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By Benson Hewitt
Last week I wrote about the Francis P. Duke, a schooner of 50 tons, and owned by the late Captain Patrick, Sr. of Fogo leaving that town in the morning of December 16, 1947, with a crew of five and one passenger, and destined for St. John’s with a load of codfish.
As I also mentioned, they were hoping for a fast trip to the capital city and get back to Fogo to attend a Christmas ‘time’. The forecast was not promising and it was expected the captain, Edward Miller, would take shelter in Seldom Come By that night. For whatever reason, he decided to cross Bonavista Bay for Catalina when a severe storm overtook him, and he was obliged to steam back, hoping to find shelter. It is speculated that by the time he had reached Greenspond the storm had unleashed its fury, and that he set his course for Valleyfield, thinking that the latter might be more accessible. Instead of getting into Valleyfield safely, he hit the Shag Rock in the Shag Rock Tickle between Pool’s Island and Badger’s Quay, dead on, and the mountainous waves quickly destroyed the schooner, taking seven men to their untimely death.
An idea of the severity of the storm was the fact that people attending a concert in the Orange Lodge in a nearby community were obliged to spend the night in the hall. Undoubtedly, because it was night and stormy there were no spectators of this terrible disaster, and even if there were on-lookers, there was absolutely nothing anybody could do to try and save anyone.
On Wednesday, December 17, people of Pool’s Island, Greenspond, Wesleyville, and Badger’s Quay found the spars and masts of the Francis P. Duke swinging on the anchor chains. The wooden hull, planking and bulwarks were torn away. A major part of the hull with the name board Francis P. Duke on it, drifted ashore in nearby Hermit’s Cove. Broken dories and part of the deck were located in nearby Badger’s Quay.
The next day, and still terribly stormy, two men, Captain Ambrose Holwell of Badger’s Quay, and Herbert Dyke of Pool’s Island, both sent messages to the marine authorities in St. John’s advising them that a schooner had been lost with its crew at Shag Rock Tickle and then the search for bodies got underway. At that point they were not aware of the name of either the schooner or the number of fatalities. Stormy weather and high seas temporarily postponed the search for bodies on Thursday and Friday, the 18th and 19th of December.
After the search got underway, the men of the area recovered the bodies of Captain William Miller, August Pickett, and Maxwell Payne which were returned to Fogo on the SS Glencoe. The bodies of Sewart Keefe, Ignatius Miller, Donavan Bryan and Alfred Mullins were never found. The funeral and memorial services were held on Dec. 23, 1947. I have included some other information on another boat owned by the Miller family of Fogo.
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