Part 4

The first of the three hurricanes struck Jamaica on the third of October. Nine English warships, under the command of Sir Peter Parker, went to the bottom. Seven of his vessels were dismasted or severely damaged. From the tenth to the fifteenth of October a second--and even more powerful hurricane--ravaged Barbados and progressively devastated other islands in the Eastern Caribbean. This one has been rated the most terrible hurricane in history by many students of storms. It wreaked awful destruction on the island of St. Lucia, where six thousand persons were crushed in the ruins of demolished buildings. The English fleet in that vicinity disappeared. Neither trees nor houses were left standing on Barbados. Off Martinique, forty ships of a French convoy were sunk and nearly all on board were lost, including four thousand soldiers. On the island itself, nine thousand persons were killed. Most of the vessels in the broad path of the storm as it progressed farther into the Caribbean, including several warships, foundered with all their crews. It drove fifty vessels ashore at Bermuda, on the eighteenth.

Before this terrible storm reached Bermuda another one roared out of the Western Caribbean, crossed western Cuba and passed into the Gulf of Mexico, on October 18. Unaware of the approach of this hurricane, a Spanish fleet of seventy-four warships, under Admiral Solano, sailed from Havana into the Gulf, to attack Pensacola. They were trapped in the eastern section of the Gulf and nineteen ships were lost. The remainder were dispersed, several having thrown their guns overboard to avoid capsizing. Nearly all the others were damaged, many dismasted. The Spanish fleet was no longer a fighting force.

Within three weeks most of the battle fleets in and around the Caribbean had been put out of commission. Both Redfield and Reid were impressed by the power displayed by these hurricanes. In his search of the records, the former succeeded in getting a copy of a letter written by a Lieutenant Archer to his mother in England, giving an account of the first of these terrible storms. The following story is condensed from Archer's letter.

Archer was second in command of an English warship named the _Phoenix_. It was commanded by Sir Hyde Parker. Before the first of these three hurricanes developed, the _Phoenix_ had been sent to Pensacola, where the English were in control. Late in September, she sailed to rejoin the remainder of the fleet at Jamaica. On passing Havana harbor, Sir Hyde looked in and was astounded to see Solano's Spanish fleet at anchor. He hurried around Cuba into the Caribbean, to take the news to the British fleet.

At Kingston, Jamaica, the crew of the _Phoenix_ found three other men-of-war lying in the harbor and they had a strong party for "kicking up a dust on shore," with dancing until two o'clock every morning. Little did they think of what might be in store for them. Out of the four men-of-war not one was in existence four days later and not a man aboard any of them survived, except a few of the crew of the _Phoenix_. And what is more, the houses where the crews had been so merry were so completely destroyed that scarcely a vestige remained to show where they had stood.

On September 30, the four warships set sail for Port Royal, around the eastern end of Jamaica. At eleven o'clock on the night of October 2, it began to "snuffle," with a "monstrous heavy appearance to the eastward." Sir Hyde sent for Lieutenant Archer.

"What sort of weather have we, Archer?"

"It blows a little and has a very ugly look; if in any other quarter, I should say we were going to have a gale of wind."

They had a very dirty night. At eight in the morning, with close-reefed topsails, the _Phoenix_ was fighting a hard blow from the east-northeast, and heavy squalls at times. Archer said he was once in a hurricane in the East Indies and the beginning of it had much the same appearance as this. The crew took in the topsails and were glad they had plenty of sea-room. On Sir Hyde's orders, they secured all the sails with spare gaskets, put good rolling tackles on the yards, squared the booms, saw that the boats were all fast, lashed the guns, double-breeched the lower deckers, got the top-gallant mast down on the deck and, in fact, did everything to make a snug ship.

"And now," Archer wrote, "the poor birds began to suffer from the uproar of the elements and came on board. They turned to the windward like a ship, tack and tack, and dashed themselves down on the deck without attempting to stir till picked up. They would not leave the ship."

The carpenters were placed by the mainmast with broad axes, ready to cut it away to save the ship. Archer found the purser "frightened out of his wits" and two marine officers "white as sheets" from listening to the vibration of the lower deck guns, which were pulling loose and thrashing around. At every roll it seemed that the whole ship's side was going.

At twelve it was blowing a full hurricane. Archer came on deck and found Sir Hyde there. "It blows terribly hard, Archer."

"It does indeed, Sir."

