Coffin Ship

by William Henry

  From further conversation with the passengers and people of the town, it is certain to mind that Captain Oliver is liable to severe censure for some parts of his conduct. We would be the last to say one word that would add to the poignancy of his feelings in view of his great disaster; but, in a question involving the lives of more than one hundred fellow beings, we are bound to speak faithfully, the truth, as it has been presented to us.

  It seems that on the afternoon of Saturday 6th inst., he numbered his passengers. Upwards of one hundred names were borne upon the manifest, or list, as two passengers called it who answered to the call. A line was then drawn across the deck, and between twenty and thirty other names were borne upon a small memorandum book. If the consignee has a duplicate list of passengers he or they should produce it. Unless a complete list can be produced we can never fully ascertain the exact number who perished on board this vessel on the fatal morning of October 9 [sic].[3]

  On 1 January 1979, the curator of the Maritime Museum in Cohasset recorded further criticism of Captain Oliver’s actions. He stated in a letter that when the Cohasset lifeboat encountered Captain Oliver in the St. John longboat, the captain allegedly shouted, in reference to the wreckage, ‘Don’t bother wasting your time. There is no one left alive.’ However, shortly after the disaster Captain Lothrop gave a written statement that said that on approaching the longboat neither Captain Oliver nor his crew showed ‘any intention of communicating with us which they might easily have done being directly to windward of us’. A degree of doubt exists as to whether Captain Lothrop was in fact on board the lifeboat, but this first-hand statement strongly indicates that he was. In any case, both of these statements are damning insofar as Captain Oliver either gave his rescuers incorrect information or none at all.

  The crew of the lifeboat were later astonished to discover that there had been so many fatalities. Had they known that survivors were still clinging onto the wreckage of the St. John they could have tried to rescue them as they were closer to the brig than to the Kathleen at the time. Regardless of what Captain Oliver did or did not say to his rescuers, he must undoubtedly have had a difficult time trying to explain to the authorities how it was that he and so many of his crew had survived when so many passengers had died. Little is known of what happened to Captain Oliver following the disaster. Some say that he went out west and simply disappeared. There are also some conflicting records that do not list Martin as his Christian name. However, the majority of sources state that his name was Martin Oliver.

  Reports indicate that the St. John was an ‘aging and somewhat unseaworthy craft’ at the time of its fatal voyage. It was also noted that the timbers were ‘rotten’. However, the owners of the ship do not seem to have commented on its tragic end and its questionable state of repair, though it is possible that their reaction was simply not recorded. Both Henry and Isaac Comerford later became justices of the peace in Galway. Henry Comerford died on 6 September 1861 at Ballykeale House in his sixty-seventh year. According to one source, three of St. John’s cabin passengers were nieces of Henry Comerford. With the exception of the Sweeney family, the only other three sisters recorded among the victims are Honora, Mary and Margaret Mulkenan, but they were listed as steerage passengers. Nevertheless, it is my opinion that these three sisters were the nieces of Henry Comerford.[4]

  All of the survivors of the St. John eventually returned to Ireland, with the exception of one woman, Mary Kane Cole, who settled in Cohasset. In 1868 she married a local man. Ironically, his name was James St John. Twenty-four-year-old Mary was already a widow when she sailed to America on the St. John. Her husband, Charles Cole, had died in Ireland and Mary had boarded the ship in the hope of starting life anew in America. James St John was a tailor and store-keeper in America. A father of five children, James had also been widowed. James and Mary had no children of their own. Mary died in 1917.

  According to local sources in Lettermullen, some of the St. John survivors, who had not been recorded on the ship’s manifest, also returned home. They included Martin and Patrick Flaherty, who were brothers, and a second Patrick Flaherty, who was seemingly not related. One of the sailors who survived was James Flaherty, also from Lettermullen. Today, descendants of these survivors still live in the Lettermullen area. The baby girl rescued from the sea by Captain Lothrop was adopted by a family named Norwell. She later married into an Irish immigrant family from Boston. They became wealthy land dealers in the Dorchester Bay area. This baby was not included on the original list of survivors.[5]

  In the aftermath of the tragedy, rumours surfaced of certain individuals profiting from the ship sinking; all of these rumours are unfounded. In 1984 a newspaper published an account, or more correctly a rumour, that accused the captain of trying to flee west with the passengers’ gold, which had been hidden in a wooden box or chest which the newspaper identified as ‘the captain’s strong box’. This is highly unlikely considering that the captain would have been preoccupied with saving his own life when escaping from the doomed ship. It is also highly unlikely that his passengers would have possessed nearly enough gold to fill such a box. These poor, unfortunate, starving people were fleeing from famine and had hardly enough money to feed themselves.

