by Aaron Mahnke
About that same time, the last lifeboat made it safely away under the control of the ship’s boatswain, Timothy McCarthy. According to him, the last thing he saw after leaving the ship was “the brave faces looking at us over the broken rail of a wreck, and of the echo of a great hymn sung by the women through the fog and mist and flying spray.”
The situation was desperate. Attempts were made by the ship’s remaining crew to fire a rescue line from the Lyle line-throwing gun into the trees at the top of the nearby cliff. If someone could simply reach the line and anchor it, the rest of the passengers would be saved. The first line they fired became tangled and snapped, but the second successfully reached the cliff above.
A small group of men even managed to make it to shore. There were nine of them, led by a schoolteacher named Frank Bunker. But when they reached the top of the cliff, they discovered the path forked to the left and right. Bunker picked the left.
Had he instead turned right, then men would have come across the second rescue line within minutes, and possibly saved all remaining passengers. Instead, he led the men along a telegraph line path for over two hours before finally managing to get a message out to authorities about the accident, making a desperate plea for help.
Help was sent, but even though three separate ships raced to the site of the wreck to offer assistance, the rough weather and choppy sea prevented them from getting close enough to do any good. Still, the sight of the ships nearby gave a false sense of hope to those remaining on the foundering vessel, and so when the few survivors onshore offered help, they declined.
There were no more lifeboats. No more lifelines to throw. And no ships brave enough to get closer. The women and children stranded on the ship clung to the rigging and rails against the cold Pacific waters, but when a large wave washed the wounded ship off the rocks and into deep water, everyone was lost.
All told, 137 of the 173 people aboard the ship died that cold early January morning. If that area of coastline had yet to earn its modern nickname of “Graveyard of the Pacific,” this was the moment that cemented it.
The wreck of the Valencia was clearly the result of a series of unfortunate accidents, but officials still went looking for someone to blame. In the aftermath of the tragedy, the Canadian government took steps to ensure lifesaving measures along the coast that could help with future shipwrecks. A lighthouse was constructed near Pachena Point, and a coastal trail was laid out that would eventually become known as the West Coast Trail.
But the story of the Valencia was far from over. Keep in mind that there have been scores of shipwrecks, tragedies that span centuries, in that same region of water. And like most areas with a concentrated number of tragic deaths, unusual activity has been reported by those who visit.
Just five months after the Valencia sank, a local fisherman reported an amazing discovery. While exploring seaside caves on the southwestern coast of Vancouver Island, he described how he stumbled upon one of the lifeboats within the cave. In the boat, he claimed, were eight human skeletons. The cave was said to be blocked by a large rock, and the interior was at least two hundred feet deep. Experts found it hard to explain how the boat could have made it from the waters outside into the space within, but theories speculated that an unusually high tide could have lifted the boat up and over. A search party was sent out to investigate the alleged finding, but it was found that the boat was unrecoverable due to the depth of the cave and the rocks blocking the entrance.
In 1910, the Seattle Times ran a story with reports of unusual sightings in the area of the wreck. According to a number of sailors, a ship resembling the Valencia had been observed off the coast. The mystery ship could have been any local steamer except for one small detail: this ship was already floundering on the rocks, half submerged.
Clinging to the wreckage, they say, were human figures, holding on against the wind and waves.
HOPE FLOATS
Humans have had a love affair with the ocean for thousands of years. Across those dark and mysterious waters lay all manner of possibility: new lands, new riches, new peoples to meet and trade with. Setting sail has always been something akin to the start of an adventure, whether the destination was the Northwest Passage or just up the coast.
But an adventure at sea comes with great risk. We understand this in our core. It makes us cautious. It turns our stomachs. It fills us with equal parts dread and hope. Because there, on the waves of the ocean, everything can go according to plan—or it can fail tragically.
Maybe this is why the ocean is so often used as a metaphor for the fleeting, temporary nature of life. Time, like waves, eventually wears us all down. But our lives can also be washed away in an instant, no matter how strong or high we build them. Time takes much from us, just like the ocean.
The waters off the coast of Vancouver Island are a perfect example of that cruelty and risk. They can be harsh, even brutal, toward vessels that pass through them. The cold winters and sharp rocks can threaten the survival of a ship. And with over seventy shipwrecks to date, the Graveyard of the Pacific certainly lives up to its reputation.
For years after the tragedy of 1906, fishermen and locals on the island told stories of a ghostly ship that patrolled the waters just off the coast. They said it was crewed by skeletons of the Valencia sailors who lost their lives there. It would float into view and then disappear like a spirit again before anyone could try to reach it.
In 1933, in the waters just north of the twenty-seven-year-old wreck of the Valencia, a shape floated out of the fog. When a local approached it, the shape became recognizable: a lifeboat. It looked as if it had been launched just moments before. Yet there, on the side of the boat, were pale letters that spelled out a single word.
Valencia.
