by Gary Collins
The patient female, stretched fully on her side, nudges the infant with her head and pushes it with her flippers until it preoccupies itself with feeding. The Great White Plain is now a massive nursery. It is a spectacular sight. The whelping of the harp seals has begun. The cry and mewl of the young multiplies by the minute, the influx of newborns on the ice like waves on a beach, gentle and soft, unending, yet fierce and unstoppable with the bringing of new life.
The birthing bed is never still, but always in motion beneath the pregnant seals. It is unpredictable, not to be trusted. March winds tear across the shelterless icefields without mercy. Blizzards of snow come out of the north just in time to accompany the birthing of the seals. The Newfoundland sealers call the snowstorms the whelping batch, or lapping batch, and by some unexplained wile of nature, they almost always happen when the pups are being born. The storm can last for a day or more. For its duration it hides the vulnerable mothers and newborns from predators and gives the seals a temporary shelter.
It also kills.
The storms are so severe they sometimes separate the infant seals from their mothers in blinding snowdrifts, and the pitiful bleating of the young goes unheard. By the hundreds they die from exposure to one of the harshest calving grounds on earth. After the storms they are found entombed beneath the snow by anxious mothers. They fall into water-filled crevices and, unable to swim, drown within minutes. They are crushed between the edges of ice pans or fall into shark-infested waters.
Many are stillborn—tiny, shrunken creatures preserved within their own fluids—and slip, already dead, into an uncaring world. And for some reason known only to nature, there are others that are born mute. Ironically, perhaps cruelly, the sealers call them screechers; they starve to death without making a sound. Others die crying for mothers who have slipped down a nearby breathing hole never to return.
In such a forbidding winter realm, a great multitude of young seals are unceremoniously delivered but survive the birthing. And before the month of their birth has ended, they are deserted by their mothers. The female leaves abruptly to follow the age-old craving and will mate promiscuously for days. The pups are now forsaken, alone, defenceless, and the time of the hunter is near.
* * * * *
Reuben Crewe walked the deck of the SS Newfoundland again. He had done so several times since he and his son Albert had boarded the vessel in the early afternoon of March 8. A new railway line from the main trunk at Clarenville was started in 1909, and on November 8, 1911, the rail line to Bonavista was completed. It was an easy walk from Elliston to Bonavista. There were twelve sealers in St. John’s from Elliston and many others from the Bonavista area, but not all of them had the means to come by train. Most of them had walked.
Reuben Crewe and his son had travelled by train. It was Albert’s first time. It was also his first time in a city, and now his first time stepping onto the deck of a steamer. The boy was ecstatic. Reuben wisely gave his son lots of slack to explore and enjoy his first visit to the city and to mingle and meet the old sealers. He had no intention of crowding Albert. Remembering his first time on such a voyage, he saw through his son’s eyes the wonder of it all again. It made him feel much better about the coming seal hunt. Albert’s enthusiasm for the hunt and the experience of the voyage had changed his father. Sealers Reuben had not seen for years greeted him warmly. He had to admit it felt good being aboard a sealer for another hunt. He would teach Albert everything he knew about hunting seals and about the dangers afoot on the Arctic ice floes. It would be all right. After all, he had survived one life-threatening experience at the seal hunt years ago aboard the Harlaw. The event had given him the foresight of what could happen. He told himself the chances of such a thing happening again were unlikely.
Albert Crewe couldn’t believe he was actually going to the seal hunt. Even when his father had announced in January that he was going, too, he was still doubtful. He had heard him say many times he would never ever go back to the ice. He knew his father was only going to the hunt to “have an eye on him,” but he didn’t mind that. So far on this trip his dad had not interfered with his activities. Albert had roamed the streets of St. John’s and marvelled at the items for sale in the shops. With his full head of flaxen hair and broad shoulders and still a couple of years of growth due him, he got his first glance of young city women who met him on the streets. With his long blond hair, Albert Crewe strode forth young and proud, looking for all the world like a Viking venturing forth on a voyage of discovery. Though Albert was a shy young man, he secretly loved the looks he received. He was having the best time of his life.
