The Levin J. Marvel Story:

WHY DID THEY DROWN?
Part II

Each hour took the ship
into a hopeless position

This would seem to show that he still felt the situation in command, that the Marvel could broad reach over to South or West River, but that it would be uncomfortable for the passengers. His decision would then seem to have been made from the position of a man in control of the situation. What harbor would he run to? "... we put the stays'l on forward so that the bow would drag away from the wind ... and we ran before the wind and were going to drop on down the Bay possibly toward Cove Point or Drum Point." (This was the entrance to the Patuxent River about 25 miles almost due south — a good shelter probably within the abilities of the vessel.)

"And at that time visibility closed in so that you couldn't see a 100 yards. The rain broke and came down — it was just like buckets full. It was just like sailing into a white wall, you just had to feel your way along and listen and hope there was nothing out in front of you. As we worked ourselves back across the Bay (downwind) ... we got a bearing on buoy #20 off Poplar Island. When I got the bearing off that and my compass course, I could see exactly what way to run as best I could.

"Now the wind was increasing astern of us all the time and the seas building up ... it was something I had never seen before in the Bay that had come up that quick ... this all happened in the process of maybe two hours. We were (at that time) running towards Herring Bay. (This) is a long bar that makes out into the Bay, and in the back of the bar it has good anchorage. Of course, the outside exposed side of the Bay with a northeasterly breeze (makes it) not as favorable. But it was the only harbor we had.

"Now thinking that Connie was coming up the Bay — coming from a southwesterly or southerly direction, Herring Bay would be an ideal anchorage because we would have that point that protrudes out there at North Beach ... and it would have been just a snug harbor throughout the whole blow."

In this version, apparently some time between his decision to run for Cove Point and his sighting of buoy #20, he had either changed his mind or come to the conclusion that the Marvel could do nothing but run and drift downwind. In either event Herring Bay was directly in his path ... the only thing in his path ... and it was for this negligible shelter that he steered through the rain.

In a somewhat different version given to the Coast Guard inquiring board later, Meckling said that even reefed down, the Marvel could not have sailed to windward after the fatal squall off Poplar Island — not that she had to, an easy reach would have put her in West River. What Meckling possibly meant was that she could have reached either. At any rate, he told the C.G. board that he "had no choice" but to run downwind. The latter doesn't sound as if he was in control of the situation as fully as the first version, whichever is nearer fact.

What about the passengers all this time? By Friday morning after the squall they were certainly getting their money's worth of ride.

" ... they were very, very nice," Meckling says. "They were getting up in the morning and coming saying, 'Boy, look, we're really flying!' Everyone was in very good mood. The chef had prepared hot cakes and scrambled eggs and we had fruit juice and dry cereal for breakfast that morning and everyone chowed down...." Afterwards they put on their raincoats and went on deck to watch the fun, the child-like faith of city people in public conveyances as unshaken and unshakable as ever.

And what about this Herring Bay now looming closer and closer ahead? As stated earlier, it is a mere indentation of an otherwise flat, unbroken part of the Western shore of Chesapeake Bay stretching from West River to the Patuxent River. It is exposed to winds of the easterly quadrant ranging from SE to NNE, the exact same winds predicted in storm warnings whose upper limits are 73 mph. Meckling himself said the wind and the sea were building astern all the time. Did he expect they would decrease as they piled down on ever-shoaling water and a lee shore? Did he expect his ship and his passengers could live through a hurricane anchored there?

He said that because he thought Connie was advancing up the Bay from a southwesterly or southerly direction (which in fact she was), the anchorage protected from southwesterly and southerly winds would be a snug harbor. Connie, however, was not a storm, it was a tropical hurricane in form even if it packed winds of less than hurricane force. Essentially hurricanes are a vacuum at their eye into which winds swirl in counter-clockwise fashion from all points of the compass.

If a hurricane is approaching you directly then, the actual wind is at your side or on your back, never in your face. Therefore if he was right in his estimation of the hurricane's path (and he was) he could expect just those winds he was getting — only worse. He would not expect southwesterly or southerly winds until after the hurricane had passed, at which time the damage, whatever it was to be, would have been done. Herring Bay, in short, was a lee shore offering no protection and the certain possibility of overwhelming conditions of sea and wind that could certainly endanger a vessel that could not broad reach in 40 mph of wind on Chesapeake Bay.

