QADDI
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THE HONGKONG TELEGRAPH, Tuesday, DECEMBER 6, 1938.
Life Begins at 8:01
Expected by
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The
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TUESDAY, DECEMBER 0. 1938,
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OF THE SEA
Sixty-six years ago to-day the Mary Celeste was
found.
..
Not a single fact has come to light since the Mary Celeste was found, on the afternoon of December 5, 1872, which would account for the mystery that, although in perfectly seaworthy condition, she was crewless, and was ploughing an erratic course on her own towards Europe. She was midway between the despite the fact that the ship's Azores and Cape Roca on the real name was Mary Celeste, the coast of Portugal, when boarded wrong name has clung 80 by the Nova Scotia brig Dei obstinately that one almost Gratia.
feels diffident at times in using the right one.
THE indisputable facts are these: the Mary Celeste
THE MARY CELESTE
Captain Morghouse, in the
Their superficial examination
In the intervening years, however, so many fictitious "explanations" have been pro- duced by writers who have not even troubled to acquaint them was a brigantine of 282 tons, Dei Gratia, cleared New York on above deck told them nothing selves with the known facts, 98ft. long, with a 25ft. beam and November 11-that is, two days except that there appeared to be that those facts have now be a draught slightly over 11ft. after the Mary Celeste.
No one of board, 80 Devenu come hopelessly obscured for Her principal owner was Cap- After an uneventful voyage, signalled Captain Morchouse to the average reader.
tain J. H. Winchester of the without any of the storms that join him.
figure so prominently in all the Not a soul could be found on "explanations," he found him the ship, nor any reason for self half-way between the abandoning her, as she must Azores and Cape Roca on have been abandoned, in her one December 5.
small boat.
To no less a person than the late Conan Doyle must we im- pute the main responsibility for starting the "mythology" about the Mary Celeste.
He based a gruesome story on what we must assume to have been his imperfect knowledge
Pitfall
-By-
W.F. Hartin Erratic
and
The forecastle presented the usual appearance, clothes and
That afternoon his attention personal odds and ends lying THE REPORT late last night of the details and published it in firm of J. H. Winchester
was drawn by the erratic be- about much as they might be January 1884 under the title, "J. Co., New York, but her captain, which he had overhauled. That the United States con- Habakuk Jephson's Statement." Benjamin S. Briggs, was a third was not on a steady course, for Briggs's sewing machine held &
haviour of a two-masted ship, left by their owners normally,
She In the captain's cabin, Mrs. templates embarking upon 銘 £610,000,000 naval
interest in the cargo of alcohol with the changes of owner of the ship and had an she yawed from time to time piece of cloth that might one building programme which will
a light day have been a child's pina- It was only some time later which she carried on her fatal northerly breeze and ran off be- fore. give her an entirely new fleet that the distinguished author- voyage. to protect the Atlantic gives ship of this "explanation" was
An oil-can, a thimble and a emphasis to rumours that the
that, while she was on the port nearby table, just as she might On closer approach, he saw reel of cotton remained on the policy of President Roosevelt and
tack, her jibs were set on the have placed them while sitting the U.S. Congress is changing from one of static defence to dynamic defence,
With Munich a new world was born. In that Caesarean opera-
She loaded in New York for
discovered. It served at once to Genoa, where the cargo, contain put the Mary Celeste on the pin- ed in 1,700, casks, was consigned nacle of mystery from which it to a wine merchant, has never fallen and to broad- cast those false premises which Last Voyage have been the pitfall of every subsequent imitator.
fore. the wind.
starboard tack.
at her machine. His alarm increased with the
The harmonium shipped for realisation that this Was the this voyage had the cover of the On November 9, 1872, she of seamanship to be displayed music in the rack.
Mary Celeste, for it was no sort key-board back and a piece of For among several errors of sailed down the Hudson River by his old friend, Captain tion a huge chunk of world fact, Conan Doyle made one car and carried away on their last Briggs.
A Letter dinal blunder. He power changed hands. It past that the boats of the Mary and their little daughter Sophie, presumed voyage Captain Briggs, his wife,
He signalled, but got no ang- wer, Glasses trained on the
Some reports say that a hulf- et from the democratic bloc led Celeste were found hanging in aged two, a mate, second mate. ship could detect no sign of life empty bottle of medicine and a by Britain to the authoritarian their davits, which would cer- cook, and four hands.
as the Dei Gratia came within partly eaten breakfast were on bloc led by Germany. This tainly have added the additional All four of the last named hailing distance, even the shouts the table, but there is no unim- epochal shift of power has sud-point to the mystery of how the were Germans or Americans of of her crew drew no response.
peachable evidence for this. denly left the United States crew got away from the ship. German extraction. The Mari That something seriously was
A member of the crew had standing alone and unprotected
time Register for December 18, amisa, was only too obvious, but started a letter, "Fanny, my in the world game of
EVERY other "explana- 1872, gives the names of all the what?
dear wife," and had got no fur- power
tion" of note has fol- ship's company, but mentions
ther with it. politics. In a word, Britain has lowed this mistake, but unfor- none of that fantastic company,
Do not think any of us The beds were made up, all been regarded too much in the tunately for their authors, the who claim to have survived the
would have relished the except Sophie's, and that looked past as America's first line of facts are otherwise.
disaster, and be able to explain job of Oliver Deveau, the first as if she had been sleeping there defence..
