The Ely miner., 1915-11-12

a BOUT ten years ago James
"a Gordon Bennett made trip
in his steam yacht through
u ~ the West Indies, and when he
reached La Guayra he cabled
orders to the New York Herald to
'un a series of articles describing
hat part of the Caribbean as cruis-
ng ground for yacht owners. Since
hen a good many yachtsmen have
followed Mr.. Benefits lead, but few
iave got as much out of the trip in
he way of excitement and varied ex-
,erience as did Frederick Fenger of
Boston.
Accompanied by his wife and one
nan crew, Skipper Fenger made a
:ruise of more than 5000 miles in the
Ipecially designed schooner Diablesse.
Storms along the gulf waters, dan
gers of starvation and hardships Of
ong hours at the wheel were safely
,urmounted; suspicious of being Ger
nan spies were finally routed; mu-
iny on board was quelled, when for
1 few days added help was taken on
little elton schooner returned home.
Nothing very exciting happened in
the first part of the trip except the
1esertion of the crew." who feared
TO cross the gulf stream. Captain and
Mrs. Fenger managed to reach Bimini,
and continued to Nassau, where new
crew, in the person of one Jamaica
Fred" was shipped, and he stuck to
the end.
Ran Against a Revolution.
Il hoped to reach ST. Thomas in
ten days." said Captain Fenger, "but
first we ran into head winds and then
a calm. We were in dead beat for
three and one-half weeks, except for
two nights. Off the coast of Haiti we
ran into hard blow, in which our
ing in sail We hove to under fore
sail, and the next morning ran in un-
der the island at Port de Paix.
There we found a revolution going
on. officers boarded us, headed by
the harbor master.
I'VE anchored with all our chains
ont, and the officers took all our pa
pers ashore. l was considerably wor-
ried, fearing that they would seize
the schooner. An American 80-foot
schooner yacht year before had
been fired on in the same locality"
They got away from Port de Paix
all right, however, ard made their
way. in heavy weather, along the
coast of Haiti and San Domingo and
across to Maraguez, Porto Rico. Then
they beat their way to st. Thomas.
but before reaching that island they
ran entirely out of food and water.
Sails Blown to Shreds.
From st. Thomas we sailed to the
Virgin islands," continued Captain
Fenger, "and ran across to ST.. Eusta-
thus, where the harbor master, whom
knew, warned us that the weather
was growing suspicious and that the
early season had come when hurri-
canes might be expected in the north
ern islands. We stayed two hours.
and then set out for Dominica, and
thence to st. Lucia. Just as we were
under the lee of Martinique, the
weather suddenly became extremely
heavy, and our mainsail was ripped
along the foot. We put in a reef and
kept on, from seven o'clock till about
20 p. m.
Then. without any warning. the
mainsail suddenly blew itself all
to shreds. There wasn't enough left
10 make a patch. We set our storm
try-sail and kept on running. l had
Just turned in from my watch, when
Fred yelled: Now de for's'le done
gone 1t, too. was almost com.
plete wreck, and we were beating
about in considerable distress. There
wasn't any fear about it, just excite
ment.
''All quieted finally, however, and
we got along somehow to Chateau
Belaire, and from there to St
Georges, Grenada, which we reached
on July 6, 1914.