Transcriber’s Note


This book has no Table of Contents, no List of Illustrations, and
no Index.




[Illustration: (cover)]


[Illustration: GOING OFF TO A WRECK.]




                                  THE

                              LIFE SAVERS

                                   OF

                                CAPE COD

[Illustration]


                                   BY
                              J. W. DALTON
                       _Sandwich, Massachusetts_




                    COPYRIGHT, 1902, BY J. W. DALTON


                       THE BARTA PRESS, PRINTERS
                             BOSTON, MASS.




The Life Savers of Cape Cod.


[Illustration: SURFMAN WALKER, ORLEANS STATION, DRESSED FOR STORMY
NIGHT ON THE BEACH.]

Cape Cod’s life savers are known the world over for their intrepid,
enduring bravery, gallant deeds, and the success in rescuing life that
they have achieved in their hazardous duties along the most dangerous
winter coast of the world.

Every night, along the shores of Cape Cod, from Wood End at
Provincetown to Monomoy at Chatham, in moonlight, starlight, thick
darkness, driving tempest, wind, rain, snow or hail, an endless line of
life savers steadily march along the exposed beaches on the outlook for
endangered vessels.

The life saver’s work is always arduous, often terrible. Quicksands,
the blinding snow and cutting sand storms, the fearful blasts of winter
gales, are more often than not to be encountered on their journeys;
storm tides, flooding the beaches, drive them to the tops or back of
the sand dunes, where they plod along their solitary patrol with great
peril.

When a ship is in distress, whatever way the crew is rescued by the
life savers, the task involves great hazard of their lives, hours of
racking labor, protracted exposure to the roughest weather conditions,
and a mental and bodily strain under the spur of exigency and the curb
of discipline that exhaust even these hardy fearless coast guardians.
In cases of boat service tremendous additional peril and hardships are
added.

Death has often claimed the life saver at his work. Or as a result of
his gallant, unselfish toil for the safety of others in the rigors of
winter, one life saver after another is compelled to retire from the
service on account of shattered health.

[Illustration: MAP OF CAPE COD, SHOWING LOCATION OF U. S. L. S.
STATIONS.

Small circles show where principal wrecks have taken place within past
fifty years.]

Beyond their wages of sixty-five dollars per month the surfmen receive
no allowances or emoluments of any kind except the quarters and fuel
provided at the stations.

No person belonging to the service is allowed to hold an interest in
or to be connected with any wrecking company, nor is he entitled to
salvage upon any property he may save or assist to save. A surfman
cannot be discharged from the service without good and sufficient
reason. For well proven neglect of patrol duty or for disobedience or
insubordination at a wreck the keeper may instantly discharge him;
in all other cases special authority must be first obtained from the
general superintendent.

The keeper lives at his station throughout the year, thus being on hand
during the two summer months to summon the crew and volunteers in case
of shipwreck or accident.

In “The Life Savers of Cape Cod” it has been the aim of the author
to pen-picture some of the heroic deeds performed by these guardians
of the “ocean graveyard,” as the shores of Cape Cod are known, the
terrible hardships they are called upon to endure, and the peril they
constantly face in the work of saving life and property, together
with illustrations of the life-saving stations on Cape Cod, the
boats, beach apparatus, breeches-buoy, etc., used in saving lives,
photographs of the crews of the different stations, a historical sketch
of the life-saving service, and stories of historic disasters, with
biographies of the life savers of Cape Cod, their duties, manner of
living, and their achievements.

Cape Cod extends directly out into the Atlantic, like a gigantic
arm with clutched hand, bidding defiance to the mighty ocean, for
a distance of forty miles. Shifting sand bars parallel its eastern
shores, which are an unbroken line of sandy beaches from Monomoy Point
at Chatham to Wood End at Provincetown, a distance of about fifty
miles. Myriads of shoals lie along the coast, and unnumbered vessels
have met their doom along its shores, which rightly bear the name
“Ocean Graveyard.”

The shores of Cape Cod from Monomoy to Wood End are literally strewn
with the bones of once staunch crafts, while unmarked graves in the
burial-places in the villages along the coast mutely relate the sad
tale of the sacrifice of human life.

Scenes of awful terror and heroic rescues have taken place at the time
of shipwreck along these shifting sand bars, and here, too, the life
savers have given up their lives in devotion to their duty.


HISTORIC WRECKS.

Thousands of lives have been lost in the wrecks that have taken place
along the shores of Cape Cod since the _Mayflower_ cast anchor in the
harbor at Provincetown in 1620. There is no record of the disasters
previous to the establishment of the United States Life-Saving Service
in 1872, other than mention in town records and histories of the dates
and circumstances of the most memorable, or those attended by great
loss of life.

The first shipwreck on Cape Cod, of which there is any record, occurred
in 1626, when the historic ship _Sparrowhawk_, Captain Johnson, from
England, with colonists bound for Virginia, stranded on the shoals near
Orleans, and became a total loss. The story of the wreck is told by
Governor Bradford in his diary of the Plymouth Colony. The ship’s bones
were discovered in a mud bank in 1863, the washing away of the shore
line disclosing them to view.

[Illustration: BRITISH FRIGATE SOMERSET.]

[Illustration: AN OLD WRECK.]

Another historic wreck was that of the British frigate _Somerset_,
which stranded on Peaked Hill Bars, Nov. 2 or 3, 1778. The _Somerset_
was one of the fleet of British men-of-war, whose guns had stormed the
heights of Bunker Hill, and terrorized the commerce of the colonies.
She was at anchor in Boston Harbor the night that Paul Revere made
his famous ride. When she met with disaster she was in pursuit of a
fleet of French ships, which were reported to be in Boston Harbor. The
_Somerset_ had been at anchor in Provincetown harbor for some time,
leaving there a few days before she was lost, to go in search of the
French ships. She struck Peaked Hill Bars during a northeast gale,
while trying to round the Cape, and enter the harbor at Provincetown.
She had a complement of four hundred and eighty men, and is supposed to
have carried sixty guns, thirty-two, twenty-four, and twelve pounders.
She struck on the bars with terrific force, and instantly the seas
began to pound her to pieces. She was finally thrown up on the beach
by the tumultuous walls of water, and Captain Aurey and the few of the
crew who had not perished reached the shore.

[Illustration: MATILDA BUCK.]

The residents of Provincetown viewed the wreck from High Pole Hill,
and summoned Capt. Enoch Hallett, of Yarmouth, and Colonel Doane, of
Wellfleet, who, with a detachment of militia, made Captain Aurey and
the survivors prisoners.

Captain Hallett took charge of the prisoners, marching them up the Cape
to Barnstable, and later to Boston, Colonel Doane being left to look
after the wrecked craft. There was much jubilation on Cape Cod and in
Boston over the disaster. The bones of the _Somerset_ remained buried
for a century, when the shifting sands exposed them to view. Relic
hunters soon carried away nearly all of the wreckage that could be
obtained, and the shifting sands have again entombed what remains of
the famous old frigate.

Another historic wreck was that of the pirate ship _Widdah_, which was
lost near the site of the Cahoon’s Hollow Life-Saving Station in 1718.
The ship was commanded by Captain Bellamy, and carried twenty-three
guns and a crew of one hundred and thirty men. Captain Bellamy had
captured seven vessels off the shores of Cape Cod, and on one of them
had placed seven of his crew. The captain of the captured ship ran his
vessel close to the shore, and the seven pirates were taken prisoners.
Later six of them were executed in Boston. The _Widdah_ soon after was
driven ashore during a gale, and all hands, save an Englishman and an
Indian, were lost.

[Illustration: A BAD WRECK.]

A scene of awful terror occurred when the _Josephus_, a British ship,
was wrecked on Peaked Hill Bars in the year 1842. She had a cargo
of iron rails. Her crew had been driven to the rigging as soon as
the vessel struck, and one after another they were seen to fall into
the raging sea. Those who had gathered on the shore could hear the
despairing cries of the imperiled crew, but were powerless to aid them.
At last two of the spectators, Daniel Cassidy and Jonathan Collins,
procured a dory, and against the earnest pleadings of their friends,
and in the almost certain assurance that they were going to their
death, pushed off from the beach, saying as a last farewell, “We
can’t stand this any longer; we are going to try and rescue those poor
fellows if it cost us our lives.” Half-way out to the wreck the two
heroes successfully battled with the sea, then a giant comber, catching
their frail boat, carried it along and buried it under tons of tumbling
water. The gallant men were seen to rise and struggle desperately
to reach the overturned boat, but perished in the attempt. The men
remaining in the rigging of the _Josephus_ were soon after swept to
death by the monstrous waves that tore the ship to pieces.

In 1848 the brig _Cactus_ was lost on the bars along the back of the
Cape.

[Illustration: WRECKERS AT WORK ON KATIE J. BARRETT.]

Along the shore near the Cahoon’s Hollow Station the immigrant ship
_Franklin_ was deliberately run ashore in 1849, and many of her poor,
helpless passengers perished in the disaster. This was one of the most
appalling disasters that ever occurred on Cape Cod. Speedy retribution
came to the officers of the ship for their terrible crime, the captain
and nearly all the others losing their own lives in the wreck. The late
Capt. Benjamin S. Rich, afterwards of the United States Life-Saving
Service, was the first to discover the wreck, and also found a box
containing some papers that subsequently proved that the disaster was
intentional.

[Illustration: KATIE J. BARRETT BREAKING UP.]

The year 1853 was a memorable one in the history of Cape Cod, there
being twenty-three appalling disasters along its shore during that
period. Among the vessels lost were many ships and brigs well known in
shipping circles in Boston and on Cape Cod. The weather was bitter cold
and violent storms swept the coast when most of the vessels were lost,
so that nothing could be done to assist the imperiled crews, and those
who did reach the shore perished from exposure on the desolate uplands
and beaches.

In 1866 the _White Squall_, built for a blockade runner, while on her
way home from China, struck on the bars along the back of the Cape and
became a total loss.

The wreck of the _Aurora_ is known to Cape Codders as the “Palm Oil
Wreck.” The vessel was loaded with palm oil from the west coast of
Africa. She struck on the bars off the back of the Cape, and was a
total loss.

Another terrible disaster was the wreck of the schooner _Clara Belle_,
coal laden, which stranded on the bars off High Head Station, on the
night of March 6, 1872, at the height of a fearful blizzard. Captain
Amesbury and crew of six men attempted to reach the shore in their
boat. The craft had gone but a few yards when she was overturned,
throwing the men into the sea. John Silva was the only member of the
crew that reached the shore. He found himself alone on a frozen beach
with the mercury below zero. He wandered about during the night trying
to find some place of shelter, and was found the next morning by a
farmer standing dazed, barefooted, and helpless in the highway three
miles from the scene of the wreck. His feet and hands were frozen, and
it was a long time before he recovered from the effects. The schooner
was driven high and dry on the beach, and when boarded the next day a
warm fire was found in the cabin. The haste of the crew to leave the
vessel had cost them their lives.

[Illustration: KATIE J. BARRETT JUST BEFORE HER FOREMAST FELL.]

The first fearful disaster after the life-saving service
reorganization, took place on Peaked Hill Bars, March 4, 1875, when the
Italian bark _Giovanni_ became a total loss and her crew of fourteen
perished. The bark stranded too far from the beach to be reached by the
wreck ordnance used in those days, and the surf was pounding on the
shore with such fury that a boat could not be launched, much less live,
in the sea. No assistance could be rendered the poor sailors, and one
by one they dropped into the sea and were lost.

The most appalling disaster in the history of the life-saving service
on Cape Cod was the wreck of the iron ship _Jason_, on the bars at
Pamet River, Dec. 5, 1893. Twenty-four lives were lost. The ship was
bound from Calcutta, India, for Boston, with a cargo of jute. Captain
McMillan, who was in charge of the ship, had a crew of twenty-four
men, including an apprentice, Samuel J. Evans, of Raglan, England.
Thick weather prevailed off the coast for several days preceding the
disaster, and Captain McMillan, not being in possession of reliable
information as to his position, obtained it from a New York pilot boat.

When about one hundred miles off the coast he unfortunately shaped his
course to the westward for the purpose of raising some landmark. When
the _Jason_ approached the Cape, the wind was blowing a gale from the
northeast, and the atmosphere was thick with rain, which soon turned to
sleet and snow.

[Illustration: AT THE MERCY OF THE SEA.]

The life savers along the shore at Nauset first saw the _Jason_, and
word that a ship was in dangerous proximity to the shore was sent
along the Cape to all the stations. The _Jason_ was last seen just
before five o’clock by the day patrol of the Nauset Station. The life
savers, knowing that she could hardly weather the Cape, kept a sharp
lookout for her, and at all the stations the horses were hitched into
the beach carts and every preparation made to go to the assistance of
the ship without a moment’s delay. It was a fearful night along the
shores of Cape Cod, the coast guardians having all they could do to go
over their patrol. Nothing was seen or heard of the doomed ship up
to seven o’clock in the evening, and the life savers hoped that she
had managed to work offshore or around the Cape. At half-past seven,
however, Surfman Honey, of the Pamet River Station, burst into the
station, and shouted, “Hopkins (the north patrol) has just burned his
signal.” A moment later Hopkins rushed into the station and reported
that the _Jason_ had struck on the bars about a half mile north of
the station. Keeper Rich and his crew were ready for the emergency,
and, with the beach cart, rushed to the scene. The shore was then
piled with wreckage, and the slatting of the sails of the wrecked ship
sounded above the roar and din of the storm. A careful lookout for
the shipwrecked seafarers was kept by the life savers as they hurried
to the scene, and Evans, the sole survivor of the disaster, was found
clinging to a bale of jute. He was clad only in his underclothes, and
was almost totally helpless.

[Illustration: SHIP JASON THE MORNING AFTER SHE WAS WRECKED.]

The wrecked vessel was sighted through the storm and a shot promptly
fired over the craft, but the crew had perished almost as soon as the
ship struck, and the efforts of the life savers were of no avail. The
ship (it was afterwards learned from young Evans) broke in two almost
as soon as she struck, and the members of the crew perished shortly
after. Evans told the author that as soon as the ship struck he put on
a life-preserver and took to the rigging. The captain ordered the boats
launched, but they were smashed as soon as they struck the water. While
clinging to the rigging, considering what was best to do, Evans says
that he must have been hit by a big wave or wall of water, as the next
that he knew he was on the beach and the life savers were taking him to
the station. The bodies of twenty of the crew were found and buried in
the cemetery at Wellfleet. Evans soon recovered from the effects of the
buffeting he received by the seas, and returned to his home in England.
Part of the ship is now visible at low tide, and is an object of much
interest to visitors to Cape Cod.

[Illustration: SAMUEL J. EVANS, SOLE SURVIVOR OF WRECKED SHIP JASON,

With life preserver which he wore when cast ashore.]

The wreck of the ship _Asia_, in which twenty lives were lost, occurred
on Nantucket shoals, near the Great Round Shoal Lightship in February,
1898. The ship was on her way from Manila for Boston, and was commanded
by Captain Dakin. Besides the crew of twenty-three men Captain Dakin’s
wife and little daughter were aboard.

The ship struck on the shoals during a furious northeast gale and
snowstorm on Sunday afternoon, but did not begin to break up until the
next day.

When the ship commenced to pound to pieces, the mate and the few
members of the crew who had not been swept overboard did all in their
power to assist Captain Dakin in shielding his wife and daughter from
being swept away by the seas which were breaking over the craft. Before
the ship broke up, the mate lashed the captain’s daughter and himself
to a big piece of wreckage, hoping in that way to reach the shore.
Captain Dakin and his wife were swept to death before they could fasten
themselves to any of the wreckage. Of the whole number aboard the
ill-fated craft but three were saved. These were sailors, who clung to
a piece of the ship, and after drifting about in Vineyard Sound for
several days, were picked up nearly dead and placed aboard one of the
lightships. The bodies of the mate, with his arms locked about the
captain’s daughter, and both securely lashed to a piece of wreckage,
were picked up a few days later in Vineyard Sound. Both had been frozen
to death. But few of the bodies of the other members of the crew were
found. The ship became a total loss, and the following day there was
not a vestige of her left to mark the spot where the tragedy took place.

[Illustration: SHIP ASIA WRECKED ON GREAT ROUND SHOAL.]

The schooner _Job H. Jackson_ was another terrible wreck that occurred
on Peaked Hill Bars. The schooner struck on Jan. 5, 1895, during
bitter cold weather, and the crew were driven into the rigging. A
fearful sea was pounding on the shore, and it required the combined
herculean efforts of the Peaked Hill Bars, Race Point, and High Head
life-saving crews, with their life-boats, to rescue the imperiled
seafarers, who were badly frost-bitten and helpless when taken from the
wrecked vessel.

The schooner _Daniel B. Fearing_, which became a total loss on the bars
off Cahoon’s Hollow Station, struck there during a fog on May 6, 1896.
The life savers put off to the wreck in their surf-boat, and brought
the crew ashore. A gale sprung up with great suddenness as the crew
were leaving the doomed vessel, and as the last man jumped into the
life-boat the masts of the big schooner fell with a crash, and the sea
soon completed the work of total destruction.

[Illustration: JOHN S. PARKER, WHICH BECAME A TOTAL LOSS ON NAUSET
BARS.]

On Sept. 14, 1896, the Italian bark _Monte Tabor_ struck on Peaked Hill
Bars during a furious northeast gale. The disaster was attended with
the loss of five men, whose deaths were involved in circumstances of
mysterious and almost romantic interest. Three were suicides, while
the manner in which the other two perished could not be certainly
explained. The bark hailed from Genoa, and carried a crew of twelve
persons, including the officers and two boys. She had a cargo of salt
from Trapani, Island of Sicily, for Boston. The craft had been struck
by a hurricane on September 9, and when off Cape Cod on the night of
the 13th, in endeavoring to make the harbor at Provincetown, she
struck the dreaded Peaked Hill Bars. She was discovered by Patrolman
Silvey, of the Peaked Hill Bars Station. The night was pitch dark,
the surf extremely high, and the bark was soon pounded to pieces. As
the life-saving crews could not locate the wreck, there was nothing
to shoot at and nothing to pull to, even if a boat could have been
launched. It is believed that the captain was so humiliated by the loss
of his vessel, that he fell into a frenzy of despair, and resolved to
take his own life, and it would appear that others of his crew followed
his example of self-destruction.

[Illustration: A TOTAL WRECK.]

[Illustration: STRUCK WITH ALL SAILS SET.]

Six of the crew managed to reach the shore on the top of the cabin,
and were pulled out of the surf by the life savers. Another, a boy,
said that he swam ashore. An investigation, conducted by the Italian
counsel, disclosed that the captain committed suicide.

The first evidence that the steamer _Portland_ had met with disaster
during the memorable gale of November, 1898, was found by John Johnson,
a surfman of the Race Point Station, who picked up a life-preserver
from the ill-fated craft.

[Illustration: WRECKAGE WHICH CAME ASHORE AFTER THE STEAMER PORTLAND
WAS LOST AND LIFE PRESERVER FROM THE ILL-FATED CRAFT.

Life preserver in right foreground.]

Soon after Johnson found the life-preserver, wreckage from the steamer
was seen in the surf along the shore, and within a short time the
beach for miles was strewn with it. All the life savers suffered great
hardship during that gale, which was the worst in the history of the
life-saving service.

Twice since the establishment of the United States Life-Saving Service
on Cape Cod, the life savers in the life-boats have met with disaster,
and members of the crews perished in the catastrophe.

[Illustration: CHARLES A. CAMPBELL WRECKED AT PAMET RIVER.]

[Illustration: LILLIE ABANDONED AND IN A BAD PLACE.]

Keeper David H. Atkins and Surfman Frank Mayo and Elisha Taylor of the
Peaked Hill Bars Station perished by their boat being wrecked during
a second trip to the stone-loaded sloop, _C. E. Trumbull_, on the
morning of Nov. 30, 1880, to take off two sailors who refused to go
ashore the first time.

Surfman S. O. Fisher, now keeper of the Race Point Station, C. P.
Kelley, now keeper at High Head Station, and Isaiah Young, who has not
since seen a well day, lived to tell the story after a life or death
struggle with icy seas and currents and being swept for miles along the
shore before they crawled up on the beach.

But the Monomoy disaster of March 17, 1902 was the most appalling and
attended with the greatest loss of life, twelve men, seven of them life
savers, perishing.

[Illustration: SCHOONER BEING POUNDED TO PIECES OFF ORLEANS.]

The conduct of the Monomoy crew on this occasion affords a noteworthy
example of unflinching fidelity to duty. By long experience they were
fully aware of the perils that must be encountered in going to the
wrecked vessels, but it was a summons which the brave and conscientious
life savers could not disregard.

The story of this disaster is still fresh in the public mind.


THE ESTABLISHMENT OF THE LIFE-SAVING SERVICE ON CAPE COD.

The establishment of the United States Life-Saving Service on Cape Cod
dates back but thirty years, which time also marks the reorganization,
extension, and beginning of its efficiency in the United States.
While as early as 1797 the town of Truro sold to the United States
Government a tract of land upon which to erect the first lighthouse on
Cape Cod,--Highland Light, so called,--it was not until half a century
later that the government began to provide means for the relief of
mariners wrecked upon its coasts, and seventy-five years afterwards
that the first United States Life-Saving Station was erected on the
shores of Cape Cod.

The Massachusetts Humane Society, originally formed in 1786, and
incorporated for general purposes of benevolence a few years later, was
the first to attempt organized relief for shipwrecked seafarers in the
United States as well as upon Cape Cod.

[Illustration: ONE OF THE FIRST LIFE-SAVING CREWS.]

The Society first began its work of rendering assistance to shipwrecked
mariners by building huts on many of the desolate sections of the
coast. These huts were for the shelter of shipwrecked persons who
might reach the shore. The first building of this kind was erected
on Lovell’s Island in Boston Harbor in 1807. Later, the Society
established the first life-boat station at Cohasset, subsequently
erecting others along the coast, and extending its good work to the
shores of Cape Cod.

While the Society relied solely upon volunteer crews to man these
life-boats in times of disaster, its efforts in saving life and
property were of great value, and both the state and general government
tendered it pecuniary aid at various times. When the government
extended the life-saving service to Cape Cod, the Society was relieved
of its burden of protecting that dangerous coast, thus enabling it to
better provide for other sections of the coast of Massachusetts.

The Massachusetts Humane Society may be considered the parent of the
United States Life-Saving Service. The Society is one of the oldest in
the world. It originated its coast service more than thirty-six years
before the English did, while the French service dates its birth much
later.

In 1845, a few years before Congress took steps for providing means for
rendering assistance to wrecked vessels along the coasts of the United
States, the Society had eighteen stations on the Massachusetts coast,
with boats and mortars for throwing life lines to stranded vessels, in
addition to numerous huts of refuge.

[Illustration: ETHEL MAUD BEING BURIED IN THE SAND.]

With the exception of the Life-Saving Benevolent Association of New
York, chartered by the Legislature of that State in 1849, no other
successful organized efforts outside of those of the government were
made up to this time to lessen the distress incident to shipwreck.

The first appropriation made by Congress for rendering assistance to
the shipwrecked from shore was March 3, 1847. For nearly a half century
prior to this time the efforts of the government for the protection
of mariners upon the coasts of the United States were mainly in
establishing the coast survey and extending the lighthouse system.

In 1848 the attention of Congress was called to the immediate needs of
providing further means for rendering assistance to wrecked vessels
along the Atlantic coast, and a second appropriation of $10,000 was
made. The first appropriation of $5,000 remained in the treasury as an
unexpended balance.

Later, this money was placed in the hands of the Collector of Customs
at Boston for the benefit of the Massachusetts Humane Society, for
use in the work of building and equipping new life stations along the
Massachusetts coast.

The second appropriation of $10,000 was for expenditure upon the New
Jersey coast. With this appropriation eight boat-houses were erected
and supplied with appliances for saving life and property. This marks
the beginning of the life-saving service of the United States.

In 1849 Congress appropriated $20,000 for life-saving purposes. With
this sum eight life-saving stations were built on the Long Island
coast and six additional stations erected on the shores of New Jersey.
While these newly established life-saving stations were not manned by
regular drilled crews of surfmen, as at present, they often proved of
great value at times of disaster, and in 1850 Congress made another
appropriation of $20,000 for life-saving purposes.

[Illustration: ONE OF THE FIRST UNITED STATES LIFE-SAVING STATIONS.]

Of this sum half was expended in erecting additional stations along the
shores of Long Island, and for a new station at Watch Hill, R. I.

The attention of Congress having been called to the needs of some means
of rendering assistance to wrecked vessels along the coasts of North
and South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, and Texas, the remaining $10,000
of this appropriation was expended in placing life-boats at the most
exposed points on these coasts.

