Omaha daily bee., 1888-08-10
The Strange Fate of the Ship snow.

~ ''i'hSf ihNt vi tht S1ip SitN.
New York Correspondence Globe
Democrat: About u year ago one of the
finest clipper ships that ever sailed out
Of New York harbor went ashore near
Cork, on the Irish coast. She was the
Alfred ID. Snow, and belonged to the
well known firm OF Snow IL Burgess, of
South street, in this city. Her master
was Captain Wiley, a Maine man, and
one OF the most careful IN He
had followed the sea, man and boy. for
half q century. The Snow had on
board. besides the captain and officers,
II crew of twenty-siX meu-thirty-two
men all told. Every one persisted.
1t. Is supposed that Captain Wiley
was sailing by dead reckoning and had
thus gone u mile too far to lceward.
The weather was heavy aud the fog
such that to see n cables length ahead
was impossible. However, all were lost.
aud just in sight of safety. ana nonc re-
turned to tell the tale. There is a
strange story connected with the Snow,
which was told to u GlpbC-Democrat
correspondent by Mrs. Sofa Clough. an
intimate friend of the widow of Captain
Wiley, and which has been partly veri-
fed by Il statement published at the
time Of the accident in the New York
Herald.
When the Snow left New York on her
last trip, which was around thu Horn to
san Francisco, thence with grain to
Liverpool, q strange fatality occurred
on board. She was lowed down in the
afternoon to her anchorage at Sandy
Hook. inside the Horse Shoe, where,
like all sailing ships leaving this port,
she was compelled toanchor over night.
Capt. Wiley was aboard. but he need
not have been until the next morning.
That night at about | Il. m. an old
sailor came to his cabin and insisted on
seeing him. After parlcying awhile
the MAI was admitted to the cabin.
"Cuptain Wiliey,' he sud, II have
had q dream. | dreamed | saw tho
Snow lying at the bottom of the english
Channel, and III Of us-you included
scattered around her. stark and stifr.n
Nonsense. you are drank, > sald Will
ley, go back TO your bunk and sleep it
OIL, man-youn laugh at it to-morrow.n
Captain" said the fellow. "I've
sailed with you many's the time afore
now, and ye know l'se not the salt TO be
skeered OF Davy Jones, but | can't go
with you this time: good night" With
that the fellow started for the fore
castle. The third mate followed him.
but before either reached there, Il tu-
multi was heard within. Thinking the
sailors were having a drunken carousc,
which had been strictly prohibited. the
mate forgot about the superstitious
sailor and entered the forccustlc with
the intention of discipiining the crew.
But Il strange and horrible sight met
his eyes. In one of the hunks about
which gathered the horror-strickeu
crew was the very man whom he had
followed from the captain $ cabin. He
had cut his throat from ear to ear. and
then, as though to make death doubly
sure, had plunged the knife into his
heart. He WAS dead.
On Investigating it was found that he
had not left his bunk that night. Was
1T II ghost that the captain saw-or
what? He had killed himself a few
minutes before the mate entered, it is
said, no one being awake at the time
but one sailor, who awoke the rest to
help stop his desperate act. However,
he was dead now, and the polio. author
tiles had to be sigualed. The coroner
took charge of he ship next morning
and held an inquest, the verdict being
suicide.
While in San Francisco, before tho
Alfred ID. Snow started on her voyage
to Liverpool, which she was destined
never to reach, n Of the officers wrote
to Mrs. Clough that the ghost or spirit,
If such it were, of the suicide. had sew
FRA times been seen during the VOYAGE
out, and that the entire crew fled the
ship us soon as the vessel touched at San
Francisco. At one time, on a dim
moonlight night, when she was almost
right under the equator, Il
ghostly form came from the forecastlo
and was seen by the captain and watch
to go to the maiumast shrouds.
up which he slowly climbed, singing a
weird sea song, until at last he disap-
peared above the masthead. In about
an hour one of the most severe white
squalls came up that they had everaeen,
and in which all their strength and
ability was taxed to keep the ship to-
gether.
The strange truth of the mans pre-
diction, which vas so terribly fulfilled
on the Irish coast, and the ghostlinoss
of it all, make it evident that there was
a strange spiritual naturalization
which hung to the vessel from the time
of the suicides death until she went to
pieces on the rocks.