Twenty Days of Terror on the Beebe
A storm-battered schooner arrives at Yesler's Wharf after a harrowing near-wreck off Cape Flattery.
The schooner Wilton L. Beebe, concerning the safety of which much anxiety had been felt, arrived in port Wednesday evening and is now lying at Yesler's Wharf. The Beebe had a most unenviable experience, having been twenty days from San Francisco to Port Townsend with bad weather during the entire period. On the 16th, she sprang a leak, and the hold contained two feet of water. After the flow was temporarily stopped, the bad weather continued. On the 20th, caught in a heavy sea off Cape Flattery, a much worse leak was sprung. Despite the efforts of Captain Fargesen and his crew, the water in the hold gained on the pumps. While the schooner was in this condition, three vessels were in sight at different times, but the strangers either did not see or did not choose to heed the signals, and went on their course, leaving the Beebe to her fate. The crew were finally successful in stopping the leak, and on the 27th, Port Townsend was reached with an exhausted crew.
“Captain Fargesen states that she would have gone down within an hour had not the leak been stopped when it was.”
The maritime history of the Puget Sound is defined by these perilous, unassisted journeys before modern communication. Today, the site of the former Yesler's Wharf is occupied by the urban landscape near Pioneer Square, a far cry from the salt-sprayed wood and constant threat of shipwreck described here.
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