Any judgment of his decision whether based on his interpretation or upon the facts would seem to show him an inexperienced weather observer. To his credit, he had a 179' three-masted ship under him careening down the wind without visibility and crewed by one other person, a 17-year-old lad with less experience than he, himself. Meckling was in a lonely position, he had been awake now over 24 hours with sole responsibility for the vessel, he had been badgered by his innocent passengers, completely fooled by the weather — all these things probably made Herring Bay seem a much more desirable goal than it actually was. He probably wanted to get in — somewhere, anywhere — and in a hurry.

"... as we went on down into Herring Bay and took the stays'l off and dropped the anchor with the seas running as high as they were — at that time they were 10 to 15 feet high — it took a little time for the anchor to take hold to where it would bring the bow of the vessel back up into the wind where she would lay with stability. We done fine.

"That was about 8 a.m. — oh, between 8 and 9 in the morning — I'd say. Everything progressed dandy towards noon. Of course, all the time we were lying there the seas were increasing. The wind was getting more violent, the sea was just turning into nothing but a boiling cauldron, and the rains were belting down. We were listening to the radio that Connie was going to strike the Chesapeake Bay area.

"Now about 10 or 11 — along in that time — we began taking seas clear up over the bow of the vessel and the winds were coming down still northeasterly, and we were just waiting for it to change to southwest or southerly ... when we got word that the hurricane wouldn't even be there until noon of the following day."

Meckling stated in the radio interview that he had been through one or two hurricanes in his life. Now the Marvel was at anchor, now as master of the ship he had time to think over these experiences. What he thought was the same thing he had thought out on the Bay — that the hurricane would eventually give him southerly winds since it was coming from a southerly direction. His knowledge of weather and hurricanes — even with a radio to tell him about NE storm warnings — hardly seems accurate.

One by one they were
thrown from the deck

And what about his 23 passengers? "The seas continued to get worse, and the wind worse, and I asked all the passengers then to stay down below because the wind was blowing at such velocity that you couldn't stand upright on the deck. ... they were all down below getting on very fine, and it got towards noon, and the seas were coming clear over the bow and coming up on the deck. We were doing very well all this time.

"I went down and told them. I said, 'Now we're in no state of emergency or anything like that (in fact they were and had been since the Poplar Island squall), but because of this condition — it appears to be continuing to get worse — I'd like to have your cooperation and everyone get into life preservers'."

The passengers laughed and joked about the whole operation, but humored Meckling by doing as they were told. Apparently they were still no more concerned than they might have been if they had been in a subway that was delayed for a few moments.

What Skipper Meckling did not mention to the passengers was that, should it be necessary to leave the old Marvel they would have to flounder through the water as best they could. He did not carry a life boat, and his yawl boat was to be swept away unnoticed before even it could contribute to the safety of those aboard. Had ample life boat facilities been provided, a different fate might have awaited the passengers now strapping on their cumbersome life preservers — unknown to them another schooner, the two-masted LaForrest L. Simmons loaded with 250 tons of slag was sinking not far from where they lay anchored. The two men aboard the Simmons were to escape unharmed in their lifeboat and make it safely to shore.

Back on the Marvel, however, things were rapidly going from bad to worse. At about 11 a.m., "the anchor apparently let go of its hold and allowed the ship to drop broadside to the sea for about four or five swells. She rolled tremendously, and we worked ourselves forward on the deck, the two crew members and myself, and we put our auxiliary anchor overboard. We put the second anchor overboard ... and brought her back up again ... very nicely, but during these tremendous rolls we had taken in a lot of water. The boat had practically laid broadside or laid down because of the swell, and we had both our pumps operating very good both fore and aft. We also had an emergency hand-type pump that we put into operation, and everyone took turns and got a big joke out of operating this old fashioned bilge pump, and it was very, very efficient."

This is in contrast to Steve Morton's testimony before the C.G. board much later. He confirmed that the two pumps fore and aft were air-cooled gasoline type motor pumps that shorted out easily when wet. For that reason the forward pump did not function during the crisis, and the remaining power pump and hand pump were unable to hold the water down.

Meanwhile, the passengers were having their troubles too. Seas had disabled the cooking gas bottles and they ate a cold buffet which was terminated when someone found that water was coming in the portholes. When the passengers tried to shut the ports, they found that the studs in many cases couldn't be swung into position, that many of the butterfly nuts were missing and that the port gaskets wouldn't hold out water. They tried stuffing blankets in, but that proved ineffectual. Gradually the water climbed higher and high below.

