by Gary Collins
Hodge was an enterprising man. In 1894 he decided to expand his mercantile enterprises to include his chandler business, and he also added shipowner to his many titles. He had given the idea much thought, and knowing the wood for such a project was readily available just up the bay, he decided to build a schooner of his own. Hodge built the frame and walls of his two-masted schooner from juniper.
He gave the native wood several coats of hot tar to prolong its life, and by the late spring of 1895 the skeleton of his as yet unnamed schooner was finished. Her dead-straight, nearly seventy-foot keel had been chopped and fashioned with axe and adze, her raking stem and slanted stern scarfed and married together. Even her two tall pine masts were peeled and ready to be stepped. Little work was done on the vessel during the fishing season, though; all of his crew’s energies were needed for the business of catching codfish.
The following winter was unusually mild with lots of snow. Planks procured from a sawmill in the bay had been bought in the fall. One still, starlit night in the spring, John Hodge stood by the side of his nearly completed schooner. From outside the cove came the rote of the sea, but John barely noticed it.
He turned toward the lamplit windows of his home not far away, then looked skyward. It was always his way, as is the way of all seamen, to look to the sky every night before retiring. Either bad weather or clear, it was a thing almost everyone living along this coast did. Instinctively he faced north and a broad smile seamed his face as he looked at the North Star. It never changed, the constant, true guide for seamen. It was even called the Seaman’s Star! North by the coast, he thought. North by the compass, north to the fish, north by the star. He knew what he would call his new schooner—the Northern Light.
* * *
Complete with jaunty bowsprit, she slid easily from her cod-liver-greased ways. Seventy-two feet in length, with a beam of twenty-two feet and all of nine feet deep, she was christened and given the official number 106308. Fore and aft gaff, rigged with new sails fastened to her two forest-scented poles, the Northern Light was ready for sea in 1896.
A new century came and brought new ventures. By 1909 a new master walked the deck of the Northern Light. He was also the proud owner of the well-proven schooner. Thomas Parsons lived in the central part of Bonavista Bay called Chandlers Reach. Chandlers Reach has several narrow arms and bays. One of them is called Goose Bay. At the end of this long, narrow bay is the town of Bloomfield, where the Parsons family, latterly from Pinchard’s Island, lived.
Thomas Parsons had a wide, hawklike nose above a thick moustache. He had a dimple midway between his square chin and his lower lip that gave him trouble shaving. He hated it. His face looked like old leather. Two big ears rivalled the size of his huge nose, and they almost always kept up a broad-rimmed pepper-coloured quiff hat.
He hadn’t always lived here in this sheltered place. Both he and his brother-in-law, Edgar Parsons, had moved here from Pinchard’s Island on the north side of Bonavista Bay. Just south of Cape Freels, Pinchard’s Island holds in check the might of the North Atlantic from the mainland town of Newtown, barely a mile to leeward. Compared to Pinchard’s Island, the settlement of Bloomfield perched on the shores of a pond. Unlike the windswept Pinchard’s Island, which was bereft of trees, Bloomfield had much to offer. Here in this protected bay were woods to hunt through, trees for all their building needs, and fertile land for growing. Still, the way of the sea was in the Parsons boys’ blood, and their love of living at the edge of the open sea stayed with them.
Edgar owned two schooners, the Helena and the Millie Ford. He was master of the Millie Ford well into his seventieth year.
Thomas fished the coast of Labrador with the Northern Light and followed her prow all along the northeast coast of Newfoundland, delivering freight to isolated settlements for thirteen years. On the day he entered St. John’s harbour in 1929, Thomas had with him on board the Northern Light his two sons, Rex and Peter, the latter just eighteen years old. Both were learning the sea trade from the deck of their father’s schooner and the two boys were about to have a cruel test forced upon them.
Besides Thomas and his two sons, there were Carty Halloway, Fred Wiseman, and Richard “Dick” Russell, who was first mate. All of them were from the same bay. So crowded was the pier space that Thomas swung his schooner on her hook near midstream in the harbour and rowed ashore. The talk of dropping fish prices was on the tongue of every schooner master in the harbour. It was rumoured that the prices would soon fall even further. They were already down to a barely break-even point. The fishermen knew all too well what this year’s fish prices meant. Provisions would have to be purchased on tick until next year. It was an endless, vicious financial cycle.