In 1853 and 1854 Congress made liberal appropriations for life-saving
purposes, and fourteen new stations were built on the coast of New
Jersey.

The service was at this time extended to the Great Lakes, twenty-three
life-boats being stationed at different points on Lake Michigan, and
several others on the other lake shores and on the Atlantic coast. In
1854 there were one hundred and thirty-seven life-boats stationed along
the coasts of the United States. Of this number fifty-five were at
stations on the New York and New Jersey coasts.

[Illustration: HAROLDINE STRANDED ON NAUSET BARS.]

[Illustration: AFTER THE BEACH COMBERS HAVE WORKED ON THE WRECK.]

The absence of drilled and disciplined crews at these stations,
however,--together with irresponsible custodians and the lack of proper
equipments, the result of pillage or decay,--contributed to great loss
of life and heartrending scenes of disaster along the Atlantic coast.
The inefficiency of the life-saving service, as it then existed, was
apparent to all. Public sentiment had now become excited, and Congress
was appealed to for immediate relief from the existing conditions.

In 1853 a bill which provided for the increase and repair of the
stations and the guardianship of the life-boats passed the Senate;
but, unfortunately, failed to reach the House before adjournment. An
appalling disaster, the wreck of the _Powhatan_, on the coast of New
Jersey, in which three hundred lives were lost, caused the bill to be
promptly and favorably acted upon at the next session of Congress.
Under the provisions of this bill a superintendent at a salary of
$1,500 per annum was appointed for the Atlantic and Lake coasts,
keepers were placed in charge of the stations at a salary of $200,
bonded custodians secured for the life-boats and other apparatus, and
the stations and equipments speedily put in order.

[Illustration: ELSIE M. SMITH, WHICH BECAME A TOTAL LOSS ON NAUSET
BEACH.]

The service was somewhat improved as a result of this, but there were
still many defects in it, which were brought to light as disaster
followed disaster along the seaboard. Up to this time the life-saving
crews were not regularly employed.

A bill providing for the employment of regular crews of surfmen was
presented to Congress in 1869. Strange though it may seem, in view of
the terrible disasters and loss of life which had so recently taken
place along the Atlantic coast, the bill suffered defeat. A substitute
bill, however, which provided for the employment of crews of surfmen,
though only at alternate stations, was passed. This marks the
beginning of the employment of crews of surfmen at the United States
life-saving stations, and was the first step in the direction of their
employment at all stations for regular periods.

[Illustration: SHIP A. S. ROPES DISMASTED OFF PROVINCETOWN DURING A
GALE.]

During the winter of 1870–71 a number of appalling, fatal disasters
occurred along the Atlantic coast. These disasters not only revealed
the fact that the coast was not properly guarded, but also that the
service was inefficient and needed a more complete organization. In
1871 Congress again appropriated $200,000 and authorized the Secretary
of the Treasury to employ crews of surfmen at such stations and for
such periods as he might deem necessary.

Mr. Sumner I. Kimball, the present general superintendent of the
United States Life-Saving Service, was at that time in charge of the
Revenue Marine Service, and the life-saving stations being then under
the charge of that bureau, he at once took steps to ascertain the
conditions of the service.

An officer of the Revenue Marine Service was at once detailed to visit
the life-saving stations and to make a report of their condition and
requirements.

The report made by the officer was a startling revelation. Absolutely
no discipline was found among the crews, no care had been taken of
the apparatus, some of the stations were in ruins, others lacked such
articles as powder, rockets, and shot lines, every portable article
had been stolen from many stations, and the money that Congress had
appropriated had been practically wasted.

From the report it was plainly evident that the reorganization of the
service must be speedily brought about, and in accordance with an
act of Congress in 1872, the organization of the present system of
life-saving districts with superintendents took place.

The inefficient keepers were at once removed and the most skilled
boatmen obtainable were placed in charge of the stations.

The stations were also manned by the most expert surfmen to be found
along the coast, and the patrol of the coast at night and during thick
weather by day was inaugurated. It was soon found that the life-saving
stations, however, were too far apart for the crews to be of assistance
to one another in the event of a wreck, and measures were adopted to
place them within distances of from three to five miles of one another.
To bring about this result, twelve new stations were built on the New
Jersey coast, six on Long Island, while the location of some of the
existing stations were changed.

The stations were plain houses forty-two feet long and eighteen wide,
of two stories and four rooms. One room below was used by the crew as
mess-room, the other room contained the boats and other apparatus used
at wrecks. One of the upper rooms was used as a sleeping room for the
crew, the other room was used as a storeroom.

As a result of the reorganization of the service, the record for the
first season shows that not a life was lost in the disasters that
occurred on either the Lake shores or the Atlantic coast.

[Illustration: AN ABANDONED FISHERMAN IN A BAD PLACE.]

Interest in the success of the life-saving service under the new
system was now keyed up to a high pitch. Congress had authorized a
new station for the coast of Rhode Island in 1871, and in June, 1872,
one more was ordered for that coast, and nine for the coast of Cape
Cod. These stations were built and manned in the winter of 1872. The
nine that were erected on Cape Cod were located as follows: Race Point
and Peaked Hill Bars, at Provincetown; Highlands, at North Truro;
Pamet River, at Truro; Cahoon’s Hollow, at Wellfleet; Nauset, at
North Eastham; Orleans, at Orleans; Chatham, at Chatham; and Monomoy,
on Monomoy Island. Since that time four new stations have been
established, the Wood End, High Head, Old Harbor, and Monomoy Point.

[Illustration: THE LIFE-SAVERS MESS ROOM, NAUSET STATION.]

The life-saving stations on Cape Cod are situated among the sand hills
common to the eastern shores of the Cape, at distances back from the
high-water mark as to insure their safety. In most instances they
are plain structures, designed to serve as a home for the crew and
to afford storage for the boats and other apparatus. In most of the
stations on Cape Cod the lower floor is divided into five rooms--a mess
room, which also serves for a sitting room for the crew, a kitchen,
a keeper’s room, a boat and beach apparatus room. Wide double-leafed
doors with a sloping platform permit the quick and easy running out of
the surf-boat and other apparatus from the station.

The second story contains two rooms: one the sleeping room for the
crew; the other has spare cots for rescued persons, and is also used as
a storeroom.

[Illustration: THE SIMPLY FURNISHED SLEEPING QUARTERS, CAHOON’S HOLLOW
STATION.]

On every station there is a lookout or observatory, from which the
life savers, during the day when the weather is fair, keep a careful
watch of all shipping along the coast. In order that the life-saving
stations may be distinguished from a long distance at sea, they are
usually painted dark red, and as a further aid to shipping, they are
marked by a flagstaff about sixty feet high erected close by them. This
flagstaff is also used to signal passing vessels by the International
code. These stations are manned from the 1st of August until June
1st following, the keeper remaining on duty throughout the year. The
stations are generally furnished with two surf-boats (supplied with
oars, life preservers, life-boat compass, drag, boat-hooks, hatchet,
heaving line, knife, bucket, and other outfits), boat carriages, two
sets of breeches-buoy apparatus (including guns and accessories), carts
for the transportation of the apparatus, a life-car, cork-jackets
(life preservers), Coston signals, signal rockets, signal flags of the
International and General signal code, medicine chests with contents,
patrol lanterns, barometer, thermometer, patrol clocks, the requisite
furniture for housekeeping by the crew and for the succor of rescued
persons, fuel, oil, tools for the repair of the boats and apparatus,
and minor repairs to the buildings, and the necessary books and
stationery.

With the International and General code of signals, shipping, when
miles at sea, can, by this means, open communication with the stations,
be reported, obtain latitude and longitude, or, if disabled, can thus
send for assistance.

All the life-saving stations on Cape Cod are connected by telephone
with lines running to central stations in Provincetown and Chatham.
Close watch of the movements of all shipping is in this way easily
maintained, and in time of disaster help is quickly summoned and
obtained from one station to another.

[Illustration: BARK KATE HARDING HIGH AND DRY ON THE BEACH AND SOON A
TOTAL WRECK.]

In the life-saving service the week begins on Sunday night at midnight,
and the days are each set apart for some particular kind of employment.

On Monday the members of the crew are employed putting the station
in order. On Tuesday, weather permitting, the crew are drilled in
launching and landing in the life-boat through the surf.

On Wednesday the men are drilled in the International and General code
of signals.

Thursday, the crew drill with the beach apparatus and breeches-buoy.

Friday, the crew practice the resuscitation drill for restoring the
apparently drowned.

Saturday is wash-day.

Sunday is devoted to religious practices.


SALARIES OF THE KEEPERS AND SURFMEN.

The keepers of the life-saving stations receive $900 per year for their
services, and the surfmen $65 per month.

In the early history of the life-saving service the keepers received
but $200 per year, later their salary was increased to $400, then to
$700, and, finally, to the present figure.

The surfmen in the early days of the service received but $40 per
month, later it was increased to $45, then to $60, and, finally, to the
present sum.

[Illustration: BEACH COMBERS AT WORK STRIPPING THE WRECKED FISHING
VESSEL FORTUNA.]

At the opening of the “active season,” August 1 of each year, the men
assemble at their respective stations and establish themselves for a
residence of ten months, being allowed one day in seven to visit their
homes between sunrise and sunset. They arrange for their housekeeping,
usually forming a mess, each man taking turns by the week in cooking.
The crew is organized by the keeper arranging and numbering them in
their supposed order of merit, the most competent and trustworthy
being designated as No. 1, the next No. 2, and so on. These numbers
are changed by promotion as vacancies occur, or by such rearrangement
from time to time as proficiency in drill and performance of duty may
dictate. Whenever the keeper is absent, the No. 1 surfman assumes
command and exercises the keeper’s functions. When the rank of the crew
has been fixed, the keeper assigns to each his position and prepares
station bills for the day watch, night patrol, boat and apparatus
drill, care of the station, etc. Then all is ready for the active work
and the watch of the sea and shore that never ceases, day or night,
until the close of the active season ten months later.

The patrol of the beaches each night, and during thick weather by
day, by which stranded vessels are promptly discovered and the rescue
of the imperiled crews made the object of effort by the life saver,
distinguishes the United States Life-Saving Service from all others
in the world, and in a great measure accounts for its unparalleled
triumphs in rescuing shipwrecked seafarers.

If the surfman sights a vessel in distress or running into danger
during the night, he fires a brilliant red Coston signal which he
always carries. This is a signal to the shipwrecked crew that they have
been seen and assistance has been summoned, and to the crew of a vessel
which is approaching the danger line along the coast that it is time to
haul offshore.

[Illustration: COSTON SIGNAL.]

During the daylight on clear days the watch is kept from a lookout on
the station, or by observation from points where the entire beach and
sea limits of the station’s district can be clearly seen. Foggy days,
and during thick weather, and every night, fair or foul, the watch is
by the patrol of every foot of the water front of each district. The
stations are located about five miles apart, and the district patrol
beats of each are thus about two and one-half miles on either side of
the station. The boundaries of each district are marked by a little hut
in some protected spot on the beach called “The half-way house,” except
at the Wood End Station. The night patrol is divided into four watches,
one from sunset to 8 o’clock (the dog watch), one from 8 to 12, one
from 12 to 4, and one from 4 to sunrise. Two surfmen are designated for
each watch.

When the time for their patrol arrives, the surfmen set out from the
station, in opposite directions, keeping well down on the beach as
near the surf as possible until they reach the half-way house. Here
they get warmed, and the surfmen from the adjoining station are met
and checks exchanged. If a patrolman fails to meet the patrolman from
the adjoining station at the half-way house, he, after waiting for
a reasonable time, continues his journey until he either meets the
patrolman or reaches the other station and ascertains the cause of
failure. He thus patrols the neglected shore and is at hand to assist
in case of disaster detaining the other patrolman. At the stations
where the patrolmen carry watchmen’s time-clocks the key is secured to
a post at the end of the beat, and the patrolman is required to reach
it, wind the clock, and must bring back the dial in his clock properly
recorded.

[Illustration: HALF-WAY HOUSE, WHERE SURFMEN FROM ADJOINING STATIONS
MEET AND EXCHANGE CHECKS.

These houses are connected with the stations by telephone, and often
from here the keepers are notified of disaster, and the crew summoned
to a wreck.]

The means employed at the life-saving stations for rescuing persons
from wrecked vessels is everywhere essentially the same, either
a life-boat is sent out through the surf or the breeches-buoy,
or life-car used. The rescues by boat are the most thrilling and
hazardous. The method of establishing communication with stranded
vessels is over a century old, successful experiments with this method
having been made as early as 1791 by Lieutenant Bell of the Royal
Artillery. He demonstrated the practicability of the method by means
of a mortar, which carried a heavy shot four hundred yards from a
vessel to the shore. Lieutenant Bell also observed that a line might
be carried from the shore over a stranded vessel by the means of his
mortar, but the credit for the actual execution of this method of
establishing communication is given to Capt. G. W. Manby, according
to a report of a committee of the House of Commons, dated March 10,
1810. A London coach-maker first conceived the idea of a life-boat. The
present type is the product of a century’s devoted study and experiment.

[Illustration: A SURFMAN’S CHECK.]

Practice drills in the use of the breeches-buoy and surf-boats are
carried on constantly at each station, until so proficient are the
crews that practice rescues are often made in less than three minutes.
The practice is carried on under conditions as near active work in a
disaster as are possible, and a description of a drill will give the
best idea of actual work at a wreck.

For the practice with the beach apparatus, the breeches-buoy, each
station has a drill ground prepared by erecting a spar, called a wreck
pole, to represent the mast of a stranded vessel seventy-five yards
distant. This is over the water, if possible, from the place where the
men operate, which represents the shore.

[Illustration: TAKING A MAN ASHORE WITH THE BREECHES-BUOY. LYLE GUN IN
FOREGROUND.]

Each man knows in detail every act he is to perform in the exercise
from constant practice, and as prescribed in the Service Manual. At the
word of command they drag the apparatus to the drill ground, where they
effect a mimic rescue by rigging the gear and taking a man ashore from
the wreck pole in the breeches-buoy. If one month after the opening
of the active season a crew cannot accomplish the rescue within five
minutes, it is considered that they have been remiss in drilling.

No such celerity, however, is expected of the life savers in effecting
rescues from shipwrecks, when storm, surf, currents, and motion
of the stranded crafts conspire to obstruct. The hastening of the
work of mimic rescue, however, gives the life-savers the utmost
familiarity with the apparatus and prepares them for working speedily
and successfully in utter darkness and under the most trying weather
conditions.

The boat practice consists in launching and landing through the surf,
capsizing and righting the boat, and practice in handling the oars.
Drill signaling is interrogating each surfman as to the meaning of
the various flags, the use of the code book, and actual conversation
carried on by means of sets of miniature signals provided for each
station.

The beach apparatus, the breeches-buoy, is used to effect the rescue of
shipwrecked seafarers when vessels have stranded near the shore and the
conditions make it inexpedient to use the surf-boats. At such times the
apparatus is hauled to the scene in the beach cart; horses, kept at all
the stations for the purpose, assisting the life savers in the work.

[Illustration: READY FOR A PRACTICE DRILL WITH THE BREECHES-BUOY AND
FLAGS.]

Frequently the storms which sweep the beaches are so violent that the
horses refuse to pull the cart, and the life savers are then obliged
to cover the head of the animals before they can be induced to face
the fury of the elements. The life savers when on such journeys are
usually driven to the back of the beaches by the tides, and the task of
dragging the apparatus over the sand dunes is extremely difficult and
hazardous.

The “cut throughs” in the beaches, places where during storms the seas
rush through to the lowlands, further contribute to the dangers that
confront the life savers as they rush along with the apparatus.

These “cut throughs” are also the dreaded menace of the surfmen on
patrol, during stormy weather and high tides, the seas, as they sweep
through them, often entrapping the life savers, throwing them down,
burying them in the rushing waters, and jeopardizing their lives.

As soon as the life savers reach the scene of disaster, the Lyle gun is
quickly taken from the cart, loaded, sighted, and fired, the captain,
who sights and fires the gun, taking good care that he has sent the
shot flying through the storm well to the windward of the wrecked
vessel, so that if the shot should fail to go across the vessel, yet
beyond it, the line will be carried to the wreck by the force of the
gale.

[Illustration: LIFE SAVERS AND HORSE HARNESSED TO SURF BOAT CART READY
TO GO TO A WRECK.]

The work of burying the sand anchor, getting the crotch, whip line,
hawser, and breeches-buoy ready is speedily accomplished. Torches are
kept burning by the life savers to tell those on the wrecked vessel
that assistance is at hand and the life savers are at work, and even if
the imperiled crew do not hear the report of the gun, which has fired a
shot to the vessel, they at once begin a search for the shot-line which
is invariably found somewhere in the rigging.

The captain, with the shore end of the shot-line in his hand, waits for
a signal from the ship that the line has passed over the vessel, and
that the crew have found it and are ready to proceed with the work of
rescue. A tail-block with a whip, an endless line rove through it, is
made fast to the shot-line, and the wrecked seafarers haul it aboard
their vessel as speedily as possible. Attached to the tail-block is a
tally board with the following directions in English and French printed
on it:--

“Make the tail of the block fast to lower mast well up. If the masts
are gone, then to the best place you can find. Cast off shot-line, see
that rope in the block runs free, and show signal to shore.”

[Illustration: THE BEACH CART, MEN, AND HORSE, WITH HARNESS ON, READY
TO GO TO A WRECK.]

The foregoing instructions having been complied with, the result will
be as shown in Figure 1.

[Illustration: FIGURE 1.]

As soon as the life savers get a signal from the vessel that the
tail-block has been made fast, they “tie” bend on a three-inch hawser
to the whip, the endless line, and by it haul the hawser off to the
vessel. Occasionally circumstances permit wrecked crews to assist in
this part of the work, but usually the life savers are compelled to do
it alone. To the end of the hawser, which has been bent on to the whip,
the endless line, is also attached a tally board with the following
directions in English and French:--

“Make the hawser fast about two feet above the tail-block; see all
clear, and that the rope in the block runs free; show signal to the
shore.”

[Illustration: FIGURE 2.]

These instructions being obeyed, the result will be shown as in Figure
2.

[Illustration: FIGURE 3.]

Particular care must be taken that there are no turns of the whip, the
endless line, around the hawser; to prevent this the end of the hawser
is taken up between the parts of the whip, the endless line, before
making it fast. When the hawser is made fast to the wrecked vessel,
the whip, the endless line, is cast off from the hawser, and the life
savers, having been signaled to this effect, make the shore end of the
hawser fast to the strap of the sand anchor. The crotch is then placed
under the hawser and raised, and the latter drawn as taut as possible,
thus making a slender bridge of rope between the vessel and shore. The
traveler block, from which is suspended the breeches-buoy, is then put
on the hawser, the whip, the endless line, made fast to breeches-buoy,
and thus hauled to and from the vessel, as shown in Figure 3, which
represent the apparatus rigged with the breeches-buoy hauled out to the
vessel.

[Illustration: SHOT USED WITH LYLE GUN.]

The life savers always carry a good supply of shot and lines with them,
and if the first shot fails to carry the line to the vessel, which
seldom occurs, owing to the skill of those who have charge of this
important branch of the work, a second one is promptly fired. The work
of hauling the breeches-buoy to and from a wrecked vessel is an arduous
task. The whip, the endless line, after passing through the seas,
becomes coated with ice and sand, which cuts the mittens and lacerates
the hands of the surfmen in a fearful manner at times.

The captain and one of the life savers rush into the surf and take
the rescued persons out of the breeches-buoy as soon as it reaches
the beach, while the other members of the crew stand ready to again
send the breeches-buoy off to the wreck as soon as one rescue has been
accomplished. In this way one after another of shipwrecked crews are
brought ashore.

[Illustration: LYLE GUN, SHOWING SHOT PROTRUDING FROM THE MUZZLE.]

Women and children and helpless persons are landed first from wrecked
vessels. Children when brought ashore in this way are held in the arms
of some elder person or securely lashed to the breeches-buoy. The
instructions to mariners are to remain by the wreck until assistance
arrives, unless the vessel shows signs of immediately breaking up. If
not discovered immediately by the patrol, the crews of wrecked vessels
are instructed to burn rockets, flare up, or other lights, and if the
weather is foggy to fire guns.

Under no circumstances should the crew of wrecked vessels attempt
to land through the surf in their own boats, until the last hope of
assistance from shore has vanished. Often when comparatively smooth at
sea, a dangerous surf is running alongshore, which is not perceptible
three or four hundred yards offshore, and the surf when viewed from
a vessel never appears so dangerous as it is. Many lives have been
unnecessarily lost by crews of stranded vessels being thus deceived and
attempting to land in the ship’s boats.

After a crew has been rescued the work of recovering the apparatus
is quickly accomplished, and every part of it except the shot is
invariably recovered, and often even the shot is also saved. This is
done by a hawser cutter, which is pulled off to the wreck on the hawser
the same as the breeches-buoy, cutting the hawser off close to where
it is attached to the wrecked vessel. The life savers then haul the
apparatus through the sea to the shore.

The first gun used for throwing a line to stranded ships was of cast
iron, and weighed two hundred and eighty-eight pounds, and threw a shot
weighing twenty-four pounds, with an extreme range of four hundred and
twenty-one yards. This soon gave place to an improved gun, which was of
cast iron, with steel lining, mounted on a wooden carriage. This gun
weighed two hundred and sixty-six pounds, and carried a twenty-four
pound shot four hundred and seventy-three yards. The Lyle gun, which
is now used by the life savers of Cape Cod, is a bronze smooth bore
gun, weighing but one hundred and eighty-five pounds, and fires a
cylindrical line, carrying shot, weighing about eighteen pounds,
some six hundred and ninety-five yards. This projectile has a shank
protruding from the muzzle of the gun to an eye in which the line is
tied--a device which prevents, to a degree, the line from being burned
off by the ignited gases in firing. As further protection against this
happening, the life savers wet that part of the line liable to become
burned. When the gun is fired the weight and inertia of the line cause
the projectile to reverse. The shot-line is made of unbleached linen
thread very closely and smoothly braided, is waterproof, and has great
elasticity, which tends to insure it against breaking. The lines in use
vary in thickness according to circumstances. They are of three sizes,
designated as number 4, 7, and 9, being respectively 4/32, 7/32, or
9/32 of an inch in diameter. Any charge of powder can be used up to the
maximum six ounces.

[Illustration: FAKING BOX.]

The Lyle gunshot line is carried in a faking box, so called, a wooden
box with handles for convenience for carrying. The line is coiled
on wooden pins, layer above layer. When brought into use the pins
are withdrawn, and the line lies disposed in layers ready to pay out
freely and fly to the wreck without entanglement. While six hundred
and ninety-five yards is the greatest range to be obtained by a Lyle
gun, about two hundred yards is considered the working limit. The line
sags so, at more than two hundred yards, and the currents are usually
so swift, that the crew of a stranded vessel could not haul the whip
aboard their craft at a much greater distance, and in addition any one
being pulled ashore in the breeches-buoy further than that would most
likely perish from the cold and buffeting of the seas before they could
be rescued.

[Illustration: LIFE-CAR.]

The crotch is made of two pieces of wood, three by two inches thick,
and ten feet long, securely bolted together, and crossed near the top
so as to form a sort of X. The sand anchor is two pieces of hard wood,
six feet long, eight inches wide and two inches thick, crossed at their
centers, bolted together, and furnished at the center with a stout
iron ring. It is laid obliquely in a trench behind the crotch. An iron
hook, from which runs a strap of rope, having at its other end an iron
ring called bull’s-eye, is fastened into the ring of the sand anchor.
This strap connects with a double pulley-block at the end of the hawser
behind the crotch, by which the hawser is drawn and kept taut. The
trench is solidly filled in, and the imbedded sand anchor, held by the
lateral strain against the side of the trench, sustains the slender
bridge of rope constituted by the hawser between the stranded vessel
and the shore.

The large majority of vessels now stranded on the shores of the Cape
being coasters, with crews from six to ten men, the breeches-buoy is
invariably used in preference to the life-car. It weighs but twenty-one
pounds. It consists of a common life-preserver of cork, seven and
one-half feet in circumference, to which short canvas breeches are
attached. Four rope lanyards, fastened to the circle of this cork, meet
above an iron ring, which is attached to a block, called a traveler.
The hawser passes through this block, and the suspended breeches-buoy
is drawn between ship and shore by a whip, an endless line. At each
trip it receives but one person, who gets into it with their legs down
through the canvas breeches legs, holding to the lanyards, sustained in
a sitting position by the canvas saddle, or seat of the breeches, with
his legs dangling below. When there is imminent danger of the vessel
breaking up and great haste is required, two persons get into the
breeches-buoy at once, and to further expedite the work of rescue, the
hawser is dispensed with, part of the hauling line being used for the
breeches-buoy to travel on to and from the wreck.