"I don't remember its blowing so hard before," shouted Sir Hyde, striving to get his voice above the roar of the wind. "The ship makes good weather of it on this tack but we must wear her (to turn about by putting the helm up and the stern of the boat to the wind), as the wind has shifted to the southeast and we are fast drawing up on the Coast of Cuba."

"Sir, there is no canvas can stand against it a moment. We may lose three or four of our people in the effort. She'll wear by manning the fire shrouds."

"Well, try it," said Sir Hyde, which was a great condescension for a man of his temperament to accept the advice of a subordinate. It took two hundred men to wear the ship, but when she was turned about, the sea began to run clear across the decks and she had no time to rise from one sea until another lashed into her. Some of the sails had been torn from the masts and the rest began to fly from the yards "through the gaskets like coachwhips."

"To think that the wind could have such force!" Archer shouted into the gale.

"Go down and see what is the matter between decks," ordered Sir Hyde in a lull.

Archer crept below and a marine officer screamed, "We are sinking. The water is up to the bottom of my cot!"

Archer yelled back, "As long as it is not over your mouth, you are well off." He put all spare men to work at the pumps. The _Phoenix_ labored heavily, with scarcely any of her above water except the quarter-deck and that seldom.

On returning, Archer found Sir Hyde lashed to a mast. He lashed himself alongside his commander and tried to hear what he was shouting. Afterward, Archer tried to describe this situation in his letter. "If I was to write forever, I could not give you an idea of it. A total darkness above and the sea running in Alps or Peaks of Teneriffe (Mountains is too common an idea); the wind roaring louder than thunder, the ship shaking her sides and groaning."

"Hold fast," shouted Sir Hyde as a big wave crashed into the ship. "That was an ugly sea! We must lower the yards, Archer."

"If we attempt it, Sir, we shall lose them. I wish the mainmast was overboard without carrying anything else along with it."

Another mountainous wave swept the trembling ship. A crewman brought news from the pump room. Water was gaining on the weary pumpers. The ship was almost on her beam-ends. Archer called to Sir Hyde, "Shall we cut the mainmast away?"

"Ay, as fast as you can," said Sir Hyde. But just then a tremendous wave broke right on board, carried everything on deck away and filled the ship with water. The main and mizen masts went, the _Phoenix_ righted a little but was in the last struggle of sinking.

As soon as they could shake their heads free of the water, Sir Hyde yelled, "We are gone at last, Archer. Foundered at sea! Farewell, and the Lord have mercy on us!"

Archer felt sorry that he could swim, for he would struggle instinctively and it would take him a quarter hour longer to die than a man who could not. The quarter-deck was full of men praying for mercy. At that moment there was a great thump and a grinding under them.

Archer screamed, "Sir, the ship is ashore. We may save ourselves yet!"

Every stroke of the sea threatened dissolution of the ship's frame. Every wave swept over her as she lay stern ashore.

Sir Hyde cried out, "Keep to the quarter-deck, my lads. When she goes to pieces that is your best chance."

Five men were lost cutting the foremast. The sea seemed to reach for them as it took the mast overboard and they went with it. Everyone expected it would be his turn next. It was awful--the ship grinding and being torn away piece by piece. Mercifully, as if to give the crew another desperate chance, a tremendous wave carried the _Phoenix_ among the rocks and she stuck there, though her decks tumbled in.

Archer took off his coat and shoes and prepared to swim, but on second thought he knew it wouldn't do. As second officer, he would have to stay with his commander and see that every man, including the sick and injured, was safely off the ship before he left it. He wrote later that he looked around with a philosophic eye in that moment and was amazed to find that those who had been the most swaggering, swearing bullies in fine weather were now the most pitiful wretches on earth, with death before them.

Finally, Archer helped two sailors off with a line which was made fast to the rocks, and most of those who had survived the storm got ashore alive, including the sick and injured, who were moved from a cabin window by means of a spare topsail-yard.

On shore, Sir Hyde came to Archer so affected that he was scarcely able to make himself understood. "I am happy to see you ashore--but look at our poor _Phoenix_." Weak and worn, the two sat huddled on the shore, silent for a quarter hour, blasted by gale and sea. Archer actually wept. After that, the two officers gathered the men together and rescued some fresh water and provisions from the wreck. They also secured material to make tents. The storm had thrown great quantities of fish into the holes in the rocks and these provided a good meal.