He and a couple of other young hunters had already had an amazing experience in the city. They explored the many shops, sometimes peering in the windows, sometimes growing bold and actually walking into the stores. Into one such store they had entered quietly, not bothering to kick the dirty street-snow from their heavy boots. The door closed on its own behind them. It took a minute for the boys to realize they had entered an establishment that sold woman’s apparel. They were embarrassed and were about to leave when they witnessed an incredible scene in the back of the store. Standing there was a naked woman with pale white skin and long eyelashes over dark, half-closed eyes. Standing behind her and out of the view, a man’s hands were caressing her fully-pointed breasts. The boys stared with gaping mouths and bulging eyes.
“Be with you in a minute,” said a thin, high-pitched voice.
But when the store owner stepped around the manikin he had been dressing, his store was empty but for the snow tracks on the floor.
Albert walked the top deck of the Newfoundland and watched her final preparations for sea. He was too excited to go below for supper. He didn’t want to miss anything that was happening above decks. Such is the way of all young sailors who go to sea for the first time. Just after dusk, he watched in fascination as the city lights appeared, seemingly one by one, when he saw a man walk briskly astern to the after hold and promptly disappear over its coaming. He looked young, Albert thought, maybe even younger than me. One of the dockworkers, he figured. As he continued to watch, the final sling of provisions was hoisted aboard. The after hold cover was fitted tight, the winches stopped, and the dockworkers walked ashore. The young man Albert had seen jump into the hold was not among them.
A fierce rumble came from the ship’s belly that made her decks tremble. It was accompanied by a burst of black smoke from her high stack and from somewhere else the hissing whine of released steam. The shoring lines were slipped from the wharf bollards and pulled up over the side of the ship. Albert Crewe felt the wooden deck vibrate from stem to stern as her bows swung slowly from the dock.
* * * * *
The ship’s doorways filled with men rushing on deck to see her leave. A whistle blew from somewhere on her superstructure. It sounded hoarse and worn. Astern of the ship came the farewell whistle of the Florizel, captained by Wes’s older brother, Joseph Kean, who was also preparing for sea. The high-pitched horn from Abram Kean aboard the Stephano also sounded around the harbour. The Stephano was the world’s newest sealing vessel and her captain was acknowledging his son’s departure aboard one of the oldest. Old man Kean’s ship was owned by Bowring’s. She was also the world’s best icebreaker, and though Abram Kean had to follow the rules of steel ships leaving for the seal hunt, he hated watching and not being the first one to leave, even though its captain was his youngest son, Wes.
Despite the late hour, people had gathered on Harvey’s Wharf to wave and yell goodbyes to the sealers lining the rails. Some of them had either family or friends aboard and others just came to see the first of the sealers off. It was the thing to do in St. John’s each spring. The night was black without starshine or moonlight. A cold, raw wind was blowing, but deep in the bowl of St. John’s harbour it was difficult to tell from which direction. Women clad in long coats with high collars buttoned, their heads covered wit
h woollen scarves, waved their gloved hands. Men shouted encouragement from the dock. Sealers lining the Newfoundland’s port side yelled and whistled as the ship moved away from the wharf and the crushed harbour ice rustled along her hull. Steam whistles sounded again. The people ashore shouted. Whiskered, hard-looking men standing at her rail spat over the side and flicked cigarette butts into the water. Her hoarse whistle sounded again. Barking dogs added to the din. And at the stroke of midnight the battered and worn Newfoundland was under way for her historic encounter with the Great White Plain.
She looked small and appeared to be skulking by the huge old cliffs that formed the harbour entrance. Her lights looked yellow from a distance, like the light from lamps in kitchen windows. Her boiler valves were opened wide and her lone engine roared to full throttle as she slipped out over the night sea. Aboard the vessel, bells rang and doors slammed. She took the first roll of a surprisingly calm sea in a gentle tilt. The wind on her starboard quarter was from the northeast by the time she hauled to port after clearing the city walls. The city didn’t fade away in the darkness astern of the ship. It simply disappeared as if by magic when the Newfoundland closed the door to The Notch behind her.