"Right shortly after we finished eating, the ship began a porpoising affair," Meckling's story continues. "The length between swells of the sea is the determining factor of how the ship will ride. Now a smaller boat would have done all right and a larger boat would have done all right. But there is a certain point there that doesn't allow the ship to lift out of one (sea) until the other one has piled on. Well, that's exactly what started to occur. The ship started to porpoise and tons of water were being thrown down on our forward deck."

At some time during these dwindling hours, Meckling says he tried to send for help with his ship-to-shore radio, resorting finally to sending out a Mayday. It was apparently never heard, although the skipper insists that the visual "electric eye" device on the transmitter showed that the set was putting out a signal.

"Then I went to the passengers and told them, 'Now this is not an emergency. We are doing very well. We are holding our own. We are in no immediate danger, but I would like to have everyone — if it's necessary to make an orderly abandonment of the ship — and I'd like to have a line tied to each life preserver so that no one will be separated from the group. ... as long as we stay in a group we'll be all right. And everyone laughed and said, 'It's not going to be necessary,' and I said, 'Well, that's beside the point. I'd like to have a line tied to each life preserver and that way we'll all have a safe journey ashore if it's going to be necessary.' They said, 'Well, all right if you want us to do it, we'll go ahead with it.' And they took it as a lark.

" ... so they were all milling around in the fantail right outside the after hatch. There were eight or ten of them, I suppose, on the after ... deck and several more in the lounge, and they were filing out of the lounge one at a time to get this line fastened to them and Mr. Pinckney was standing there with the line. ... And apparently at that time the anchor must have lifted and allowed the ship to drop back broadside to it. We made one roll to port. As the roll returned to starboard the ship continued on over on its side into the water."

One by one all 27 including Skipper Meckling were swept into the water and separated. Only four others and Meckling managed to hold together as a group and drift in on the seas, choking and paddling as best they could. They entered the water at about 2:40 in the afternoon.

As they drifted towards shore, they could see that, "These seas were running through there 15, 20 and I would say that some of them were 25 feet high and were crushing down on these (rock) jetties (on the beach) and throwing spray up in the air 40 and 50 feet high. It was a terrific sight. ... I don't know how it looked from the beach, but it was something from out there. Looking in, it looked like going into ... into something terrible.

"Holding together with hands, we stroked with one hand and tried to work ourselves away from where these jetties were sticking out from this little point of land that shown up to be North Beach. ... as we were doing this, we bobbed up (and) one of the members yelled, 'There's a boat, there's a boat!' As we rose on the next swell, it was a duck blind." They managed to drift down on it but, "... when we were swept into this bottom of this structure, the ladies didn't have enough strength to life themselves out of the water to get away from it."

When they hit the blind, a figure jumped up inside; it was Mr. Harold Schwartz, another passenger. He helped Steve Morton in first, then Mrs. Hutchison. "Mrs. Roberts, she couldn't get out of the water, and I done my best to help her. I picked her up enough so that she could get her knees on the bottom lead of the structure — this little lead where they put their duck boats in — and she got her knees on there and clung to that. And at the same time Miss Nancy Madden was being swept away — she couldn't hold on any longer and let go. As she was being swept under me, I reached down and grabbed her by the back of the life jacket and held on to her. We got Mrs. Roberts into the duck blind then, but Nancy Madden and myself were far enough away out on this little leader that the ones in the blind couldn't reach us. I pulled Nancy up to where she could pretty near stand up, and when she put her feet on the rung she was too weak to support her own weight and started to fall back into the water.

"I done everything I could do to hold onto her, and possibly we rested about a minute. It seemed like an hour. We stood there, and I kept pleading with Nancy, 'Come on, we've got to, we've just got to!' And she finally made an effort and I pushed her from behind as far as I could and got her up onto a rung that we were both out of the water."

Inside the duck blind, they pulled down the tarpaper insulation and wrapped it around themselves for warmth. Each wave swayed the blind, and they huddled together knowing at any moment that they might be flung back overboard.

On shore a car's headlights went by — they waved and were not seen. About 20 minutes later two men came down on the beach and saw them, for this time they waved a yellow hat on a stick. Commandeering a 14' skiff and an outboard, the two men started out towards the blind 150-200 yards offshore.

