s wife, told me of the mailboat run and Rudy’s comment to his passengers in an October 8, 2016, interview. I confirmed the mailboat’s partial passenger list in a January 4, 2018, phone interview with Danielle Crockett.

  Donnie, meanwhile: Leon offered his comment in the Situation Room on July 4, 2016.

  He had company: Partlow, “Tangier Island Aches for Lost Waterman.”

  Dorsey Crockett, running: Kimberlin, “An Island Waits for Its Lost Soul.” The “weren’t no letup” quote is from Partlow, “Tangier Island Aches for Lost Waterman.”

  Word reached: Lonnie’s quote is from an interview on April 29,

  When William Henry Harrison Crockett drowned: This favorite island story is related in Mariner, God’s Island.

  When William Henry Harrison Crockett died: My passages on Swain and the church named for him were informed by John I. Pruitt, Beacon of the Soul: A Centennial Remembrance (Tangier, Va.: Centennial Committee of Swain Memorial United Methodist Church, 1997); Mariner, God’s Island; and two unpublished typescripts—the undated “The History of Swain Memorial Methodist Church” by Hattie Thorne, Carol Moore’s grandmother, and “This Is the Lord’s Doing,” a 1954 compilation of church facts by former pastor Oscar J. Rishel marking Methodism’s 150th anniversary on Tangier. See also Swain, A Brief History of Tangier Island.

  The year after: “Lead Simple Lives,” Washington Evening Star, July 15, 1899, preserved at http://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045462/1899-07-15/ed-1/seq-15/#date1=1898&sort=relevance&rows=20&words=ISLAND+Island+Islander+TANGIER+Tangier&searchType=basic&sequence=0&index=4&state=&date2=1900&proxtext=%22Tangier+Island%22&y=16&x=9&dateFilterType=yearRange&page=1 (retrieved November 13, 2017). It was picked up in the Richmond Dispatch of July 19, 1899. Swain’s reply, dated July 26, appeared in the Dispatch of July 30, 1899, under the headline “Tangier Island: A Protest Against a Recent Letter in Relation to It.”

  The incident for which: Swain’s death was detailed in Mariner, God’s Island, and Pruitt, Beacon of the Soul.

  Swain Memorial’s bell: Population figures from 1880 and 1900 are from Hall, Tangier Island. The Heistin’ Bridge is depicted in “Sketch of bridge at Tangier, Va., complained of by boatmen of the locality,” USACE Baltimore District File No. H-50-20-09, December 1925. The footbridge to Uppards is remembered by islanders Jack Thorne and Ginny Marshall and depicted in another Corps of Engineers document I found in the Norfolk District’s library: Report of June 22, 1928, by Lt. Col. C. R. Pettis, USACE, on preliminary examination of Tangier Sound, Va., with a view to securing a channel to the foot of County Road on the south end of Tangier Island.

  “The road that they made”: Author interview with Jack Thorne, June 26, 2016.

  A few features of daily life: Mariner, God’s Island.

  The gasoline engine: My description of trotlining is from personal observation. The 1913 population figures are from a letter from the secretary of war, transmitting, “Preliminary Examination of Channel from Tangier Island, Va., to the Mainland,” January 24, 1913, included with a letter from the chief of engineers, Reports on Preliminary Examinations and Survey of Channels to Tangier, Va. (H.R. Doc. No. 107, 63rd Congress, 1st Session). It’s interesting that early twentieth-century corps documents consistently spelled Canaan as Canane, which prompted me to ask older islanders whether the settlement was pronounced that way—that is, kuh-NANE, as West Virginians pronounce their Canaan Valley. None had heard it said that way.

  The Army Corps: The reference to Tangier’s fleet was contained in a letter from the secretary of war, transmitting, “Preliminary Examination of Channel from Tangier Isl
and,” with a letter from the chief of engineers, Reports on Preliminary Examinations and Survey of Channels to Tangier. The reference to the channel’s depth is from Report of the Chief of Engineers, U.S. Army, 1923 (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1923).

  During World War I: The description of the work and the quote are from Report of the Chief of Engineers, U.S. Army, 1923.

  August 1879 brought: Author interview with Jack Thorne, June 26, 2016. Storm information in this and subsequent paragraphs was informed by The Eastern Shore of Virginia Hazard Mitigation Plan (Accomac, Va.: Accomack-Northampton Planning District Commission, 2005). The document is accessible at http://a-npdc.org/wordpress/HazardMitigationPlan.pdf (retrieved November 13, 2017).

  In August 1955: I interviewed Duane Crockett at the firehouse on July 14, 2016.

  “I think of this little island”: I interviewed Dewey Crockett at the school in March 2000.

  Iris Pruitt, at eighty-eight: Our interview took place on December 12, 2016.

  Carol Moore’s late father: Author interview with Carol Moore, October 30, 2016.

  Damaging though Sandy was: The damage figures I list are from Eastern Shore of Virginia Hazard Mitigation Plan.

  In all the fuss: Ibid.

  Almost as soon: Ibid., and Mariner, God’s Island.

  The track put Tangier: Author interview with Jack Thorne, June 26, 2016.

  Ginny Thorne Marshall: Author interviews with Ginny Marshall, November 10, 2016, and Jack Thorne, June 26, 2016.

  Folks on the mainland: Author interview with Will Eskridge, March 2000.

  Consider that in 1930: Population figures are from the U.S. Census.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Hours before daybreak: I spent the described day aboard the Alona Rahab on June 28, 2016.

  The economics of hard potting: Lonnie explained his expenses when we talked on the boat and via text message on April 22, 2017.

  In the days before reliable: The effects of the 1893 freeze are captured in “Seven Dropped on the Ice,” Washington Post, January 24, 1893; and “Frozen Oystermen,” Los Angeles Times, January 25, 1893, from which I quoted. My passage on the 1936 freeze relied on “Island Group Claims Food Needed Badly,” Washington Post, February 7, 1936; and “Life Lost in Mercy Dash: Aid Tragedy Draws Fire,” Los Angeles Times, February 9, 1936.