The ship's long boat was it.
mate of the Dei Gratia and the when removed. smashed while she was loading her cargo in New York and the Habakuk Jephson's benefit, were by Captain Morehouse to board Still less, might I add, for Mr. two men who were ordered off smaller-a yawl-was missing there any passengers.or colour- the Mary Celeste. when the ship was found dere- ed men on board.
lict.
The fall ropes, trailing astern
CAPTAIN BRIGGS, a man
Derelict
still hanging on an accustomed Captain Briggs's watch was
hook; the ship's log remained where it was normally kept.
That fundamental transfer of some of the power from London and Paris to Berlin necessitates internal changes in U.S. affairs which will be so important as to in the water, indicated beyond
"Murder, plague, or what, THE only things that make its present political issues shadow of doubt that the crew character, had a friend, a Cap- silence?" they must have asked with the crew
of religious and upright could account for this uncanny
appeared to have gone were a chrono- and the partisan bickering over had attempted to, or did, get tain Morehouse, who was due to themselves again and again as meter, the ship's papers, and New Deal measures seem like away in the yawl before being sail for Europe a little later in they tossed in their little boat probably some tinned food, for trivial nursery babble, For overtaken by the disaster which the brig Dei Gratia, and they towards the derelict.
had fixed a tentative rendezvous
one of the drawers of the store- world events that are far more
wiped them out.
If this all-important fact is in Barcelona, where they would the men in the boat while he and open.
Deveau cautiously kept one of room had been emptied and left. powerful than President Roose-borne in mind the reader will at be calling for cargoes of fruit the other hoisted themselves velt or any individual are now once be able to appreciate the on their return voyages, about to tell democracy what it voluminous literature
aboard by chain plates. on the shall have to do.
Mary Celeste in its true perspec- tive.
Germany has taught demo- cracy that stutic defence is Even The Name inadequate,
It has even reached the pro- This point, the importance of portions of a book entitled "The dynamic preparedness machine Great Mary Celeste Hoax: A as against a static collection of Famous Sen Mystery Exposed," military and naval inventories, is in which its author, Mr. Law- the key to what is now being
rence Keating, not only seeks to proposed in U.S. naval circles. What Did They Say?
WHAT did Lord Shaftesbury
say in 18487 "Nothing can save the British Empire from shipwreck." What did Disraeli
1849?
нау in
"In industry, commerce and agriculture there is no hope."
What did the dying Duke vf| Wellington say in 1852?
"I thank God I shall be spared from seeing the consummation of ruin that is gathering about us."
What did Lloyd George say last month?
dispel much of the fiction which has been written on the subject, but much of the fact which is beyond dispute.
ther than the name of the ship Indeed, one need go on fur-
to see how the fashion for dis- tortion inaugurated by Habakuk | Jephson has persisted.
He, I believe, was the first to call it the Maria Celeste, but
Britain."
He says, "A hundred times able men have cried, "This is the has gone on and on-to over | end of Britain.' And Britain
greater strength.”
Pay no
Be confident, then. heed to the prophets of evil.
Go about your business, seck your pleasures, in the assuranco that the strength of Britain is ng a rock and that its resilience But what does Sir Willam has triumphantly aurvived days Crawford say?
far darker than those passed
"Are we going, can any lower?"
we go,
He says, "Have faith in through recently.
GRIN AND BEAR IT
A cutlass showing what look- ed like bloodstains caused some commotion at the time, but it need not bother us, since the
to be rust.
By Lichty stains were subsequently found
“All my Ufo Foe dreamed about this moment when my, namne
changes from Schnitzenwurstlich to Smith!“
Spots Of Blood
The same applies to some. spots of blood found on the deck.. If they really were blood, no one has ever suggested that they were more than could come from some quite superficial wound, such as a member of the crow might sustain in the ordinary working of the ship.
were
Indeed, apart from the entries in the log and on a slate, the only discoveries material to 1. theory of the mystery, that the cover of the main hatch was off and, although the cargo was perfectly stowed, one cask. appeared to have broken open. or been breached.
The Mary Celeste was of course taken by Captain More. house, as salvage, to Gibraltar.. There she created a nine-days' wonder, but at the time people confidently believed that news of the captain and crow, rescued by a vessel bound for a distant port, would eventually solve the mystery.
But no nows has ever coma~~. only a spate of l-disguised fiction which has added confu-. sion to facts already aufliciently natounding.