"Now if you can imagine how we felt out there in the duck blind watching this boat come towards us! It done everything but stand straight up on its stern. It had a man about 230 pounds in the bow, and the sea would just pick that little boat up and throw it like a leaf." Eventually the boat arrived at the lee side of the blind, removed Mr. Morton and Miss Hutchison. "I had the feeling that that was the last trip if they were even going to be able to complete that one." But they did and returned to save all the occupants of the blind.

All of this testimony is possibly exaggerated, coming as it does from a man who had been up for 28 hours before being dumped into the Bay for another three hour life-or-death swim. However, it is beyond belief on some points.

First, the height of the waves reported from 10 to 25 feet is very doubtful. It takes a staggering amount of wind pushing water a long, long way to build up a sea of that sort — and if such conditions had occurred on the Bay, an unlikely thing in itself, the force of waves this size would probably have smashed the duck blind long before it had to support the weight of six people on its thin stilt legs. The same waves breaking on shore would have made it impossible for two mere men to launch a 14 foot skiff and power out to the duck blind two times and then go back safely again — particularly since the helmsman was wearing a big straw hat as stated by Mr. Meckling.

Second, the facts: the highest velocity winds reported that day at Annapolis, Md., were 29 knots with gusts up to 39 knots. The sharpest single gust was 53 knots recorded at 5:40 that evening. The highest velocity winds recorded at Patuxent River were 32 knots with gusts up to 42 knots. The highest single gust was one of 48 knots occurring at 3:28 that afternoon. Generally speaking, the Bay had been subjected to sustained winds from the NE blowing about an average 35 knots for only 10 hours — no place for a boat to be, but then still, something short of the conditions as described by Mr. Meckling.

Meanwhile, in addition to the six persons from the duck blind, eight others had reached shore. One of them, Dr. B.H. Roberts of New Haven, husband of the woman rescued from the blind, reached shore only to turn around, wade out into the surf again to help others and lose his own life. Before the night was out, it was confirmed that 14 persons had lost their lives sin the Marvel disaster.

Why were they drowned?

Certainly the faith of the passengers throughout was remarkable. And they had just cause to believe — presumably the Marvel was operating in the eyes of the law, a sound ship of 64 years history skippered by a man in whom they had every right to believe. Why were they fooled, why were they drowned?

Obviously, John Meckling was not experienced enough to command the Marvel. Obviously, the Marvel was not sound enough to meet anything more than extremely mild weather, a condition anyone knows is not endless even on tranquil Chesapeake Bay. Just as obviously, there was a great gap between these facts and the promises set forth in the Marvel's advertising brochure which was so worded as to imply that the ship was sturdy, ably commanded and outfitted to meet every emergency.

Sample quotes: "Ahoy, Matey! There's loads of fun awaiting you on the good ship Levin J. Marvel as she starts on her tenth season ... fun and adventure on Chesapeake Bay ... visiting historic towns on the Eastern Shore ... atmosphere on board is ... informal ... with deck games ... billowing sail ... the gurgling whisper of water passing by the rail ... nostalgia and romance of a sailing vessel. ... You will feel secure and safe ... the skipper ... is a veteran of the Chesapeake, the crew is experienced and courteous."

Mr. Samuel Finkelstein, an attorney from New York who read and believed and brought down a party of seven for a cruise said, "Even with our layman's limited experience it was evident to us that the ship in question was most unsanitary, unsafe and in deplorable condition." He laid emphasis on the "difference between the brochure and what our eye saw." The party refused to sail but never got their $105 back. Mr. Finkelstein complained through channels to the C.G. but was unable to interfere with the continuing business of the Marvel. In the light of these things, why was the operation allowed to live on?

The principal law that controls passenger carrying vessels of this type is the Motor Boat Act. Auxiliary legislation controls sailing craft when used as sailing craft only, only when they exceed 700 gross tons. Since the Marvel had no engine and was only 183 gross tons, there was no direct legislation covering her operation as a passenger carrying vessel on the books. She had but to adhere to Rules of The Road and the Federal Security code to be legal.

When Meckling and his partner John Thomas Evans, Jr. purchased the vessel in 1954, it was laid up. The ship was in deplorable condition ... dirty, hogged, old and rotten in many of her structural members, a decaying hulk that had efficiently done the job she had been designed for 64 years earlier — carrying fertilizer and lumber up and down the Bay. More recently she had been operated as a passenger carrying cruise ship by an owner that finally retired her for the safety of his passengers and the protection of his pocketbook.

