Custer weekly chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, S.D.) 1890-1931, 1892-02-13
A GOOD SHIP ABANDONED.
The Florida Drifting With Sails Set
and Lights Lit
Supposed That the Crew Mutinied, Killed
the Omcers aud Took to the Boats--
The Men Known to Have
Been Dissatisfied.

New YORK, Feb. 5-The big ship
lunic, which arrived from Liverpool,
brought in a strange story of the sea.
At 7 a. m, January 20, in latitude Al
minutes 50 seconds and longitude 40
minutes as seconds, she passed the de-
relict Norwegian ship Florida. The
Florida was rolling about on the
waves, changing her course with every
shift of the wind. No sign of life could
be seen on board. Her side lights were
burning as il she had been lately aban-
ioned Where were her mon? Where
was her skipper? Dead-murdered,
perhaps; ut any rate the big ship, still
flying the Norwegian flag at her fore
peak, reeled about on the waves like a
drunken man.
The Florida left Pascagoula on De-
cember 81, bound for Derdrecht- On
January 3 she put into Ship Island and
Eve days later cast anchor at Havana
There her captain reported that her
crew were in a state of mutiny. The
crew charged the skipper with inhu
nanity. and had threatened his life.
The Norwegian consul prevailed upon
some of the men to return to duty.
Those ~whQvrefuscd were put in irons
and returned to the vessel. On Janu-
airy 10 the Florida hoisted her big sails
and the last seen of her by the people
On the Havana piers she was heading
straight for Norway.
NovA o..a. tha atra atAr,, ~ Tho
Runic. Perhaps down in the hold of
the drifting vessel the ironed men
were dying. 1t may have been that
the crew OF the ship took to the boats
and left the captain to shift for him
self. There is very little of the milk
of human kindness in a mutinous
crew. 1t is doubtless another tragedy
Of the sea, and the Florida will con-
tinue to veer and swing about the
ocean until some day there will come q
storm and she will go to the bottom,
taking her tragic history with her.
The vessel appeared to the Runic's Off
GERS to be seaworthy and there is no
apparent reason why she should have
been deserted, even had the crew mu-
tinted. A broad deck is always more
comfortable than a frail boat, and es-
pecially on the high seas.
Stories have been told of ships in the
tropic seas which were suddenly in
vaded with the plague and entirely de-
populated. Gould this have happened
with the Floridaf II may have been,
and yet there vas no plague or fever
In Havana.
Far more likely that some time in
the midnight watches there were
shouts and shots and trampling of feet
and %clanking of chains and running of
blood, and then a great carnival OF
drunkenness and rudcrless drifting.
Then after all of this was over and
the knowledge of their crime burst
upon them, the m%utineers loaded the
boats with a great Gathering of the
davits, cursing and endless confusion.
and rowed away over the sea. a gang
of Eugene Arams fleeing from their
crime. Such things may have been,
Anger and hate might lead them to
the crimes and fear cause them TO leave
the ship.
The Florida was registered at 1,2Gi
tons and carried a crew Of twenty-five
men. She was built in 1867 by l..
King, at st. John. y. b., and was
originally called the Laura Fletcher.
She is owned by Harsen & Abramson,
of Porsgund, Norway.