The Star of the Sea (9 page)

Friday, 12 November, 1847
Twenty-one days at sea remaining

L
ONG:
20°19.09′W. L
AT:
50°21.12′N. A
CTUAL
G
REENWICH
S
TANDARD
T
IME:
11.14 p.m. A
DJUSTED
S
HIP
T
IME:
9.53 p.m. W
IND
D
IR
. & S
PEED:
N.W. Force 4. S
EAS:
Choppy all last night but middling fair now. H
EADING:
S.W. 226°. P
RECIPITATION
& R
EMARKS:
Extremely cold. Heavy rain and thunder all the day. The
Kylemore
out of Belfast two miles to the aft. Ahead of us the
Blue Fiddle
out of Wexford Town.

Last night four of the steerage passengers died: Peter Foley of Lahinch (forty-seven yrs, land labourer); Michael Festus Gleeson of Ennis (age unknown, but very aged, a purblind); Hannah Doherty of Belturbet (sixty-one yrs, a onetime domestic) and Daniel Adams of Clare (nineteen yrs; evicted tenant farmer). Their mortal remains were committed to the sea. God Almighty have mercy upon their souls and receive them unto that anchorage where reigns His peace.

The total of those who have died since this voyage commenced is eighteen. Five are in the hold this night, suspected of Typhus. Two, it is certain, will not see the morning.

I have given orders for burials to be conducted from the stern from now on and held at dawn or after dark. It is a habit of many of the women of steerage to indulge in ‘keening’ at such sad moments;
a peculiar variety of wailing ululation where they rend their garments and pull at their hair. Some of the First-Class passengers were complaining about the disturbance. Lady Kingscourt, in particular, was a little concerned that her children might be distressed by the queer proceedings.

Large number of steerage with dysentery, scurvy or famine dropsy. Smaller number (about fifteen) with all three. One seaman, John Grimesley, is quite smitten with a fever. A steward, Fernão Pereira, has a septic wound to the hand, caused by a cut from a broken wineglass. Both men were seen by Surgeon Mangan, who put leeches on the first, and a pasted opiate poultice on the second. He is of the view that they will recover presently if excused from duty and so they have been. (Both are good honest men; no idlers or scrimshankers. I do not propose to dock any pay.) The Maharajah is also unwell, though only with seasickness, and has retired to his stateroom, not to be disturbed. I myself had a poor chest earlier in the day, and took a quarter-grain of opium. Found it vivifying.

Instructions have been issued for the men to desist from referring to the steerage passengers as ‘steeries’, ‘steeragers’, ‘raggers’, ‘shawlies’ & cetera. (These terms are employed not only to disparage certain passengers that were better assisted with kindliness, but are used among the men themselves as varieties of insult.) Leeson has informed them this will not be tolerated. Every man, woman and child on this vessel will be addressed with respect, the common run of person as well as the better. They are Steerage or Ordinary Passengers, and will be known as such.

A troubling matter must be reported:

This forenoon it was brought to my attention by First Mate Leeson that very late last night some person – presumably male – had sawn through the bars in the lower foredeck gate, which leads to the First-Class compartments. At first I was perplexed, for in accordance with the regulations all the steerage passengers’ belongings were carefully searched on boarding the vessel; such items as knives, saws, swords, blades, skewers & cetera being confiscated until we debark at New York. But Leeson being a diligent and thorough Mate – who has long since deserved promotion, though receiving none – had enquired of Henry Li the cook. The latter attested that a small hacksaw used for butchery had been pilfered from the galley some
time last night, along with some pig innards and a flagon of freshwater.

A number of items have been stolen from First-Class; viz: a silver-plate watch belonging to Minister Deedes, a pair of cuff-links from the Mail Agent George Wellesley and a quantity of American dollar paper currency from the Maharajah. All are agreed that to search the entirety of steerage would probably prove fruitless, if such an endeavour were possible, which it is not now. I have promised that the thefts will be repaired by the Company’s insurance policy and requested the victims to keep the matter to themselves, as I do not wish to cause wider alarm than is necessary. Meanwhile I have arranged for extra watchmen at night and other measures.

Leeson has said he will put it about steerage that the Minister is very saddened by the loss of his watch, a gift from a number of grateful parishioners on his retirement. We shall see if such a stratagem brings results.

Such petty thievings have happened previously on similar voyages and in my experience will happen again. Human Nature being the drama it is, a certain degree of resentment may be thought inevitable; indeed, I might venture, understandable.

The London office will by now have received my official notification of the 8th inst. written from Queenstown, on the perennial matter of overcrowding. Again and again in this past fourteen years, I have insisted that you, as the directors of this company, bear a legal, and indeed a moral duty to maintain the fundamental protection of those who entrust their lives to this vessel and to my own captaincy of same. And yet again, despite my unending protestations, too many steerage tickets have been sold for this voyage, by a factor of thirty percentage at the minimum.