Two black-clad men with hands in pockets stood on the pier just above the waiting schooners. One of them spat a long, brown line of liquid that spattered between the schooner and the slimy pier. He moved a visible lump of tobacco to one side of his mouth before speaking.
“’Tis not only fish prices, $7.50 fer a quintal! Cod oil is down. I was expectin’ thirty-five or farty cents fer it. I was offered twelve cents fer the gallon! I told the bugger dat wudden even worth the smell of the bloody stuff. Dat was yesterday. This evenin’ he offered me ten cents. I took it. What else could I do?”
The other man up on the wharf joined in the talk.
“You’re right, it’s not only cod prices that are down. The merchants up there on Water Street will try to tell you that the oil isn’t worth much anyway. Did you know that this island exported more than one and a half million gallons of rendered cod oil last year?” The smooth talker had everyone’s attention now. “The oil is used for oiling the gears of fine English machinery, mostly, but they’ve got it in the schools here now in some places, I hear. It’s brought back from some other country where it’s sealed in blue bottles and served to the children by their teachers from a spoon. Only one spoon for the entire class, I was told! Not very hygienic, in my opinion. It would be nice to know how much it’s worth when it returns here in that manner. I can’t see why it isn’t manufactured here. Full of vitamins A and D. Good for you,” he finished.
Talks nice, dat feller do, thought Thomas. Makes a lot of sense, too. Never thought much about cod oil, meself. Wonder what he meant about that vitamin stuff? He knew a fellow who used to drink the stuff right out of the barrel. Thomas had ten barrels of the smelly oil lashed on the deck of his own schooner.
“The best I could get was $8.12 fer a quintal of me top cod,” said another schoonerman, changing the subject. “You’d better be on yer toes, b’ys. I ’eard one of the skippers say he was only quoted $5.12 a quintal.”
Thomas was worried about the prices, but he wasn’t about to let it show. “We were lucky nuff to ketch a big run of fish this year. We shouldn’t have much of a cut fer small stuff. ’Twas well-salted on the Labrador. Well-dried by the women and youngsters at home, too, dat’s fer sure. I’m hopin’ fer top dollar.”
“You’ll probably get top dollar, Tom, b’y. Problem is, what is dat top dollar gonna be?”
The talk went on about prices and merchants, about bank trouble over there in the States.
“If that’s the trouble, Yankee banks must be the trouble every year, then,” someone reasoned.
“I remember the last year of the war. The fall of ’18, it was. We got $14.50 fer a quintal of cod. As much as $15.20 fer prime. Kin you imagine dat!”
The well-dressed gentleman up on the wharf who talked nicely spoke again. “Do any of you gentlemen have salmon salted in those barrels I see on your vessels?”
The man next to him on the wharf answered. “I’ve only one, meself. Dere wuddent many salmon were we were. Too far north fer ’em, I figured we was. Another one of the schooners here, though, ’e’s got fifty barrels aboard, I’d say. Caught most of ’em in his cod trap, he did.”
“The United Kingdom pur
chased one million three hundred thousand pounds last year, give or take a few hundred pounds.” The cultured man smiled. “Some fishermen are packing it in ice. Keeps it fresh. The amazing thing is, the return to this nation was only a little over two hundred thousand dollars. Can you imagine the profits being made from these waters? It is fishermen like you who keep a steady pulse in this city. I don’t envy your trade.”
The man turned and walked away with his head down and his hands still thrust deep in his pockets.
“Who was dat feller, now?”
“Don’t know who ’e is. I’ve seen him around the schooners before, though. Sounds like dat feller from Gambo, Joey Smallwood. ’E’s small like ’im, too. ’Eard ’im on the radio one time. Never seen ’im, though.”
“Talks nice,” someone said, echoing Thomas’s thoughts.