[Illustration: “A PERILOUS TASK.” LIFE SAVERS GOING TO A WRECKED VESSEL
ON PEAKED HILL BARS.]

There are many kinds of life-boats, and various devices for effecting
communication by line with stranded vessels. The type of boats in use
on Cape Cod are the Monomoy and Race Point models. All these boats
are distinctly known as surf-boats. They are constructed of cedar
with white oak frames, and are from twenty-two to twenty-four feet
in length. The surf-boats have air chambers at the ends, and are
fitted with cork fenders along the outer side to protect them against
collisions with hulls or wreckage, and to further aid in keeping them
afloat, and righting lines by which they can be righted if capsized in
the surf. They weigh from seven hundred to one thousand pounds. In the
hands of the skilled surfmen of Cape Cod they are capable of marvelous
action, and few sights are more impressive than the surf-boat plowing
its way through the breakers, at times riding on top of the surge, at
others held in suspension before the roaring tumultuous wall of water,
or darting forth as the comber breaks and crumbles, obedient to the
oars of the impassive life savers. All these boats are so light that
they can be readily transported along the sandy shores of the Cape
under normal weather conditions, and launched in very shallow water.

[Illustration: HEAVING STICK.

A small line is attached to this, and the life savers find it a very
valuable means of getting a line to a vessel or piece of wreckage. It
can be used advantageously at about fifty yards.]

The type of boat that is best suited for one locality, however, may be
ill adapted for another, and a boat that would be serviceable at one
time might be worse than useless at another. On the coast of Cape Cod
the boat service at wrecks is generally not very far off from shore,
and the chief and greatest danger lurks in the lines of surf which must
be crossed, and in the breakers on the outlying shoals.

The self-righting and bailing boat is more unwieldy, not so quickly
responsive to the tactics of the steersman, and not so well adapted
to the general work on Cape Cod. Where long excursions are apt to be
undertaken, and the service is especially hazardous, the men feel safer
in a self-righting and bailing boat, one of which has been introduced
at the new Monomoy Point Station.

[Illustration: WAITING FOR A GOOD CHANCE TO LAUNCH.]

[Illustration: LIFE SAVERS PRACTICING LAUNCHING THROUGH THE SURF.]

[Illustration: A GOOD LAUNCHING. CAPTAIN IN THE ACT OF GETTING INTO THE
BOAT.]

When the surf-boat is used to effect rescue it is taken along the
beach to a point as near the wreck as possible, unloaded from the cart,
and at a favorable time run into the raging waters. The keeper is the
last man to get aboard the surf-boat, climbing in over the stern as
she is run into the sea. The life savers who remain ashore to assist
in getting the boat off run waist deep into the sea, helping to guide
the boat, and to prevent her, if possible, from being capsized in
the surf. The keeper steers with a long oar, and with the aid of his
trained surfmen, intent upon his every look and command, guides the
buoyant craft through the surf with masterly skill. He is usually able
to avoid a direct encounter with the heaviest breakers, but if he is
obliged to let them strike him, he meets them directly “head on.”

[Illustration: A GOOD LANDING.]

[Illustration: IN DANGER OF OVERTURNING.]

Although sometimes hurled back upon the beach and broken in desperate
and unavailing attempts at a launch against a resistless sea, this
boat, which might easily be upset, has rarely been capsized in going
through the surf. While there is always great peril in launching these
boats in times of shipwreck, the greatest danger lies in landing
through the surf. The gigantic walls of water speeding to the shore
cannot then be met head on as when the boat is passing out, and when
one of these tumultuous combers break over the stern of the boat,
which, fortunately, has rarely occurred on Cape Cod, the lives of those
aboard the craft are placed in great peril.

In landing the life savers jump into the surf as the boat is about
to touch the beach, and with the assistance of those of the crew who
remained ashore to select a good landing place, the craft is quickly
run up on the beach far out of the reach of the dangerous undertow.

[Illustration: AFTER A WRECK, SURFMEN OF CAHOON’S HOLLOW STATION
CARRYING A BODY TO THEIR STATION.]

This work is also attended with great danger, the surfmen sometimes
receiving injuries by being struck by the boat, which incapacitates
them from further duty in the service. The keepers and crews place
their faith in the surf-boats which they use, and they are ever ready
to face any sea in which a boat will live.

When a distressed vessel is reached, the orders of the keeper, the
captain of the crew of life savers, who always steers and commands,
must be implicitly obeyed.

There must be no headlong rushing or crowding, and the captain of the
ship must remain on board to preserve order until every other person
has left. Women, children, and helpless persons are taken into the boat
first. Goods or baggage will not be taken into the boat under any
circumstances until all persons are landed. If any be passed in against
the keeper’s remonstrance he throws it overboard.

It often happens, however, that some of the crew, and even captains
of wrecked vessels, attempt to get their baggage into the surf-boats.
At a wreck which Captain Cole and his crew went to in the night a few
years ago the captain of the craft insisted that the life savers should
wait until he could get his baggage ready to take ashore. Captain Cole,
in a voice that could be heard above the roar and din of the storm,
commanded the bow oarsmen, who was holding the painter that kept the
surf-boat alongside the wreck, to cut the painter. The captain of the
stranded craft no sooner heard this command than he jumped into the
boat, leaving his effects behind, and was safely taken ashore.

Persons rescued from shipwreck are taken to the nearest life-saving
station, the weak, sick, and the disabled are treated with remedies
from the medicine chest, supplied under the direction of the
Surgeon-General of the Marine Hospital Service. Those who have escaped
from shipwreck and are wet, hungry, and cold are provided with dry
clothing, warmed, fed, lodged, and cared for until they are able to
leave.


RESTORING THE APPARENTLY DROWNED TO LIFE.

The method adopted for restoring the apparently drowned is formulated
into rules which each member of the crew commits to memory. In drill
he is required to repeat these and afterwards illustrate them by
manipulations upon one of his comrades. The medicine chest is also
opened, and he is examined as to the use of its contents.

The dry clothing is taken from the supply constantly kept on hand at
the different stations by the Women’s National Relief Association, an
organization established to afford relief to sufferers from disasters
of every kind. The libraries at the stations are from the donations of
the Seamen’s Friend Society and sundry benevolent persons. The food is
prepared by the keepers or the station mess, who are reimbursed by the
recipients if they have the means, or by the government.

The life-saving service is attached to the treasury department. The sea
and lake coasts of the United States have an extent of more than ten
thousand miles, and are divided into thirteen life-saving districts,
each under the immediate supervision of a district superintendent. The
chief officer of the service is the general superintendent, who has
general charge of it and of all administrative matters connected with
it. An inspector from the Revenue Marine Service visits each station
monthly during the “active season,” which is ten months, from August 1
to June 1, and examines and practices the crews in their duties. On
his first visit, after the opening of the stations each year, if any
are found not up to the standard, they are promptly dropped from the
service. The district superintendents are promoted from the corps of
keepers, and must be residents of the respective districts for which
they are chosen, and are rigidly examined as to their professional
familiarity with the line of coast embraced within the district and the
use of life-boats and all other life-saving apparatus.

The keeper of each station has direct control of all its affairs,
and as his position is one of the most important of the service, the
selection is made with the greatest care.

[Illustration: A RESCUED SHIPWRECKED CREW.]

The indispensable qualifications are that he shall be a man of good
character and habits, not less than twenty-one and not over forty-five
years of age, with sufficient education to be able to transact the
business connected with the station, be able bodied, physically sound,
and a master of boatcraft and surfing.

No difficulty is found in filling vacancies that occur among the
keepers, as they must be promoted from the ranks of the surfmen, and
the merits of all the surfmen, having been ascertained by inspection,
drill, and active service, are on record. The keepers are required to
reside at their stations all the year round, and are entrusted with
the care, custody, and government of the station and property. They
are captains of their crews, exercise absolute control in matters of
discipline, lead the men, and share their perils on all occasions of
rescue, always taking the steering oar when the boats are used, and
directing all operations with the other apparatus.

[Illustration:   WEEKLY TRANSCRIPT OF JOURNAL.]

The keeper and six men constitute the regular crew at each of the
stations on Cape Cod, except at the Monomoy Station, where the regular
crew is seven men. An additional man called “the winter man” is added
to all stations on December 1 of each year, so that during the most
rigorous part of the season one man, at least, may be left ashore
to assist in launching and beaching of the surf-boat, and to have
charge of the station and perform the extra work that winter weather
necessitates.

The life-saving crews are selected from able-bodied and experienced
surfmen after the rigid examination required by the department.

[Illustration: SURFMAN GAGE, ORLEANS STATION,

Dressed for cold night, with time clock, beach lantern, and coston
signal.]

The surfmen, in addition to being obliged to pass a rigid physical
examination before they can enter the service, must also pass a similar
examination yearly before the opening of the active season. No matter
how long they may have been in the service, the hardships they have
suffered, the perils they have faced, or the great deeds of heroism
they have performed, if they are found not to be physically sound they
are dropped from the service, ruined in health, without the slightest
compensation for the years of faithful service.

The profession of a surfman is entirely different from that of a
sailor, being only acquired by coast fishermen and wreckers after
years of experience in passing in and out through the surf. The method
of selecting the life-saving crews has resulted in securing the most
skilful and fearless surfmen, whose gallant deeds of heroism have made
them famous throughout the land. Upon original entry into the service
a surfman must be a citizen of the United States, not over forty-five
years of age.

He is examined as to his expertness in the management of boats and the
use of other life-saving apparatus, and matters of that character. He
signs articles by which he agrees to reside at the station continuously
during the active season, to perform such duties as may be required of
him by the regulations and by his superior officers, and also to hold
himself in readiness for service during the inactive season if called
upon. For this he receives sixty-five dollars per month. For each
occasion he is called upon, during the two months’ inactive season, he
receives three dollars.

The district superintendents, inspectors, keepers, and crews, the law
says, are to be selected “solely with reference to their fitness and
without reference to their political or party affiliations.”

[Illustration: STRANDED CLOSE TO SHORE.]

Every time a wreck occurs the keepers are required to make out and
forward to the department a wreck report, containing answers to a great
number of pertinent questions.

If a life is lost the law requires that a thorough investigation be
instituted with a view of ascertaining the circumstances, and whether
the fatality was due to any neglect or misconduct on the part of the
service. Any misconduct or incompetency at other times is likewise
subject to rigid investigation. The results of the investigations into
the circumstances of loss of life are fully set out in the annual
reports of the service, which the general superintendent is required to
make.

Life savers, disabled in the line of duty, are retained upon the
payrolls during the continuance of their disability, not to exceed
one year, though in certain cases the period may be extended upon
recommendation for a greater period, but not more than two years. In
case of their death from service or from disease contracted in the
line of duty, their widows and children under sixteen years of age are
entitled to be paid during a period of two years the same amount that
the husband or father would have received.

In addition to saving the lives of the imperiled, an important part of
the duty of the life savers is that of saving property. The amount of
property saved annually by these guardians of the coast largely exceeds
the cost of maintenance of the service. The keepers are authorized and
required by law to take charge of and protect all such property until
claimed by those legally entitled to receive it, or until otherwise
directed by the department as to its disposition. The keepers have the
powers of the inspectors of customs and faithfully guard the interests
of the government in all dutiable wrecked property.

[Illustration: LIFE SAVERS FLOATING A SCHOONER.]

Doubtless the United States Life-Saving Service system appears to
be an expensive and elaborate one, but it must be remembered that,
putting aside entirely the consideration of the value of human life,
which is beyond computation, it saves many times its cost in property
alone, and that it fulfils the functions usually allotted to several
different agencies. It rescues the shipwrecked by both the principal
methods which humane ingenuity has devised for that purpose, and
which, in some countries, are practiced separately by two distinct
organizations; it furnishes them the subsequent succor which elsewhere
would be afforded by shipwrecked mariners’ societies; it guards the
lives of persons in peril or of drowning by falling into the water
from piers and wharves in the harbors of populous cities, an office
usually performed by humane societies; it nightly patrols the dangerous
coast for the early discovery of wrecks and the hastening of relief,
thus increasing the chances of rescue, and shortening by hours intense
physical suffering and the terrible agony of suspense; it places over
peculiarly dangerous points upon the rivers and lakes a sentry prepared
to send instant relief to those who incautiously or recklessly incur
the hazard of capsizing in boats; it conducts to places of safety
those imperiled in their homes by the torrents of flood, and conveys
food to those imprisoned in their homes by inundation and threatened
by famine; it annually saves, unaided, hundreds of stranded vessels,
with their cargoes, from total or partial destruction, and assists in
saving scores of others; it protects wrecked property after landing
from the ravage of the elements and the rapine of plunderers; it
extricates vessels unwarily caught in perilous positions; it averts
numerous disasters by its flashing signals of warning to vessels
standing in danger; it assists the custom service in collecting the
revenues of the government; it pickets the coast with a guard, which
prevents smuggling, and, in time of war, surprise by hostile forces,
which makes the service unlike all other organizations established for
similar purposes.

[Illustration: THETA, STRANDED IN A BAD PLACE.]

[Illustration: BEACH COMBERS WAITING TO STRIP THE WRECKED VESSEL.]

The distinction of having founded and created the United States
Life-Saving Service having been the subject of much discussion in
recent years, General Superintendent Kimball, in his report to the
Secretary of the Treasury as to the claims of W. A. Newell, as the
originator of the system of the Life-Saving Service of the United
States, in conclusion states as follows:--

“The fact is, the credit of originating and developing the United
States Life-Saving Service cannot truthfully be awarded to any single
individual.

“In Congress and out of Congress many men have contributed, some in
a great and some in a less degree to the success of its fortunes.
To even write down the names of the legislators in both houses of
Congress, who have been its advocates and champions, and to refer
ever so briefly to their valuable assistance, would occupy much space
and require considerable research, but there occurred to me at once
as conspicuous among the host of its promoters, Senators Hannibal H.
Hamlin, O. D. Conger, W. E. Kenna, W. J. Sewell, and William P. Frye,
and Representatives S. S. Cox, Charles B. Roberts, John Lynch, James
W. Cobert, and Jesse J. Yeates. Presidents of the United States and
various Secretaries of the Treasury have promoted its welfare. Many
officers of the life-saving service also, as well as officers detailed
to it from the Revenue Cutter Service, have, from time to time,
suggested and assisted to carry into effect important improvements.

“The life-saving service was not designed and laid out at one stroke,
in a single comprehensive plan, as an architect designs a building, or
a military genius, perhaps, devised a scheme of army organization, but
its system and development have been accomplished step by step, day
teaching unto day the necessity and wisdom of each successive measure
of progress.”


CAPT. BENJAMIN C. SPARROW.

Capt. Benjamin C. Sparrow, superintendent of the second life-saving
district, was born in Orleans, Oct. 9, 1839. He is a lineal descendant
of Richard Sparrow, who came over in the ship _Ann_, landing at
Plymouth. When a boy he always accompanied his father, a well-known
life saver and wrecker, to the shipwrecks that occurred along the
coast, and at an early age became familiar with the scenes of disaster
from which the shores of Cape Cod have become noted.

In those early days, long before the establishment of United States
life-saving stations on Cape Cod, volunteer crews responded to the
calls for assistance when there was a wreck along the coast. There were
others who engaged in the work of saving lives and of wrecking, or
assisting distressed vessels, and they were known as “beach combers.”

Captain Sparrow was a “beach comber” for many years, and relates
thrilling and interesting incidents that occurred during his
experience. After finishing his education in the public schools of his
native town, he taught in the public schools in the adjoining town of
Eastham.

He entered Phillips Academy to prepare himself for the legal
profession, and was a student there at the outbreak of the Civil
War. The war had hardly begun, however, before he left college, and
enlisted in the regular army, in the engineer battalion attached to
the headquarters of the Army of the Potomac, serving in this capacity
until 1864. During his term of service he endured much hardship, being
a prisoner at Belle Isle in the summer of 1862.

At the close of the war he returned to his home in East Orleans, where
he has since resided. On Dec. 25, 1866, he married Miss Eunice S.
Felton, of Shutesbury, Mass.

He has been connected with the United States Life-Saving Service for
thirty years, or since the time of its reorganization, his appointment
as district superintendent being a part of the plan adopted by the
government to stamp out the evils which existed in the service at the
time.

Captain Sparrow in the thirty years in which he has been
superintendent of the second district has been actively engaged in the
arduous duties of his calling, and to his efforts is due the success in
securing the discipline and efficiency in this hazardous service in the
district under his charge.

[Illustration: CAPT. B. C. SPARROW, DISTRICT SUPERINTENDENT UNITED
STATES LIFE-SAVING STATION.]

His home is connected by telephone with all the stations along the
shores of the Cape, and the moment a wreck is reported to him he is
away to the scene.

Ofttimes he has been obliged to travel many miles on foot in the teeth
of a raging gale and driving storm to reach the scene of a disaster,
yet he has attended nearly every wreck that has taken place along the
shores of Cape Cod during the past thirty years.

The veteran captain has often shared the hardships and braved the
perils with the life savers in their work along the beaches, and the
hardships of thirty years have left their deep imprint upon him. The
night that the schooner Calvin B. Orcutt was wrecked on Chatham bars,
Captain Sparrow suffered such hardship going to the scene that his
eyesight has since been seriously impaired.

The life-saving department recognized Captain Sparrow’s ability from
the first by appointing him on the board of experts to examine new
appliances and methods proposed for use by the department.

This position he has filled with great credit to himself and to the
betterment of the department to the present.

[Illustration: A DERELICT CAST ASHORE.]

Captain Sparrow has always taken an active interest in the affairs of
his town, and his fellow-citizens have honored him from time to time
with public offices within their gift. To the life savers of Cape Cod
Captain Sparrow has ever been a staunch friend.


HIGHLAND STATION.

This station derives its name from the Highlands of Cape Cod which are
in the immediate vicinity, and is one of the original nine stations
built on Cape Cod in 1872. It is seven-eighths of a mile west of Cape
Cod Highland Light, and about one and one-half miles from the North
Truro village.

[Illustration: HIGHLAND STATION.]

Its approximate position as obtained from the latest coast survey
charts is latitude north 42° 02′ 55″, longitude west 70° 04′ 20″.
Shoals run parallel with the shores at this station, and many appalling
disasters have occurred there since the station has been established.
The surfmen exchange checks with the surfmen from the High Head Station
on the west patrol, which is about one and three-quarter miles, and
with the surfmen from the Pamet River Station on the east patrol, which
is about two and one-half miles. On the east patrol the surfmen are
unable at times to follow the beach, the tides forcing them to grope
their way along the tops of the cliffs, which, in many places, rise
one hundred feet above the level of the sea. So steep are the cliffs
at points along the east patrol, that the surfmen have ropes extending
from the top to the bottom by which they are able to reach the top
when driven from the beach by the tides. In attempting to climb one of
these steep cliffs on a stormy night a few years ago, Henry Baldwin, a
substitute at this station, had the bank break under him, and falling
to the beach below, a distance of nearly fifty feet, fractured his
hip and received multiple injuries. When the unfortunate surfman did
not return to the station at the appointed time, a surfman was sent
out to search for him. No trace of him could be found, however, and
at four o’clock in the morning Captain Worthen called all hands, and
after a search of a few hours, the injured surfman was found on the
beach attempting to crawl to the station. This shows one of the perils
which confront the surfmen attached to this station. John Francis, a
surfman, who, after eighteen years of service at this station, was
forced to resign from it on account of injury to his eyesight, had a
narrow escape from death while a member of this station crew. Francis
was attempting to make his way along the beach to a point where he
could climb to the top of the cliffs. The sea was running high, and
the great undertow catching Francis, threw him down and carried him
far out from the shore. He struggled desperately, and by the merest
chance succeeded in making his way out of the surf, when thrown upon
the shore by a mountainous wave. He was more dead than alive when he
reached the station. Surfman William Paine, of this station, had a
fearful experience during a blinding snowstorm. Paine got lost, his
eyes becoming frostbitten so that he could not open them. He walked
about all night in a little grove of pine woods to keep from freezing,
and was found the following day by his comrades.

[Illustration: NEAR THE HIGHLAND STATION.]

There are three surf-boats at this station, two for active service, one
for drilling the crew, two beach carts with full sets of apparatus, and
a life-car. One of the surf-boats and a beach cart are kept in a house
near the shore. “Nellie,” a horse owned by Captain Worthen, is employed
at the station during the winter months. Cats and dogs are the pets of
the surfmen, a number of them living about the station.

Captain Worthen has been keeper of this station since it was placed in
commission, a period of over thirty years. During that time there is
a record of twenty-seven wrecks within the province of the station.
The records as to the number of persons taken ashore is not plain,
although it is certain that one hundred and fifty have been rescued by
Captain Worthen and his crew.

Only one crew in the whole history of the station has been rescued by
means of the breeches-buoy, the crew, ten in number, of the British
bark _Kate Harding_, from Barbadoes, which stranded during a fierce
gale and dangerous sea, were thus safely taken ashore. The bark became
a total wreck.


CAPT. EDWIN P. WORTHEN.

Capt. Edwin P. Worthen, keeper of the Highland Life-Saving Station,
has the distinction of being the oldest keeper in point of years of
service, not only on Cape Cod, but in the United States. He has been
in the life-saving service for more than thirty years, and has been
the keeper of the Highland Station since the station’s establishment.
He is a native of Charlestown, Mass., having been born in that city
sixty-five years ago, or July 27, 1837, to be exact.

[Illustration: ALONG THE SHORE AT HIGHLAND LIGHT.

Showing steps which life savers climb when driven to the top of the
cliffs by the seas.]

Captain Worthen is indeed a warrior of the sea, a triumphant fighter
of the storms that sweep the coasts of Cape Cod, a life saver who has
witnessed some of the most awful scenes of terror at time of shipwreck,
and heroically rescued seafarers from the very jaws of death.

When but eight years of age, Captain Worthen went to sea as cook on
a fishing and coasting vessel, continuing to follow the sea in one
capacity or another until he was thirty-five years of age, when he was
appointed keeper of the Highland Station.

Not one of the original crew of the Highland Station is in the service
at present, save the veteran keeper Captain Worthen. For thirty years
he has made the station which he helped to build his home, and has been
a faithful and vigilant guardian of the coast. Skilled in the art of
handling boats through the surf, absolutely fearless when duty calls,
he has an enviable record as a life saver. Under his watchful eye,
careful guidance, and discipline, the members of his crew have been
trained to perfection in the art and science of managing boats in the
most riotous waters, and are ever ready to follow their keeper.

[Illustration: CAPT. EDWIN P. WORTHEN, KEEPER OF HIGHLAND STATION.]

In his thirty years of service as keeper on the dangerous coast of Cape
Cod, he has assisted at nearly all the wrecks that have occurred in the
region of the “Highlands,” yet he never received an injury of any kind
in that whole time. Captain Worthen has always taken a deep interest
in the welfare of the life savers, and his associates of the Surfman’s
Mutual Benefit Association of the United States have honored him with
the office of chairman of the District Committee.

While Captain Worthen has witnessed many changes in the service along
the shores of Cape Cod, the shifting treacherous sand bars near his
station, however, still remain as a menace to the mariner, and continue
to levy a fearful tribute on the shipping around Cape Cod. The sands
along the coast there are literally strewn with half-buried skeletons
of wrecked vessels, while unmarked mounds in the little village
graveyards near by, tell a sorrowful tale of the fearful sacrifice
of human life. The first wreck which Captain Worthen went to after
his appointment as keeper was on Dec. 25, 1872, before the station
was built. With volunteers he rescued fourteen men, the whole crew of
the German bark _Francis_, which became a total loss. The same night
another vessel, the _Peruvian_, was lost on the coast, and her crew
of twenty-eight perished. The captain of the _Francis_ died two days
later, and was buried near the Highland Station, Captain Worthen caring
for his grave ever since.

Captain Worthen enjoys good health, despite his age and the great
number of years he has served as a life saver, and seems destined to
enjoy a long life. He married Julia E. Francis.


HIGHLAND CREW.

The No. 1 surfman is William P. Paine. He was born in North Truro in
1866, and has been in the life-saving service for twelve years, all of
which have been spent at this station. From his boyhood days Surfman
Paine was a boatman and fisherman along the shores of Cape Cod, and was
well accustomed to braving the hardships and facing the perils that
fall to the lot of a life saver. He married Edith L. Hopkins.

