NEDDY FITZGERALD:

Neddy Fitz was born in 1900 in Petite Forte and came to Merasheen in the “Heel and Miller Gould“ with Pad Houlihan. After that he lived in Merasheen, and fished in the Cape St Mary's boats as a share man and later with various trap crews, including Wareham's with Pad Houlihan.

With skipper Din Pat one spring, while fitting out the "Iris and Verna" for Golden Bay, Neddy was painting the top of the spar and cross trees when he had finished, rather than climb down the stays, he grabbed the wrong part of the rope, which flew through the block, and Neddy came tumbling down from the cross trees a drop of about forty feet. As the hatches were off the holds of the "Iris and Verna", Din Pat, Tom Hann and other crewmen were afraid to go look where Neddy had fallen, thinking he was surely killed. When they had built up their courage, they went forward and found him in the middle of a big coil of cable, unharmed.

The story was often told of the time that the lightning bolt struck Neddy's house and destroyed a portion of the corner of his home. One of Neddy's sons, Dominic, is still fishing in Merasheen. Neddy lived just above Gus’s in Big Merasheen.

The Jam on Gerry’s Rock

(Sung by Kathleen Pomroy and Bride Rose)

Come all you bold shanty boys, and listen while l relate
Concerning a young river man and his untimely fate
Concerning a young river boss, so handsome, true and brave
T'was on the Jam on Gerry's Rock, he met his watery grave.

T'was on a Sunday morning, as you will quickly hear
Our logs were piled up mountain high, we could not keep them clear
Our foreman cried, "Turn out brave boys, with hearts all void of fear
We'll break the Jam on Gerry's Rock and Ellington we'll steer."

Now some of them were willing, and more of them were not
To break a Jam on Sunday, for they did not think they ought
While six of our Canadian boys, they volunteered to go
To break the Jam on Gerry's Rock, with their foreman, Young Munroe.

They worked there until nine o'clock, when they heard this young voice say
“I warn you boys, be on your guard, for the Jam will soon give way"
Those words were scarcely spoken, when the Jam did break and go
And it carried off these six young youths, with their foreman, Young Monroe.

Now when the rest of the shanty boys, the sad news they did hear
In search of their brave comrades, to the river they did steer
Meanwhile their mangled bodies, down by the stream did flow
While dead and bleeding near the bank, was that of Young Monroe.

When they took him from his watery grave, brushed back his raven hair
There was one fair girl amongst them, whose sad cries rent the air
There was one fair girl amongst them, who came from Shigna town
Her cries and moans rose to the sky, her true love had gone down.

Fair Clara was a noble girl, the river man’s true friend
Who with her widowed mother, lived by the river bend
The wages of her own true love, the boss to her did pay
And the shanty boys made up for her, a generous purse next day.

They buried him in sorrow's death, t'was on the first of May
In a green mound by the riverside, where grew a hemlock grey
And engraved upon the hemlock, down by his grave did grow
Was the name and date and the sad fate, of our foreman, Young Monroe.

Now Clara did not long survive, her heart broke with the grief
About six weeks later, death came to her relief
And when at last, the time had come, when she was called to go
Her last request was to be laid by the side of Young Monroe.