The Mount Holly news. [volume] (Mount Holly, Burlington Co., N.J.) 1891-1942, 1900-03-27
GRIM SABLE ISLAND.
THIS WRECK sTREwN SAND BAR IS
DOOMED BY THE SEA.


One of che weird Legends of This
Ocean Graveyard A Woman In
white, a Bleeding Forefnger and
q Ring Sold In Halifax.
sable island belongs to Nova Scotia,
is 145 miles from Halifax and IS miles
east Of Cape Canso." writes Gustav
Kobbe in Ainslee's. 1T is treeless,
shrubless waste, scanned by wind and
wave and of ever changing aspect. A
cone shaped hill near che east end,
once mere undulatiOn of sand, is now
over 100 feet high and is still growing.
Other hillocks are gradually being
moved away by storms. The hillocks
are liable to be undermined SO swiftly
and swept out of existence that they
are carefully watched from the various
stations on the island, there being
no certainty how far an inroad of the
sea will extend after each successful
attack Even the coarse grass of the
island grows In a different manner
from that of the mainland. 1t does not
bear seed, but shoots up from roots
which run along under the sand. Dur
ing the winter the sand is blown over
the grass and buries it sometimes three
or four feet deep, but the hardy blades
grow up next season, as If the island
sands had protected them from the
cold of winter in order to make them
all the stronger.
'"rhe island itself is fighting for self
preservation. 1t seems as If 1t drew
ships into its fatal embrace as rallying
points for its loose and shifting sand,
thus to protect itself by bulwark of
wrecks against humiliation by the sea.
Tradition says that when Sable island
was discovered by Cabot in 1447 it was
80 miles long and 10 miles wide. In
1902, when rescue station was estab-
lished there, it was only 40 miles long
Since then it has shrunk to but little
more than 20 miles in length, and in
width 1t is only mile at it's widest.
Within % years the western end lost
seven miles. Shoals over which the
ocean now surges are pointed out as
former sites Of lighthouses One Of
these was so swiftly undermined by
the sea that it had to be abandoned
with the greatest precipitation. The
spot where once stood the superintend-
ent's house Is now under two fathoms
of water.
"The island. rapidly diminishing at
it's western end, is slightly gaining at
its eastern. Slowly, like ship drag
ging its anchor, it is moving eastward.
Will 1t ever reach the edge Of the
shoals, stand tottering on the brink of
the abyss till it receives it's coup de
grace and plunge over the submarine
bank forever into the depths? Unfor-
tunately It's end will probably be less
dramatic There is good ground for
believing that this gray sand bar will
slowly wear away until it becomes an
other submerged shoal added to an am
buscade already some 60 miles in
length. for Il line of breakers extends
16 miles from one end of the island and
% miles from the other.
"In the space of single year Sable
island claimed more than 200 lives. In
fact, so many wrecks line the shoals
Of this ocean graveyard that the new
pile up on the old, like bodies heaped
in one ditch. The Crofton Hail. an iron
sailing ship wrecked few years ago
on the northeast bar, broke in two
about amidships. The pieces have
drifted together again. and the island
ers suppose that she struck crosswise
upon an old submerged wreck and is
settling over it, which accounts for the
two parts coming together Nor is the
island satisfied with the awful tribute
which it exacts from the living. The
same informant who writes me about
the Crofton Hall adds that the bark
John Mcleod, which was wrecked off
DEVILS island at the entrance to Halt
fax harbor. drifted ashore on Sable is
land bottom up. wreck of a wreck!
zone of the grimmest legends Of Sa-
BILE island dates from the wreck Of the
Amelia, and there is enough evidence
Of truth contested with 1t to show
what bloody deeds were added on that
occasion to the terrors of shipwreck.
Captain Torrens, who commanded the
gunboat which was dispatched to Sable
tS1dAQ dltEl Lie WlCGh Va LIZ <AAtCAAop
was one of the survivors Of the second
disaster. A passenger on the lost trans
port was Lady Copeland, on her way
to join her husband. The captain Of
the gunboat had been told that she
wore on her forefnger a ring of pecul-
lar arti1ce.
"The story has it that Captain Tor
rens, wandering over the island one
night In search of possible survivors,
was attracted by the piteous whining
of his dog in front Of small, open
shelter known to have existed at that
time, but long since toppled to pieces.
Approaching the shelter, he was star
tied to see the figure of a woman all ia
white and holding toward him the
bleeding stump of forefnger. While
he was gazing at the apparition it rose,
silently glided past him and dived into
the sea. But time and again thereafter
the white woman with bleeding fore
finger was seen wandering over the
sand hills.
"It is probably only part of the weird
legend that Captain Torrens, feeling
sure that shocking crime had been
committed. tracked the guilty pirate
until he discovered his family on the
coast Of Labrador and learned that the
ring had been sold in Halifax. 1t is
fact, however. that many years after
the disaster Lady Copeland's ring was
discovered in jewelry store In Hall
fax and was returned to her family.
From that hour her ghost has ceased
to haunt the island"