Wes Kean knew why the seas were calm in the face of a brisk wind out of the northeast. The ice pack was near, keeping the seas down. Stepping out to the bridge rail, he could smell the fresh bite of it in the air. He ordered his lookouts to “keep an eye fer ice.” The Newfoundland’s navigator, Charles Green, made the first entry in his log.
Monday, March 9th, 1914. From Saint Johns towards Wesleyville. Got underway at midnight. 12:30 Am steamed through narrows. Wind NNE force 3. Direction NE. Lookout---carefully attended to.
Green entered meticulous notes in his personal log and kept it private. To calculate wind speed he used the Beaufort scale. A method of accurately determining wind speeds had been in use as early as 1705, when Daniel Defoe, author of the novel Robinson Crusoe, had spent considerable time working at it. But it was Irish Royal Navy Officer Francis Beaufort, serving on the HMS Woolwich in 1805, who perfected the method.
* * * * *
John Antle knew the ship was leaving. The throb of her engines reverberated through his hiding place. His hand on her hull trembled with the pulse of it. John wasn’t especially afraid of the dark but he hadn’t known until now he didn’t like close quarters. He squirmed and crawled over boxes and barrels in the dark until he found himself on the floor. There he found a door in the bulkhead with a dull light showing around its edges. Surprisingly, the hold was nearly empty. Apart from the provisions—he was sure one of the boxes smelled like prunes—the smell of the ship’s bilge was overwhelming. Then he heard a low hissing sound that increased to a screeching whine. The boiler valves were being gradually opened to the engine. After a few more minutes of vented steam came a throbbing sound that he could feel up through his boots. The propeller shaft was turning. They were under way. The big shaft, turning slowly in its tunnel, had stirred up months of stagnant bilge water. The smell was putrid. Young Antle staggered in the dark until his hands found the bulkhead near the closed door. He retched until his stomach emptied itself somewhere in the dark. He felt better right away, but no matter the consequences, he needed fresh air, and had to get out. The door latch worked noisily but easy enough. The door was unlocked and, fearing he would vomit again, he stepped through.
He was standing in a small, shadowy passageway at the end of which, through an open door, he could see two men with bared arms shovelling coal into a blazing furnace. Beyond that, a ladder led above. He climbed up and entered a room crowded with noisy men. No one noticed him. Antle made his way through the crowd to the open deck to stand beside a young man who looked no older than himself. The other man was leaning over the rail as if trying to keep the fading city lights in view.
“Away to the hunt at last!” said John Antle, proud as you please.
The other man turned with the last of the city lights illuminating his yellow hair.
“Not quite yet,” said Albert Crewe. “We’ve a stop in Wesleyville to pick up the b’ys from Bonavist’ North.”
* * * * *
The winter storms of 1914—especially the ones that brought the whelping batch of early March—were some of the worst on record. All through the winter the north winds had prevailed, piling snows in layers until inland valleys were filled level. Only the lofty barrens, their tops swept clean by the relentless winds, showed any promise of a warmer season to come. In the outports, only the scattered ends of picket fences showed in lanes packed with snow. The inner bays and coves, and even some of the outer edges of them, were still in the full grip of winter.
On one such broad, frozen cove on the morning of March 9, just north of the little fishing village of Pound Cove, a group was struggling south through the snow. They were all sealers from the Newtown-Templeman area and were making their way to the port of Wesleyville to board their appointed sealing vessels. Boulders jutting up out of the shallow cove had their tide level marked with baddy catters. The bay ice in this area, surrounded by many communities, was fairly well-travelled, but a steady fall of new snow with strong northeast winds all day yesterday and into last night had now covered all signs of tracks. The land that stretched to the west was flat and barren save for scattered bunches of tuckamore. The low trees were bent over with the strain of a lifetime of wind and winter snowfall.
“Not much need fer hurryin’, b’ys,” George Tuff said. “There’ll be nar ship comin’ in Wesleyville harbour this day. Or t’morrow, either, I’m ’lowin’, be the looks of it.” He directed his speech to a few of the younger men who went walking briskly ahead of the others.