“I seen paper and pen stickin’ out of his jacket pocket. If ’twas Joey, ’e was campaignin’ fer dat bugger Dick Squires last year, I ’ear. Dere’s a prime minister fer ya, no damn mistake!”
“Might be one of them newspaper fellers. Reporters, dey calls ’em. Joey was one of dem, too, I believe.”
“You know what, b’ys?” said Thomas, who appeared to be reflecting on the stranger. “I figure I’ve wrung more salt water out of me mitts dan dat feller ’as sailed over! Still an’ all, I ’lows ’e knows more about the fish business dan we do! Expensive-lookin’ coat ’e was wearing. Nice high collars, too.”
The men all nodded their heads in agreement.
* * *
The crew spent the next day busily off-loading the Northern Light. Everyone was right about the fish prices. There was only so much haggling to be done and there were lots of schooners with fish aboard. All were looking for the top dollar. After a while it came down to taking the price offered or making room for another vessel. The fishermen, who had no alternative, always took the price.
Setting sail with night nearly upon them and with the glass heading down for bad weather, which he ignored, Thomas Parsons ordered the Northern Light out of St. John’s harbour. He could see the masthead lights of two other schooners in the offing. Behind him, others were preparing to leave. The old Northern Light took the first of the ocean swells and seemed to gather herself for an unwanted voyage.
Before they had covered a mile into their northern passage, Parsons was sorry he had left port. The winds were strong from the southeast and already looked as though they were going to shift farther west. He thought he felt a winter nip in the air. Outside the best of natural harbours in the world, things looked and felt vastly different. He debated turning around. Glancing astern he saw another light coming out through the Notch. He would not be going back now. It was a matter of pride.
Despite his fear the next couple of hours were not too bad. The night was black with no stars showing through the lowering clouds. There was no guiding light from his schooner’s namesake to lead her north to home. They were making pretty good time along and the lights of Torbay glinted and winked at them as they passed that part of the coast. Parsons took a direct course for the light on Cape St. Francis, which was clearly visible hard on the port bow. They were about fourteen miles from St. John’s.
The lights from Torbay seemed farther away than they should be. Soon they rounded Cape St. Francis and put its bright light astern, along with any sight of land. The next compass bearing pointed them for the light on the south side of Baccalieu Island. The wind blew hard out of the blackness of Conception Bay. Southwest, Parsons figured, but it was hard to tell for sure. The always-changing winds that came at them had no pattern. He saw the lights from two schooners ahead, but they were far to the north. Behind he saw two or maybe even more. The Northern Light wasn’t the only schooner beating north tonight. It gave him some comfort.
The evening watch, usually divided into two two-hour watches among the crew, sailors called the first and last dogwatches. There were almost always two or more of the men on deck, and Parsons was always one of them.
They approached the north side of Conception Bay. They were already far enough across the bay to see lamplight from houses on the other side. The temperature had dropped and a few snow flurries had found them earlier, but they had stopped. Thomas figured he might try to get into the fishing village of Bay de Verde, situated on the northeast end of Conception Bay and south of Baccalieu Island. If they kept on past Baccalieu, there would be nowhere else to seek safety. He wasn’t even sure if he could tack into Bay de Verde in the dark with this wind. Parsons tried a starboard tack to land, which seemed like it might work at first, but he was more than a mile away when the first real blast of danger hit them. The wind, northwest, came from the headlands so suddenly it almost caught them unprepared. Such a wind on a night like this could carry them away from the land.
The Northern Light’s sails were close-hauled, a precaution that brought the sails closer to the masts so that the wind met the sail at an acute angle. The sheets were hardened in as tight as possible. The sails were as flat as they could be without fluttering. It was hell to do on a rolling and pitching deck. The schooner heeled over a long while before she came into the wind and straightened. All hands were on deck and they were all soaked and very cold. They would not make port anywhere south of Baccalieu.
* * *
There was a little relief from the heavy seas as they passed Baccalieu Island, but the wind blew stronger than before. They sailed slowly along by the light on the north end of the island. Parsons heeled her again and got around Grates Cove Point, a difficult and dangerous manoeuvre with the sails close-hauled. Then a vicious wind from the maw of the God Head Bay struck her broadside!
