Waterbury evening Democrat., 1908-09-09
TRAPS FOR MARINERS
Some Points of Peril That Are
 Dreaded by Seamen.
MERcILEss .KENTIsA KNOCK.


 Vast csmstsry AFor All Ships That
 Are oripped by lts Relentless Sands.
 Sable Islands Fingers ob Death.
 The exact location of Davy Jones' locker is not shown on any ocean chart extant, principally because 1t is state and not place, but if any one ocean death trap deserves the title 1t is the Thames estuary. The British. naval department has a chart upon which
 1t marks the position of wrecks. with a black dot. On this chart the Thames
 mouth tract is solid black spot. So numerous have been the wrecks that
 the dots run together. The point
 where the black dots actually pile one on top of another is the Kentish Knock,
 and this Is the place among all of the
 ocean's danger spots that dGsSves the title of Davy Jones' locker.
 At the Kentish Knock 1t is not keel
 shattering rocks of piercing points of
 coral that wreck the ocean travellers.
 It is sand. treacherous, .clinging sand.
 that grasps the doomed ship with q
 grip of steel and holds 1t firmly while the angry sea beats 1t to fragments. Many vessel posted at Lloyd's as
 missing would be duly accounted for
 if the Knock sand would give up it's
 booty. There is no hope for ship or
 man when Father Neptune asks toll at the Kentish Knock, for the nearest
 land Is twenty miles away and the
 nearest lifeboat at Margate, thirty
 miles away. The sands of the ocean are far more dangerous than the rocks. The sand banks extend over more space. there fore offer more points of contact than the rocks, which usually rise in one
 slender pinnacle. The waters flow over
 them in smooth waves, and there are
 no warning breakers.
 Next to the Thames mouth tract in
 point of danger is the Hugli. the salt
 water river on which Calcutta stands.
 The most trying part of large vessels
 voyage from New York to Calcutta is the last few miles of this calm river. In this strange river in windless weath-
 CT and fiat, calm water vessels have been lost, dashed to pieces on the ever shifting sand banks by the force of the tides The sands grasp the keel of the marked vessel, and she stops, but the tide moves on with relentless force, and the helpless ship Is carried over on her beam ends. She careens over
 and founders with all on board. One of the worst shoals in the Hugli bears the name James and Mary. It was the name of a great Indian merchant shipwrecked on the sunken sand banks. Another danger point dreaded by the
 master mariner has neither sand nor rocks, but great submarine waterfall In the English channel there is point just beyond the Shambles banks where there is sudden drop in the sea bot. tom. The channel tides sweep over the banks and down this sudden drop,
 creating rapids equal in fury to those of Niagara. The American ship Georgian foundered in Portland race. the name by which this danger point is known,
 and all hands went down with her.
 Ships bound to New York from Flu rope pass quite near deadly hidden
 shoal which runs out from Sable is.
 land, lying of Sable cape. in Nova l Scotia. The shoal runs out for miles in five directions like the fingers of a great hand reaching out for what il , can destroy. When the gales blow
 heavy seas boom upon the shoals with
 sufficient force to shatter the stanchest
 vessel afloat, and when the wind ceases the beaches are strewn with wreckage and the bodies of those who have per. ished. The distance from the shore is too great and the surf too heavy for | the life savers to reach a struggling
 vessel, and few lives are saved at this point. Ten vessels have been wrecked in this trap in single day.
 The rocky danger points in the ocean
 have nearly all been tagged. and light houses have been erected on the most dangerous-all except one. There is nc lighthouse on the Virgin rock. and there never will be. Out in the mid-At- lantic giant pinnacle rears its head
 up from the ocean floor and endeavors yainly to reach the surface of the sea It Is too short by about eighteen feet There it stands with its sharp point
 hidden by the ocean waves, waiting to pierce the bottom of some unsuspecting
 vessel and send it down to join the pile of ships ribs and dead mems bones that litter the floor around it's base The waves seem to be in league with the rock, for if a vessel of light draft tries to pass over its head the waves shoot 1t down into trough at the bot tom of which the point of the rock is waiting to rip out Ter keel
 These danger spots, however, are but anpexes to the real Dayy Jones' locker the Kentish Knock, that cemetery of
 ships and men where dripping ghosts of master mariners and their men fiji
 over the ruins of their .vcssels.-B. R
 Winslow in Los Angeles Times.
 s Bridge Builders.