  Another account indicates that the chest was actually owned by one of the survivors. He supposedly left it at the Lothrop house in Sandy Cove after he had recovered from his ordeal and moved away. However, there is yet another story concerning the captain’s strong box to consider. In an undated letter, a local woman named Lucy Treat writes that her father had once told her of a strange scene he came upon the day after the St. John tragedy. He had been walking along the beach when he encountered a neighbour hauling a chest after him. The neighbour hid this chest near Sandy Cove. Shortly afterwards this man was said to have become ‘conspicuous by his ability to afford unusual luxuries and also paid off a mortgage on his house within the year’. According to the letter, two generations later the neighbour’s grandson gave Lucy’s brother a small portable chest, saying that it belonged to the captain of the St. John. Whether this story is true or not, both the chest and letter are now on display at the Maritime Museum in Cohasset. The chest has a secret compartment and looks authentic. Other items from the St. John are on display in the Cohasset Museum, including Captain Oliver’s writing desk, a limestone ballast and a masthead truck.[6]

  Another story surrounding the St. John claims that there was a curse on the ship and its fate was sealed long before it set sail for America. The story goes that Colm Conneely, a brother of Tony Conneely from Lettermullen, the reported first captain of the ship, wanted to join the priesthood, but he either failed the entrance exam or was unable to raise the necessary college fees. So great was his disappointment that he renounced the Catholic faith and became an Anglican minister in England. He became acquainted with many influential people in England and it was through these connections that the finance to build the St. John is said to have been raised. At the time of the St. John’s fatal voyage, Tony Conneely was unable to sail as his wife was ill. Many conjectured that the sinking of the brig was God’s way of punishing Colm Conneely for abandoning the Catholic religion. This story was recorded in an Irish book called Stories of the Islands, written by Peter Dirrane and published in 1929. However, another source states that Colm Conneely was not an Anglican minister and there are also those who believe that there was another ship named the St. John which may have been the ‘cursed’ ship; this was smaller vessel, supposedly built in Galway, but again this has never been proven.[7]

  Notes

  [1] Ancient Order of Hibernians in America, undated letter.

  Boston Irish Reporter: ‘Cohasset Monument Honors Famine Victims’ (October 1996).

  Brig St. John Memorial Mass, Ancient Order of Hibernians. Father John Murphy, Division 9, Plymouth (4-10-1997).

  Brig St. John of Galway was Cohasset’s Worst Shipwreck, Cohasset Historical Society. John Bhaba Jaick Ó Congaola collection.

 
Fraser, Robert, Cohasset Vignettes (1981).

  Diary of Elizabeth Lothrop (11-10-1849, 25-12-1849).

  Ennistymon Parish Magazine, ‘The Shipwreck of the St. John’. Article compiled from material supplied by Brud Slattery, John Flanagan (both Lahinch), and Frank Flanagan (USA) (1996).

  Miscellaneous articles and letters from the John Bhaba Jaick Ó Congaola collection: ‘Catholics to Honour Irish Immigrants Lost in Cohasset Shipwreck of 1849’ (1949).

  Notes copied from Newcomb Bates (Jr), the Town Clerk of (Cohasset) (7-10-1849).

  The Galway City Tribune; Tribune Extra: ‘Galway Victims of a Major Tragedy’ (27-11-1998).

  The Galway Vindicator: ‘Awful Shipwreck at Minot’s Ledge – Loss of St. John of Galway. About One Hundred Drowned – Men, Women and Children’ (3-11-1849).

  The Irish Immigrant: ‘Brig Saint John Anniversary’ (13-12-1999); ‘Ninety-Nine Irish Lives Lost in Brig St. John Shipwreck’ (September 1999).

  The Pilot: George E. Ryan, ‘Wreck of Brig St. John’ (October, 1979).

  [2]Brig St. John of Galway was Cohasset’s Worst Shipwreck, Cohasset Historical Society. John Bhaba Jaick Ó Congaola collection.

  Diary of Elizabeth Lothrop (11-10-1849, 25-12-1849).

  [3]The Galway Vindicator: ‘Awful Shipwreck at Minot’s Ledge – Loss of St. John of Galway. About One Hundred Drowned – Men, Women and Children’ (3-11-1849).

  [4]Brig St. John of Galway was Cohasset’s Worst Shipwreck, Cohasset Historical Society. John Bhaba Jaick Ó Congaola collection.