Trinity Bay, the early Europeans called it. They might have been from Spain. They had already named the island of Trinidad, or Trinity. Or maybe it was the English, with their penchant for Christian names, who had named the bay. It could have been the first day after Pentecost—Trinity Sunday—when they sailed here. Trinity, in the Christian belief, is Father, Son, and Holy Ghost: one God. Most seamen who traversed this area must have believed the latter. They called it the God Head Bay.
Here was one of the worst of all the many bays to sail across in Newfoundland, especially with a wind from any point west. Where the long, narrow bay ends to the southwest, a mere three miles of barren land separate it from Placentia Bay, that inlet splayed landless to the open sea as far as South America.
On this night the hurricane-force winds from the northwest tore across Placentia Bay. The narrow strip of land between the two bays only heightened and modified its strength. It bore down and across Trinity Bay toward the black ocean like a thing possessed.
The Northern Light reeled like a swaying pugilist who had just received a knockout punch. The sudden blast and sheer power of the wind bore her bows over before the vessel had a chance to turn.
“My God, she’s goan to broach to,” yelled Fred Wiseman.
Parsons was fighting with the helm. “Get forward and haul the canvas off ’er,” he yelled above the sounding seas.
Both his sons joined the rest of the men. They half sprinted, half stumbled along the tilting, swaying deck. Young Peter was the quickest. He ducked under the quivering main boom and bent double, racing past the mainsail. Reaching the foresail, he started to let go the frozen sheet. He tried to untie the sheet at the clew, but try as he might, he couldn’t get it untied. He pulled a knife from his pocket. Carty Halloway came to his aid.
“We’ll ’ave to cut the sheet, Carty. The knots are all froze up.”
A freezing spray lashed up over the bulwarks and engulfed the men. By now the Northern Light was half seas over, but they stood their ground.
“I’ll ’ole a strain on the sheet while you cuts ’er, Pete.”
It was a big mistake!
The instant the knife severed the straining rope, Carty took the full weight of the foresail in his hands.
Peter jumped to help him, but it was too late. The stiff, frozen rope burned through Carty’s hands like a hot poker. He yelled in pained surprise and let go the sheet. The sail swung away as if in delight at being away from its bindings. Carty looked aloft and yelled a warning to Peter, who was trying to save the renting sail.
“The gaff is broke, Pete! Get back! She’s comin’ down!”
Carty was right. The force of the wrenching wet sail had sheered the top gaff at the throat halyards. The only thing holding the foresail now were the wooden hoops at the luff of the sail, and they wouldn’t last. An inarticulate shout that sounded like Thomas came from somewhere aft. Another deadly flaw of wind, and the foresail ripped free of the hoops one by one with crackling sounds. The brown canvas fell and sprawled half across the deck, the other draped half over the starboard side of the schooner and dragging in the raging sea. The yell from aft came again, louder this time.
“Cut ’er loose from the fore boom! Let the bugger go,” Thomas yelled.
Both Peter and Carty rushed to the shouted order. Under the strain, the footropes holding the foresail to its boom snapped at the first cut. The wind and wave tore the sail free and it disappeared over the side. For just a second one of the sheets tangled among the swirling deck debris, and then all signs of the sail were gone.
Thomas had seen most of the action from his position at the wheel. His eldest son, Rex, along with the first mate had dashed toward the mainsail with Fred Wiseman in tow. He saw young Peter head forward, and even in that fearful moment he felt pride for his quick-thinking boy. The deck of his schooner was awash. If the boys didn’t get the canvas off her soon . . . Thomas’s stomach knotted at the possible outcome.
With Rex and Fred pulling against the mainsheet, Dick took the strain and managed to get it untied. The three men worked as one and soon brought the mainsail down.
Thomas saw what was happening with Peter and Carty on the foredeck. He shouted a warning about the sudden release of the foresail, but it went unheeded. Realizing they couldn’t hear above the roar of wind and slashing sails, he watched in dismay as the foresail came crashing down. He yelled again as loud as he could. They must have heard his frantic call, for he saw them cut the sail loose.