One of the ship's boats was left in fair condition. In two days the carpenters repaired it, and Archer, with four volunteers, set off for Jamaica. They had squally weather and a leaky boat, but by constant baling with two buckets, they arrived at their destination next evening. Eventually, all the remainder of the crew they had left in Cuba were saved except some who died of injuries after getting ashore from the _Phoenix_ and a few who got hold of some of the ship's rum and drank themselves to death.

How many times this drama of death and narrow escape may have been repeated in the three great hurricanes of 1780 is not disclosed in the records. But hundreds of ships and many thousands of men were lost. And at that time no one knew the true nature of these great winds. It was not until more than fifty years had passed and Redfield and Reid examined all the reports that these tremendous gales were found to be parts of three separate hurricanes. This ignorance seems strange, for nearly three hundred years had passed since Columbus ran into his first hurricane.

As Reid worked at great length on these old records in logs and letters, he became confident that Redfield was right about the whirling nature of tropical storms. There were ten hurricanes in the West Indies in 1837 and these supplied Reid with a great deal of added information. One of the most exciting was the big hurricane in the middle of August of that year.

This was a vicious storm which was first observed by the Barque _Felicity_ in the Atlantic, far east of the Antilles, on August 12, 1837. The chances are that it came from the African Coast, near the Cape Verde Islands, as many of the worst of them do. By the time these faraway disturbances have crossed the Atlantic and approached the West Indies, they are usually major hurricanes, capable of wreaking great destruction. This one was no exception, but its path lay a little farther to the northward than usual and its most furious winds were not felt on land, even on the more northerly islands in the group.

Ships in its path reported winds which appeared to be of a "rotatory" nature when Reid plotted them on maps. On the fifteenth, the storm passed near Turk's Island and on the sixteenth, was being felt on the easternmost Bahamas.

At this stage, the ship _Calypso_ became involved in the storm and was unable to escape. The master, a man named Wilkinson, wrote an account to the owners, from which the following is taken:

"During the night the Winds increased, and day-light found the vessel under a close-reefed main-topsail, with royal and top-gallant-yards on deck, and prepared for a gale of wind. At 10 A.M. the wind about north-east, the lee-rail under water, and the masts bending like canes. Got a tarpaulin on the main rigging and took the main topsail in. The ship laboring much obliged main and bilge-pumps to be kept constantly going. At 6 P.M. the wind north-west, I should think the latitude would be about 27°, and longitude 77°W. At midnight the wind was west, when a sea took the quarter-boat away.

"At day-dawn, or rather I should have said the time when the day would have dawned, the wind was southwest, and a sea stove the fore-scuttle. All attempts to stop this leak were useless, for when the ship pitched the scuttle was considerably under water. I then had the gaskets and lines cut from the reefed foresail, which blew away; a new fore-topmast-studding-sail was got up and down the fore-rigging, but in a few seconds the bolt-rope only remained; the masts had then to be cut away."

By this time the wind was even more furious and the seas so high none expected the _Calypso_ to survive. The master continued his story:

"My chief mate had a small axe in his berth, which he had made very sharp a few days previous. That was immediately procured; and while the men were employed cutting away the mizenmast, the lower yard-arms went in the water. It is human nature to struggle hard for life; so fourteen men and myself got over the rail between the main and mizen rigging as the mast-heads went into the water. The ship was sinking fast. While some men were employed cutting the weather-lanyards of the rigging, some were calling to God for mercy; some were stupified with despair; and two poor fellows, who had gone from the afterhold, over the cargo, to get to the forecastle, to try to stop the leak, were swimming in the ship's hold. In about three minutes after getting on the bends, the weather-lanyards were cut fore and aft, and the mizen, main, and foremasts went one after the other, just as the vessel was going down head foremost.

"The ship hung in this miserable position, as if about to disappear (as shown in the accompanying reconstruction of the scene by an artist who worked under the direction of the master of the _Calypso_) and then by some miracle slowly righted herself.

"On getting on board again, I found the three masts had gone close off by the deck. The boats were gone, the main hatches stove in, the planks of the deck had started in many places, the water was up to the beams, and the puncheons of rum sending about the hold with great violence. The starboard gunwale was about a foot from the level of the sea, and the larboard about five feet. The sea was breaking over the ship as it would have done over a log. You will, perhaps, say it could not have been worse, and any lives spared to tell the tale. I assure you, Sir, it was worse; and by Divine Providence, every man was suffered to walk from that ship to the quay at Wilmington."