  Comber, H., The Book of Thomas J. Comber and Eliza Comerford (n.d.). John Bhaba Jaick Ó Congaola collection.

  Miscellaneous articles and letters from the John Bhaba Jaick Ó Congaola collection: Article by Robert N. Fraser, the Curator of the Cohasset Maritime Museum (1-1-1979).

  Notes copied from Newcomb Bates (Jr), the Town Clerk of (Cohasset) (7-10-1849).

  The Boston Daily Herald: ‘Brig St. John of Galway, Ireland, Lost October 7, 1849, at Cohasset’; ‘List of Survivors and Drowned’; ‘The Burial of the Victims of the St. John – Melancholy Sight’ (12-10-1849).

  David Wadsworth, The Curator of the Cohasset Historical Society, ‘Information relating to the “St. John” wreck’, (8-3-1984). John Bhaba Jaick Ó Congaola collection.

  The Pilot: George E. Ryan. ‘Wreck of Brig St. John’ (October 1979).

  Ó Congaola, John Bhaba Jaick, ‘The Wreck of the Brig St. John.’

  [5]Boston Sunday Herald: ‘Cohasset Ceremony Recalls Shipwreck’ (10-10-1999).

  Fraser, Robert, Cohasset Vignettes (1981).

  The Boston Daily Herald: ‘Brig St. John of Galway, Ireland, Lost October 7, 1849, at Cohasset’; ‘List of Survivors and Drowned’; Joe McLaughlin, ‘Tell it to Joe – Monument to shipwrecked Irish’ (8-7-1976).

  The Boston Irish Echo: Paddy Mulkerrins, ‘More on the Ill-Fated Brig, St. John – Remembers the St. John’ (14-4-1984); Bill Loughran, ‘More on the Ill-fated Brig, St. John’ (14-4-1984); Paddy Mulkerrins, ‘Survivors Found’ (letter to editor); Bill Loughran, ‘The Ill-fated Brig St. John’ (14-1-1984).

  The Patriot Ledger: Edward Rowe Snow, ‘Brig Wreck Killed 143 Off Cohasset’ (6-10-1959); Laura Doherty, ‘Celtic Cross: Cohasset’s Memorial to a Shipwreck’; ‘Ceremonies to Honor Irish Shipwreck Victims’ (6-10-1999).

  Article by Robert N. Fraser, the Curator of the Cohasset Maritime Museum, 1-1-1979.

  [6]The Irish World and American Industrial Liberator and Gaelic American: Frank Durkan, ‘Death of a Famine Ship’ (6-10-1984).

  Article by Robert N. Fraser, the Curator of the Cohasset Maritime Museum, 1-1-1979.

  The Patriot Ledger: Edward Rowe Snow, ‘Brig Wreck Killed 143 Off Cohasset’ (6-10-1959); Laura Doherty, ‘Celtic Cross: Cohasset’s Memorial to a Shipwreck’; ‘Ceremonies to Honor Irish Shipwreck Victims’ (6-10-1999).

  The Pilot: George E. Ryan, ‘Wreck of Brig St. John’ (October 1979).

  [7]The Boston Irish Echo: Paddy Mulkerrins, ‘More on the Ill-fated Brig, St. John – Remembers the St. John’ (14-4-1984); Bill Loughran, ‘More on the Ill-fated Brig, St. John’ (14-4-1984); Paddy Mulkerrins, ‘Survivors found’ (letter to editor); Bill Loughran, ‘The Ill-fated Brig St. John’ (14-1-1984).

  Ó Congaola, John Bhaba Jaick, ‘The Wreck of the Brig St. John’.

  X – Commemoration and Remembrance

  Henry David Thoreau’s observations as he walked the Cohasset shoreline on 9 October 1849 are an important part of the St. John story. One wonders about Thoreau’s own feelings about the sad event. He was not impressed with the funeral procession, confessing that if he had found a body ‘cast up on the beach in some lonely place’ it might have affected him more. His writings on the subject can either be interpreted as a show of indifference or as evidence of a strong belief in the will of God. The following words recorded by Thoreau commemorate, in a strange sort of way, the aftermath of the terrible disaster in October 1849:

  I sympathized rather with the winds and waves, as if to toss and mangle these poor human bodies was the order of the day. If this was the law of Nature, why waste any time in awe or pity? If the last day were come, we should not think so much about the separation of friends or the blighted prospects of individuals. I saw that corpses might be multiplied, as on the field of battle, till they no longer affected us in any degree, as exceptions to the common lot of humanity. Take all the graveyards together, they are always the majority.