The No. 2 surfman is Hiram R. Hatch. He was born in Truro, is
forty-four years of age, and has been in the life-saving service for
twenty-one years. Surfman Hatch went to sea when a boy, shipping
before the mast on a coasting vessel. He followed the sea until he was
twenty-three years of age, and was a skilled boatman when he joined the
service. In his long years of experience as a surfman he has had many
thrilling escapes, and has proved a faithful and able life saver. He
married Sarah W. Small, and is the father of a daughter.

The No. 3 surfman is William McFadden. He was born in Provincetown in
1872, and has been a member of this station crew for eight years. He
had a wide and varied experience on the water before entering the
service, and has made an able and skilled life saver. He married Sarah
R. Knowles.

The No. 4 surfman is Manuel F. Oliver. He was born in Provincetown,
is twenty-eight years of age, and the youngest member of this station
crew. Surfman Oliver has been in the life-saving service two years. He
spent one year at the Gay Head Station on Martha’s Vineyard. He was a
sailor, boatman, and fisherman before entering the service and has made
a valued member of Captain Worthen’s crew. He married Maggie Morris,
and is the father of two children, a daughter and son.

The No. 5 surfman is Antone T. Lucas. He was born in Fayal, Azore
Islands, and is forty-eight years of age. Surfman Lucas has been in
the life-saving service for twenty-five years, all of which have been
spent at this station. Prior to his entering the service he went to sea
on coasting vessels and merchant ships, and for several years he was a
whaleman. In his twenty-five years of service as a life saver he has
endured much hardship, has faced the greatest peril in the performance
of his duty, and is a faithful and fearless warrior of the sea.

[Illustration:

       Left to right: A. T. LUCAS.  JOHN MARSHALL.  M. F. OLIVER.
   CAPTAIN WORTHEN (seated).  W. P. PAINE.  M. FRANCIS.  H. R. HATCH.
                            WM. M. MCFADDEN.

HIGHLAND CREW.]

The No. 6 surfman is Manuel Frances. He was born in Provincetown, and
is thirty-two years of age. Surfman Frances has been in the life-saving
service for two years. He was a boatman and fisherman off the shores
of Cape Cod for a number of years, and well prepared for the work he is
called upon to perform as a life saver. He married Carrie Silva, and is
the father of two daughters and one son.

The No. 7 surfman is John Marshall. He was born in St. Georges, Fayal,
Azore Islands, in 1853. Surfman Marshall has been in the life-saving
service for twenty-two years, all of which have been spent at this
station. Before he entered the service he spent a number of years on
the water as a sailor, boatman, and fisherman. During his long term of
service he has had several narrow escapes from death in the performance
of duty. Owing to an injury which he received while at work assisting
at a wreck, he was incapacitated for duty for a period of six months.
Surfman Marshall is an able boatman and a brave and hardy life saver.


CAHOON’S HOLLOW STATION.

The Cahoon’s Hollow Station is located on the “back side” of Cape Cod,
two and one-half miles east of Wellfleet. The present station replaced
the one which was destroyed by fire in February, 1893. The original
station was one of the nine that were built on the shores of Cape Cod
in 1872. The station’s approximate position as obtained from the latest
coast survey charts is latitude north 41° 56′ 40″, and its longitude
west 69° 55′ 05″.

[Illustration: CAHOON’S HOLLOW STATION.]

The surfmen from this station on the north patrol cover a distance of
about two and one-half miles, meeting and exchanging checks with the
surfmen from the Pamet River Station. On the south patrol the surfmen
have a walk of about four miles, meeting and exchanging checks with the
surfmen from the Nauset Station.

The coast at this station is exceedingly dangerous; sunken rips stretch
out under the sea and extend along the shore for miles. Owing to the
great sand dunes which have been built by the winds, the surfmen are
unable to obtain a good observation seaward from the lookout on the
station, and the day watches are stationed in a small house on the
bluff overlooking the sea.

There are three surf-boats, one dory, two beach carts, breeches-buoys,
etc., and one life-car at this station. Two surf-boats and the dory
are used for the work of rescue and one for practice. The life-car has
never been used save for practice.

At the Cahoon’s Hollow Station since Captain Cole has been keeper,
sixteen vessels of different types have become stranded on the
beach there. On these vessels there was a total of one hundred and
twenty-four persons, and of this number but one person was lost. Those
saved by Captain Cole and his crew were taken ashore in all kinds of
ways, some by the surf-boat, others by the breeches-buoy, and many were
dragged through the surf with lines. Charles H. Ashley, of Haverhill,
was the only person lost within the patrol of the Cahoon’s Hollow
Station. He was a member of the crew of the barge _Blackbird_, and was
drowned attempting to reach the shore in a small boat. Of the sixteen
vessels that were cast ashore on the beach ten were a total loss.


CAPT. DANIEL COLE.

Capt. Daniel Cole, keeper of the Cahoon’s Hollow Life-Saving Station,
was born in Wellfleet in 1844, and has been in the life-saving service
ever since it was established on Cape Cod, with the exception of one
year. He entered the service when the Cahoon’s Hollow Station was
manned, and after serving as a surfman for a number of years was
appointed keeper twenty-three years ago.

[Illustration: CAPT. DANIEL COLE, CAHOON’S HOLLOW STATION.]

Captain Cole, in addition to being a veteran life saver, is also a
veteran of the Civil War. When a boy hardly nine years of age he went
to sea, his first trip being to the Grand Banks on a vessel that
sailed from Cape Cod. He continued to go to the Grand Banks year after
year until he went to the West, and engaged in trading on the Great
Lakes. He was a trader on the lakes when the war broke out. He was but
nineteen years of age, but of fine physique, strong, healthy, appeared
much older, and was readily accepted in the 12th Illinois Regiment,
Company K, Second Brigade, 15th Army Corps, and was soon on his way
to the front. He participated in numerous engagements, and was with
Sherman on his “march to the sea.” When his term of enlistment expired
he was discharged, at Louisville, Ky., and at once returned to his home
on Cape Cod. He again went fishing to the Banks, continuing until the
life-saving service was extended to Cape Cod, when he was prevailed
upon to join the new crew at Cahoon’s Hollow. He continued to serve as
a surfman for a number of years, joining the station crew at the close
of each fishing season. One year, while he was master of a fishing
vessel, he remained out of the service. The following season he joined
the station when the crew went on duty, and has been at the station
continuously since that time. William Newcombe, who was placed in
charge of the station when it was manned, resigned after a few years,
and Captain Cole was placed in command. As a surfman, Captain Cole had
shown rare judgment and exceptional skill in the work of saving life
and property, and his promotion to keeper of such an important station
was a merited reward. He has made an enviable record as a life saver
since keeper, but one life having been lost within the patrol of his
station since he took charge. Disasters are frequent along the shore
near his station, and the crew have made many heroic rescues, and had
numerous thrilling escapes in devotion to their duty. One of the worst
wrecks that have occurred within the province of the station happened
on Dec. 31, 1890, when the schooner _Smuggler_ became a total loss. The
vessel struck during a furious gale, and was discovered by one of the
surfmen about four o’clock in the morning. Running to the station, a
distance of about two miles, the surfman aroused the keeper and crew,
and all hands started for the wreck in the teeth of the gale, with the
beach apparatus in a wagon drawn by the station horse. The whirlwinds
of sand sweeping along the shore blinded the men, and the horse at
times refused to go. After much hardship, but with little delay,
Captain Cole and his crew reached the scene. The fifteen men, the crew
of the vessel, had been driven into the rigging, and the craft was fast
breaking up and moving along the shore. With great despatch a shot was
fired over the vessel, the breeches-buoy was put in working order, and
the men pulled through the surf from the stranded vessel to the shore.
The life savers suffered terribly from the cold, and the rescued crew
were nearly dead when they reached the shore. As the last man was
pulled out of the surf, the vessel went to pieces, not a vestige being
left to mark the spot where the disaster took place.

[Illustration: PANCHITA, DRIVEN ASHORE AT PROVINCETOWN.]

Captain Cole maintains a high standard of efficiency and discipline
at his station, and has a crew of fearless and skilled life savers.
Captain Cole married Harriet Blodget, and is the father of two sons.
He is a member of the J. C. Freeman Post, G. A. R., No. 55, of
Provincetown, the Surfmen’s Mutual Benefit Association, the Royal
Arcanum, and the Adams Lodge, F. A. M.


CAHOON’S HOLLOW STATION CREW.

The No. 1 surfman is Freeman W. Atwood. He was born in Wellfleet in
1846, and has been in the life-saving service for twenty-five years,
all of which have been at this station. Before entering the service
Surfman Atwood was a fisherman and coastwise sailor. He went to sea
when a boy, and from his long experience as a fisherman and sailor
along the shores of the Cape was well prepared for the work of a life
saver. In all his years of experience he has never met with serious
mishap. He has seen much hardship as a member of this crew and can
be relied upon to unflinchingly face the greatest perils in the
performance of his duty. He married Lucy N. Rich, and is the father of
three boys.

The No. 2 surfman is Eugene O. Young. He was born in Yarmouth Port
and is forty-nine years of age. Surfman Young has been a life saver
for nineteen years, joining this station when he entered the service.
He was a boatman, fisherman, and coastwise sailor before entering the
service, and has made a valued member of the station crew, as he is a
tried and true life saver. Surfman Young has assisted at all the wrecks
that have taken place at the station during his term of service, and
has suffered much hardship and had many perilous adventures within that
period. He married Susan A. Rich, and has a family of two girls and one
boy.

The No. 3 surfman is Edward Lombard. He was born in Truro in 1865,
and has been in the life-saving service for twelve years, three at
the Pamet River Station, the remaining nine at this station. Surfman
Lombard was a fisherman and boatman before he entered the service. He
saw much active service while a member of the Pamet River Station, and
has always proven himself a brave and skilled life saver. He married
Nellie Howes, and has a family of four boys.

The No. 4 surfman is Stanley M. Fisher. He was born in Nantucket in
1877, and is serving his first year as a life saver. Surfman Fisher,
after spending a few years as a boatman and fisherman along the shores
of Nantucket, went to Texas, where he worked on a stock ranch. Tiring
of this kind of a life, he enlisted in the regular army, Company K,
Sixth Regiment, and went with his regiment to the Philippine Islands,
remaining there until the expiration of his term of service. Fisher,
with his regiment, was stationed on Negroes Island for one year, and
also at Panay for a year. He took part in six hot battles and several
minor engagements with the Philippines, but escaped without the
slightest injury. He was a member of a volunteer crew which rescued a
crew from a sunken vessel in Vineyard Haven Harbor during the gale of
November, 1898, receiving gold and silver medals as a recognition of
his bravery.

Fisher is an expert boatman, and under the guidance of Captain Cole he
cannot fail to become an able and skilful life saver.

[Illustration:

   Left to right: CAPTAIN COLE.  FREEMAN W. ATWOOD.  EUGENE O. YOUNG.
           EDWARD LOMBARD.  STANLEY M. FISHER.  JAMES LOPES.

CAHOON’S HOLLOW CREW.]

The No. 5 surfman is James Lopes. He was born in Provincetown in 1866,
and is serving his first year as a life saver, having joined the crew
at this station in August, 1902. Prior to his joining the service he
was a boat fisherman along the shores of the Cape. He was a member
of a volunteer crew which rescued a crew from a vessel wrecked in
Provincetown Harbor during the November gale of 1898, and received
a medal in recognition of his bravery. He had a wide experience in
boating and is possessed of the qualities necessary to make an able
life saver. He married Minnie Rogers, and is the father of one child, a
daughter.

The No. 6 surfman is Clarence L. Burch. He was born in Provincetown in
1875. Surfman Burch is a new man in the service, having joined in the
service in December, 1902. He had been a boatman and fisherman along
the shores of the Cape for a number of years, and also a coastwise
sailor. He went with a party of prospectors to the Klondike gold
region, but remained there a short time, returning to Cape Cod to
engage in fishing. He is skilled in the art of managing boats in all
kinds of weather, and well qualified for the work of a life saver. He
married Dorothy McKenzie, and is the father of two girls.

The No. 7 surfman is Charles H. Jennings. He was born in Provincetown
in 1878, and is serving his first year as a regular surfman. Surfman
Jennings was a fisherman and boatman before he entered the service,
and had also substituted as a surfman at the High Head Station, under
Captain Kelley. He will receive careful training under Captain Cole,
and will, no doubt, make a skilled and fearless life saver. He married
Edith J. Rogers.

[Illustration: ICEBERGS ALONG THE SHORE AT PEAKED HILL.]


PEAKED HILL BARS STATION.

The Peaked Hill Bars Station is another of the original nine stations
which were erected on Cape Cod in 1872. A more bleak or dangerous
stretch of coast can hardly be found in the United States than at this
station. The coast near the station rightly bears the name “Ocean
Graveyard.” Sunken rips stretch far out under the sea at this place,
ever ready to grasp the keels of the ships that sail down upon them,
and many appalling disasters have taken place there. There are two
lines of bars that lie submerged off the shore at Peaked Hill Bars
Station, the outer and inner bars they are called. They run parallel
with the coast line for a distance of about six miles. The outer bars
lie about fourteen hundred yards offshore, the inner bars about six
hundred. These bars are ever shifting, and the depth of water on them
varies in accordance. It is not often that vessels are wrecked on the
outer bars, although they often strike there and are driven over them
only to meet with destruction on the inner bars. The surfmen of this
station have a patrol of about two miles east and west, meeting and
exchanging checks on the westward patrol with the surfmen from Race
Point Station on the eastward with the surfmen of the High Head Station.

[Illustration: PEAKED HILL BARS STATION.]

When the station was erected there was a long stretch of low beach
between it and the shore, but now sand dunes made by the action of
the wind shut off all view of the ocean except from the lookout tower
on the station. It is at this station that the effect of the flying
sand upon the glass in the windows is plainly seen, the whirlwinds
of sand having made them as rough as if they had been dipped in
acid, and almost shutting out the light of day. This effect of the
sand in destroying the transparency of the window-panes is an object
of curiosity and never-failing wonder to visitors. On the bluff
overlooking the ocean the crew have erected a small building, where the
day watches keep a lookout and members of the crew spend some of their
leisure moments.

The station is located two and one-half miles east of Provincetown
village, and its approximate position as obtained from the latest
coast survey charts is latitude north 42° 04′ 40″, longitude 70° 09′
50″. From Provincetown the road to the station crosses the great sand
deserts for which that region is noted.

This station is supplied with two surf-boats, one four oared, the other
five, two sets of beach apparatus, breeches-buoys, guns, etc., and a
practice boat.

Captain Cook and his crew of the Peaked Hill Bars Station have
taken twenty-five persons ashore in their surf-boat, and one in the
breeches-buoy since Captain Cook assumed charge of the station. The
following vessels, which struck on the Peaked Hill Bars, became a total
loss: _Willie H. Higgins_, _Albert L. Butler_, _Cathie C. Berry_, _Kate
L. Robinson_, and _Jennie C. May_.

[Illustration: THE SAND DUNES ON THE WAY TO PEAKED HILL BARS STATION.]

Seven men and one woman were taken ashore from the _Higgins_. The
captain and one sailor were washed ashore from the schooner _Albert L.
Butler_, which was wrecked during the memorable November gale of ’98,
and one man was taken off by the breeches-buoy, while two others were
taken ashore after the tide went down.

The schooner _Cathie Berry_ stranded during a terrific gale. The life
savers launched their boat and went to her only to find her abandoned.
The schooner _Helen_ came ashore during a bad time; the life savers
went to her in their boat, but none of the crew came ashore.

The schooner _Kate L. Robinson_ carried a crew of seven men, and all
were rescued by Captain Cook and his crew in their surf-boat. The crew
of the _Theta_, seven in number, together with a woman passenger, were
also taken ashore in the surf-boat, as were two members of the crew of
the _Jennie C. May_.


CAPTAIN COOK. PEAKED HILL BARS.

[Illustration: CAPT. WILLIAM W. COOK, KEEPER OF PEAKED HILL BARS
STATION.]

Capt. William W. Cook, keeper of the Peaked Hill Bars Station, one
of the most dangerous of all, was born in Provincetown, within sight
of his station, Nov. 3, 1852. He has been in the life-saving service
for twenty years, fourteen years as a surfman and six as keeper at
this station. When a boy he evidenced great love for boats, and after
leaving school, until he entered the life-saving service, he spent
nearly all his time at sea. He was first in the merchant service, but
later joined the fleet of whaling vessels that cruised on the north
and south Atlantic grounds, gaining a wide experience as a whaleman,
and becoming thoroughly familiar with the handling of boats under the
most trying conditions and roughest weather. When he decided to enter
the life-saving service the department was glad to secure him, and
as an evidence of their faith in his ability, they assigned him to
the dangerous Peaked Hill Bars Station, under the late Capt. Isaac G.
Fisher.

For fourteen years Captain Cook patrolled the beaches and faithfully
performed the duties of a surfman, and then succeeded Captain Fisher as
keeper, when the latter was transferred to the Wood End Station. In all
his years of experience, both as a surfman and keeper of this station,
Captain Cook has never had his boat capsized, has never been overboard
from his boat, and has never lost or had a member of his crew seriously
injured in the performance of duty.

Of all the wrecks which Captain Cook and his crew have gone to, one of
the most hazardous undertakings was at the wreck of the three-masted
schooner _Willie H. Higgins_, in March, 1898, from which they rescued
seven men and one woman in the surf-boat. At the wreck of the schooner
_Theta_, Captain Cook and his crew made a most daring rescue of her
crew of seven, and the captain’s wife. The rescue was made in the
surf-boat in a riotous sea that threatened to engulf the boat and drown
both rescued and rescuers. The thrilling rescue was witnessed by a vast
multitude that had assembled on the beach, and a mighty cheer was sent
up as willing hands pulled the surf-boat out of the maddened waters
onto the beach.

Captain Cook uses a twenty-one foot steering oar when going to a
wreck in the surf boat, and to this he attributes his great success
in handling the craft under the worst conditions of wind or wave. The
steering oar is the same kind as he used when a whaleman. That he is
skilled in the use of it is evidenced by the enviable record he has
made since he has been keeper of the station. He is a warrior of the
sea who knows no fear when duty calls, and who is ever ready to put off
from the beach to aid distressed seafarers, when it is possible for
a boat to live. He married Annie Young Snow, and is the father of a
daughter.


PEAKED HILL BARS STATION CREW.

The No. 1 surfman is Levi A. Kelley. He was born in Provincetown, and
is forty years of age. Surfman Kelley entered the service in 1884, and
was assigned to this station. He is an expert boatman, and the life of
a life saver has not the least terror for him. He followed the sea for
a number of years as a fisherman and sailor, and became well accustomed
to the hardships similar to those of a surfman before he joined the
service. He married Nona B. Lewis, and is the father of a boy.

The No. 2 surfman is Benjamin S. Henderson. He was born in Wellfleet
in 1855, and has been a member of this station crew for seventeen
years, or since he entered the service. Surfman Henderson came from
a sea-going family, and took naturally to the hard and perilous work
that life savers are called upon to perform. He followed the sea for a
number of years before entering the service. He married Mary Dears, and
is the father of two girls and two boys.

[Illustration:

       Left to right: LEVY KELLEY.  JAS. F. FISH.  WM. D. CARLOS.
       CAPT. W. W. COOK (seated).  CHAS. HIGGINS.  WM. E. SYLVIA
                            BENJ. R. KELLEY.

PEAKED HILL BARS CREW.]

The No. 3 surfman is James F. Fish. Surfman Fish was born in East
Boston in 1853. When a young man he went to sea, making a number of
trips on fishing vessels, and later entering the merchant service.
He entered the life-saving service in 1881, being assigned to this
station, and has served faithfully in the capacity of a surfman for
nearly twenty-two years. Surfman Fish served his apprenticeship as
a life saver under the late Capt. Isaac G. Fisher. He has had many
thrilling adventures and narrow escapes from death in the service. He
is an expert boatman and as fearless a surfman as patrols the shores of
Cape Cod. He married Mary L. Enos.

The No. 4 surfman is William D. Carlos. He was born in Provincetown in
1870, and has been in the life-saving service for five years. Surfman
Carlos went to sea when he was seventeen years of age, engaging in
boating and fishing from that time until he entered the service. He
was first assigned to the Chatham Station, where he remained for one
year, being transferred to this station in 1898. He gained a thorough
knowledge of handling boats in the roughest water while a fisherman,
and was well fitted for the work of a surfman along the dangerous coast
of Cape Cod. He married Matilda B. Travis, and is the father of a boy.

The No. 5 surfman is Charles A. Higgins. He was born in Provincetown in
1862, and has been in the life-saving service for seven years. Surfman
Higgins followed the vocation of a boat fisherman from the time he was
a young man until he joined the crew at Peaked Hill Bars. He is an
expert boatman and a brave and faithful surfman. He married Bessie L.
Bangs.

The No. 6 surfman is William E. Sylvia. He was born in Provincetown,
and is thirty-two years of age. Surfman Sylvia is a new man, but has
had a wide experience as a sailor and fisherman, and possesses the
other qualities that go to make a successful surfman. He married Louise
Smith.

The No. 7 surfman is Benjamin R. Kelley. He was born in Truro, and
is fifty-seven years of age, the oldest surfman, in point of years,
at this station. Surfman Kelley was assigned to this station when he
entered the service eighteen years ago, and has remained a member of
the crew ever since. He followed the sea for a number of years before
entering the service, and is an old and tried surfman.

[Illustration: ALONG THE SHORE AT PEAKED HILL BARS.]


RACE POINT STATION.

This station is one of the original nine stations erected on Cape Cod
in 1872, and was manned in the winter of 1873. The station is one and
five-eighths miles east of Race Point, from which it derives its name.
Its approximate position as obtained from the latest coast survey
charts is latitude north 42° 04′ 45″, longitude west 70° 13′ 15″. From
Provincetown the station is about four miles distant, and easy of
access over a highway across the sand dunes. The coast at Race Point is
very treacherous, and has been the scene of many wrecks. The tides run
past the point with great velocity, and vessels are frequently swept to
destruction on the sunken rips which lie along the coast there.

[Illustration: RACE POINT STATION.]

The surfmen of this station go over a patrol westward of two and
one-half miles, and eastward about one and three-quarters miles. On the
eastward patrol the surfmen meet and exchange checks with the surfmen
from Peaked Hill Bars Station; on the westward patrol the surfmen use
a time clock, as “Race Run” so called, an inlet through the beach,
prevents them from meeting the surfmen from Wood End Station. The
station is supplied with three surf-boats of the Race Point model, two
beach carts, with guns, breeches-buoys, etc., and a life-car.

Ninety-two vessels, of all descriptions, have met with disaster near
this station since Capt. “Sam” Fisher has been keeper. On these
vessels there were over six hundred seafarers, including two women. Of
this number of persons taken ashore, thirty-seven were landed by the
breeches-buoy, the surf-boat being employed to bring the others that
were saved to the shore.

“Nigger,” the horse which is on duty at the Race Point Station, is
a noble and intelligent animal. When storms are sweeping the coast,
“Nigger” shows a restlessness that is not dispelled until fair weather
again prevails. As the surfmen return from their patrol at night,
“Nigger” always gives evidence in some way or another that he is awake
and ready for duty. “Nigger” takes kindly to the work of dragging the
heavy beach apparatus and surf-boat through the sands, and responds to
the call “ship ashore” as lively as the surfmen. “Nigger” is the pet of
all the surfmen, and seems to enjoy having visitors call to see him.

[Illustration: NIGGER, THE HORSE KEPT AT RACE POINT STATION.]


CAPT. SAMUEL O. FISHER.

Capt. Samuel O. Fisher, keeper of the Race Point Life-Saving Station,
was born in Provincetown in 1861, and has been in the life-saving
service twenty-three years, eight of which he spent as surfman at
Peaked Hill Bars Station and fifteen as keeper of this station. “Sam”
Fisher came from a seafaring family and is a near relative of the late
Isaac G. Fisher, a noted life saver. He went to sea as a sailor on a
coasting vessel when a young man. He left the coastwise trade to go tow
boating, which he followed for a short time, when he again entered the
coastwise trade. He was also a fisherman and boatman off the shores
of Cape Cod. He entered the life-saving service when nineteen years
of age, being assigned to the Peaked Hill Bars Station under the late
Captain Atkins. He was then an experienced boatman, strong and robust.
He had been a member of the station crew but a short time when he came
near losing his life in a terrible tragedy that took place on the bars
near the station.

[Illustration: CAPT. “SAM” O. FISHER, KEEPER OF RACE POINT STATION.]

It was at the time the sloop _C. M. Trumbull_ stranded on Peaked Hill
Bars. Captain Atkins and his brave crew had pulled out to the stranded
sloop and was about to effect the rescue of the imperiled crew when the
surf-boat was capsized, throwing all hands into the raging sea. Captain
Atkins and two members of the crew perished, Fisher and two others
managing to reach the shore after a desperate struggle. After the death
of Captain Atkins, the late Capt. Isaac G. Fisher was prevailed upon
to take charge of the station. Capt. “Sam” Fisher remained as surfman
under Capt. Isaac Fisher until he was appointed keeper of the Race
Point Station, succeeding John W. Young.

