Who Was the Last to Die?
Famous legal bailie over eslale was sot
off l>.v sensational sinking of tlio Steam¬
boat Home.
THE
WRECK OF THE STEAM BOAT HOME.
Off
Оп лсоск,
on Mondiv. October
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The question of which member of
a family was the last to survive in a
shipwreck which took the lives of all
five led to the longest and one of the
most remarkable legal contests in
Florida's history.
Hardy Bryan Croom, his wife and
their three children died in the wreck
of the shipwrecked "Home" off Cape
Hatlcras October 9, 1837. cn route
from their native North Carolina (via
New York) to Florida, where they
were to make their home.
In addition to the last survivor issue
there was also that of whether the
family’s residence was North Carolina
or Florida, and a major difficulty in
deciding the 1 9-ycars-long litigation
was due to a lack of existing laws to
cover such a case.
Croom. a native of Lenoir County.
N. C, was a son of Gen. William
Croom. from whom he had inherited
a fortune, including land in Florida.
He was a graduate of the University
of North Carolina with both A.B. and
M.A. degrees, and was recognized as
a scholar, especially in the field of
natural sciences.
Croom also served as state senator
in North Carolina for several years.
Mrs. Croom, the former Frances
Smith, was a daughter of Nathan
Smith, a wealthy citizen of New Bern.
N. C. The Crooms were married in
1821, and at the time of the tragedy
their family consisted of two daughters
and a son.
Croom had long been interested in
Florida. Between 1830 and 1837 he
made annual pilgrimages there while
his family remained in New Bern.
In 1831 he sold his North Carolina
plantation and moved his Negroes to
Florida.
A brother, Bryan Croom. already
had established a plantation home in
Gadsden County.
In 1837 Hardy Bryan Croom de¬
cided to move his family to Tallahas¬
see. The last letter he ever wrote, dated
Oct. 5. 1837, from New- York, directed
to his brother Bryan in Florida, ad¬
vised that he and his family had taken
passage on the steamship "Home,"
which was scheduled to sail two days
later for Charleston.
The family embarked as planned,
and the ship “Home" left New York at
4 o'clock that afternoon with 90 pas¬
sengers and 40 crew members (in¬
cluding officers.)
The next afternoon a severe storm
was encountered, and the ship proved
The accompanying article by Miss Lola
Anderson, of Tampa, first appeared in the
Tampa Tribune. Roland Beasley, formerly
of Monroe, now living in Florida, sent it
to Tut St Ait with the suggestion that it
might be of interest to our readers.
unseaworthy. She was taking water,
and by the next day the situation had
worsened until the passengers, even
women and children, had to help bail
out water using buckets and pans.
Finally the water rose high enough
to extinguish the fire under the boiler
and the sinking ship was adrift in
heavy seas. In a last effort to save
those aboard, an attempt was made to
run her ashore by using a sail.
The effort was to no avail and the
crippled vessel broke up a little south
of Cape Hatteras with the loss of most
of the passengers and crew. Among
those lost were the five members of the
Croom family.
As an aftemath of the disaster, one
of the most remarkable legal cases in
the history of Florida, even in the
United States, was filed in the circuit
court of Leon County.
Henrietta Smith, maternal grand¬
mother, and Elizabeth Armistcad. ma-
THE STATE, September 17. 1960
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