Page 7 - The Wreck of the First "Aspy"

ISSUE : Issue 13

Published by Ronald Caplan on 1976/6/1

Walter LePriend Freddie Martell & Walter LeFriend George Buchanan we went back and we stayed there. We must have been there a couple of weeks anyhow. Stayed till she went. Came in a storm that night and that was the end of her. We left when we saw she was breaking up. George Buchanan, River Bennett: It took an awful storm to break her up • she was well built. Big timbers in her. That was a stormy night though. Wireless message from Dingwall to get out of White Point. There was a southerly gale coming. We had freight a- board, and 30 passengers. And the captain kept her out so man-' minutes of each course • the wind was blowing in on the shore • he kept her out and the wind was pushing her in all the time • and she struck on this rock. There was 80 feet of water at her stern and the rock came through her cargo, right through this forecastle • and she hung on that. And there was a man named Freddy Martell in there all the time. A fireman, he was off of watch. And we put a bar a- gainst the door so the sea wouldn't open the door. He was up to his neck in the wa? ter when we thought of him and got him out of there. Vincent Welsh was the cook on her. I'll tell you what he did. The dining room had a lot of water on the floor and I guess a force of habit • he was gathering up to salvage crockery and there was one plate fell out of his arms on the floor • and do you know what he did? He i-vent in the galley and got a dust pan and a broom and swept it up. And her in ready to smash up. we had to try and get the lifeboats off. The first one got off the rope was rotten. The smoke from the galley pipe was hitting against it and it kind of burnt it. The rope broke and the boat went down. We had to lug the other one across the deck and she was rolling like that, back and forth. Just like hailstones, the wind blowing the water in your face. There were a lot of ships lost that night. We couldn't use the oars so we ran a line under the seats of the lifeboat. Got a line fastened to the Aspy and made the other end fastened to the cliff. That's how we got them ashore with the one boat. The rope was running under the seats so she couldn't get away. And there was one old woman she was way over 70 years of age. There were no old men. There was a cow and a calf on board, and there were 10 sheep. Well the sheep will drown themselves; when the wool gets wet they go to the bottom. They went down the bottom of the engine room. They got panicy, you know. And they got running up CENTRAL& NOVA SCOTIA TRUStCOMmMY 225 Chorlott* Stiwt/Sydnty, Novo ScoHa, P. O. Box 307, BIP 6H2 TfMwm (902) 562-5596 Bstate Plaxming • Mortgages and Real Es? tate • Savings & Chequing Accounts • Guaranteed Investment Certificates • Inyestnent Management Phone C902> 794-7251 Cable BRENNANS Telex 019-35149 Night & Holiday 736-8479 794-3178 Brennans Travel Agency '*mn!' PURVES STREET, NORTH SYDNEY STEAMSHIP • AIRLINE • RAIL AND HOTEL ACCOMMODATIONS Cape Breton's Magazine/7

Cape Breton's Magazine