ON JUNE 24, 1408, a French court sentenced a murderer to death by execution. She had entered the home of a neighbor and found a four-month-old child inside, alone and unattended. Although she never disclosed her reason for doing so, she killed the child right there in the house.
After her trial, she was moved to the prison to be held until her execution. The others who were imprisoned there most certainly jeered at her. They called her names. Yes, they were hardened criminals, but to kill a child…even they were appalled. (The prison, however, treated her the same as those men by charging her family the same rate for her daily meals.)
On July 17, she was guided to the platform and a rope was placed around her neck. A crowd was most likely gathered that day to watch the spectacle. Like the criminals inside the prison, they too must have mocked her and shouted insults. And then, after the trap door snapped open and she plummeted to her death, it was over.
History is full of these stories. A criminal goes to trial, and justice wins the day. What was odd about the trial of 1408, though, was the suspect. She wasn’t a local woman, or even a relative of the child she killed. She wasn’t even human.
She was a pig. Literally, a farm animal. Tried in a court of law, sentenced to be put to death, and then executed on the gallows three weeks later.
During the long history of criminal trials, spanning cultures and centuries, all manner of oddities have entered the courtroom. As unusual as it might sound to put livestock on trial, humans have been guilty of worse.
And sometimes even the dead get to testify.
THE ERRAND BOY
Edward Shue was a stranger when he rolled into the small West Virginia town in the autumn of 1896. He claimed to have come from Pocahontas County to the north, but whether or not he was a mystery to everyone in town, he brought a necessary skill. Edward was a blacksmith, and he quickly found work in a local shop owned by James Crookshanks.
Within days of arriving, one of the local women caught his eye, and so Edward set his sights on winning her affection. Elva was young and beautiful, and the locals couldn’t really blame the newcomer for falling head over heels for her. For her part, though, the feeling was mutual, despite the fact that Edward was at least a decade older than s
he was. Within a matter of weeks, the couple was married.
The first few months of their marriage were mostly uneventful, although it was later said that the young bride had become pregnant shortly after the wedding. The local physician had been treating her for slight complications with her pregnancy since the new year, but most of the people in town had no idea. It seems Elva was good at keeping secrets.
On the afternoon of January 23, 1897, with snow on the ground and a chill in the air, Andy Jones stepped into the warmth of the blacksmith shop. He was just eleven years old, but he worked for the newlyweds as an errand boy and housekeeper when they needed him. It was a common thing to see his small shape darting up and down the road, running messages from husband to wife and back again.
Edward told Andy that he was going to stop by the market before coming home at the end of the day, and so he instructed the boy to go and ask Elva if there was anything else she needed him to purchase. This was before text messaging, before the telephone, before email. So Andy, in his own way, was a premodern SMS service.
The boy ran off, and when he arrived at the couple’s house, he let himself in. When he did, he was horrified to find Elva lying facedown on the floor at the foot of the stairs. One hand was pinned beneath her chest, while the other arm was stretched out. The house was deathly quiet.
At first he thought she was sleeping. He called out to her as he approached, but stopped when he noticed the odd bend in her neck. Even to his young, immature mind, something seemed wrong. Rather than moving closer, he backed slowly away, then turned and bolted home. Once there, he told his mother about everything he had seen.
Moms always have a way of knowing what to do, it seems. She quickly headed out the door to call on the town doctor, George Knapp, and took Andy with her. It took them nearly an hour to track him down and bring him to the blacksmith’s home, but when they arrived, there was no body on the floor of the hall.
It might have been easy to write it off as a prank. Certainly in our own day and age, with tales of the boy who cried wolf, there’s always a small suspicion that unbelievable stories might actually just be lies. Thankfully, though, they heard the sound of sobbing from the second floor of the home. Andy and his mom politely let themselves out, but Dr. Knapp headed upstairs.
He entered a main bedroom to find Elva’s lifeless body laid out on the bed, with Edward seated beside her. He had apparently come home after Andy left and discovered his dead wife on the floor. After carrying her up to their room, he had changed her into a dark, formal dress with a high collar and long sleeves, and then arranged her for burial.
He was in tears, cradling her head and sobbing. When Dr. Knapp entered the room, Edward didn’t look up. Attempting to be as respectful as he could of the man’s loss, the doctor quietly inspected Elva’s body for anything that might hint at the cause of her death. Having recently helped her with some other medical issues, he was familiar with her current state of health. At first glance, he felt that nothing seemed out of the ordinary, but he wanted to be thorough.
It was only when he reached for her head and neck that Edward stirred. He pushed the doctor’s hands away and continued to gently run his fingers through her hair, sobbing deeply the entire time. It was clear to Dr. Knapp that the man simply needed to mourn. Picking up his things, he let himself out and exited the house.
While Edward grieved the loss of his young bride, Dr. Knapp went back to his office and recorded what little information he’d been able to ascertain. He listed her cause of death as “everlasting faint” before amending it to add the phrase “complications from pregnancy.”
Life was hard in rural West Virginia at the end of the nineteenth century, that much was certain. What Dr. Knapp didn’t know, however, was how much harder it had been for Elva Shue.
THINGS BURIED
The burial didn’t go as planned. It began with Edward’s rather unorthodox appearance at the undertaker’s hours before the graveside service. He insisted on helping the undertaker position his wife in the coffin, and then placed one of her favorite scarves around her neck. He added two other items of clothing, pressing them in on either side of her head. He said it was so she could rest easier.
At the funeral, he continued to act in odd ways. He paced beside the casket the entire time. He stooped low every now and then to adjust her clothing, to make things perfect. And he wept continuously as he did this. It was the sort of panicked, nervous fussing you might expect from a distraught spouse.
The man was clearly grieved. He and Elva had been newlyweds, after all. This loss, so close to the emotional high of their wedding…well, it must have been crippling. And everyone seemed to understand that. Everyone, that is, except for Mary Heaster, Elva’s mother.
Mary didn’t trust Edward. And maybe that distrust was simply fueled by her dislike of the man. After all, he had rolled into town—a total stranger, an older man, a mysterious past—and taken her daughter from her. Maybe she just had issues of her own to deal with. Or maybe a mother’s intuition is always right. No one knew for sure; they just knew she hated the guy.
Mary Heaster wrestled with this uneasy feeling for weeks. She had trouble sleeping, and understandably, she found it difficult to move on, to take a much-needed deep breath and press forward through life. And according to her testimony, she also prayed. It was a source of solace for her, and probably one of the ways she was grieving the loss of her daughter. Every day and every night, she prayed for the truth. But mostly she prayed for one specific thing: she wanted her daughter to return and tell her side of the story. Sure, all of us long for the ones we’ve lost. We’d love one more cup of coffee with them, one more hug, one more conversation. I know firsthand just how hard it is to let go. But Mary wanted her daughter to literally come back, and she prayed hard for it every day. And then it happened.
Mary told others that it happened over the course of four nights, each night revealing more truth, the experience becoming more visual and real. She said that her daughter, whom she had always called Zona, came into her room and spoke to her, first as a ball of light, and later as a fully formed body.
According to Mary, this was no dream; it was a vision. Her daughter revealed that Edward had killed her after months of physical abuse. There’d been an argument that final day, and Edward had strangled her right there at the foot of the stairs, breaking her neck high up beneath the skull. Once the story was told, Mary said, her daughter vanished once again.
Whatever suspicion she might have had prior to this vision, Mary Heaster quickly became a woman on a mission. She went to the local prosecutor, a man named John Preston, and told him the story. At first there wasn’t much he was able to do. The case was closed, and a ghostly vision was far from being a valid reason to open it back up again.
But he wanted to help. Maybe, he told her, if there was something new, some new piece of information that could help call the official cause of death into question, it might justify digging deeper. Mary agreed, and John Preston got to work.
Not being a friend or relative of Elva’s, Preston hadn’t attended her funeral. When he started to ask around, though, people who had been there started to share interesting observations: Edward’s odd behavior around the coffin, the positioning of the clothing around the area of her neck and head, his insistence that he never leave her side. All of it smelled a bit odd to an outside observer.
Preston took his suspicions to Dr. Knapp and asked the man if he’d seen any unusual details when he examined Elva’s body the afternoon she was discovered. At first Knapp was defensive and stood by his work, by his medical opinion. We’ve all been there, I think—those moments when we know we might have made a mistake but we refuse to admit it. Dr. Knapp tried to make one of those prideful stands.
But Preston refused to let the matter rest, and eventually the physician caved in and told him the truth. Yes, he had examined her, but Edward had made a complete examination impossible. He was too protective, too territorial. Knapp admitted that
he hadn’t been able to fully examine her neck, and that omission had haunted him ever since.
In the end, that was the key they’d been looking for. Those details were enough to reopen the case, and with it, Elva Heaster Shue’s grave. Dr. Knapp was assisted by two other physicians, who came to town to help with the exhumation, and after the coffin was set up in the local schoolhouse, they opened the lid.
What they found inside changed everything.
LASTING MARKS
Elva’s neck was badly bruised. It wasn’t an oversight by Dr. Knapp, though. Sometimes bruising happens deep beneath the skin, and it’s only after death that the marks rise to the surface. Here they were, and these marks were damning: clear finger impressions on both sides of the throat.
The doctors then conducted an autopsy on Elva’s body and discovered what the marks hinted at. Her windpipe had been crushed, ligaments had been torn, and the vertebrae at the base of her skull had been completely displaced. Elva’s death had been no accident: someone had strangled her, gripping her throat until the physical trauma ended her life.
The first thought on everyone’s mind was that Edward had killed her, but that was quickly tempered by more sober thoughts. There was no proof tying Edward to the murder of his wife, no evidence that pointed definitively to him. Yes, there were finger marks, but those fingers could have belonged to anyone, right?