The morning Astorian. [volume] (Astoria, Oregon) 1899-1930, 1904-11-02
WHY SULLIVAN
QUIT THE SEA
Well Known Larry Once Ate
Human Flesh When Starva.
tion Faced Crew.
HIS GRUES0ME NARRATIVE
Cook Was Chosen as Executioner
and Plump Boy of IL Was
Selected for the
Slaughter.
HIS GRUESOME NARRATIVE

why did l quit the sea?" repeate,
Larry Sullivan in response to a ques
tion. We'll, l will tell you, but
but don't say anything about it,
In 1882 shipped before the mas
on the British bark Alden Bessie. w,
were bound for the United Kingdom
with a lumber cargo taken from a Pa
cific coast port-just which one II
does not matter. The craft was old
and should have been condemned be-
fore was born.
while rounding the Horn we ran
into succession of gales and lost a
good portion of our rigging. But we
weathered the storms all right and
were getting along fine when we no.
ticed with a shudder that our feed was
getting rather slim. The truth OF the
matter was the grub supply had been
just about exhausted for a month or
so. but the officers kept the mater
quiet fearing that a mutiny would oc-
cur when the fact became known.
Every day We noticed that the amount
of our handouts became less and
less.
Contrary winds or calms held us
back. Do what we would it was i'm
possible for us to make much pro-
gress with our disabled ship. And
there we wandered around on the deep,
blue sea about as helpless as Munroe
was when he confronted Jeffries. Not
sail was in sight and all was about
as gloomy on board as could be when
the captain came out to the fore cas-
tie one morning and informed us that
the total supply of provisions that
stood between us and starvation was
less than five pounds. You may be
certain that we ate of this very scan
tily. but very shortly it faded away to
nothing. But this would not have
been so bad had it not been for the
fact that we were also about out of
fresh water. In short the truth
seemed to suddenly dawn upon all of
us that we were in devil of a fix.
Il suppose we were just about as
fine and decent lot of fellows as it
would be possible to find by looking
the world over. and it seemed shame
that we should perish out there like
rats When almost overcome with
thirst and starvation we decided that |
something must be done.
"At last we decided that one of our
number would have to be killed and
eaten. Who should be the victim?
We pondered for long time upon this
question and finally decided to pick
out one of the fattest boys in the out
fit for slaughter. He was a nice
young fellow only about Is years of
age. But who should kill him was
the next thing to settle. Mind you,
we kept our decision quiet from the
doomed boy. After much deliberation
we hit upon the plan of drawing
straws to see who would have to kill
him. AS it happened the cook was
elected as exeeutioner.
Half an hour later we had the first
square meal that we had eaten for
more than three months. Two weeks
we succeeded in putting in
to Rio Janeiro, and of course our
troubles were then ended
But then resolved to quit the sea.
It still makes me shudder when / re-
call that awful occurrence. While
this is the worst, / went through
almost as frightful experiences while
|, was rowing around the world on a
square-rigger. l want no more of 1t
IN mine.
Come around some time and will
all yoIl pOnd ctorvo