At Tuff’s words they looked left to seaward, where the Arctic ice was jammed against the landwash, and understood his meaning. They had seen the ice coming for days with the constant “in-winds” pressing the ice floes onto the land. Still, they were hopeful. The SS Newfoundland was due in Wesleyville late this evening and they had no intention of missing her entry into the harbour. It was part of the excitement of the voyage, watching the ship they would soon board steam into view. After all, it was coming for them.
“I don’t know, Jarge b’y,” one of the young men said. “There’s a few big swatches of water off our place and ’tis bound to be the same off Wesleyville. So being, ’tis sure Skipper Wes will find a way t’rough,” he added eagerly. “’Sides, when we come down off that high knob of land before we got on the ice, I was sure I seen a scud of smoke off to the south’ard.”
“’Tis only a few lakes of water made be the big pans grounded solid on shoal ground,” Tuff replied, “an’ not to be mistaken fer open sea leads.”
“Ha ha! P’raps the smoke you seen was a louse on yer eyebrow,” said one fellow, causing a ripple of laughter from the others.
“Nar louse ever crossed my brow, I’ll ’ave ’e know,” came the indignant reply.
“Jest wait till you sleeps with the weight of the ship’s curvies drawn tight under yer chin to keep warm an’ the morning glories are bitin’,” laughed one of the older sealers.
The young man made to reply but realized he was being made fun of and wisely laughed with the others.
By now the sealers had crossed the quiet cove and were on the snowy land again. The lead man was already breaking trail in the deep snow, the last man walking up over the baddy catters, when they were hailed by loud voices from behind. The shouts were accompanied by the barking of dogs. They all turned as one and looked across the cove they had just crossed. Several dark-clad men with packs slung over their shoulders and hauling sleds behind them were just walking onto the ice on the other side. Behind them came another group of men led by two teams of dogs pulling komatiks loaded with seamen’s bags. Despite the laborious travel, the dogs barked excitedly upon seeing the strangers across the cove.
“Swilers from beyond the cape, by God!” The men stop
ped walking and decided to wait for the others to cross the cove.
“Farder north than that,” said another. “I recognize a couple from Dotin’ Cove among ’em.”
He was right. The men who had caught up with them were sealers from north of Cape Freels, where Bonavista Bay ended and Notre Dame Bay began. It happened every spring without any communication between them. When it was time for the sealers to meet their ships in different ports, they would invariably meet on the trails. Now the groups exchanged rough, hardy greetings. Old friends and relatives were welcomed, and newcomers like young Cecil Mouland and his cousin Ralph Mouland were introduced.
Some were hardened sealers meeting other vessels in Wesleyville. Word had come by wireless to the different post offices that another ship, the Eagle, would also pick up the last of her crew at Wesleyville this year. Most had secured their berths to the ice by this late date, but there were also a few among them who were hopeful there would be sealers who would fail to make the sailing time, or who “dropped berths” for them to fill at the last minute.
They started off again after a while and the dogs stopped barking. The last leg of their journey was silent as the ice hunters crossed the wintry barrens to Wesleyville in the gathering wind.
* * * * *
Later that same day the brewing wind from the northeast whipped up the snow-covered land again. Drifting in open places was severe. On the highest hill on the north side of Newport, a group of men stood peering into the wind. They were trying to see any sign of a ship steaming north toward them, but there was none. No ship hull down on the horizon, no smear of smoke against the grey sky. Nothing. The sea stretched white with ice as far as their vantage point allowed them to see.
Jesse Collins and his cousin Fred Collins and the two brothers Phillip and Joshua Holloway were headed for Wesleyville. With them were Jonas Pickett and Robert Brown from Fair Island. These two had crossed the bight between Silver Fox Island and Newport late yesterday evening, spent the night with friends in Newport, and had now joined the others. The wooden ship they had secured berths aboard, the SS Newfoundland, was supposed to have left St. John’s harbour at the stroke of midnight last night and should be in sight by now. But there was no sign of the Newfoundland or any other ship in that immense icefield.