Fulford drowning tragedy 1942

On February 18, 1942, the American naval vessels USS Truxtun and USS Pollux were heading to the US Naval Base at Argentia when they went aground on the jagged rocks of Chambers Cove and Lawn Point on Newfoundland's south coast in a ferocious winter storm. Giant waves pounded the vessels and eventually broke them to pieces with the deaths of 203 out of the 389 officers and enlisted men on board the two vessels.  In the following weeks, a wave of debris from the wreckages spread into Placentia Bay.  In various communities in the path of the debris drift, there was an effort to salvage anything they could. 

Fifteen days later on March 5th in Big Merasheen harbour, approximately 100 kilometers Northeast of Chambers Cove, there were 3 or 4 dories out behind the head picking up debris.  When the others left to row in, 42 year old John Thomas Fulford and his cousin, 37 year old John Francis Fulford, both known as "Jack", waited a little longer.  They hauled a large piece of heavy lumber across their dory and to avoid going outside the Westerd sunkers, they waited their chance and came through the inside run and made it. When they reached the Shag Rocks, it broke on them capsizing and breaking up the dory and both of them were drowned.

Parts of the dory were found over on Matt's Head, just out from Lou's Rock. There were a lot of bodies found at the time from the American ships, down as far as the Rams and everything was covered in heavy bunker C oil from the ships.    Whether the two Jacks sunk or were mixed up with the other heavily oiled bodies we will never know.  That night, the light out at the lighthouse stopped working.  Some men went out the next morning to the light hoping that the men had survived and were inside but unfortunately their bodies were never found.

Jack T was the eldest son of Patrick and Johanna (Gardiner) Fulford and married for 17 years to Bride (Connors) Fulford.  Bride was 3 months pregnant at the time and had 6 other children to support, the oldest being her 15 year old daughter Lucy.  Jack F was the eldest son of Michael and Ellen (Kerrivan) Fulford and was not married.

Mrs. Bride used to tell about a dream she had before the two Jacks went out, where she saw her husband Jack T all covered in water.  It’s said that she witnessed the dory capsizing and was awakened that night by the ghost of her husband and found a puddle of seawater on the bedroom floor. Mrs. Bride told that story many times and always kept her head down while telling it. For years after, she said she could still hear Jack coming up the stairs at night with his let-down suspenders hitting the stairs as he walked.

It couldn't have been easy for Mrs. Bride to raise such a large young family.  The other Fulford families were close, her family from Clattice Harbour visited often and she had a lot of help from other neighbours in the Little Harbour.  Jack had a schooner as he fished on the Southern Shore and Cape St. Mary's in her (Johnny Barnett was one of his crew). Jack was building a new schooner out in the Island Cove at the time of the accident and unfortunately poor Mrs. Bride had to beat it up for firewood.   

Mrs. Ellen's daughter Hannah said that when she was young, you couldn't get a stick long enough for a trouting pole from the harbour out to the head and they often dried the peat in Hynes Mash to burn.  Little wonder at the stories of Mrs. Bride carting a load of blasty boughs from in by the motor road to have something to burn.  But endure she did, raising a fine family and never losing that hearty laugh.  She's also well remembered for helping bring many a child into the world as a midwife.

A cross was placed on the cliff overlooking the narrows by Din Pat, brother of Jack F, and his brother-in-law Jack Pitcher sometime after the drowning.  Around 1986, Jack T's son Phonse cast a concrete cross in the fish plant and erected it in place of the old cross. 

Jim Gardiner and Johnny Barnett noted in a story that Jack F was sent home to die with TB.  Jack was almost dead from the TB  and his mother, Mrs. Ellen, began pouring the cod liver oil into him every day.  So much so that it even came out through his skin, soaking his shirts.  Within a year he was back on the go without TB, adding some more time to his life.

While Jack was recuperating, he started making moonshine for money to live on while he was still sick.  Somebody reported him and the Rangers came out to check it out but were met on the wharf by a priest, probably Fr. Fyme, who told them to go back because there were no laws broken in Merasheen.

Johnny Barnett also related that Jack T was working on the US Naval Base in Argentia in 1941, fell off a building and ended up in hospital.  Later when he was well enough to leave the hospital he told Johnny "I'm going back to Merasheen; if I'm going to be killed making a living I want to be home."

From the 1980 reunion book: “Joey Pitcher, regarded as the best sculler in Merasheen ... saw Jack Fulford fall out of his moving motor boat almost down to the Fish Rock. Joey ran to the Priest's wharf where his punt was moored, and when the engine wouldn't start, sculled to the Fish Rock. He spotted Jack Fulford about six feet under water and hooked him under the arm with the pin of the sculling oar. Jack was unconscious so he laid him across the taut and they revived him after Joey got him ashore. When they brought him around, Jack said. "When l go, that's the way l want to go - drown! It's just like going to sleep in a feather bed”... He had gotten a few extra years lease on life because of Joey Pitcher's sculling.”

Growing up, I never realized the historical significance of a piece of lumber, painted navy grey, about 12’ long by 18” wide by 4” thick and quite heavy, that continued to live in my father’s shed long after we left Merasheen. My brother still has it.  Mrs. Bride saw the dory capsizing and was able to say for certain that this was the piece of lumber, later floating in to the Island Cove beach, that caused the accident.

In Waiting - by John Pitcher (1985)

Silence struck in morning
Gloom brought on the dawn
Church bells tolled pulsating notes
With a seagulls weeping song.

In this angry time I wonder
With the cursing off the tongue
With my cousins's in the ocean
Now the weeping has begun.

I greet him in a silk lined box,
If the sea gives up its parts
Will God just keep their mortal souls,
While their love is in all our hearts.

I cry in nights to the cradled ocean
Could you be so cruel to see
That the Almighty God's devotion
Would have saved these sons for me.

But green oceans powerful plunder
You carve flesh and bury bones
Time you move and sway indifferently
Wearing words off marble stones.

Lifeless time you cannot feel
Nor do you care for the loving touch
This broken heart cannot conceal
God, for faith you ask too much.

Credits: Wayne Fulford and John Pitcher for the stories, poem and additional insights.