... Shipwrecked
Onyellowed, tissue-thin paper, bound in leather, and entitled simply “Journal,” was found an entry which matches all the adventure stories of shipwrecked men ever told. Its authenticity can only be judged by the excerpt which follows:
Herein the reader, if there be any, will find the story of my most harrowing experience at sea. It is only by the Grace of God Almighty that I am alive this day to record it thus.
I was twenty years old when I shipped out from Boston on a journey to the East Indies. She was a good ship, my fellow crew members were capable, congenial men, many of whom I had sailed with in the past. Our captain had earned our respect even in the few short days we had been acquainted with him. All hands and officers were convinced that clear sailing and a profitable journey lay before all.
I cannot record here in a vivid enough manner, my impressions during the first three weeks of our sailing. The weather was fair and mild, good winds had prevailed constantly; the life aboard ship was especially pleasant. There was no need for any such feeling as I had found myself indulging in for several days. But it nevertheless prevailed. Perhaps all I can coherently say is that I had a vague unrest, a mind-plaguing thought constantly with me, like the shadow of some dark cloud over my being. This feeling brought with it the still, subconscious impression of disaster and imminent death which I could not, try as I would, shake off. I said nothing to my mates about this feeling. They would perhaps have scoffed at me—if not, my revealing of such an impression would onlyserve to disturb the uncommonly smooth-running life of our close existence on the lonely seas.
It was on a calm, uneventful afternoon, while all hands were engaged in dilatory activities of repair and small duties, that this feeling reached its highest peak. I felt a strange compulsion to plunge into immediate intense activity, for my fears were mounting by the minute, and, in my youthful mind, I felt vaguely ashamed. I had just left my post by the starboard boat, where I had been engaged in lashing down some canvassing, when I glanced up to see the lookout in the crow’s nest peering intently out to sea. I knew somehow that my fear was about to materialize. And verily, a moment later, the call came from the nest, “Ship on far port horizon ho! She bears the Jolly Roger!”
The action over our entire ship was so instant in contrast to the almost sluggish movements of the minute before that it was as if a painting had suddenly sprung into life, each of its immobile figures leaping into definite motion. We clapped on every sail, but the pirate ship was on us before we could get up enough sail to escape. They sent a shot straight through our rigging.
The happenings of the next hour remain in my mind only as a confused jumble of shouts, clashing swords, and hand to hand combat. The pirate crew were a determined and bloodthirsty lot, not content to merely take over our monetary possessions. They outnumbered us and overpowered us, deliberately destroying and ravaging everything upon which they could lay their hands.
They seemed at last content with what damage they had wrought. The burly pirate captain ordered us toabandon our ship, which he and his men then set afire. Before the fire had reached the hold, what few of our number were left managed to reach some supplies, and with those few essentials, we rowed away. I will never forget the frustrated agony in my soul as I watched our valiant ship, strewn with the bodies of our gallant captain and mates, burn to a charred skeleton, and sink slowly beneath the waters....
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There were two lifeboats, lost and tiny as pea pods on a pond, drifting in lone aimlessness on the sea. There were eight of us, including myself, in one boat, and five in the other. We saw the other boat, which we could not reach because of the waves, drift farther and farther away. At last, after it had been hidden from our sight by a monstrous wave, we saw it again, capsized. We tried valiantly to reach those who were floundering in the sea. It was hopeless. One by one they sank beneath the surface, lost forever in the smothering embrace of the sea.
For a day and a night, the fierce winds and huge waves crashed against our small craft, and I cannot explain today why we did not meet the same fate ashad our unfortunate comrades in the other boat. Upon the second day, the rolling sea was changed to a flat, millpond surface, and the sun was unbearably hot. We had managed to bring with us only four bottles of water, enough to last but a few days. We did not live, we merely existed. I felt the gnawing, piercing pangs of thirst and hunger congest and constrict my being. Within fourteen days, four of our number had died of thirst, and there were three men besides myself left, starving.
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My hands, when I reached up to touch my burned, bearded face, were trembling like a man beset with palsy. My eyes, I knew, were like my comrades’, empty, vacant, hopeless. I was conscious only of a searing ache over my entirety, and my mind was skipping and sliding over disjointed thoughts. We looked at each other, and still did not see; we were conscious only of hunger and heat and thirst. When we spoke, it was as if in a dream. Jackson had managed to hook a small fish, but had not the strength to pull it into the boat. I believe we realized the helplessness of our plight, and began at that moment of realization to get crazed. It was not long before we began to talk of drawing lots to see which of us should be killed to provide food for the others. The thought is horrible and distasteful now, as I sit with my belly full of good warm food, but then the thought meant only one thing—the lessening of the most terrible of pains—Hunger.
We resisted this impulse as long as humanly possible. But at last the time came when we must destroy one of our number, or fall upon each other like crazed wolves. We cast lots, and it fell upon me to be the victim. I prepared to die so that others might live.
I cannot give my reader any searing recollection of faith or impression that come to a man about to die, for I had none. I knew only that my breast was bared, and that one of my mates, with arm raised, was about to plunge his knife into my vitals. I believe that I wanted to die. But the shining knife did not come sweeping down, for at that moment, we heard a gunshot in the distance, and, looking in the direction from which the sound came, saw a white sail on the horizon.
This ship had seen our distress signal—my own shirt which hung from a propped up oar—and had fired a shot to let us know we had been seen. Death, under such horrible circumstances, breathes hotly down on few men.
I lived to see the pirate captain who had been the cause of our agony hanged from his own yardarm in the harbor of Calcutta.
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