October 20, 1934
THE STATE
Роде
Seven
High and Dry
on the Beach
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в*/
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AYCOCK «ROWIV
THE “G. A. Kohler,” high and dry on the beach above
Hatteras, where she was wrecked some time ago. A
rather weird sight, when you come upon it unexpectedly,
3s Mr. Brown describes in the accompanying article.
IK she had cleared the Outer Dia¬
mond and gotten a few hour* .sail¬
ing into tin* Gulf Stream lieforc
running into the August hurrienne of
1933, tiie G. A. Kohler would probably
have weathered the gale and thus still
1ю
sailing the high sons today. But un¬
fortunately the trim four-niaslid
schooner ran head on into the storm
in the vicinity of Wimble Shoals, (a
few miles north of Cape Hatteras)
and today the old wcnther-l-*aten hulk,
stripped of everything valuable, i*
embedded high and dry OH the bench
between Little Kennckect and Gull
Shoal coastguard stations a few miles
south of Oregon Inlet on the outer
banks of the coast.
The craft presents a weird picture.
The fore, main, mizzen and jigger
masts are still intact and also the bow ¬
sprit. but her decks have l<e.*n cleared.
All movable objects aboard have lie u
salvaged by natives in nearby com¬
munities and her last buyer, Mr.
Hooper, of Salvo will probably soon
blow the remainder of the vessel to
pieces to got lirewood or timbers.
Bigger and better ships than the
Kohler have run into gales in tin*
vicinity of Wimble Shoals and have
been driven ashore along the beacli in
this section, but she was the first i«»
he wrecked there in several years. In
the olden days of sail the masters of
all passing vessels feared Wimble and
Diamond Shoals. If the weather was
stormy they tried to give these shoals
a wide berth, if they failed and passed
through this “graveyard of the Atlan¬
tic” safely they considered it more of
an “act of God" than export sailing,
and anyone familiar with those waters
will come pretty near agreeing with
the old time skippers.
The bonce, skeletons or ribbings of
old wrecks are still visible along the
hanks from Lookout to Oregon Inlet.
Shifting sands continue to cover or
uncover these grim reminders of lost
ships, but today the Kohler is the only
«reek along this eighty mile stretch
of the outer coaet that still has the
ap|M»arauec of a one-time sailing craft.
Her hailing port was Baltimore. She
had sailed from Baltimore on her last
voyage bound for Haiti for a cargo
of logwood. On the trip down she was
in ballast.
A eoiistguardsinaii in tin* (Bill Slmal
station first sighted her distress sig¬
nals about I o'clock on the morning of
August 23. Already she was near the
outer reef and it was only a few mill-
ini's Inter that she grounded 2(W yards
off shore. Ignoring weather condi¬
tions, — and they Were had on that
morning — other nearby stations were
notified and by daybreak rescue crews
from Gull Shoal, Little Kcnnokeet,
Big Kcnnckoet and Gliicamacoiuieo
stations were on the beach with life¬
saving equipment. This apparatus
consisted of boats, Lyle guns, (a line
throwing cannon) brooches buoy,
hundreds (.f yards of rope of different
sixes, a portable
11<ни|
light ami am¬
munition for the gun.
Just as soon as it was light, enough
to distinguish the position of the
vessel, ( ’apt. Clarence Brady, in charge
of Little Ken
некое!
, fired the gun that
carried the line across the deck tin* first
shot. This was not a matter of luck
but flu* result of skillful training that
the life-savers receive in the coast¬
guard stations along the const.
It was only a matter of a few min¬
utes until those aboard the grounded
Kohler had hauled out the heavy line
that served ns a track for the breeches
buoy and made it fast to one of the
masts. Within an hour every man
aboard, the skipper and his mate, (both
white) and five Negro sailors were
safely on the beach. It would have
been almost im]>ossildc to have
launched a boat in the surf although
if the craft had been out of range of
the line-throwing gun the guardsmen
would have risked their life in the
attempt.
A few days later the Kohler had
washed closer inshore. I n the mean¬
time the skipper and his mate re¬
mained bv the craft until the under¬
writers had come down and had held
their vendicti (auction). Valued at
several thousand dollars while she was
afloat she sold for only a few hundred
dollars on the beach to a Mr. Williams
of Avon who. in turn, strip|H*d her of
movable objects and then sold the hulk
to Mr. Hoover of Salvo, both localities
bciug villages between Cape Hatteras
and Oregon Inlet.
Although she was already in the
wash of the breakers, the Septemlier
hurricane, (u grnnddaddy compared
to the one of August) swept the craft
far above the high water mark and
now her hull has sunken almost t<> her
wuturlinc into the sand.
She is a good sized craft, considering
the majority of sailing schooners one
sees today. Her length was 212 f«vt
and she was of 1,-H52 gross tonnage.
She was built in Wilmington, Dela¬
ware in 1919, her original name being
the Charles S. Gawthrop and at that
time she was an auxiliary vessel; —
that is she had an engine in addition
to her sail power.
The first time I saw her was from
the air. I was flying up the beach
with Mr. and Mrs. Tull my brother
Gone and Tommie Moore. Wo wore
right over the craft before Tull banked
his plane and pointed towards the
vessel. It all happened so suddenly
(Continued on page twenty-two)