When they went to move the old Marvel from her mooring, she foundered, and it was necessary to make temporary repairs before she could be moved safely to Baltimore. After this experience and conversation with the former owner as well as a trip of inspection throughout the ship, it should have been apparent what was required to make the ship safe for carrying passengers. At Booz Brothers shipyard in Baltimore, however, only $1,486.57 was spent in searching out and caulking the bottom to one strake above the waterline — barely enough work to make her float the rest of the season. The comments of the treasurer of the yard were succinct: he said he would not have wanted to have risked himself on the vessel as a passenger.

Still that year, the old boat originally built in Bethel, Delaware, in 1891 and subsequently re-built in 1919 and 1926, went into service carrying passengers. Some new canvas was purchased, some new running rigging, odds and ends and the boat was in business again. She did not then have nor did she have at the time of the disaster, a sound hull, modern efficient bilge pumps, a life boat, a main auxiliary propulsion engine, stout sails throughout, adequate running rigging and other auxiliary equipment. What did Meckling think of his craft? In a radio interview he said, "her hull was not a new hull but was in very good shape." Certainly, however, the boat was not insured and never faced the realism of an insurance survey under his ownership.

The new owners wrote to the C.G. outlining a plan whereby the Marvel would make and depart her anchorages under sail and ferry passengers ashore in a rowboat or lifeboat. The C.G. had to admit that they could thereby get by without inspection under the Motor Boat Act, though in a subsequent letter relating to the powered yawl boat, they clearly stated that if she was used to propel the Marvel in the Bay or to ferry passengers, each act would qualify schooner and yawl boat to come under inspection.

This does not imply that the C.G. favored the Marvel's operation. September 9, 1954, the Baltimore office wrote Meckling that the boat had been towed, was therefore to be considered a motor vessel and should suspend operation until inspection was made under the Motor Boat Act. An appeal by Meckling clouded the issue sufficiently for him to continue operations after this exchange. Later at the hearing, when it developed that he had not only continued operation but had used his powered yawl boat, he was questioned as to how he thought this could be anything but a violation of the law.

"My passengers were not paid passengers until we were under sail," he replied. The yawl boat towed the Marvel to position where she could sail, fares were collected and the corporation secretary returned to shore with the money.

"This was done specifically then, with the intent of getting around the law," one member of the C.G. Board of Inquiry suggested.

"No," Meckling answered, the yawl boat was used simply to make clearing the crowded Annapolis harbor less dangerous to other craft and the passengers.

In practical operation, Meckling soon found it necessary to use the yawl boat for carrying passengers to shore for swimming, pushing the Marvel up and down channels, in and out of docks and for pushing her into port from the Bay in calm conditions.

There was no actual legislation allowing the C.G. to board and inspect the Marvel and forbid her from operating — this lack of lawful authority being one reason why 14 persons were drowned. There were, however, three statutes Meckling apparently violated from time to time: 1) operating at night without carrying proper lookouts as prescribed by Rules of the Road; 2) using the yawl boat to push the Marvel thus making her a power craft, and ferrying passengers in the yawl boat without having a holder of a Motorboat Operator's license at the helm as set forth in the Motor Boat Act; 3) not possessing for himself or any of his crew Port Security cards as required by the Federal Security code.

The C.G. is empowered to enforce all three of these pieces of legislation and could have done so long before the disaster. They could have boarded and asked for Port Security cards or easily observed the Marvel's operation when she was actually violating Rule of the Road or the Motor Boat Act. Their laxity in enforcement is a contributing reason why 14 were drowned.

Lack of adequate legislation, lack of enforcement, these primarily cost too many lives. While it is still up to the C.G. to decide what laws Meckling has violated at this writing, and up to the U.S. Attorney General's office to determine whether or not there was criminal negligence involved, the fact remains that under the present legal set-up, someone would have gone down sooner or later, on some coast in some boat with the same results.

And the situation is still not remedied. Sailing cruise boats of the Marvel's category, and certain types of party boats that are powered still continue uninspected, unregulated operation. A definite threat to unknowing, paying passengers.

Links:

http://www.cr.nps.gov/maritime/nhl/victory.htm
http://www.victorychimes.com/return.htm

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