From such accounts the hurricane hunters gathered the facts which led to a better "law of storms" and made life at sea safer for the officers and men who struggled with sails and masts in tropical gales. But it is most likely that the experiences of the crews of those sailing ships that were caught in the worst sectors of fully developed hurricanes in the open sea were never told. It is not probable that any survived the calamitous weather on the right front of the storm center, where the sea, the atmosphere, the rotation of the earth, and the forward motion of the hurricane are combined in a frenzy of destructive power.

In one sense, all of the men who survived these terrors at sea were hurricane hunters. They had to be. Those who lived were the men who were always alert to the first signs in sea and sky, who knew when one of the big storms of the tropics was just beyond the horizon. They were learning and passing the knowledge along to others. By the middle of the nineteenth century, the mariner had a "law of storms" that kept countless ships out of the most dangerous parts of tropical disturbances.

_4._ STORM WARNINGS

"_I am more afraid of a West Indian hurricane than of the entire Spanish Navy._" --McKinley

Strangely enough, government weather bureaus were not set up for the purpose of giving warnings of tropical storms. Maybe there was a feeling in the years before radio that nothing could be done for the sailor on the open sea except to teach him the law of storms. And for the landsman the case looked hopeless until the telegraph came in sight. At any rate, most of the men who began to fly into hurricanes during World War II were astonished to find that, up to that time, the prediction of tropical storms had been a kind of side issue.

Although hurricanes are nearly always destructive and other kinds of storms--the "lows" on the weather map--are generally mild, once in a long time one of these others results in a catastrophe. Starting as a low which is spread weakly over a wide area, with cloudy weather, rain or snow, and gentle winds, now and then the exceptional storm suddenly fills newspaper headlines. Gales and winds of hurricane force bring a blizzard, tornado, bad hailstorm, or torrential rain and a damaging flood. If it really is a bad one, it finds its way into the pages of history. In times past, these storms often struck populous districts, while hurricanes, in early centuries, hit on thinly settled islands or coasts.

So far as we know, the worst storm to devastate the British Isles was one of this kind. It was not a tropical cyclone. It was entirely unexpected, as were most of the big gales in England in the old days. Surprise was one of the elements of danger. The weather is seldom fine in the British Isles, over the English Channel or in the North Sea. Gloom, with fog or low-flying clouds, is the rule. Even on the best days, a damp haze hangs everywhere. It is like looking through a dirty window pane. Into this background of gloom many a big storm stole its way eastward from the Atlantic. The record-breaker tore up the docks, wrecked shipping and crumbled buildings in the year 1703.

Houses were ruined and big trees were blown down. Whole fleets were lost and more than nine thousand seamen were drowned. The most violent winds came at night. Startled by the roar of the storm, Queen Anne got out of bed and found a part of the palace roof had been torn away. One prelate, Bishop Kidder, was buried beneath the ruins of his mansion. Awakened by the giant gusts, he put on his dressing gown and made for the door, but a chimney stack crashed through the ceiling and dashed out his brains. His wife was crushed in her bed. After the gales subsided, London and other cities looked like they had been sacked by an enemy. All over the south of England, the lead roofs of churches were rolled up by the wind or blown away in large sheets.

Though other gales almost as bad as this one came in later years, it was more than a century before the storm hunters made much progress. Not long after 1800, several men with an inquiring mind began to get results. Redfield was one, but he studied hurricanes and not the storms of higher latitudes, such as the one which devastated the British Isles.

Shortly after 1800, there were signs of the coming of faster means of travel and communications and they were destined to be a vital factor in weather forecasting. In 1816 a "hobby-horse" with wheels was displayed in Paris by an inventor named Niepice. It was propelled by a man or two sitting on it and pushing on the ground. Even with two men pushing, it went no faster than a man could walk. But strong claims were made about its possibilities. At about the same time, several men were working on devices like the telegraph.

Whether it was this trend or not, something aroused the intense curiosity of a young professor, William Heinrich Brandes, of the University of Breslau, in Germany. He began a study in 1816, to see if the weather moved from place to place and if it would be possible to send predictions ahead by means then available. Everybody at that time knew that storms moved but it was the general belief that ordinary changes in the weather didn't go anywhere. Brandes collected newspapers from many places and searched them for remarks about the weather, which he put on maps. Here he was amazed to see that all kinds of weather seemed to be constantly in motion, quite generally from west to east. But the newspaper reports were rather poor for his purposes and he couldn't be too sure about the rate of travel.