From his experience at Peaked Hill Bars Station Capt. “Sam” Fisher
was well fitted for the arduous duties of keeper of the Race Point
Station. During the fifteen years that he has been keeper of the Race
Point Station he has led his crew to deeds of great heroism. He has had
many narrow escapes from serious injury and death in the performance
of his duty, and was once obliged to retire for a period of fifty days
on account of injuries received while working on a wrecked schooner.
Once he was obliged to swim ashore from an overturned boat, and several
times he has narrowly escaped losing his life going to wrecks. Lawrence
Maddocks, a member of the crew who was thrown out of the boat with
Captain Fisher at the time of the wreck of the schooner _Julia Bailey_,
died shortly after from the effects of exposure.

[Illustration: LIFE SAVER STARTING OUT ON THE SUNSET WATCH FROM RACE
POINT STATION.]

He married Myra L. Pierce.


RACE POINT STATION CREW.

The No. 1 surfman is Edwin B. Tyler. He was born in Provincetown, is
thirty-two years of age, and has been in the United States Life-Saving
Service five years. Prior to his joining the service he engaged in
boating and fishing. In this way he obtained a thorough knowledge of
the coast about the tip end of the Cape, and became skilled in the
management of boats in the surf, all of which has been of great value
to him since he entered the service. Surfman Tyler, in the few years
that he has been in the service, has had his full share of the hardship
that is part of the life of a life saver on Cape Cod. He married
Pauline Ryder.

The No. 2 surfman is George H. Burch. Surfman Burch was born in
Provincetown fifty years ago, and in point of years of service he is
the oldest member of the crew of the Race Point Station. He has been a
member of the Race Point Station crew for fifteen years, joining the
station when he entered the service. Surfman Burch went to sea when
a boy, and followed it until he entered the life-saving service. In
addition to being a coastwise sailor, he also went in pursuit of the
whale. He is an old and tried life saver who knows no fear, and on whom
the fifteen years of hardship has left no visible trace. He married
Mary Sylva of Provincetown, and is the father of a son.

[Illustration:

      Left to right: FRANK BROWN.  MARTIN NELSON.  EDWIN B. TYLER.
        CAPTAIN FISHER (seated).  GEO. H. BURCH.  JOHN B. BANGS.

RACE POINT CREW.]

The No. 3 surfman is Henry I. Collins. He was born in Truro in 1871.
Surfman Collins entered the life-saving service three years ago, being
assigned to this station. Before entering the service he had followed
the sea as a boatman and fisherman from the time he was a small boy.
He is an expert boatman, and was not long in the service before he
demonstrated his worth as a life saver. He married Nellie Lombard, and
is the father of two girls.

The No. 4 surfman is Frank Brown. Surfman Brown was born in
Provincetown in 1866. He joined the life-saving service in 1899, being
assigned to the Muskeget Station at Nantucket. After serving there
for several months he was transferred to this station. Surfman Brown
from his long experience as a fisherman and in the coasting trade is
an expert boatman, and also possesses all the other qualifications
necessary to make a life saver. He married Margaret Sullivan of
Provincetown.

The No. 5 man is John B. Bangs. He was born in Provincetown and is
twenty-nine years of age. Surfman Bangs has been in the service seven
years. He was first assigned to the High Head Station under Captain
Kelly and has been connected with this station but one year. Surfman
Bangs from his experience as a coastwise sailor, fisherman, and boatman
found no difficulty in passing the rigid examination necessary to enter
the service, and is a skilled and intrepid life saver.

The No. 6 surfman is Martin Nelson. Surfman Nelson was born in Sweden
in 1869. He went to sea when about fifteen years of age and sailed over
a great part of the world before he reached the shores of Cape Cod.
He has been in the service four years, being assigned to the Monomoy
Station under the late Captain Tuttle when he entered the service.
Surfman Nelson was also a member of the crew of the Monomoy Station
under the late Captain Eldredge, being transferred to the Race Point
Station but a short time before. Captain Eldredge and all but one of
his boat’s crew lost their lives. Surfman Nelson came of a seafaring
family and seems especially fitted for the hard life that he has
chosen. He married Louise C. Smith, of Provincetown, and is the father
of a boy.

The No. 7 surfman is Eugene R. Conwell. He was born in Provincetown in
1880, and is the youngest member of the crew of this station. Surfman
Conwell entered the service in June, 1902, being stationed on the
floating station at City Point during the summer season, coming to this
station in December, 1902. Surfman Conwell, while a young man, is an
experienced boatman and has the youth and vigor that will help to make
him a valuable member of any life-saving crew to which he may become
attached.


HIGH HEAD STATION.

This station was established and manned in 1883 by Captain Kelley and
a crew of trained surfmen. The station is three and one-half miles
northwest of Cape Cod Highland Light, and its approximate position as
obtained from the latest coast survey charts is latitude 42° 03′ 55″
longitude west 70° 06′ 50″. From Provincetown the station is about five
miles distant. The eastern end of the dreaded Peaked Hill Bars extend
along the coast at this station, and from wrecks that have taken place
on these bars the crew of the station have made many daring rescues.
The surfmen at this station exchange checks with the surfmen from the
Highland Station on the east and the Peaked Hill Bars Station on the
west.

The patrol is about one and one-half miles each way, the shortest
patrol on the entire coast of Cape Cod. The station is supplied
with two surf-boats, a practice-boat, three beach carts with guns,
breeches-buoys, etc., and a life-car.

[Illustration: HIGH HEAD STATION.]

The practice-boat came from the Peaked Hill Bars Station, and is the
one which was capsized at the wreck of the schooner _C. M. Trumbull_
at the time the late Captain Atkins, keeper of the Peaked Hill Bars
Station, and two members of his crew lost their lives. A surf-boat and
beach cart are kept in a house near the beach to be near at hand in the
event of disaster. The horse kept at the station is owned by Captain
Kelley, and is employed by the government during the winter season, to
help drag the apparatus at the time of a wreck.

Capt. Charles P. Kelley, keeper of the High Head Station, with his
crew of life savers, have taken thirty-seven persons ashore in their
surf-boat during the twenty years that Captain Kelley has been in
charge. The breeches-buoy has not been used in active service within
the patrol of the station, however, since Captain Kelley assumed
command. From the schooner _Laura Brown_ five men were rescued and the
vessel saved; from the brig _Emily T. Sheldon_ eight men were taken
ashore, the vessel becoming a total loss. The schooner _Oliver Ames_,
which stranded near the station, was saved with her crew of seven.

From the schooner _Plymouth Rock_, which became a total wreck near
the station, the crew of six were saved. The crew of the _Abbie H.
Hodgman_, five in number, were saved and the vessel floated. The sloop
_Red Rover_, which was a total wreck, had her crew of two men rescued.
The schooner _Lucia Porter_, with a crew of six men, were saved by the
crew of this station, as was the schooner _William H. Oler_ and her
crew, eight in number.

[Illustration: HANNAH E. SHEWBERT.]

From the schooner _Jennie C. May_ three persons were taken ashore, the
vessel finally becoming a total loss. The schooner _Carrie Richardson_
had her crew of four men taken off by the life savers, the vessel
becoming a total wreck, and from the schooner _Job H. Jackson_, which,
also, became a total wreck, the life savers, under Captain Kelley,
rescued the crew of four men.


CAPT. CHARLES P. KELLEY.

Capt. Charles P. Kelley, keeper of the High Head Life-Saving Station,
was born in the village of South Yarmouth, Mass., in the year 1850.

He attended the public schools in his native village until he was a
young man, when he went to sea. His first experience being on a fishing
vessel. Later he engaged in the coastwise service, and after a number
of years joined the fleet of merchantmen which, at that time, carried
on an extensive trade with the West Indies.

At the age of twenty-nine, Captain Kelley left the merchant service and
joined the crew of life savers under the late Capt. David H. Atkins, at
the Peaked Hill Bars Life-Saving Station.

[Illustration: CAPT. CHARLES P. KELLEY, KEEPER OF HIGH HEAD.]

Captain Kelley was attached to the Peaked Hill Bars Station for about
three years, during which time he had a number of thrilling experiences
and narrow escapes from death in the performance of his duty.

At the time of the wreck of the sloop _C. M. Trumbull_, on Peaked
Hill Bars, Captain Kelley was in the life-boat with Captain Atkins
going off to the rescue of the imperiled crew, when the latter and two
members of the crew lost their lives.

It was Captain Kelley who discovered the sloop stranded on the bars.
The life-boat was quickly manned and put off to the wrecked vessel, and
in a short time three of the crew were landed on the beach. A second
trip through the breakers was safely made, and the boat was alongside
the sloop, ready to take off the remaining two members, when the boom
of the sloop caught the life-boat under the belt, and capsized it,
throwing all hands into the boiling sea.

The night was intensely dark and the weather freezing cold. Captain
Atkins was never seen, and the other two members of the boat’s crew
perished after repeated attempts to get into their boat.

Captain Kelley, surfman as he was then, together with “Sam” Fisher,
now keeper of the Race Point Station, and Isaiah H. Young reached the
shore after a terrible struggle, and were pulled out of the surf by the
members of the crew who had remained ashore.

All three were more dead than alive. The bodies of Captain Atkins
and the two members of the crew, Elisha Taylor and Frank A. Mayo,
were afterwards found on the beach by the life savers of an adjoining
station.

Captain Kelley had been in the service but about a year when he passed
through this terrible experience, yet he remained at the dangerous
Peaked Hill Bars Station for three years under the late Capt. Isaac G.
Fisher, being transferred to the High Head Station as keeper when the
station was first manned in 1883.

Captain Kelley had such a wide and varied experience when following the
sea, and later as a surfman attached to the Peaked Hill Bars Station,
that he was especially well qualified for the responsible position of
keeper of the High Head Station, where he has been in command for over
twenty years.

During his long term of service as keeper he has been called upon at
times to face the elements when they were in their greatest fury, yet
he has unflinchingly responded to every call, and, with the surfmen
under his charge, have had many thrilling experiences, and endured
untold hardship. Captain Kelley was twice married; his present wife was
Hannah C. Graham. He is the father of one child, a daughter.


HIGH HEAD STATION CREW.

The No. 1 surfman is Fred C. Franzer. He was born in Provincetown, Aug.
19, 1863, and has been a member of the crew of this station for sixteen
years, or ever since he joined the service. He had been a boatman,
fisherman, coastwise sailor, and whaleman before entering the service.
He is a most experienced life saver, an expert surfman, and a faithful
coast guardian. He married Catherine Sylvey, of Provincetown.

The No. 2 surfman is Benjamin Kelley. He was born in West Dennis, and
is forty-eight years of age. He went to sea at an early age and made a
number of voyages to the Atlantic whaling grounds, and until he joined
the service, sixteen years ago, had followed the sea in one capacity
or another. Surfman Kelley is at present on sick leave, suffering from
injuries received in the performance of duty, his place at the station
being filled by his son. Until he received the injuries which compelled
him to retire temporarily from the service, he had faithfully performed
the arduous duties of the life of a surfman, and was an efficient and
trustworthy life saver. He married Susan C. Snow, and is the father of
two children, a son and daughter.

[Illustration:

       Left to right: A. A. BAKER.  L. C. MULLET.  H. H. KELLEY.
      CAPTAIN KELLEY (seated).  DAVID B. SNOW.  CURTIS F. HIGGINS.
                            ROB’T E. ELLIS.

HIGH HEAD CREW.]

The No. 3 surfman is Robert E. Ellis. He was born in Woburn, Mass., is
thirty-four years of age, and has been a member of this crew for three
years. He was a boatman and fisherman before entering the service, and
under the instruction of Captain Kelley has made an able and fearless
life saver.

The No. 4 surfman is Albert A. Baker. He was born in Chatham, and is
thirty-four years of age. Surfman Baker has been in the service four
years, joining this station when he entered. He was a coastwise sailor,
boatman, and fisherman before entering the service, and has made an
efficient and faithful life saver. He married Susie A. Pratt, and is
the father of three boys.

The No. 5 surfman is David B. Snow. He was born in Wellfleet, is
twenty-five years of age, and has been in the service two years. He
followed the sea from the time he was fourteen years of age until
he entered the life-saving service. He is a skilful boatman and an
efficient life saver.

The No. 6 surfman is Curtis F. Higgins. He was born in Orleans, and
is thirty-two years of age. He has been a member of this crew for two
years, entering the service after following the sea as a boatman,
yachtsman, towboatman, and a steamshipman. From his experience in the
different kinds of work on the water in which he had engaged, he was
well prepared for the work of a surfman, and has made an able and
faithful life saver. He married Leonora B. Jason.

The No. 7 surfman is Samuel C. Mullett. He was born in Chatham, and
is thirty-four years of age. Surfman Mullett is the winter man at
this station, joining the station in December and remaining until May
following. He has been in the service for three years. During the
summer seasons he is a member of the City Point Station, South Boston.
Surfman Mullett followed the sea from the time that he was a boy until
he entered the service. He is an experienced surfman and well fitted
for the hardships that he is called upon to endure as a life saver. He
married Mrs. Bessie Cash.


WOOD END STATION.

This station is one of the new type of life-saving stations, with
commodious quarters for the keeper and crew, large boat room and
lookout. It was built in 1896, and manned in 1897. The late Capt.
Isaac G. Fisher, who was keeper of the Peaked Hill Bars Station at
the time, was placed in charge of the station and a picked crew of
surfmen. Captain Fisher continued as keeper until ill-health caused
him to resign from the service. Capt. William Sparrow, now keeper of
the Point Allerton Station, who was No. 1 man under Captain Fisher,
acted as temporary keeper until Captain Bickers was placed in charge.
The station is located on the narrow strip of beach at the tip end of
Cape Cod, Provincetown, one-eighth of a mile east from the Wood End
lighthouse. Its approximate position as obtained from the latest coast
survey charts is latitude north 42° 01′ 15″, longitude west 70° 11′
30″. From Provincetown the distance to the station over the sand dunes
and along the beach is about three and one-half miles. Across the head
of the harbor, a way that is accessible when the tide has ebbed, the
distance is much shorter. The station is supplied with two five-oared
surf-boats of the Race Point model, two beach carts, with guns,
breeches-buoys, etc., and one life-car. The patrol from this station
extends three and three-quarters miles north, and two and one-quarter
miles south. This is the only station on Cape Cod where the surfmen do
not meet and exchange checks with the surfmen from other stations, time
clocks being employed to record the performance of duty of the patrol.

[Illustration: WOOD END STATION.]

No total wrecks have occurred within the province of this station
since Captain Bickers has been in command, and no persons have been
taken ashore by the crew either in the surf-boat or breeches-buoy,
although a large number of vessels have met with disaster near there.
The following vessels have been assisted and floated by Captain Bickers
and crew: the yawl _Adventurer_, the barge _Paxnos_, and the schooners
_Clara_, _Zephyr_, _Caviar_, _Manomet_, _Joseph I. Johnson_, _St.
Bernard_, _Marjorie Brown_, _Gladstone_, and _Lewis H. Giles_. Captain
Bickers and his crew also assisted in the rescue of the two men,
members of the crew of the schooner _Two Forty_, who had been adrift in
an open boat for fourteen hours.

“Tom,” the pet cat at the Wood End Station, while not being able to
aid in the work of life saving, often goes out with the surfmen on
their lonely patrol along the beaches to keep them company. “Tom” knows
every foot of the beaches and seems to delight in going out with the
surfmen, whether the weather is fair or stormy. “Tom” often meets the
surfmen half-way along the beach as they are returning from their
patrol, running along ahead of the men as if to show them the way to
the station. “Tom” is the pet of the crew and is well taken care of by
them.

“Jim,” the horse which is at the Wood End Station, is owned by Captain
Bickers, the keeper. He was raised on Cape Cod, and has been connected
with the station for one year or since Captain Bickers assumed charge
of the station. “Jim” is an intelligent animal, and has upon more than
one occasion been of valuable service to the crew, by hauling apparatus
to scenes of disaster. “Jim” knows when bad weather prevails, and is
ever ready to do his share in the work of saving life or property.

[Illustration: JIM, THE HORSE KEPT AT WOOD END STATION.]


CAPT. GEORGE H. BICKERS.

[Illustration: CAPT. GEORGE H. BICKERS, KEEPER OF WOOD END STATION.]

Capt. George H. Bickers, keeper of the Wood End Life-Saving Station,
was born in Charlestown, Mass., in 1858. He has been in the life-saving
service for eleven years, ten as a surfman at Race Point and one as
keeper of the Wood End Station. After leaving school, when a young
boy, Captain Bickers shipped before the mast on a coasting schooner.
He followed coasting for a few years, when he went whaling. As a
whaleman he learned the art of handling boats in riotous waters as
well as seamanship in all its branches. Captain Bickers followed
the sea until he was thirty-three years of age, when he entered the
life-saving service, being assigned to the Race Point Station under
Capt. “Sam” Fisher. From his experience as a sailor and whaleman he
was well fitted for the duties of a life saver. He remained a member of
the Race Point crew until the death of Capt. Isaac G. Fisher, keeper
of the Wood End Station, when he was appointed to fill the vacancy.
Captain Bickers enjoyed an enviable record as a surfman, and has made
a record since being keeper of the Wood End Station that places him
in the front rank of life savers. One disaster followed another near
his station soon after he assumed command, yet not a life was lost,
and nearly every craft was saved from destruction by his brave and
vigilant crew. But one mishap has occurred since Captain Bickers took
charge of the station, the capsizing of the surf-boat while going to a
wrecked fishing vessel. The crew quickly righted their boat, bailed her
out, went to the wreck, and saved the craft from destruction. Captain
Bickers has a crew of skilled and fearless life savers who are ever
ready to obey his commands.

He married Abbie L. Cahoon, and is the father of a son.


WOOD END STATION CREW.

The No. 1 surfman is Francesco A. Silva. He was born in Fayal, Azore
Islands, in 1863, and has been in the life-saving service for six
years, all of which have been spent at this station. Surfman Silva went
to sea when a boy, sailing before the mast on a merchant ship. Later
he became a whaleman, voyaging from one part of the world to the other
in pursuit of the monsters of the deep. Surfman Silva performed his
first work as a life saver under the late Capt. Isaac G. Fisher, and
soon became an experienced and efficient surfman. He married Julia A.
Lornes, and is the father of a son.

[Illustration:

          Left to right: CAPTAIN BICKERS.  FRANCESCO A. SILVA.
        JONATHAN C. SMALL.  FRANK C. WAGES.  ALBERT G. MABBETT.
                  WILLIE F. ELDREDGE.  JAMES E. WORTH.

WOOD END CREW.]

The No. 2 surfman is Jonathan C. Small. He was born in Provincetown,
and is twenty-six years of age. Surfman Small engaged in boating and
fishing off the shores of Cape Cod from the time he was a boy until
he entered the life-saving service, and was well fitted for the
position he now holds. He has been in the service five years, and is an
experienced and fearless life saver.

The No. 3 surfman is Frank C. Wages. He was born in Provincetown in
1869, and has been in the life-saving service at this station since it
was manned in 1897. Surfman Wages was a sailor and fisherman along the
shores of Cape Cod before entering the service, and has made an able
and faithful life saver. He married Phœbe Silva, and is the father of a
son.

The No. 4 surfman is Albert G. Mabbett. He was born in Whitehall,
N. Y., in 1872, and has been in the life-saving service for six years.
He shipped as a sailor before the mast on a coasting vessel when he was
a boy, and spent several years in the coasting trade. Later he made
a number of trips on the United States school ship _St. Mary_, going
on cruises to England, Ireland, and through the Straits of Gibraltar
to the ports along the Mediterranean Sea. Prior to entering the
life-saving service as a regular surfman, he had substituted at other
stations along the shores of Cape Cod. As a substitute he performed
meritorious service, and has made an efficient and brave life saver. He
married Grace May Henderson, and is the father of two daughters and a
son.

[Illustration: MARY NASON WRECKED AT WOOD END.]

The No. 5 surfman is Willie F. Eldredge. He was born in Chatham, is
thirty-six years of age, and has been in the life-saving service three
years. Before entering the service he was a boatman and fisherman
along the Chatham shores, and from his experience in that work was
well prepared for the duties of a surfman. He also substituted at many
of the life-saving stations along the shores of Cape Cod, and is an
experienced and efficient life saver.

The No. 6 surfman is James E. Worth. He was born in Provincetown in
1861, and has been in the life-saving service one year. When a boy
Surfman Worth went cod fishing to the Grand Banks, and later shipped
on a merchant vessel and made a great number of trips to the West
Indies Islands and South American ports. After a few years in the
merchant service he became a whaleman, and in that service had a number
of thrilling experiences. After giving up going to sea he became a
baggage-master on the Old Colony Railroad. Later he entered the employ
of the Cold Storage Plant at Provincetown, remaining there until he
entered this service. When he entered the service he was assigned to
the Muskeget Station on Nantucket, and was later transferred to this
station. He is an expert boatman and a brave and hardy life saver. He
married Nellie P. Lewis, and is the father of two daughters and four
sons.

The No. 7 surfman is John N. Lewis. He was born in Provincetown, and is
thirty-eight years of age. Until he entered the service four years ago,
he had followed the sea from a boy. For three years he was a member of
the City Point Station, South Boston, during the summer seasons, and
also spent one season at the Straitsmouth Station, Cape Ann. Surfman
Lewis is a skilled boatman, and has proved that he can be depended upon
to do his duty in any emergency.


PAMET RIVER STATION.

The Pamet River Station is another of the original nine stations which
were erected on Cape Cod in 1872. It is located three and one-half
miles south of Cape Cod Highland Light, its approximate position as
obtained from the latest coast survey charts is latitude north 42° 00′
00″, longitude west 70° 01′ 15″.

The station stands on one of the high sand dunes which line the ocean
shore in Truro village about three miles from the Truro railroad
station. When the station was built it stood several hundred feet back
from high water mark, but the sea has made such great inroads into the
sand dunes at that point on the beach, that the high water mark is now
less than one hundred feet distant from the station, which will soon
have to be moved to insure its safety. Sand bars with but a small depth
of water over them fringe the shore at this station, extending seaward
for several hundred yards, and the history of the station records
many fearful disasters on them. It was on these dreaded bars that the
terrible ocean tragedy, the wreck of the ship _Jason_, occurred, and
also where the three crafts, the _Powwow_, _Miles Standish_, and the
_E. Pavey_, were wrecked at one time. The wreck of the _Jason_ was
one of the most appalling disasters that has ever taken place on the
shores of Cape Cod, twenty-six lives being lost. Of the whole crew,
Samuel Evans, the ship’s apprentice, was the only person that managed
to reach the shore. Of the whole number, thirty-four, aboard the ships
_Powwow_, _Miles Standish_, and _Pavey_, twelve were lost.

The surfmen from this station have a patrol that extends two and
one-half miles north and about an equal distance south, the surfmen
meeting and exchanging checks on the south patrol with the surfmen from
Cahoon’s Hollow on the north with the surfmen from the Highland Station.

The patrol is exceedingly hazardous and difficult. When the tide is
high the surfmen are driven to the tops of the sand dunes and obliged
to grope their way along the crest of the cliffs, which in many places
are a hundred feet above the sea-level.

[Illustration: PAMET RIVER STATION.]

When the station was manned, Capt. Jonathan Lee was appointed keeper.
He was succeeded by Capt. Nelson W. Weston, George W. Kelley, and Capt.
John H. Rich, the latter being succeeded by the present keeper, Capt.
George W. Bowley.

Captain Bowley has been in charge of this station but a little over one
year, during which time no wrecks have occurred within the territory
covered by the patrol from the station, and the crew has been called
upon but twice to assist disabled vessels. The first assistance
rendered by Captain Bowley after his appointment as keeper was to a big
tug boat which got caught on the bars off the shore and was in great
peril. The next call was to assist a steam yacht which became disabled
off the shore near the station.

This station is supplied with two surf-boats of the Monomoy model, two
beach carts with full sets of apparatus, and one life-car. “Johnny,” a
horse owned by Captain Bowley, is employed by the government during the
winter season to assist in hauling the apparatus to wrecks.


CAPT. GEORGE W. BOWLEY.

[Illustration: CAPT. GEORGE W. BOWLEY, KEEPER OF PAMET RIVER STATION.]

Capt. George W. Bowley, keeper of the Pamet River Life-Saving Station,
was born in Provincetown, Sept. 27, 1870, and has been in the United
States Life-Saving Service for eleven years, ten as a surfman at the
Highland Station at North Truro, and one year as keeper of this station.

Captain Bowley came from a family of life savers, his father having
been a surfman at the High Head Station, in Provincetown, for eighteen
years, being forced to resign on account of ill-health caused by the
hardship he had suffered in that long term of service.

Captain Bowley when a boy was employed as a messenger at the telegraph
station in his native town. Later he went to sea on a coasting vessel,
and afterwards made a number of voyages to the West Indies. He spent
a number of years fishing along the shores of Cape Cod, entering the
service when he was twenty-one years of age. The training as a life
saver which he received at the Highland Station, under the veteran
keeper, Captain Worthen, not only made him a No. 1 surfman, but also
fitted him for the higher position which he now holds.

Since he has been keeper of the Pamet River Station, Captain Bowley
has spared no pains to maintain a high standard of efficiency and
discipline, and he has a crew of trained surfmen ever ready to obey his
commands.


PAMET RIVER STATION CREW.

[Illustration: SURFMAN E. S. DYER, PAMET RIVER STATION.

Oldest surfman in the United States Life-saving Service.]

The No. 1 surfman is Ephraim S. Dyer. He was born in Truro in 1845,
and has the distinction of being the oldest surfman in point of years
of service, among the life savers of Cape Cod, if not in the United
States. He joined the service when it was established on Cape Cod, and
has been attached to the Pamet River Station ever since that time.
Before entering the service Surfman Dyer went to sea for a number of
years, following the coastwise trade. He also spent a number of years
as a fisherman and boatman along the shores of Cape Cod, and was in
every way qualified for the position he has held for so long a time.
During his long term of service Surfman Dyer has had many narrow
escapes from death in the performance of his duty. Upon one occasion
when three wrecks, the _Powwow_, _Miles Standish_, and _Pavey_,
occurred at one time, he became entangled in the wreckage of one of
the vessels, and a big rope, becoming twisted around his legs, dragged
him to the bottom, nearly drowning him. During the thirty years that he
has been connected with this station, Surfman Dyer has assisted at all
the wrecks that have occurred near there, and beyond a sprained ankle
he has never received any other injury in the work of saving life and
property. The hardships which he has suffered in thirty years do not
appear to have affected him in the least. He is hale and hearty and
ever ready to respond to the call “vessel ashore.”

Surfman Dyer was twice married; his present wife was formerly Lydia
Moore. He has one child, a daughter.

[Illustration:

        Left to right: E. S. DYER.  J. H. ATWOOD.  R. F. HONEY.
  CAPTAIN BOWLEY (seated).  G. W. PAINE.  I. T. HATCH.  A. NICKERSON.

PAMET RIVER CREW.]

The No. 2 surfman is Joseph H. Atwood. He was born in Weymouth, Mass.,
in 1845, and has been in the life-saving service for seventeen years,
all of which have been spent at this station. Surfman Atwood went to
sea when he was but nine years of age.

For thirty-one years he followed the sea in one capacity or another,
making a number of voyages to the West Indies, in engaging in the
coastwise trade. From his long years of service on the water he was
especially adapted for the arduous duties of a surfman. He has had
many thrilling experiences as a surfman. Once he had his leg fractured
in assisting at a wreck, and later at the wreck of the schooner
_Campbell_ he was hit on the head by a falling spar and nearly killed.
He was twice married; his present wife was formerly Mary Dyer. He is
the father of two daughters.

The No. 3 surfman is Richard Honey. He was born in Truro in 1862, and
has been in the life-saving service for twelve years, all of which
have been at this station. Surfman Honey was a sailor before entering
the service. He was an expert boatman when a boy, and after entering
the service he quickly became familiar with the work incident to a
surfman’s life, and has made a faithful and fearless life saver. He
married Drusilla Gray.

The No. 4 surfman is George Paine. He was born in Truro, and is
forty-eight years of age. Surfman Paine has been in the life-saving
service and a member of the Pamet River crew for twelve years. When a
young man he went to sea on a coasting schooner. Later he became a trap
fisherman and was stationed at Sandwich and other points along the bay
shore for a number of years.

As a trap fisherman he was obliged to battle with the surf, and he has
few equals as a boatman.

He possessed the highest qualifications when he entered the service,
and has made a brave and trustworthy life saver. He married Annie
Allen, and is the father of five children, three girls and two boys.

The No. 5 surfman is Isaiah T. Hatch. He was born in Truro in 1857.
He first entered the life-saving service in 1888, remaining at this
station for one year. He reentered the service in 1892, and again
became a member of this crew. Surfman Hatch followed the sea as a
sailor boatman and fisherman from the time he was a young man until he
entered the service, and was familiar with the duties which he has been
called upon to perform as a life saver. He is a skilled boatman and a
brave and hardy son of Cape Cod, who knows no peril when duty calls. He
married Katie Rogers.

The No. 6 surfman is Manuel Cory. He was born in Provincetown in
1869, and has been in the life-saving service for seven years, all of
which have been spent at this station. Surfman Cory was a boatman and
fisherman before he entered the service. He is a perfect type of a life
saver. Of perfect physique and muscles of steel, the rigors and perils
of his vocation have no terrors for him. He is skilled in boating and
every branch of the work of life saving, a surfman, who knows no fear
when duty calls. He married Mabel F. Snow.

The No. 7 surfman is Alonzo Nickerson. He was born in Harwich in 1871,
and has been in the service five years. He was a boatman and fisherman
before entering the service, and has made a skilled and faithful
life-saver.


ORLEANS STATION.

This station is another of the original nine stations erected on the
shores of Cape Cod in 1872. It is located on what is called Little
Ponchet Island, back of the Nauset Beach, about two and one-half miles
south of Nauset Harbor, and about five miles from the Orleans village.
Its approximate position, as obtained from the latest coast survey
charts, is latitude north 41° 45′ 35″, longitude west 69° 56′ 00″.

The first keeper of the station was the late Captain Solomon Linnell,
who was succeeded by Capt. Marcus Pierce. Captain Pierce was keeper of
the station for fifteen years, and upon his retiring from the service,
Capt. James H. Charles was placed in command.

[Illustration: ORLEANS STATION.]

The station is located at one of the most dangerous sections of the
coast, sunken bars stretching along the coast there for miles. The
patrol north from this station extends as far as Nauset Harbor, two and
one-half miles, the surfmen using time clocks. The south patrol covers
two and one-half miles of beach, the surfmen meeting and exchanging
checks with the surfmen from the Old Harbor Station. Before the Old
Harbor Station was built, the surfmen from this station were obliged to
cover the entire beach south as far as Chatham Harbor, a distance of
five miles.

At this station there are three surf-boats, two beach carts with guns,
breeches-buoys, etc., and a torch light, the latter which gives a
tremendously powerful light and is of great benefit to the life savers
while working at wrecks in the night. Captain Charles has a horse at
this station which the government employs during the winter season.

[Illustration: ALONG THE SHORE AT ORLEANS STATION.]

Since Captain Charles has been keeper of the Orleans Station nearly one
hundred lives have been saved by his crew from wrecked vessels. From
the schooner _Lizzie M. Center_ sixteen men were taken ashore in the
surf-boat by his crew, the schooner being saved. From the steam launch
_Etta_ ten men were taken ashore in the surf-boat. Two men were rescued
from a dory by the surf-boat, and from the schooner _Ann_ three men
were saved by the surf-boat and the vessel floated. From the schooner
_Lottie L. Haskins_ fourteen men were taken ashore in the surf-boat and
the vessel saved. Two men were taken ashore from a cat-boat, but the
life savers could not save the craft. From the schooner _Walter Miller_
the crew of five and one woman were taken ashore in the breeches-buoy
and the vessel saved. The schooner _Iva Laffrinier_, with crew of five
men, was boarded by the life savers, who took the crew ashore, the
vessel becoming a total loss. From the steam launch _Zilpha_ three
men were saved, and from the schooner _Zenobia_ the crew of three men
were rescued by the surf-boat, and the latter craft saved. From the
sloop _Carrol_ three men were taken ashore by the surf-boat and the
craft saved. From the cat-boat _Mary C_ three men were taken ashore in
surf-boat. One man from a dory and one from a small cat-boat were also
brought ashore in the surf-boat. From the schooner _John L. Parker_,
which became a total loss, the crew of six men were taken off by the
breeches-buoy. From the schooner _Elsie M. Smith_, which also became a
total loss, sixteen men were taken ashore by the breeches-buoy, while
from the steam launch _No Name_ two men and a woman and child were
taken ashore in the surf-boat.

[Illustration: STRANDED ON THE OUTER BAR AT ORLEANS, LATER BECOMING A
TOTAL WRECK.]

While Captain Charles and his crew have made many daring rescues both
by surf-boat and breeches-buoy, the hardest and most perilous tasks
they have are going offshore to the assistance of distressed vessels.
These jobs mean long and hard pulls with the perils multiplied, as
after boarding the crafts they are often compelled to work them into
port. No matter how far offshore the distressed vessel may be, once she
is sighted with colors flying at half-mast, Captain Charles and his
crew are off to her assistance. Frequently it happens that the vessels
they board, after pulling in the teeth of a gale for hours, are in a
sinking condition and the crews exhausted. It is then a race for life
to port, and many times have the life savers felt the vessels which
they have started to take into port sinking under them, before they had
gotten under way.

Captain Charles and his crew have had many narrow escapes in going to
the assistance of distressed vessels, and have often suffered untold
hardship in the work, but that they are ever ready to battle with the
wind or wave is evidenced by the great number of heroic rescues they
have made.


CAPT. JAMES H. CHARLES.

Capt. James H. Charles, keeper of the Orleans Station, was born in
Dennis in 1857, and has been in the life-saving service for fifteen
years, six as a surfman and nine as keeper. His whole term of service
has been at the Orleans Station.

[Illustration: CAPT. JAMES H. CHARLES, KEEPER OF ORLEANS STATION.]

His father was a well-known sea captain, and Captain Charles took
naturally to the life of a sailor. When a young man his family moved to
the far West.

Captain Charles remained in the West but a short time, returning to
Cape Cod and engaging in boating and fishing along its shores. Later
he joined the fleet of cod fishermen, and went to the Grand Banks as a
skipper. After a few years as skipper of a “grand banker,” he returned
to the West, taking up a government grant of land. He remained in the
West but a year, returning to Cape Cod, and again joining the fishing
fleet. After several seasons with the fishing fleet, he entered the
life-saving service, being assigned to the Orleans Station under Capt.
Marcus Pierce. As a surfman, under the veteran Captain Pierce, Captain
Charles displayed exceptional ability as a boatman and life saver.
The training he received with Captain Pierce soon fitted him for the
position to which he was subsequently promoted, keeper of the station,
succeeding Captain Pierce. Since he has had charge of the station, a
high standard of efficiency has always been maintained, and the daring
rescues which the crew of his station has performed testifies to their
efficiency, fearlessness, and skill. Captain Charles married Lizzie
Hurd, and is the father of three daughters and one son.


ORLEANS STATION CREW.

The No. 1 surfman is Abbott H. Walker. He was born in Orleans, Sept.
25, 1864, and has been in the life-saving service for eight years.
Surfman Walker followed the sea from boyhood, and was a well-known
boatman and fisherman. He acquired the art of handling boats in the
surf when a boy and knows the location of every rip and shoal along the
coast of Cape Cod. He had his first experience as a life saver under
Captain Charles, and has made a skilled, fearless, and efficient coast
guardian. He married Lillie Wiley, and is the father of two daughters
and two sons.

The No. 2 surfman is Richard S. Gage. He was born in Dennis in 1858,
and has been in the life-saving service for eleven years. Before
becoming a regular surfman he substituted at the Monomoy and at this
station. When he was appointed a regular surfman he was assigned to the
Pamet River Station, where he served for three years. He was a boatman
and fisherman for years, and also a coastwise and deep water sailor.
Surfman Gage is a perfect type of life saver. Skilled in the art of
boating, absolutely fearless, he has made a brave and hardy surfman.

He married Hannah M. Ellis, and is the father of two daughters and two
sons.

The No. 3 surfman is Nehemiah P. Hopkins. He was born in Eastham in
1875, and has been in the life-saving service for six years. He spent
his boyhood days boating and fishing along the shores of Cape Cod,
and had a wide experience on the water before he entered the service.
The training he has received at this station has made him a brave and
efficient life saver. He married Geneva Eldredge, and is the father of
two sons.

The No. 4 surfman is William B. Sherman. He was born in Orleans in
1857, and has been in the life-saving service for seven years. Surfman
Sherman was assigned to this station when he entered the service,
but resigned after a few months. When he reentered he was sent to
the Coskata Station on Nantucket, and was later transferred to this
station. He came from a seafaring family, his father having been an
old “Grand Banker.” Surfman Sherman learned the art of handling boats
in the surf before he joined the service, and has made an intrepid and
skilled life saver. He married Minnie Cormaney, and is the father of
one daughter and three sons.

The No. 5 surfman is Timothy F. Murray. He was born in Boston in 1859,
and has been in the life-saving service three years. Before entering
the service he had engaged in fishing and steamboating, and was a
coastwise sailor and mariner. He was assigned to this station when he
joined the service, and has made an able and skilled life saver. He
married Phœbe F. Chase, and is the father of two daughters and one son.

[Illustration:

  Left to right: CAPTAIN CHARLES.  ABBOTT H. WALKER.  RICHARD S. GAGE.
     NEHEMIAH P. HOPKINS.  WILLIAM B. SHERMAN.  TIMOTHY F. MURRAY.
                     JOHN KILBURN.  GEO. F. JORDEN.

ORLEANS STATION CREW.]

The No. 6 surfman is John Kilburn. He was born in Provincetown in
1856, and has been in the life-saving service for three years. When he
entered the service he was assigned to the Gay Head Station on Martha’s
Vineyard, where he served one year, when he was sent to the Cahoon’s
Hollow Station, remaining there one year. Surfman Kilburn was a mariner
before entering the service, and was well fitted for the work he is
called upon to perform as a life saver. He married Eliza Sparrow, and
is the father of two sons.

The No. 7 surfman is George F. Jorden. He was born in Williamsport,
Pa., in 1875, and has been in the life-saving service for two years.
He entered the service as a member of the City Point, South Boston,
Station crew. He served there two seasons and was the winterman at
Wood End Station under Captain Bickers for two years. Last May he was
transferred to the Salisbury Beach Station, where he remained until
Dec. 1, 1902, when he joined this station.

Surfman Jorden had substituted at this station before he joined the
service. He is an expert boatman and a fearless life saver. He married
Sarah Smith, and is the father of one daughter and one son.


NAUSET STATION.

[Illustration: NAUSET STATION.]

The Nauset Life-Saving Station is another of the original nine United
States Life-Saving Stations which were built on Cape Cod in 1872. It
is situated on Nauset beach about two and one-half miles from North
Eastham depot and village. Its approximate position as obtained from
the latest coast survey charts is latitude north 41° 50′ 40″, longitude
west 69° 45′ 00″. When this station was built it was placed on a site
one thousand feet south of its present location, but the shifting sands
soon required its being moved inland to a more secure location, the
site it now occupies. The sea at this point is constantly making great
inroads into the beach, the banks having been cut away for a distance
of about one hundred and fifty feet since the station was built.

The patrol north from this station is about four and one-half miles,
the surfmen meeting and exchanging checks with the surfmen from
Cahoon’s Hollow. The south patrol is three and one-eighth miles, the
surfmen that go on that patrol using time clocks to record their
performance of duty.

[Illustration:

                               Back row:
   SURFMAN WALKER.  SURFMAN GAGE.  CAPTAIN BEARSE.  CAPTAIN CHARLES.

                               Front row:
    SURFMAN SNOW.  SURFMAN JORDEN.  SURFMAN HOWES.  SURFMAN HIGGINS.

JOINT CREW.

Captains Charles, of Orleans Station, and Bearse, of Nauset Station,
with their picked crews of life savers who, at the risk of their lives,
brought the disabled schooner _Andrew Adams_ and crew into port. This,
the first instance in the history of the life-saving service on Cape
Cod, in which two life-saving captains went to a rescue in the same
life-boat, occurred during the winter of 1903.]

Nauset bars extend along the shore at this station, and many terrible
wrecks have taken place there. When the station was opened Capt.
Marcus M. Pierce was appointed keeper. Later he was transferred to the
Orleans Station, and Capt. Walter D. Knowles was placed in charge.
Keeper Knowles was succeeded by the present keeper Captain Bearse.
There are two surf-boats of the Monomoy model, two beach carts with
breeches-buoy, etc., and a life-car at this station.

“Brad,” a horse owned by Captain Bearse, is on duty at the station
during the winter season.

Captain Bearse and his crew of life savers have rescued seventeen
persons in their surf-boat and seventeen shipwrecked sailors in the
breeches-buoy since Captain Bearse has been keeper, while thirty-eight
persons were rescued from the surf by ropes and small boats. Of the
total number of vessels stranded on the bars near the station eight
schooners and one cat-boat were a total loss. Not a life has been lost
within the province of this station since Captain Bearse has been in
charge.


CAPT. ALONZO N. BEARSE.

[Illustration: CAPT. ALONZO N. BEARSE, KEEPER OF NAUSET STATION.]

Capt. Alonzo N. Bearse, keeper of the Nauset Life-Saving Station,
was born on Monomoy Point in 1842, and has been in the life-saving
service for nineteen years, three years as a surfman and sixteen as
keeper of this station. Born on Monomoy Island, within sight of the
dreaded shoals off Monomoy, as a boy he became familiar with boats and
boating, and witnessed the scenes of disaster that occurred along the
coast near his home. He quickly learned the art of handling boats in
rough water, and in launching and landing through the surf. He went
to sea at an early age, shipping on a coastwise schooner. Returning
from sea shortly after the outbreak of the Civil War, he enlisted in
the 43d Massachusetts Infantry, Company E, serving honorably with his
company for eleven months, his term of enlistment. During the time that
he was at the front he took part in the severe fighting at Kingston,
Whitehall, and Goldsboro. He escaped unhurt, however, and returned to
Cape Cod, and again went to sea. He had a wide and varied experience as
mariner, fisherman, and boatman, and was well qualified for the work
of a surfman when he joined the Nauset Station crew, under Captain
Knowles, whom he subsequently succeeded as keeper.

Captain Bearse labors diligently to maintain a high standard of
efficiency among his crew, and is a careful and fearless warrior of
the sea. Numerous disasters have occurred within the precincts of
the Nauset Station since he has been in command, and many have been
averted, owing to the vigilance of his surfmen.

He was twice married, his present wife was Cordelia Ellis, and he is
the father of three children.


NAUSET STATION CREW.

The No. 1 surfman is Allen T. Gill. He was born in North Eastham in
1857, and has been in the life-saving service for sixteen years, all
of which have been spent at this station. Surfman Gill followed the
sea and was a boatman and fisherman from the time he was a boy until
he joined the service. He has assisted at all the wrecks that have
occurred along the Nauset beach during the past sixteen years, and is a
fearless and faithful coast guardian. He married Exa E. Lewis, and is
the father of a daughter and son.

The No. 2 surfman is Charles C. Daniels. He was born in Gloucester,
and is forty years of age. Surfman Daniels has been a member of the
Nauset crew for fifteen years, being assigned to this station when he
entered the service. He went to sea when a young man as a sailor in the
coastwise surface, and was also a boat fisherman for a number of years.
He was especially fitted for the work of a surfman, and has made a
brave and faithful life saver. He married Mary Cole, and is the father
of four daughters and two sons.

The No. 3 surfman is Lewis H. Collins. He was born in North Eastham
in 1865, and is serving his fourteenth year as a life saver. Surfman
Collins was a fisherman and sailor before he entered the service. In
the fourteen years that he has been a member of the Nauset crew he
has proven himself a faithful and fearless life saver. While working
at a wreck several years ago he suffered severe injuries to his leg
and back by the capsizing of the surf-boat that rendered him unfit for
service for a long time. He married Eva W. Wiley, and is the father of
a boy.

The No. 4 surfman is Whitman F. Howes. He was born in Chatham in 1860,
and has been in the life-saving service for ten years. Surfman Howes
was a boat fisherman and sailor before entering the service, and was
well qualified for the work of a surfman when he became a life saver.
He has assisted at all the wrecks along the shore during the past ten
years and has proven his worth as a life saver whenever duty called
him. He married Carrie L. Penniman, and is the father of one daughter
and one son.

[Illustration:

   Left to right: CAPTAIN BEARSE.  ALLEN T. GILL.  CHAS. C. DANIELS.
         LEWIS H. COLLINS.  WHITMAN F. HOWES.  ORIN W. HIGGINS.
                    WARREN F. MAYO.  GEORGE F. SNOW.

NAUSET CREW.]

The No. 5 surfman is Orin W. Higgins. He was born in Eastham in 1867,
and has been in the life-saving service for nine years, all of which
have been spent at this station. As a sailor and boat fisherman along
the shores of Cape Cod, Surfman Higgins was well accustomed to the
handling of boats in the roughest water, and has made an able and
trustworthy life saver. He married Helen F. Higgins.

The No. 6 surfman is Warren W. Mayo. He was born in Eastham, and is
thirty-three years of age. He entered the life-saving service seven
years ago, being assigned to this station. Before entering the service
he had followed the sea for a number of years, and was skilled in
the art of handling boats. He has made a valuable man for Captain
Bearse and is a faithful and fearless life saver. He married Marion M.
Sparrow, and is the father of a son and daughter.

The No. 7 surfman is George F. Snow. He was born in Orleans in 1859,
and has been in the life-saving service for four years. Surfman Snow
is the winter man at this station, joining the crew in December, 1902.
For two seasons he has been a member of the City Point, South Boston,
Life-Saving Station. He was a boatman and fisherman along the shores
of the Cape before entering the service, and has made an able and
faithful life saver. He married Susan W. Alden, and is the father of
one daughter and three sons.


OLD HARBOR STATION.

This station, at the entrance of Chatham Old Harbor, has been in
commission less than five years, during which time Keeper Doane and
his crew have rescued twenty-one persons in their surf-boat and taken
thirteen shipwrecked sailors ashore in the breeches-buoy. Of the whole
number of vessels that met with disaster within the province of the
station, but two were total wrecks, viz., the _Elsie C. Smith_ of
Gloucester, and the _Commerce_ of Rockland, the latter foundering off
the shore near the station.

[Illustration: OLD HARBOR STATION.]

This station is provided with two surf-boats, two beach carts with
guns, breeches-buoys, etc., and a life-car. One of the surf-boats, a
small one, is kept in a boathouse on the point of the beach, about a
half mile from the station, where it can be quickly brought into use
for rescue work in the harbor and bay. The other surf-boat, the large
one, for use in the open sea, is kept in the station. A horse which the
government hires during the winter season is kept in a barn close to
the station.

The surfmen from this station have a patrol north for a distance of two
and one-half miles, meeting and exchanging checks with the surfmen from
the Orleans Station. On the south patrol, which is about a mile, the
surfmen use a time clock to register their patrolling of the beach at
that point.

[Illustration: HEZEKIAH F. DOANE, KEEPER OF OLD HARBOR STATION.]


CAPT. HEZEKIAH F. DOANE.

Capt. Hezekiah F. Doane, keeper of the Old Harbor Station, was born
in Chatham in 1846, and has been in the life-saving service for
twenty-two years, thirteen as a surfman and nine as keeper. When he
entered the service he was assigned to the Chatham Station, where he
served as a surfman for thirteen years, being appointed keeper of the
station in 1893. Captain Doane remained keeper of the Chatham Station
for five years or until he was transferred to the Old Harbor Station
in 1898. He was a fisherman, yachtsman, and mariner before he entered
the life-saving service and was well prepared for the work he has since
been called upon to perform. As a surfman at the Chatham Station he
had much work in rescuing shipwrecked crews and assisting distressed
vessels, and his appointment as keeper of the Chatham Station was
meritorious reward for faithful and efficient service. While keeper of
the Chatham Station, Captain Doane and his brave crew of life savers
made many perilous trips out over the shoals to distressed vessels, and
effected daring rescues of imperiled crews. Owing to the shallow water
along the Chatham shores, nearly all the work performed by Captain
Doane was with the surf-boats, the breeches-buoy having been used but
twice since he has been in the service. He married Pemah B. Pierce, and
is the father of two sons.


OLD HARBOR STATION CREW.

The No. 1 surfman is Robert F. Pierce. He was born in Harwich and is
thirty-six years of age. Surfman Pierce has been in the life-saving
service for twelve years, eight as a member of the Monomoy crew, under
the late Captain Tuttle, and four years at this station. When a young
man he engaged in boating and fishing, and later entered the coastwise
service. From his experience as a fisherman and boatman along the
shores of Cape Cod he was skilled in the art of handling boats in the
surf, and took naturally to the work he has been called upon to perform
since joining the life-saving service. While a member of the Monomoy
crew he was repeatedly called upon to face the greatest dangers, and
won for himself an enviable record as a life saver. Surfman Pierce
was out of the service one year, during which time he was engaged in
boating. He married Minnie A. Bearse, and is the father of a boy.

The No. 2 surfman is Edwin P. Ellis. He was born in Brewster and is
forty-five years of age. Surfman Ellis has been in the life-saving
service for twelve years. He was a boatman and fisherman before he
joined the service. When he entered the service he was assigned to
the Orleans Station, under Captain Charles, serving there for five
years, when he was transferred to Coskata Station on Nantucket. He
was a member of the Coskata Station crew for two years. At the end of
that time he was sent to join the crew at this station. At the Orleans
and Coskata stations Surfman Ellis received a thorough drilling and
performed much active work in life saving. He is a skilful boatman,
hardened to the rigors of a life saver’s life.

The No. 3 surfman is Benjamin O. Eldredge. He was born in Chatham, on
July 10, 1878, and has been in the life-saving service for five years.
Prior to his becoming a regular member of this station crew, he served
as a substitute at the Monomoy Station, under the late Captains Tuttle
and Eldredge. As a boatman and fisherman along the Chatham shore and a
substitute life saver he acquired a thorough knowledge of the art of
handling boats in the surf under the most trying conditions, and was
well qualified for the duties he has to perform as a life saver.

[Illustration:

    Left to right: CAPTAIN DOANE.  ROB’T F. PIERCE.  EDWIN P. ELLIS.
       BENJ. O. ELDREDGE.  OTIS C. ELDREDGE.  FRANCIS H. BASSETT.
                            ZEBINA B. CHASE.

OLD HARBOR STATION CREW.]

The No. 4 surfman is Otis C. Eldredge. He was born in Chatham in
1856, and has been in the life-saving service for seven years. When
he entered the service he was assigned to the Jerry’s Point Station,
N. H., under Capt. Silas Harding, remaining there three years, when he
was transferred to this station. Before entering the service, Surfman
Eldredge was a boat fisherman and “beach comber” along the Chatham
shores, and his experience in the work especially fitted him for the
duties of a life saver. He married Margaret Bloomer, and is the father
of two daughters.

The No. 5 surfman is Dean W. Eldredge. He was born in Brewster, and is
forty-seven years of age. Surfman Eldredge has been in the life-saving
service for three years. Before entering the service he was a member
of the crew of the Handkerchief Lightship. For years he engaged in
boating, fishing, and wrecking along the shores of Cape Cod, and is a
skilled surfman and a faithful life saver. When he entered the service
he was assigned to the Plum Island Station, remaining there but a short
time before he was sent to the Orleans Station, from which he was
transferred to this station in August, 1902. He married Lena Hallet.

The No. 6 surfman is Francis H. Bassett. He was born in Harwich in
1863, and has been in the life-saving service for three years. He
served two years at the Cahoon’s Hollow Station, under Captain Cole,
becoming a member of this station Dec. 1, 1901. Surfman Bassett was a
boatman and fisherman on Chatham bars for a number of years and had
also been a grocery man. He had a wide experience as a boatman, and has
made an able and fearless life saver. He married Gertrude G. Allen, and
is the father of five daughters.

The No. 7 surfman is Zebina B. Chase. He was born in Chatham in 1862,
and has been in the life-saving service three years. He was first
a member of the Salisbury Beach Station, where he remained one and
one-half years, then joining the Floating Station at City Point,
South Boston. Before entering the service as a regular surfman he had
substituted at different periods for four years at the Monomoy Station.
Prior to this he was a member of the crew of the Shovelful Lightship
for five years. From the time that he was a boy he has been engaged
in boating, or fishing, or doing service of one kind or another on
the water along the shores of Cape Cod. He is the winter man at this
station, joining the City Point Station crew in the summer season. He
is a skilful boatman and an efficient life saver. He married Etta M.
Nickerson, and is the father of one daughter and four sons.


CHATHAM STATION.

The Chatham Station is another of the original nine stations erected on
Cape Cod in 1872, and is situated near where it was first located. Its
approximate position as obtained from the latest coast survey charts
is latitude north 41° 39′ 10″, longitude west 69° 57′ 10″, one and
one-quarter miles southwest of Chatham lights. A few years after the
station was established it was moved across the harbor to where the Old
Harbor Station now stands. It remained there a few years when it was
again moved back to its original site, where it is now located, on the
northern end of Monomoy, near the “cut through,” within easy distance
of Chatham village.

When this station was moved from the Old Harbor site it was believed
that a new station would be built there, but not until after the wreck
of the schooner _Calvin B. Orcutt_ on Old Harbor bars was the station
erected. The first keeper of the station was Capt. Alpheus Mayo; he was
in turn succeeded by Capt. Nathaniel Gould, Capt. Hezekiah Doane, and
the present keeper, Capt. Herbert Eldredge.

The patrol, south from this station, is two and one-quarter miles; the
north patrol about two miles. Checks are exchanged with the surfmen
from the Monomoy Station on the south; on the north patrol time clocks
are used. The station is supplied with four surf-boats, (Monomoy
model), one dory, two beach carts with full sets of apparatus, and one
life-car. “Baby,” a horse employed by the government, is kept at the
station to assist in hauling the apparatus to wrecks.

[Illustration: CHATHAM STATION.]


WRECKS AT THE CHATHAM STATION.

Since Keeper Eldredge has had charge of this station he has made
twenty-six trips to disabled or wrecked vessels in the station
surf-boat. On board the vessels assisted by Keeper Eldredge and his
crew there were seventy-four persons. Of this number eight were
taken ashore in the surf-boat. Six of these comprised the crew of
the schooner _Electa Bailey_, which was a total loss, one was from a
crippled cat-boat, and the other was a sick sailor taken ashore from a
schooner. Most of the work done by the crew of the Chatham Station was
on two and three masted schooners that became stranded on the Chatham
bars.


CAPT. HERBERT E. ELDREDGE.

[Illustration: CAPT. HERBERT ELDREDGE, KEEPER OF CHATHAM STATION.]

Capt. Herbert E. Eldredge, keeper of the Chatham Station, was born in
Chatham in 1863, and has been in the life-saving service for thirteen
years, eight as a surfman and five as keeper, all of which have been
spent at this station. Captain Eldredge began his career on the water
along the Chatham shore when a boy of thirteen years, and was an
expert boatman, fisherman, and wrecker before he was twenty years of
age. For six years he went fishing on the rips off Chatham, one of the
most perilous occupations along the coast. As a member of Capt. Joseph
Bloomer’s wrecking crew, Captain Eldredge had a wide experience working
on wrecked vessels along the coast, and was especially fitted for the
responsible position that he now holds. He has a crew of brave and
hardy life savers for whom the rips and shoals that abound along the
Chatham shore have no terrors. Not a life has been lost within the
province of the Chatham Station during the time that Captain Eldredge
has been keeper.

He married Mary A. Nye, and is the father of two daughters and a son.


CHATHAM STATION CREW.

The No. 1 surfman is Bradford N. Bloomer. He was born in Chatham in
1871, and has been in the life-saving service for six years, all of
which have been spent at this station. Before entering the service
Surfman Bloomer was a Monomoy fisherman, so called. In this work he
became skilled in the art of handling boats in the surf, and obtained
a knowledge of the shoals that lie hidden along the coast off Chatham
that especially fitted him for the work of a surfman. He married Julia
Pitts, and is the father of two daughters.

[Illustration:

         Left to right: HERBERT P. SMITH.  NATHANIEL HAMILTON.
        JOHN W. CROWELL.  SAMUEL D. ELDREDGE.  CHARLES H. HOWES.
                BRADFORD D. BLOOMER.  CAPTAIN ELDREDGE.

CHATHAM CREW.]

The No. 2 surfman is Charles H. Howes. He was born in Chatham, is
thirty-six years of age, and has been in the life-saving service five
years. Surfman Howes was assigned to the Coskata Station on Nantucket
when he entered the service; later he was transferred here. He was
a boatman and fisherman over the Old Harbor bars from boyhood until
he entered the life-saving service. The experience he gained in that
hazardous work fully prepared him for the duties of a surfman, and
he has made a brave and trustworthy life saver. He married Henrietta
Jones, and is the father of a daughter and son.

The No. 3 surfman is Samuel D. Eldredge. Surfman Eldredge was born in
East Harwich in 1859, and has been in the life-saving service for five
years, all of that time at this station. He was a boatman and fisherman
from the time that he was a boy until he entered the service, and was
in every way qualified for the work of a life saver. He married Sarah
J. Eldredge.

The No. 4 surfman is John W. Crowell. He was born in East Harwich, and
is twenty-six years of age. Surfman Crowell has been in the life-saving
service six years, serving four years at the Monomoy Station under
the late Captain Eldredge, the remaining time at this station. Before
entering the service he was a boatman and fisherman on the Chatham
bars. As a member of the Monomoy crew he was called upon to face the
greatest perils in the work of rescuing lives from wrecked vessels, and
proved a faithful and brave surfman. He married Elsie Nickerson, and is
the father of a son.

The No. 5 surfman is Nathaniel Hamilton. He was born in Foxboro,
Mass., in 1872, and has been in the life-saving service for four
years. Surfman Hamilton was formerly a member of the Coskata Station,
Nantucket. Owing to injuries received by falling on a piece of
wreckage, while on patrol duty at that station, he was on sick leave
for one year. When he reentered the service he was assigned to this
station. He was a boatman and fisherman before entering the service,
and has made a brave and efficient life saver. He married Abbie L.
Johnson, and is the father of three daughters.

The No. 6 surfman is Franklin W. Eldredge. He was born in Chatham
in 1859, and has been in the life-saving service one year. Surfman
Eldredge joined the Coskata Station crew when he entered the service,
and after five months at that station was transferred here. He was a
boatman and fisherman before he entered the service, spending thirteen
years as a fisherman over Chatham bars. He entered the life-saving
service fully prepared for the most perilous work, and has proved to be
a skilled and faithful life saver. He married Modena B. Jerauld, and is
the father of three daughters and two sons.

The No. 7 surfman is Herbert P. Smith. He was born in Edgartown,
Martha’s Vineyard, in 1877, and has been in the life-saving service
five years. Surfman Smith was a boatman and fisherman along the
shores of Martha’s Vineyard from boyhood. In addition to being an
expert boatman, he received a thorough nautical training, having made
several foreign cruises as a cadet on the United States training ship
_Enterprise_. Surfman Smith also served on the repair ship _Vulcan_
during the war with Spain.

He is skilled in the art of boating through the surf and has made a
faithful and fearless life saver.


MONOMOY STATION.

The Monomoy Station is another of the original nine stations erected
on Cape Cod when the United States Life-Saving Service was extended to
these shores. It is located two and one-half miles north of Monomoy
Light. Its approximate position as obtained from the latest coast
survey charts is latitude north 41° 35′ 25″, longitude west 69° 59′
10″. When the station was manned, March 20, 1873, Capt. George W.
Baxter, of West Harwich, was placed in command. He resigned on account
of ill-health in 1882, and his successor was Capt. William Tuttle. His
death occurred July 1, 1899, and the late Capt. Marshall W. Eldredge
was appointed to fill the vacancy Aug. 4, 1899. Captain Eldredge
perished in an attempt to rescue five persons from the stranded barge
_Wadena_, March 17, 1902.

[Illustration: MONOMOY STATION.]

The patrol north of this station is about two and one-half miles, the
surfmen meeting and exchanging checks with the surfmen from the Chatham
Station. The patrol south is about one and one-half miles, the surfmen
meeting and exchanging checks with the surfmen from the Monomoy Point
Station.

There is no more dangerous stretch of coast on Cape Cod than off
Monomoy. Disaster follows disaster in that region, and the work of the
life savers is attended with the greatest peril at all times.

The following disasters have occurred at the Monomoy Station since
Captain Ellis has been in command: Schooner _Elwood Burton_, of New
York, stranded on the Handkerchief Shoal, the life savers rescuing her
crew of six men in their surf-boat. Five men, the crew of the barge
_Paxinos_, which had struck on Pollock Rip, were rescued from a sinking
boat by the Monomoy crew. They were later placed aboard the barge,
which was soon floated by the life savers. From the schooner _Dora
Mathews_, which stranded on the beach near the station, three men were
taken ashore in the breeches-buoy. A number of other crafts which met
with disaster along the shore were assisted by Captain Ellis and his
crew.

[Illustration: CAPT. SETH L. ELLIS, KEEPER OF MONOMOY STATION.]


CAPT. SETH L. ELLIS.

Capt. Seth L. Ellis, keeper of the Monomoy Station and sole survivor of
the Monomoy disaster, was born in Harwich Port, Oct. 12, 1858, and has
been in the life-saving service seven years, all of which have been at
this station.

Captain Ellis came from a family of seafaring people. His father, Capt.
Seth N. Ellis, was an old West Indies tradesman.

Captain Ellis went to sea with his father when but nine years of age.
When fifteen years of age Captain Ellis joined the fleet of mackerel
fishermen, remaining with the fleet until he went coasting. While a
member of the crew of the three-masted schooner _Enos B. Phillips_, of
Boston, Capt. T. Reuben Allen, of Harwich Port, master, the vessel was
struck by a blizzard that made her a helpless wreck. With her jibboom,
bowsprit, foremast, and maintop masts gone, all her head sails lost,
and the cabin and forecastle wrecked, the schooner was blown across
the gulf stream and out of the track of all shipping. After many
days, during which the crew suffered terribly, Captain Allen finally
triumphed and brought the vessel into port.

Captain Ellis has been master of sailing and steam vessels, and now
carries a captain’s first-class steamboat license for the Atlantic
coast. Captain Ellis was also a well-known mackerel fisherman, being
a member of the crew of the first steam fishing vessel employed in
mackerel fishery, the _Novelty_, of Boston. Later Captain Ellis engaged
in boat fishing along the shores of the Cape near Chatham, continuing
in that work until he joined the Monomoy crew of life savers.


MONOMOY STATION CREW.

The No. 1 surfman is Walter C. Bloomer. He was born in Chatham in
1867, and has been in the life-saving service for five years. Surfman
Bloomer was a “Monomoy” fisherman, boatman, and wrecker before entering
the service. When he joined the service he was assigned to the Brant
Rock Station, where he remained three years, being transferred to this
station. At this station, under the late Captain Eldredge, he saw much
active service and proved himself a fearless and skilful surfman. On
the occasion of the terrible Monomoy disaster, when his keeper and
six of his comrades lost their lives, Surfman Bloomer was doing cook
duty, and remained at the station. He married Velma Stevens, and is the
father of two girls and two boys.

The No. 2 surfman is Thomas H. Kane. He was born in Manchester, N. H.,
in 1870, and has been in the life-saving service four years. Surfman
Kane followed the sea from the time he was fifteen years of age until
he entered the life-saving service. He was a “grand banker,” a mackerel
fisherman, and had a wide and varied experience on the water. He was a
member of the Rockport Life-Saving crew, and was with Captain Charles
at the Orleans Station for one year. Surfman Kane joined the Monomoy
Station, to fill a vacancy caused by the death of one of the crew who
perished with Captain Eldredge at the Monomoy disaster.

He is an expert boatman, a brave and hardy surfman. He married Sarah
Whellock, and is the father of a daughter and son.

The No. 3 surfman is Edwin A. Studley. He was born in North Harwich in
1864, and has been in the life-saving service for two years, one year
at the Orleans Station and one year at this station. Surfman Studley
followed the sea since he was a boy. For several years he was a member
of the crew of the Pollock Rip Lightship, and later he joined the crew
of the Shovelful Lightship. He was also a sailor in the coastwise
trade, and engaged in boating and fishing along the Chatham shores for
several years. He is an efficient boatman and a fearless life saver. He
married Alice Phillips, and is the father of a son.

[Illustration:

               Standing: GEORGE CAHOON.  WALTER F. WIXON.
        Seated: THOMAS H. KANE.  WALTER BLOOMER.  CAPTAIN ELLIS.
                  SURFMAN RESIGNED.  EDWIN A. STUDLEY.

MONOMOY CREW.]

The No. 4 surfman is George C. Cahoon. He was born in Harwich in 1872,
and has been in the life-saving service but a year. When he entered
the service he was assigned to the Race Point Station, under Capt.
“Sam” Fisher, and was transferred here this year. Surfman Cahoon was
a fisherman and boatman along the shores of Cape Cod from the time he
was a boy until he entered the service. He is an able boatman and has
already shown himself to be an efficient life saver. He married Emma
Jones, and is the father of a daughter.

The No. 5 surfman is Walter F. Wixon. He was born in South Chatham in
1866, and is serving his first year in the life-saving service. Having
been a boatman and fisherman along the shores “back of the Cape” for a
number of years, he is skilled in handling a boat, and has a thorough
knowledge of the rips and shoals that line the shore there. He married
Minnie E. Chase.

The No. 6 surfman is Thomas W. Bearse. He was born in West Harwich in
1863, and is serving his first season as a life saver. Surfman Bearse
was a boatman and fisherman along the Chatham shores before he entered
the service, and was well prepared for the work he has been called upon
to perform as a surfman. He married Annie Cahoon, and is the father of
two boys.

The No. 7 surfman is Frank Thomas. He was born in Provincetown in 1874,
and entered the life-saving service Dec. 1, 1902. Surfman Thomas went
to the Grand Banks when he was but eleven years of age. He followed the
sea from that time until he entered the service, engaging principally
in dory fishing off Cape Cod. He is an expert boatman and gives promise
of becoming an able life saver. He married Rosie Gracie, and is the
father of two daughters.

The No. 8 surfman is Marcus N. Smith. He was born in West Chatham in
1865, and has been in the life-saving service one year. He followed the
sea and was a boatman and fisherman along the shores of Cape Cod from
the time he was a boy until he joined the service. He first served at
the Muskeget Station, Nantucket, joining this station as the winter man
Dec. 1, 1902. He has proved his efficiency as a life saver, and is a
valuable addition to the crew at this station.

Owing to the great amount of work which the crew of this station was
called upon to perform, and the long patrol that the surfmen were
obliged to go over before the Monomoy Point Station was built, eight
surfmen were employed at this station, and they are still retained.
It is the only station on Cape Cod where that number of surfmen are
employed.


MONOMOY POINT STATION.

The Monomoy Point Station is located near the extreme end of Monomoy
Island, about nine miles from Chatham lights, which bear about
north-northeast. Monomoy Island is a long, narrow strip of beach at
the elbow of Cape Cod. The dreaded Shovelful and Handkerchief shoals
stretch out under the waters of Nantucket Sound along the eastern and
southern shores of the island, and in the vicinity countless vessels
have met their doom and many lives have been lost. Owing to the great
number of disasters that occurred off the southern end of Monomoy, the
present life-saving station was built. At the time that this station
was erected it was intended that the old Monomoy Station should be
abandoned and the crew transferred to this station.

After the appalling calamity, “The Monomoy Disaster” on March 17, 1902,
when Captain Eldredge and six of his crew of life savers lost their
lives, the department decided to continue the old Monomoy Station.

The station is one of the most modern buildings of its kind, with large
and airy rooms for the crew and a big boat room for the surf-boats,
beach carts, and other apparatus.

[Illustration: MONOMOY POINT STATION.]

The patrol north from this station is about one and one-half miles, the
surfmen meeting and exchanging checks with the surfmen from the Old
Monomoy Station. The south patrol along the beach on the end of Monomoy
is also about one and one-half miles, the surfman on that patrol
carrying a time clock to record their performance of duty.

At the Monomoy Point Station there are three surf-boats. One of these
boats is a self-bailer, the only one on Cape Cod. There are also two
beach carts with apparatus, and one life-car. Six surfmen with Keeper
Kelley go in the self-bailer at the time of shipwreck. A horse owned
by the government, called “Susan,” is kept at the station to assist
in hauling the apparatus to scenes of disaster. There are also two
other horses owned by the surfmen kept there. Cats are the pets of the
surfmen, a half dozen making their home at the station.


CAPT. JOSEPH C. KELLEY.

[Illustration: CAPT. JOSEPH C. KELLEY, KEEPER OF MONOMOY POINT STATION.]

Capt. Joseph C. Kelley, keeper of the Monomoy Point Life-Saving
Station, was born in West Brewster in 1873, and has been in the
life-saving service for five years. When he entered the service he
was assigned to the Peaked Hill Bars Station under Captain Cook. He
remained there but a few months, when he was transferred to the Chatham
Station under Capt. Herbert Eldredge. Captain Kelley was appointed
keeper of the new Monomoy Point Station in August, 1902, although
the station was not manned until Oct. 30, 1902. Captain Kelley has
the distinction of being the youngest life-saving station keeper on
Cape Cod, if not in the United States, having been honored with the
appointment of keeper of the Monomoy Point Station when he was but
twenty-nine years of age.

When a young man he was a boatman and fisherman along the shores of
Cape Cod, and later became a coastwise sailor. He became accustomed
to the perils incident to the work of boating along the shores of the
Cape, and skilled in handling boats in the roughest water at an early
age. At the Peaked Hill Bars Station under the veteran seafighter,
Captain Cook, Surfman Captain Kelley received a most thorough drilling
in the work of life saving, which proved of untold benefit to him
when he joined the Chatham Station, and better prepared him for the
responsible position he now occupies. At the Chatham Station under
Captain Eldredge, Captain Kelley was No. 1 surfman. He assisted at all
the wrecks that occurred along the shore there for nearly five years,
demonstrating his ability to cope with the most stupendous problems
of life saving. Captain Kelley has a selected crew of experienced and
fearless surfmen, who in the brief history of the station have proven
themselves equal to every emergency that has arisen.

[Illustration: THE HORSES THAT ARE KEPT ON DUTY AT MONOMOY POINT
STATION.]

Five disasters occurred on the shoals near the station within as many
weeks after the station was manned, and in every case the vessels
were saved and not a life was lost. Captain Kelley married Chestena
Batchelder.


MONOMOY POINT STATION CREW.

The No. 1 surfman is Joseph D. Bloomer. He was born in Prince Edward
Island in 1857, and has been in the life-saving service since Oct. 1,
1902. Surfman Bloomer followed the sea in one capacity or another since
he was a boy. For five years he was engaged in trading between Portland
and the West Indies Islands. Upon coming to Cape Cod he took up his
residence in Chatham, and for the past twenty-five years he has been
a boatman, fisherman, anchor dragger, and wrecker on the shoals off
Monomoy. Before entering the life-saving service as a regular surfman,
he had substituted at the Chatham and Monomoy Stations, and was well
used to the duties of a surfman. The rips and shoals off Monomoy are
all familiar to Surfman Bloomer. During the twenty-five years that he
has spent in that region he assisted at all the wrecks that took place
near there, and was one of the best-known Monomoy wreckers so-called.
Skilled in the art of boating, with a thorough knowledge of the shoals
along the shores of Cape Cod, Surfman Bloomer has few equals as a life
saver. He married Adeline Bloomer.

[Illustration:

                               Back row:
         OBED H. SHIVERICK.  JOHN E. ELLIS.  JOSEPH D. BLOOMER.
                            CAPTAIN KELLEY.

                               Front row:
      RICHARD E. RYDER.  CHARLES G. HAMILTON.  REUBEN W. ELDREDGE.
                            EDWIN L. CLARK.

MONOMOY POINT CREW.]

The No. 2 surfman is John E. Ellis. He was born in West Harwich in
1874, and entered the life-saving service when this station was manned
Oct. 1, 1902. Surfman Ellis followed the sea from the time that he
was a boy until he joined the life-saving service. He engaged in
steamboating for a few years, and later made a great number of trips on
barges from the middle Atlantic ports around Cape Cod. He spent several
years boating and fishing on the shoals off Monomoy, and is a skilled
boatman and a fearless life saver. He married Lilian M. Ashley.

The No. 3 surfman is Obed H. Shiverick. He was born in Dennis in 1867,
and entered the life-saving service when this station was manned.

Surfman Shiverick went to sea when a small boy, his first trip being
to the Grand Banks. He was a fisherman for a number of years, when he
joined the crew of the Cross Rip Lightship under Captain Jorgensen, and
for four years was a member of the Nantucket Shoals Lightship, also
under Captain Jorgensen, going with the veteran captain when he took
charge of that floating beacon. Surfman Shiverick has had a wide and
varied experience on the water. He is familiar with the rips and shoals
along the shores of Cape Cod, is a skilled boatman, and a brave and
efficient life saver. He married Sadie McQuarrie, and is the father of
two daughters.

The No. 4 surfman is Edwin L. Clark. He was born in Chatham in 1876,
and has been in the life-saving service since Oct. 1, 1902. Surfman
Clark followed the sea from a boy. For a number of years he engaged
in barge towing around Cape Cod, and later joined the crew of the
Shovelful Lightship, where he remained one year. At different periods
for two years he substituted at the Monomoy Station, under the late
Captain Eldredge. He is well accustomed to the hardships incident to a
surfman’s life, skilled in the art of handling boats, and is an able
life saver. He married Minnie B. West, and is the father of a daughter.

The No. 5 surfman is Reuben W. Eldredge. He was born in South Dennis in
1864, and entered the life-saving service when this station was manned.
Surfman Eldredge followed the sea from a boy. For ten successive years
he went cod-fishing to the Grand Banks. While fishing on the banks
one season he lost track of his vessel during a thick fog, and was
tossed about in an open dory for five days without food or water. He
was finally picked up in an unconscious condition by a French fishing
vessel, and put aboard his own vessel. He recovered in a short time,
and despite the terrible suffering through which he passed, continued
to go to the “banks” for several years. Later he became a coastwise
sailor, and was also a member of the crew of the steamer _City of
Macon_ for some time.

Surfman Eldredge, after giving up going to sea, became a fisherman and
wrecker along the shores of Monomoy. He also substituted at the Chatham
Station under the late Captain Eldredge. He is perfectly at home in a
boat under any and all conditions of wind or weather. The sea has no
terrors for him, and he is inured to the hardships and perils of a life
saver’s life. He married Alice D. Young, and is the father of a son.

The No. 6 surfman is Joseph Christie. He was born in Scotland, is
thirty-one years of age, and has been in the life-saving service since
this station was manned. Surfman Christie was a boatman and fisherman
for a number of years, and also served as substitute at the Cuttyhunk
Life-Saving Station. He served in the United States Navy in the war
with Spain. He married Lizzie Jackson. Surfman Christie is at present
on sick leave, on account of injuries received in the performance of
his duty.

The No. 7 surfman is John E. Ryder. He was born in Chatham in 1879, and
has been in the life-saving service two years. He is the winter man,
so called. During the summer season Surfman Ryder is stationed at the
City Point Station, South Boston. Before entering the service he was a
boatman and fisherman along the coast of Cape Cod, becoming familiar
with the handling of boats in the surf, and acquiring a knowledge of
the rips and shoals that abound there. He is an expert boatman and a
brave and hardy life saver.

Surfman Charles G. Hamilton, who is substituting for Surfman Christie,
joined the crew on Dec. 1, 1902. He was born in Chatham in 1859. He
has been a boatman, lobsterman, fisherman, and wrecker off Monomoy for
nearly twenty years. For the past fifteen years he has lived on Monomoy
Point, and has assisted at nearly all the wrecks that have occurred in
that vicinity during that time. He is a well-known wrecker, who knows
the location of every rip and shoal in the region about Monomoy.

He was also a grand banker, a coastwise sailor, and engaged in
steamboating around the Cape. He is thoroughly accustomed to the perils
of the sea, and is an expert boatman and a fearless life saver. He
married Etta Batchelder.


THE MONOMOY DISASTER.

When the late Capt. Marshall W. Eldredge was appointed keeper, Captain
Ellis was his No. 1 surfman. Captain Ellis served as No. 1 surfman
until May 1, 1902, when he was appointed keeper to succeed his late
captain, whose life was given up in an heroic attempt to rescue an
imperiled crew. Captain Ellis married Aureilla M. Cahoon, and is the
father of one son. The story of the terrible tragedy in which Captain
Eldredge and six members of his crew, together with five persons whom
they had taken from the stranded barge _Wadena_, perished, is best told
by the sole survivor, Captain Ellis, and is as follows:--

“On Tuesday, March 11, 1902, about one o’clock A. M. the schooner
barge _Wadena_ stranded during a northeast gale and heavy sea on the
Shovelful Shoal, off the southern end of Monomoy Island. The crew were
rescued by our station crew. The barge remained on the shoal without
showing any signs of going to pieces, and wreckers were engaged in
lightering her cargo of coal. On the night of March 16 the weather
became threatening, and all except five of the persons engaged in
lightering the cargo were taken ashore from the barge by the tug _Peter
Smith_, which was in the employ of the owners of the barge.

“Shortly before eight o’clock on the morning of March 17 one of the
patrolmen from our station reported that the _Wadena_ appeared to be in
no immediate danger, but later Captain Eldredge received a message from
Hyannis, inquiring whether everything was all right with the men aboard
the barge. Up to this time no one at the station was aware that any
persons had remained on the barge over night.

[Illustration: BARGES WADENA AND FITZPATRICK STRANDED ON SHOALS AT
MONOMOY.

_Wadena_ in foreground. In attempting to take an imperiled crew off the
_Wadena_, Captain Eldredge and six of his crew of life savers perished,
together with the crew of the barge, five in number. March 17, 1902.]

“Upon the receipt of this inquiry Captain Eldredge, putting on his hip
boots and oil clothes, set out for the end of the Point, where he could
personally ascertain the conditions.

“Arriving there he found that the barge was flying a signal of
distress. He at once telephoned me, as I was the No. 1 man at the
station, directing me to launch the surf-boat from the inside of the
beach, and with the crew pull down to the Point. About two and one-half
miles south of the station we took Captain Eldredge aboard and I gave
him the steering oar.

“The wind was fresh from the southeast and there was a heavy sea
running, but all the crew were of the opinion that the condition of the
barge _Wadena_ was not perilous, as she seemed to be sound and lying
easy.

“Captain Eldredge decided to pull around the Point to the barge. At
certain places on the shoals the sea was especially rough, and some
water was shipped on the way out to the distressed craft, but without
any trouble we succeeded in bringing our surf-boat under the lee of the
barge just abaft the forerigging, the only place where it was practical
to go alongside.

[Illustration: DRILL OF THE MONOMOY CREW, SHORTLY BEFORE THE DISASTER
IN WHICH SEVEN OF THE CREW PERISHED.]

“As soon as we got alongside the barge a line was thrown aboard and
quickly made fast by the persons on board. The persons on board the
barge were all excited and wanted us to take them ashore as soon as we
could. Captain Eldredge, without a moment’s delay, when he found out
the number of persons on board the barge and their desire to be taken
ashore, directed them to get into the surf-boat.

“The seas were breaking heavily around the stern of the barge, and
there was little room for operations in the smooth water, and the rail
of the barge was twelve or thirteen feet above the surf-boat. Four of
the five men lowered themselves over the side of the barge, one at a
time, into the surf-boat, without mishap, by means of a rope, but the
captain of the barge, who was a big, heavy man, let go his hold when
part way down and dropped into the boat with such force as to break
the after thwart. All five being safely in the boat, two were placed
forward, two aft, and one amidships, and told to sit quietly and keep
close down in the bottom of the boat.

“In order to get away from the barge quickly, the painter was cut, by
orders of Captain Eldredge, and the surf-boat was at once shoved off.
In order to clear the line of breakers that extended from the stern of
the barge so that we could lay a good course for the shore, a part of
the surfmen were backing hard on the port oars, while the others gave
way with full power on the starboard side. Before we could get the boat
turned around a big wave struck us with fearful force, and quite a lot
of water poured into the surf-boat.

“Captain Eldredge stood in the stern of the boat with the steering oar
in his hand giving his orders, and the surfmen stuck to their posts.

“As soon as the water came into the boat, the rescued men jumped up,
and becoming panic-stricken, threw their arms about the necks of the
surfmen so that none of us could use our oars. The seas, one after
another, struck us, and the boat, filling with water, turned bottom up,
throwing us all into the raging sea. The seas kept striking us after
the boat upset, and we were soon in among the heaviest breakers. Twice
we righted the boat, but the seas which struck her before we could get
into her capsized her each time.

“After righting the boat twice, our strength was fast leaving us, and
we all knew that we could not survive long without assistance. The five
men that we had taken off the barge were the first to be swept off the
overturned boat and to perish before our eyes. They did not regain a
hold of the boat after she turned over the first time, and were quickly
swept to death.

“All of us clung to the boat, giving each other all the encouragement
that we could. Surfman Chase was the first one of our crew to perish,
then Nickerson and Small were swept to death. Captain Eldredge, Surfmen
Kendrick, Foye and Rogers and myself still managed to hold to the
boat. Every sea which struck the boat swept completely over us, almost
smothering us. Kendrick was the next one of our crew to perish, and
poor Foye soon followed him. Captain Eldredge and Surfman Rogers and
myself were the only ones left, and we expected that we, too, would
soon share the fate of our comrades.

“Rogers was clinging to the boat about amidships, while Captain
Eldredge and myself were holding on near the stern. Captain Eldredge
called to me to help him to get a better hold, and I managed to pull
him on to the bottom of the boat, when a sea struck us and washed us
both off. I managed to regain a hold on the bottom of the boat, and
looking around for Captain Eldredge, I saw that he was holding on to
the spar and sail which had drifted from underneath the boat, but was
still fast to it. The seas were washing me off the boat continually at
this time, and when I last saw our brave captain, he was drifting away
from the boat, holding on to the spar and sail.

“My strength was fast going, and when poor Rogers begged me to help him
climb further up onto the boat, the only thing I could do was to tell
him that we were drifting towards the beach, and that help would soon
be at hand and to hold on.

[Illustration: CHURCH AT ORLEANS WHERE MEMORIAL SERVICES WERE HELD FOR
LOST MONOMOY CREW.]

“Rogers had lost his strength, however, and failing to get a more
secure place on the bottom of the boat, feebly moaning, ‘I have got to
go,’ he fell off the boat and sank beneath the waters.

“I was now alone on the bottom of the boat, and seeing that the
center board had slipped part way out, I managed to get hold of it,
and holding it with one hand succeeded in getting my oil clothes,
undercoat, vest, and boots off.

“By that time the overturned boat had drifted down over the shoals in
the direction of the barge _Fitzpatrick_, which was also stranded on
the shoals, and when I sighted the craft I waved my hand as a signal
for help. I soon saw those on the barge fling a dory over the side into
the water, but could see nothing more of the dory after that on account
of the mist and high sea until it hove in sight with a man in it rowing
towards me. The man in the dory was brave Capt. Elmer F. Mayo. He ran
the dory alongside of me, and with his help I got into the boat. I was
so used up that I was speechless, and all that I could do was to kneel
in the bottom of the boat and hold on to the thwarts. To land in the
dory through the surf was a perilous undertaking, but Mayo, who is a
skilled boatman, carefully picked his way over the rips and headed his
little boat for the shore.

“Surfman Bloomer of our station, who had been left ashore, had walked
down to the Point to assist Captain Eldredge and crew in landing, and
when he saw Mayo fighting his way through the breakers, he ran down
into the surf, seized the little boat, and helped Mayo to land safely.

“Bloomer was told of the terrible tragedy by Captain Mayo, as I was
unable to speak at the time. As I have often said, ‘If the persons we
took off the barge had kept quiet as we told them to, all hands would
have been landed in safety.’”

[Illustration:

  Seth L. Ellis
  Keeper, Monomoy L.S. Station
]


CAPT. ELMER F. MAYO.

Capt. Elmer F. Mayo, “The Hero of Monomoy,” was born in Chatham, and
is forty years of age. From boyhood he has been a boatman, fisherman,
anchor dragger, a substitute at the life-saving stations on Cape Cod,
and wrecker along the shores near Monomoy, and is well accustomed to
the perils and rigors incident to work of that kind.

Among the boatmen and wreckers along the Chatham and Monomoy shores he
has always been regarded as an A No. 1 boatman, skilled in the art and
science of handling boats in the surf, and absolutely fearless. His
father was the first keeper of the Chatham Station.

Upon the discovery of gold in the Klondike region a few years ago, Mayo
joined a party of prospectors, and went to the Copper River country. He
remained there but a short time, returning to Cape Cod and resuming his
former occupation.

At the time of the Monomoy disaster, he was on board the barge
_Fitzpatrick_, near by the stranded barge _Wadena_, in company with
Captain Mallows of Chatham, and the captain of the barge.

The _Fitzpatrick_ had stranded at the time the _Wadena_ went on the
shoals, and Mayo and Mallows were aboard arranging to float the craft.
They had remained on board the _Fitzpatrick_ over night, the same as
those on board the _Wadena_, so as to be on hand early in the morning
to begin the work.

There was a small fourteen-foot dory alongside the _Fitzpatrick_, and
the night before the fatal disaster, the wind freshening up, Mayo
hauled the dory aboard, made some thole pins, and got a pair of oars
ready for use should bad weather oblige them to go ashore.

[Illustration: CAPT. ELMER F. MAYO, THE HERO OF MONOMOY, AND SURFMAN
ELLIS, WHOM HE RESCUED.

Captain Mayo standing.]

The oars were too long for the small craft, and Mayo cut a piece off
each of them. The wind blew a gale during the night preceding the
disaster, and there was considerable rough water around the barge the
next morning. The craft was not leaking, however, and there seemed no
cause for alarm. A thick fog swept in over the shoals in the morning,
hiding the stranded sister barge _Wadena_ from the view of those on the
_Fitzpatrick_, and they were in ignorance of the fact that a signal of
distress was flying in her rigging.

The first intimation that Mayo and Mallows had that a terrible
tragedy had been enacted within a short distance of them was when the
overturned life-boat, with the sole survivor of the Monomoy life-saving
crew, Surfman Ellis, clinging to it, was seen drifting out over the
shoals.

At the sight of the life-boat with a surfman clinging to it, both
Mayo and Mallows knew that a terrible disaster had happened. Mayo in
an instant threw off all his clothing except his underclothes, and
while Mallows entreated him not to go, telling him he believed that to
attempt to reach the overturned life-boat would cost him his life, Mayo
grabbed the dory, threw it into the raging sea, and slid down a rope
from the barge into the frail craft.

[Illustration: FOURTEEN-FOOT DORY USED BY CAPT. ELMER F. MAYO, IN
RESCUING SURFMAN ELLIS.]

With the improvised thole pins and the long oars, with handles so
large that he could hardly grasp them, Mayo had a fearful struggle in
preventing the dory from being swamped by the seas.

With a strong and steady stroke, and energy born of desperation, he
kept the little boat head to the sea, sending her along with marvelous
speed. Within a short time he was within hailing distance of the man
on the bottom of the life-boat. Surfman Ellis saw the boat as it was
thrown from the barge, but in the fog had lost sight of it. Mayo,
however, had kept the overturned life-boat within sight all the time,
and as soon as he got within hailing distance he shouted to Ellis, whom
he then recognized, to hold on!

It was a hazardous task to take Ellis from the bottom of the life-boat,
but both Mayo and Ellis were skilled in that kind of work, and it was
successfully accomplished. To land on the beach through the surf would
be attended with greater peril, but Mayo knew that Ellis must have
immediate treatment, and after placing him in the bottom of the boat,
he headed the dory straight for the shore. The fog still hung over the
waters, and it was solely from his thorough knowledge of the waters
about that region that Mayo was able to avoid the myriads of shoals
and rips, and guide the boat to a point on the beach where it would
be possible to land. Surfman Bloomer, of the Monomoy Station, who had
walked down the beach, saw the boat headed for the beach, and running
down, got there just in time to assist Mayo in landing.

[Illustration: THE MONOMOY SURF-BOAT.]

Both the United States Government and the Massachusetts Humane Society
recognized this great heroic act of Captain Mayo, and awarded him
medals. The committee having charge of the Monomoy Fund also presented
him with a portion of the money received by them, in recognition of his
heroism in rescuing Surfman Ellis from a watery grave.

Captain Mayo married Mrs. Priscilla Nye.

The late Capt. Isaac Green Fisher, keeper of the Wood End Station, was
born in Truro in 1838, and was the son of Caleb and Mary G. Fisher,
of that town. For twenty years he was keeper of the Peaked Hill Bars
and Wood End Life-Saving stations, and was known the country over as a
wondrous surf-fighter and saver of human life. Prior to his entering
the life-saving service he had been engaged in whaling for a number of
years, and won distinction in that skilled work by his fearlessness and
marvelous dexterity with the steering oar.

As keeper of the dangerous Peaked Hill Bars Station, Captain Fisher
rescued hundreds of shipwrecked seafarers, and assisted a countless
number of stranded crafts to places of safety. He also assisted at
nearly all the wrecks that took place at the stations along the back of
the Cape, adjoining the Peaked Hill Bars Station.

He was retired from the service at his own request on account of
physical disability, June 14, 1901, and died September 18 following.

[Illustration: THE LATE CAPT. ISAAC G. FISHER AND HIS CREW OF SURF
FIGHTERS.]

[Illustration: RELATIVE POSITIONS OF MEN WHILE PLACING APPARATUS.]

[Illustration: POSITION OF LIFE SAVERS WHEN SHOT LINE IS BENT TO WHIP.]

[Illustration: HAULING OFF WHIP.

FULL CREW OF LIFE SAVERS PRACTICING WITH BREECHES-BUOY.]

[Illustration: HAULING OFF THE HAWSER.]

[Illustration: RAISING THE CROTCH.]

[Illustration: MAN THE LEE WHIP. HAUL OFF.]

[Illustration: MAN WEATHER WHIP. HAUL ASHORE.]


                             In Memoriam.

To the memory of the heroes who gave up their lives in their devotion
to duty.

                CAPT. MARSHALL N. ELDREDGE.
                SURFMAN ELIJAH KENDRICK.
                SURFMAN ISAAC T. FOY.
                SURFMAN VALENTINE D. NICKERSON.
                SURFMAN OSBORNE CHASE.
                SURFMAN EDGAR C. SMALL.
                SURFMAN ARTHUR ROGERS.

                            --Monomoy, March 17, 1902.

                CAPT. DAVID H. ATKINS.
                SURFMAN FRANK MAYO.
                SURFMAN ELISHA TAYLOR.

                    --Peaked Hill Bars, Nov. 30, 1880.




                           HORACE S. CROWELL,

                       Dealer, Broker, and Agent

                            SEASHORE ESTATES

             216 Washington St., S. Cor. State St., Boston.

        Telephone 1290 Main.      W. U. Cable Address, “Crowe.”

             DEVELOPMENT, IMPROVEMENT, AND CARE OF ESTATES
                              A SPECIALTY.


                   *       *       *       *       *


                       OPEN DURING SUMMER SEASON

                                SMALL’S
                          PHOTOGRAPHIC STUDIO

                          BUZZARD’S BAY, MASS.

                    Artistic Photographs in Platinum

                               NOVELTIES

            Carbon Photographs on Wood, Leather, Porcelain,
                               and Glass

                         TELEPHONE CONNECTIONS


                   *       *       *       *       *


                               JOHN ADAMS

                       Staple and Fancy Groceries

                          Meats and Provisions

                           COMMERCIAL STREET
                                PROVINCETOWN, MASS.


                   *       *       *       *       *


                               CAMPBELL’S

                       Livery and Boarding Stable

                      CARRIAGES FOR ALL OCCASIONS

            We furnish careful drivers to accompany tourists
               to the Life-Saving Stations and all other
                           points of interest

                         CONNECTED BY TELEPHONE

                       PROVINCETOWN,        MASS.


                   *       *       *       *       *


                              HOTEL ARAGON

                           MIDDLEBORO, MASS.

                  Heated by Steam      Electric Lights

                      Guests are assured of every
                        Comfort and Convenience

                        J. H. DALTON, _Manager_


                   *       *       *       *       *


                             Eldredge Bros.

                       LIVERY AND BOARDING STABLE

                             ORLEANS, MASS.

                We furnish carriages for all occasions.
                   Tourists taken to the Life-Saving
                  Stations and all places of interest.

                  CONNECTED BY LONG DISTANCE TELEPHONE


                   *       *       *       *       *


                          “The Eagleston Shop”

                             HYANNIS, MASS.

                 Furniture and Fitments
                        China, Pottery and Rugs
                                       For Summer Homes

                             HYANNIS, MASS.


                   *       *       *       *       *


                             HOTEL PILGRIM

                            PLYMOUTH, MASS.

                Remodeled and Refurnished by New Owners

                        Will Open June 10, 1903

             Improvements made this year include:

                   Enlargement of Office
                   Enlargement of Dining Room
                   New Music Hall, Open Fireplace
                   New Private and Public Baths
                   New Ladies’ Lavatory
                   New Plumbing throughout
                   Electric Lights
                   New Billiard and Amusement Parlors
                   New Carpets and Furniture
                   New Porte Cochere
                   New Sun Parlor
                   New Bath Houses on the Beach
                   New Landing Float for Boats
                   Sail Boats, Experienced Skippers
                   Row Boats
                   Fishing Facilities
                   A Good Stable

             THE TABLE AND SERVICE WILL BE OF A HIGH ORDER

         Our Illustrated Circular will be mailed on application

                                Address,
                         A. B. DAVIS, _Manager_

             N. B. Until June 1  the manager may be seen on
           Saturdays from 9 a. m. to 4 p. m. at International
          Hotel and Tourist Bureau, 147 Summer Street, Boston.


                   *       *       *       *       *


                             ATLANTIC HOUSE

                          FRANK SMITH, Prop’r

                  Masonic Court, off Commercial Street

                          PROVINCETOWN, MASS.

                           OPEN ALL THE YEAR


                   *       *       *       *       *


                          Huyler’s Chocolates.

                     Cigars, Imported and Domestic.

                           ADAMS, Pharmacist,

                         Opposite Post Office,

                          Provincetown, Mass.

                       Prescriptions a Specialty.

                     Ice-cold Soda, Fruit Flavors.

                        The Up-to-date Pharmacy.


                   *       *       *       *       *


                  HEATED BY STEAM      LIGHTED BY GAS

                             IYANOUGH HOUSE

                             HYANNIS, MASS.

                        T. H. SOULE, Jr., Prop’r

                  FIRST-CLASS LIVERY STABLE CONNECTED


                   *       *       *       *       *


                              S. L. HAMLIN

                       Staple and Fancy Groceries

                           THE LARGEST STORE
                         AND THE LARGEST STOCK
                        OF GROCERIES ON CAPE COD

                            FALMOUTH, MASS.

            Branch Stores at Falmouth Heights and Teaticket


                   *       *       *       *       *


                      BOSTON BRANCH CLOTHING STORE

                   Clothiers, Hatters, and Outfitters

              For Ladies, Gentlemen, Misses, and Children.


                        SATISFACTION GUARANTEED
                           or money refunded.

                     BOSTON BRANCH CLOTHING STORE,

               JOHN S. ARENOVSKI, Proprietor and Manager,

                   Main Street,      FALMOUTH, MASS.


                   *       *       *       *       *


                            JOHN H. CROCKER

                               DEALER IN

                            SEASHORE ESTATES

                            FALMOUTH, MASS.

                       Grower of choice Cape Cod

                              CRANBERRIES


                   *       *       *       *       *


                             PATRONIZE THE

                       Boston and Hyannis Express

  Forwarders of goods of all descriptions to all points in the United
                      States at the lowest rates.

                DAILY MESSENGER FROM HYANNIS TO BOSTON.

We are better prepared than any other express to handle Household
Goods, Groceries, Lumber, Boats, and heavy goods at low rates for
Hyannis, Hyannisport, Sea Side Park, Craigville, Centreville,
Osterville, Hyannis Park, West Yarmouth, Englewood Beach, and South
Yarmouth.

                General Office, 105 Arch Street, Boston.

            Telephone Main 906.       W. F. ORMSBY, Manager.


                   *       *       *       *       *


                           ORMSBY’S TRANSFER

                   Furnishes the carriage service at
                Hyannis station for carrying passengers
                  and baggage in Hyannis or to any of
                      the nearby summer resorts.

                 REGULAR MAIL CARRIAGE TO HYANNISPORT.

                Special Carriages or Hacks when ordered.

                       W. F. ORMSBY, Proprietor.

               Telephone Connection.       HYANNIS, MASS.


[Illustration: (back cover)]




Transcriber’s Notes


Punctuation, hyphenation, and spelling were made consistent when a
predominant preference was found in the original book; otherwise they
were not changed.

Simple typographical errors were corrected; unbalanced quotation
marks were remedied when the change was obvious, and otherwise left
unbalanced.

Illustrations in this eBook have been positioned between paragraphs
and outside quotations. In versions of this eBook that support
hyperlinks, the page references in the List of Illustrations lead to
the corresponding illustrations.

The layouts of the captions under group photographs and the
advertisements at the end of the book have been modified to accommodate
to narrow screens.

Page 84: “a short time before. Captain Eldredge” was printed that way,
but the period may be a printer’s error.

Page 144, under “In Memoriam,” “Isaac T. Foy” was printed that way, but
on page 135, his surname was printed twice as “Foye.”