  It is the individual and private that demands our sympathy. A man can attend but one funeral in the course of his life, can behold but one corpse. Yet I saw that the inhabitants of the shore would be not a little affected by this event. They would watch there many days and nights for the sea to give up its dead, and their imaginations and sympathies would supply the place of mourners far away, who as yet knew not of the wreck. Many days after this, something white was seen floating on the water by one who was sauntering on the beach. It was approached in a boat, and found to be the body of a woman, which had risen in an upright position, whose white cap was blown back with the wind. I saw that the beauty of the shore itself was wrecked for many a lonely walker there, until he could perceive, at last, how its beauty was enhanced by wrecks like this, and it acquired thus a rarer and sublimer beauty still.

  Why care for these dead bodies? They really have no friends but the worms and fishes. Their owners were coming to the New World, as Columbus and the Pilgrims did, they were within a mile of its shores; but, before they could reach it, they emigrated to a newer world than ever Columbus dreamed of, yet one of whose existence we believe that there is far more universal and convincing evidence – though it has not yet been discovered by science – than Columbus had of this: not merely mariners’ tales and some paltry drift-wood and seaweed, but a continual drift and instinct to all our shores. I saw their empty hulks that came to land; but they themselves, meanwhile, were cast upon some shore yet further west, toward which we are all tending, and which we shall reach at last, it may be through storm and darkness, as they did. No doubt, we have reason to thank God that they have not been ‘shipwrecked into life again’.

  The mariner who makes the safest port in Heaven, perchance, seems to his friends on earth to be shipwrecked, for they deem Boston Harbor the better place; though perhaps invisible to them, a skilful pilot comes to meet him, and the fairest and balmiest gales blow off that coast, his good ship makes the land in halcyon days, and he kisses the shore in rapture there, while his old hulk tosses in the surf here. It is hard to part with one’s body, but, no doubt, it is easy to do without it when once it is gone. All their plans and hopes burst like a bubble! Infants by the score dashed on the rocks by the enraged Atlantic Ocean! No, no! If the St. John did not make her port here, she had been telegraphed there. The strongest wind cannot stagger a Spirit; it is a Spirit’s breath. A just man’s purpose cannot be split on any Grampus or material rock, but itself will split rocks till it succeeds.[1]

  Most people need some sort of memorial
to visit when remembering their departed loved ones. They take consolation in erecting headstones that record the deceased’s name in stone and serve as a testimonial to their time in this world. But a monument or memorial was denied to those lost at sea or consigned to a mass grave following the sinking of the St. John. Grief has far-reaching tentacles that can touch every corner of a nation, and a tragedy such as this affects not only the friends and family of those who are lost but also entire communities. The need to remember and commemorate tragic events becomes strong. While this need is not unique to Ireland, it is an important part of our way of life. This is perhaps a legacy of the famine. The mass exile of people during these troubled years exported our tragedy to other countries and bound other people to our plight. Links with Irish organisations already in existence in America were strengthened and their leaders lent their support to the immigrants.

  Wooden carving of the brig St. John in the church in Lettermullen by Dermot Nestor. (Courtesy of Alice Scanlan)

  The Ancient Order of Hibernians was adamant that a memorial be erected to commemorate the loss of the St. John. Eventually, on 26 May 1914 the Cohasset Central Cemetery authorities granted permission for a memorial to be erected close to the mass grave in memory of the victims. On 30 May 1914 the Ancient Order of Hibernians and the Ladies Auxiliary, the female branch of the order, had a twenty-foot Celtic cross erected near the site of the grave. It was placed at the top of a low hill that overlooked the ocean and the scene of the disaster. Thousands of people (some reports estimate between ten and twenty thousand) attended the dedication. The unveiling was conducted by Tessie St John, granddaughter of James St John, the man who married Mary Kane Cole, one of the survivors. The governor of Massachusetts, Hon. David I. Walsh, spoke at the ceremony and thanked the seven thousand Hibernians from all over Bay State for attending. Superintendent Philip Lothrop Towle of Cohasset General Cemetery later stated that the exact location of the mass grave was unknown because it had not been properly marked at the time of the tragedy. The cross was located just north of where the original burial ground was believed to be. It must be very close as it seems doubtful, given the enormity of the tragedy, that such a grave could be forgotten so quickly. The Ancient Order of Hibernians must have had evidence of the site in 1914. It is likely that confirmation regarding the location of the grave would have come from living memory. The inscription on the monument reads as follows: