The View From Fogo Island

Sometime recently I was reading an article in the Globe & Mail and the place-name of Joe Batts Arm caught my attention. Further reading revealed that the article was about a Hilda Menchions who had taught school there sometime in the 1950s and who is still fondly remembered by all who came under her tutelage as a remarkable teacher. Since the story in question was considered of national interest, I thought it would be of interest to residents of Barrd Island and Joe Batts Arm where she taught more than a few years ago.

Thus, before I get into the main gist of the story, and since the past week was Education Week, it may be important to give a brief overview of the educational system back then, when she taught there.

I suppose it is fair to say that Fogo Island, and perhaps especially the communities of Barrd Islands and Joe Batts Arm have always been in the forefront, when it came to education matters. However, during the 50s there was a desperate shortage of teachers in the province, and schools, where they could be staffed at all, were staffed with unqualified and inexperienced teachers. I was one of these teachers.

At that particular time, there were four schools within the confines of Barrd Islands and Joe Batts Arm teaching from Grade I to grade XI and they were all caught up in this particular problem. However, the three schools under the auspices of the United and Anglican churches decided to form a joint system which resulted in classrooms having the unheard luxury of only one grade. This was indeed a bold new venture and immediately attracted very qualified teachers, including the first principal Clayton Menchions and his wife Hilda (Batten) Menchions. Both of these teachers had university degrees, a rarity indeed in those days. Mrs. Menchions taught Grade VIII. During their tenure here, there was a story making the rounds that Mrs. Menchions, as a baby, had been involved in a shipwreck and had been rescued by a mail bag. Details were vague and it seems that Mrs. Menchion was reticent to talk about it, as indeed she was.

Mrs. Menchions died October 6, 2007 at the age of 89, and the Globe and Mail in its Dec. 14, 2007 edition carried the full story of this harrowing rescue. Let me give you the first paragraph from this article:

Newfoundland history is rife with shipwrecks, many the stuff of legends. One of the most famous was the wreck of the SS Ethie, which ran aground at Martins Point on the Northern Peminsula. It has all the elements of a gallant rescue tale: a winters storm of record-breaking ferocity, a brave and resourceful captain and crew, a valiant dog, a baby delivered by a mailbag. That baby was Hilda Batten.

The Ethie was a steamboat in the Newfoundlands coastal fleet, (the SS Glencoe, with which a lot of us on Fogo Island were familiar, was the G in that fleet.) and on December 10, 1919 captained by Edward English and fully laden, with 92 crew and passengers on board, including a baby, was sailing between Cow Head and Bonne Bay, when it ran into one of the most savage blizzards in our history. The captain tried to keep the ship from the shore, but to no avail, because it was being relentlessly driven towards the coastline. When the captain had rounded a headland, he felt that his only option was to put the ship before the gale and dash into the little cove named Martins Point. It was reported in the newspapers of the day that the ship struck with a terrific force, listing heavily to portside and lay wedged amongst the rock nearly 300 feet offshore.

As can be imagined, the residents in this tiny community were watching this disaster unfold and immediately tried to get a line from the shore to the ship, to effect some sort of a rescue. They were having unimaginable difficulty and the rope got caught and firmly tangled in the boulders. This is where a dog, a Newfoundland, perhaps, noticed that the life-saving cable was tangled in the boulders, jumped in the water, and grabbed the line in its mouth and swam with it to the shore. (If you have a dog nearby when you read this, give him/her a treat.)

The crew immediately retrieved the rope and tied it firmly to the ship. The bosuns chair was safely attached and each passenger was reeled safely to the beach. When it was decided to send the baby across, her mother wrapped her in a blanket (Incidentally, it was not possible for her mother, or a member of the crew to accompany her safely.) and placed her in a mailbag that was strapped to the chair, and the mailbag baby was pulled across the tumultuous ocean. The Atlantic Guardian at the time reported it thus, quoting from the diary of the chief officer, John Gullage: It was certainly a sight to see this poor little baby lifted over the ships side in a mailbag, swinging over the boiling sea, but strong arms quickly pulled her to the shore

Mrs. Menchions mother kept the mailbag for the rest of her life, ritually washing it every year. Mrs. Menchions finally inherited it and has donated it to the Gros Morne National Park, and, if at any time you visit Rock Harbour, you might want to check it out. Also, pieces of the Ethies hull, boilers, and engines can still be seen on a beach in what is now Gros Morne.



There is much more to this story than what I have written here, and if you would like to read it, you may borrow it from my sister, Madeline in Barrd Islands.



benson.hewitt@nf.sympatico.ca