The Mellette County pioneer. [volume] (Wood, Mellette County, S.D.) 19??-1971, 1922-07-07
CHAPTER XX--Continued.
Copyright by Edwin Balmer

Benjamin Corvet and Captain Stat
ford?"
Sheriff. thought n moment.
"Corvet," he replied, twas a very
able man; he had insight and mental
grasp-and he had the fault which
sometimes goes with those, a ~hesitancy
Of action. Stafford was an able man,
too, considerably younger than Corvet.
Twenty years ago, when the conflict
Of competing interests was at its
height, COrvet was the head of one
line, Stafford was head of another, and
the two lines had very much the same
connections and competed for the same
cargOeS."
y begin to see" Father Perron ex-
claimed. please go on"
"In the early nineties both lines still
were young; Stafford had, / believe,
two ships Corvet had three"
$50 few? Yes; it grows plainer!"
'In 1894, Stafford managed a stroke
which, if fate had not interviewed, must
have assured the ultimate extinction
of Corvet'S line or its absorption INTO
Stafford's. Stafford gained as his part
ner Franklin Ramsdell, Il wealthy man
whom he had convinced that the lake
traffic offered chances of great profit
and this connection supplied him with
the capital whose lack had been ham
pering him, as it was still hampering
Corvet. The new iirm-Stafford and
Ramsdell-projected the construction,
with Ramsdell's money, Of a number
of great steel freighters. The first OF
these-the Miwaka, Il test ship whose
experience was 10 guide them in the
construction of the rest-waS launched
in the fall Of 1895, and was lost on its
maiden trip with both Stafford and
Ramsdell aboard. The Stafford and
RamSdell interests could not survive
the death Of both owners and disap-
peared from the lakes. Is this what
you wanted to know
The priest nodded. Alan leaned
tensely forward, watching; what he
had heard seemed to have increased
and d%eepened the priests feeling over
what he had to tell and to have aided
his comprehension Of it.
His name was Caleb Stafford" Fa-
Their Perron began. "(This Is what
Benjamin Corvet told to me when he
was dying under the wreckage on the
iferry.) He was rs fair and able a
man as the lakes ever knew. | had
my will Of most men in the lake trade
in those days; but / could not have
-.. ..f1l ,F hin, tNitJ oil thn tn1-nc tn
trade in, he had to pick out for his that
traffic which I already had chosen for
my own. But l fought him fair, Fa-
;ther--I fought him fair, and / would
Gaye continued to do that to the end.
"I was at ManiStee. Father, In the
end Of the season-December fifth Of
1875. The ice had begun to form very
early that year and was already bad !;
there was cold and a high gale. l had
laid up one of my ships at ManiStee,
iand I was crossing that night upon n
tug to Manitowoc. where another was
TO be laid up. l had still q third one
loading up on the northern peninsula at
MIanistique for a last trip which, If 1t
could be made, would mean a good
profit from q SeaSOn which so far, be-
cause Of Stafford's competition, had
been only fair. After leaving Manis-
tee, it grew still more cold, and l was
afraid the ice would close in on her
and keep her where she was, SO I deter
mined to go north that night and see
that she got out. None knew, Father,
except those aboard the tug, that I had
made that change.
"'At midnight, Father, to westward
OF the Foxes, we heard the four blasts
OF a steamer In distress-the four long
blasts which have sounded in my soul
ever since! We turned toward where
we saw the steamers lights; we went
carer and, Father, 1t was his great
ship-the Miwaka We had heard two
days before that she had passed the
500; we had not known more than that
of where she was, She had broken her
new shaft, Father, and was intact ex-
cept for that, but helpless in the rising
G . :"
The priest broke off. 1.-THE Miwaka {!
] did not understand all that that had
meant to him until just now-the new
ship Of the rival line, whose building
meant for him failure and defeat!
There is no higher duty than the
rescue of those in peril at sea. He
Benjamin Corvet, who told me this
swore to me that, at the beginning
none upon the tug had any thought ex-
cept to give aid. A small line was
-drifted down TO the tug and to this a
hawser was attached which they
hauled aboard. There happened then
the first of those events which led
those upon the tug into doing a great
wrong. He--Benjamin COrvet-had
taken charge Of the wheel of the tug
three men were handling the hawser
In ice and washing water at the stern.
The whistle accidentally blew, which
those on the Miwaka understood to
mean that the hawser had been Sc
cured 70 they drew In the slack the
-