The coastland times. [volume] (Mnateo [i.e. Manteo], N.C.) 1947-1959, 1956-06-22
STORIES
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Continued from Page One)
life to rigging to keep from being
swept overheard" One man was
swept overheard; then, as the life
savers watched helplessly the YES
sci went to pieces.
There were eight men on board
the AARON REPPARD. -Four
more drowned as she broke up. The
remaining three, clinging to wreck
age, drifted closer to shore-close
enough for the Lifesavers to go
into the surf after them. Despite
the danger from floating spars
and planks, thrown against them
by the high breakers, they man.
aged to save the three sailors. One,
keeper Hooper, needed to be saved
himself, for he was knocked down
by wave and pummelled by
wreckage, and in the process his
leg was broken.
Surfman N. G. Midget had
first sighted the AARON REP
PARD at approximately 12:4O
that afternoon; by little
after 5 pm. the crews had
returned to their stations, with the
three survivors and the injured
keeper Hooper. At almost that ex-
act time the day watch at Big
Kinnakeet station sighted another
three-masted schooner close in to
shore, abreast of the station.
Keeper A. L. Gray of Big Kmna-
keet, aware of what had been GO
ing on Immediately to the north
of him, called Cape Hatteras sta
ton for assistance, mustered his
own crew, and started down the
beach after the vessel, which was
drifting toward the south.
This was the three-master
FLORENCE RANDELL, with ten
people on board, and within half
an hour she had struck the beach,
approximately two miles south of
Big Kinnakeet station. This time
the luck turned, a line was fired
across the vessel, the brooches
buoy set up, and with the assist
ance of residents of Big Kinnakeet,
and iifesavers from Cape Hatteras
and Creeds Hills stations, keeper
Gray and his men succeeded in
landing all nine of the crewmen,
including the Captain, as we'll as
the Captains wife, before dark
that evening.
By then, however, the hurricane
was reaching full intensity, the
horses could not pull the beach
cart back to the station against
the wind, and for more than "a
hours afterwards it was impossible
for regular patrols to be main
tanned by any of the stations.
That was Wednesday, August
18th. Not until the early morning
of the 18th were patrols resumed,
and at 4:45 that morning, surfman
C. o. Miller of Little Kinnakeet,
discovered a vessel ashore, about
three quarters of mile south
of the station. He Immediately re-
ported back to acting keeper N.
w. Daley, who had taken oven
when keeper Hooper's leg was
broken. All telephone lines were
down, and Daley and his crew
hitched o. J. Gray's horse and an.
other to the apparatus cart and tried
to go down the beach to the wreck.
But the sand was so soft, almost
like quicksand, that the horses
soon mired almost to their bellies,
and fell time after time, and the
cart wheels buried up to the hubs.
But somehow they got through to
the wreck, found it to be the three
masted schooner ROBERT w.
DASEY, her bow so close to the
beach that her jib stays We're
hanging down within reach from
the shore. Again the rescue was
accomplished without loss, this
time seven men including the Cap
tain; and despite the soft beach,
the job was done a little over two
hours after she had first been
sighted. At a vendue, 12 days
later, the vessel was sold for thirty
dollars; what remained Of her car
go Of coal, for fifty cents.
Meanwhile, up here at Chicama-
comico, keeper L. Bannister Mid