Cape Breton's Magazine

ing wheel wasn't standing up where you'd be steering the boat. I found that underwa? ter 10 feet from where it's supposed to be. It was torn right off, just ripped right off--the steering wheel, the steering post, the whole bloody thing was just torn right off. Windows were all gone out of the back, where the sea was hitting her from behind, the windows were gone. The radar up on the roof of her, that was torn off. That took something, to tear that off. The Coast Guard sent a helicopter out. It was the next day, I guess it was. They took the man--the body--off of the boat with a wire. They ran a wire from the wheelhouse of the stem section of her to the shore. And they stopped him on the wire, and they took him in that way. I think he was partly dressed. Some of the clothes could have been torn off him try? ing to get him off the ladder. That's the only one that was on the boat. There were 9 missing. (Did they ever find the 9?) Not really. Parts of all 9. But not to say that they found a whole man, no. Because the next--even, oh, I guess it was a year afterward--they were still finding pieces of bones that were coming out of the beach or somewhere--I don't know where it was coming from--it was just showing up on top of the gravel. (So a whole man was never found after that?) Not really--there were parts that were missing, yes. They'd find a jawbone out of a man, or a piece of a head, stuff like that, for a year after? wards, I would say. I think it was a day or so after that, they found a fellow at the breakwater. And I think it was a day or so after that, they found a couple down around Belfry, somewhere along the line down there. Then they went to work and they got a front-end loader out at Bear Cove digging the beach up, see what they could find, you know, figured they might have been buried in the gravel. They never found anything then. (What finally happened to the Iceland II?) First, the stern section, it just got beat off. The bow section was there for the longest time, and then that got driven a- shore a piece to the west of where she had gone ashore. Just a little bit of her left now--she's pretty well beat up. There was very little salvage done to that, very lit? tle that was salvaged on her. No fish in her when she came in--she came in light. When she left to go out to the fishing grounds, if she ever reached all the way out there, I don't know. But she didn't fish when she got there, because there were no fish come in into her. Just noth? ing but a total loss. (8) Wreck of the John Harvey John Hardy, Gabarus: You know, the John Harvey, she went ashore in January, 1912. And she went to the head of Winging Point Beach (near Gabarus), on those rocks up there. And one fellow, what was his name, Edith? Edith Hardy; John Foote. John: He went ashore with a rope. Edith: "Then young John Foote a rope he took." John: He took a rope ashore. Edith; Tied it around his waist. And of course it went from the vessel. And he swam. John; Arthur Severance: One more ship that was wrecked at Winging Point, the Thordoc. (In March, 1940.) Sara: Oh yeah, that was my ship. Arthur: She fed the most of the crew for a few days. Sara: It was on a Saturday, and I was baking--oh, I did an awful lot of baking--it was only the four of us, him and me and his father and the son. I did an awful lot of baking, an awful lot of cooking--and I wasn't expecting anybody. His father said to me, "Oh well now, you're okay, you won't have to do any cook? ing for a whole week or more." I said, "No, and I'm glad of that." So I had everything And it was in the wintertime, too. And cold. Very cold. And the other fellows all got ashore. Edith: They all went ashore on that rope. The last fellow got kind of tangled up. John; So then they started to look for a place, for shelter. And they went down toward the Winging Point • there were camps down there at that time • fishing camps. And those fellows • Captain Kearly and the mate was Bill and the other fellow • well, they got into camp. This fellow who took the rope ashore and the last man that came ashore • they lay on the beach. And they died there. The other fel? lows started for Gull Cove. They didn't know where they were going, of course. And my father met them out on the beaches. When they found them, they were carrying a bird, an old sea bird, so they'd have something to eat. And they were that weak, my father when the cap? tain would put his leg down in the snow • my father