I fail to comprehend why my passengers and my men must habitually be thrust into peril of this most immediate and outrageous nature, simply for the sake of the profits accruing from so doing. Nor can any satisfactory cause be advanced for the disgraceful failure to provide a physician or at least a nurse on board; nor a safe place for the purpose of accouchements for the women. Perhaps the shareholders think babies come from under the cabbage leaves. I can assure them they do not, though it were easier if they did. It is only a blessing of providence that we have Surgeon Mangan among us
now; and if his efforts are tireless and his charity unstinting, he is not a young man and is already being overwhelmed.

Directly we dock at New York, I once more insist, arrangements must urgently be effected to ameliorate the lot of the steerage passengers, if any, on the return leg. If this is not done, another Captain will be required. I will have no more innocent blood on my hands, nor either on my conscience.

In the meantime I have had Leeson arrange for expeditious repairs; also for supplementary bolts, chains, hasps and morticed locks to be put on all gates, windows, hatches, frames, casements & cetera, this programme to be undertaken over the next several days. The cost of compleatly emptying our store of these items will no doubt be considerable to the Company. Greater, indeed, than the sum which might have been required to give every soul in steerage a daily dish of broth, or the children of steerage a pannikin of hot milk. Those more learned in matters of accounting than your humble employee may wish to reflect upon the above, for future reference.

Otherwise the ship seems peaceful enough, if restlessly so; and we continue to progress in adequate time.

The sea appears unusually tranquil for this time of year.

Greater number of sharks than is usual.

… We are all without a place to lea our head And this day we are without a Bit to eat and I wood Be Dead long go only for two Nebours that ofen gives me A Bit for god Sake But little ever I thought that it wood come to my turn to Beg Nomore

Letter to an immigrant in America

I
N WHICH THE WRETCHED
H
USBAND OF
M
ARY
D
UANE
,
QUITE UNDONE BY THE
E
VIL OF
W
ANT, RECORDS HIS
L
AST
AND
T
ERRIBLE THOUGHTS
.

Christmas Eve, 1845, Rosroe
¹

Dearest Mary Duane, my only beloved wife,

Pen could scarcely put down what I feel now. All is lost, my sweetest Mary, and can never return.

I have just come back from Delphi Lodge at Bundorragha near Leenaun, where I went up to try and see the Commander. Having walked all the way from our present shelter up to Louisburgh in the County of Mayo, I was told by a man in the town that the Commander was not there at the present time but was after going up to Delphi with Colonel Hograve and Mr Lecky.

Hundreds of people were all about the town and they trying to get a docket to get into the Workhouse, but all were turned away by the Relieving Officer, it being too full, and the constables beating the people back from the gates.

The bright windows of the stores had Christmas fare in great
abundance, geese and fowl and all such; but just as in Clifden the traders have greatly multiplied the prices. How they can do it to their own people at this awful time I cannot understand. Everything now is the fault of the English and the landlords, the people do say; and Jesus help us, so much of it is. But it is not the common man of England who is preying like a vulture on the poor people when they have nothing, but the Judas Irish merchant with his greedy eye to whatever mite he can screw out of his wretched countrymen and they so down.

The town was a dreadful sight, I could never forget it; with a multitude half dead and weeping as they walked through the streets. Worse again to see those for whom even weeping was too much effort, and they sitting down on the icy ground to bow their heads and die, the best portion of life already gone out from them. I saw John Furey from Rosaveel and thought him asleep; but he was dead; and to see that great strong man who could at one time pull a hedge out of the earth with his mighty left hand now lying so still was a terrible thing. But to witness the sufferings of the tiny children; to hear the sounds they made in their agonies. I cannot write it.

It can never be written, Mary.

People would not believe such things could have been permitted to happen.

I faced out alone for the mountain track from Louisburgh. The sun was going down by now. All along the road were unspeakable sights. Cabins and shielings had been torn down and burned. In one house at Glankeen the entire of a family had died: the parents, all of their children and four old people. Two neighbourmen told me the last to die, a boy of six or seven years, had locked the door and hidden under his bed, being ashamed for his people to be found in that way. The men were tumbling the cottage around them as a grave, having no other place to put them.

Higher up the track there was hardly a living soul to be seen. Where some of the poor people had died, dogs and rats were about. The carrion crows and foxes were gorging also. And then a wretched old woman whose bothy I passed beseeched me for a scrap of food; and when I said I had none she begged me to put an end to her life, for all of her sons were gone and she was quite
without support. All I could think of to do was to lift her up and carry her with me along the way. This I did. Christ be my judge, Mary, she weighed as a pillow; but even so, I could barely carry her. As I bore her in my arms she began to utter the Rosary that she and I might live this night. But before long she died and I laid her down and covered her as best I could with stones. I should like to say that I knelt and said a prayer but Jesus forgive me I did not, for I felt that if I did not get up at that moment I would never get up again in my life.