A Body in the Bay, and Six Weeks of False Hope
Charles Londale vanished from his Port Blakely home. Six weeks later his body was pulled from the water—with no marks, no answers, and a family that refused to believe he had taken his own life.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The body of Charles Londale, a longshoreman well known in all of the Sound cities, was picked up floating in the bay off Port Blakely yesterday morning. It had been in the water about six weeks, judging from its condition.
Six weeks ago Londale disappeared from his home, and the police of Seattle, Tacoma and Portland were asked to keep a lookout for him. His family, who reside at Port Blakely, several times heard that he had been seen in Tacoma and Portland, and until the finding of the body were convinced that he was alive.
The cause of Londale's death is a mystery. There are no marks on his body that would indicate that he had met with foul play, and his friends place no credence in the suicide theory. Londale is said to have lived in Tacoma a short time ago, but his name does not appear in the directory.
“The cause of Londale's death is a mystery. There are no marks on his body that would indicate that he had met with foul play, and his friends place no credence in the suicide theory.”
A century before DNA databases and statewide missing-person alerts, a family's search for a vanished longshoreman depended on notices passed between Seattle, Tacoma and Portland. Londale's case is a reminder that the Puget Sound waterfront was a tight, mobile working world—and that an unidentified body could close a case that was never actually solved.
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