Introduction and Dedication
Hiram Burt was born on November 3, 1812, in Taunton, Bristol County, Massachusetts, to Enos Burt (1760-1822) and Hannah Haskins (1774-1843). He was the second youngest of 10 siblings and had 5 brothers and four sisters. His father and grandfather, Captain Jacob Haskins, were both soldiers with the Continental Army during the American Revolution. Captain Haskins served as a lieutenant of the 25th Continental Infantry in 1776 and was captain of a militia under Col. John Jacob in the Rhode Island Campaign. He also fought in the French and Indian Wars. Many of Hiram’s ancestors were originally from England and were among the first immigrants to the American colonies. His kin were also the first settlers of Taunton, home to many subsequent generations.
Hiram’s father died when he was ten years old. Young Burt continued in school in Taunton until the age of 15 when he began his career as a seaman. Six years later he became the master of his first ship, and over the next thirty years sailed merchant vessels in the European, West Indies, Caribbean, and California trades.
Capt. Burt died January 19, 1866, in Taunton at the age of 53.
This story is dedicated to Capt. Burt, a life well lived and with heartfelt gratitude on behalf of thousands of souls who are alive today because of his skill, courage and heroism.
“Triumph” and Tribulation
In 1848, Capt. Burt formed a syndicate to build an 88-foot-long brig sailing ship. His partners included his older brother, Henry, his cousins Thomas Burt and Tamerline Burt, and Cook Borden. [If the name “Borden” from Fall River, Mass sounds familiar be sure to read the backstory in the Appendix] The newly christened Triumph was launched in nearby Berkley, and for her maiden voyage she carried an assorted cargo to Palermo in Sicily. With Capt. Burt as master and his brother Henry, as mate, the trip was rather uneventful other than she received a stormy baptismal before entering the Straits of Gibraltar. After discharging her cargo at Palermo, the Triumph was loaded with tons of desperately needed food which she hauled to then famine-stricken Ireland.
After a short stay in the Port of Queenstown, Capt. Burt sailed home to Massachusetts. All was fine until the Triumph reached Long Island Sound where in a thick fog she ran ashore off the coast of Rhode Island. It was initially thought the Triumph would be a total loss, but finally she was floated off the rocks and towed to Newport for repairs to her badly damaged hull.
Capt. Burt and his crew finally made it back to Boston after being away from home for over a year. He learned that many things had happened during their absence. Chief among them being the startling stories which seeped back from California of the fabulous riches to be found in that territory in the form of gold.
“Down and Around”
Before the Gold Rush exploded in 1849, there were less than 10,000 non-Native Americans who lived in the California territory. At the time, California was not yet a State and, together with the rest of the Southwest (Arizona, Nevada, New Mexico, and much of Texas) was owned and controlled by Mexico. Within three years, over 300,000 newcomers from across the country and the world invaded California to strike it rich or make money from those trying.
At that time there were two ways to get from New York to California. One was to cross the plains by an ox-drawn wagon train which took over six months. The other was by ship that sailed around Cape Horn at the tip of South America on a voyage that could take anywhere from four to six months depending on the wind and the mood of the seas. Both were fraught with sacrifice, discomfort, danger and a high risk of death. There were no railroads or telegraph lines, and people, goods and communications (mail and newspapers) could only move as fast as the wagon train or ship that carried them.
John F. Parker of the Taunton Daily Gazette, in his wonderful 1935 article, “Voyage of Triumph to San Franciso Called for Courage,” described the frenzy on the Eastern seaboard.
Boston was California-mad. The news of the discovery of gold swept the city like wildfire and on every street corner men were talking of leaving for California on the next ship or joining one of the many wagon-trains which were forming in every city and town.
Arguments as to the safest way to travel to California was the main topic of the day. By wagon-train the gold-seekers had to contend with the scorching heat and bitter cold of the western country along with continual attacks by hostile Indians. By boat from Boston, the trip was long and perilous, for to get to San Francisco, ships had to sail around Cape Horn, one the of the wildest areas of ocean in the world. Many fine ships and thousands of people were lost going to California during those early days of ’49.
Navigation companies began an exploitation not equaled to in history. Steamship lines were formed for both the Cape Horn and Panama routes to San Francisco (the Panama route took passengers only as far as the isthmus itself and the passengers then had to cross that insect-infested country on foot.)
Every old tub of a craft that could be kept afloat by bailing was thrown into dry-dock; keels were caulked and daubed, the vessels skimmed over with a coat of paint and then they were put into service.
The newspapers printed stories of fabulous strikes in the gold fields, along with many untrue stories of the quantity of the yellow metal taken from the mines. Huge pieces of iron, gilded over and placed in show cases in every city and town, bore the intriguing sign, “From California.” From all corners of the globe people flocked to San Francisco with little thought of the hardships in store for them.
The Port of Boston was a beehive of activity as Captain Burt tied up the Triumph at the wharf. Giant clipper ships, loaded with New Englanders, were leaving for California every day. Most of these ships took the Cape Horn route to San Francisco, a distance of nearly 17,000 miles.
The profits for carrying passengers and merchandise to California were tremendous and the owners of the Triumph held a hurried conference which resulted in a decision to enter their craft in the profitable but hazardous California trade.
In October 1849, the owners of the Triumph distributed handbills throughout greater Boston recruiting passengers bound for San Francisco with a guaranty to “get through” in four months. The price for passage was $175 for first class; $150, second class; or one could purchase a share in the ship and cargo for $400.
The Triumph set sail November 11 loaded with mining equipment, supplies and clothing, and 42 passengers. Most of the passengers were young men from all walks of life—all with but one thought in mind-gold. They included Hiram’s older brother, Henry, and two of their nephews (the younger sons of their sister Hannah), John Marshall, age 20, and James Otis Phillips,19.
John Parker described the first leg of the journey down the east coasts of the Americas.
For several days the passengers remained below, victims of seasickness from the rolling and pitching of the little craft. With passengers becoming accustomed to the seas, they appeared on deck and lining the rails, would yell in derision at other ships passing the Triumph. The horizon was studded with white canvas and it seemed to Capt. Burt that all the ships in the world were on that ocean and all headed “down and around.”
The trip as far as the Equator was uneventful when around 2:30 one morning as the ship was gliding through an untroubled sea, a terrific storm suddenly came up. Captain Burt ordered all hands aloft to shorten sail. Working in utter darkness, the sailors climbed the wildly rolling rigging and onto the yards to tie down the sails. One sailor [Jacob Staples according to Burt’s journal] standing below in the deck was washed overboard as a mountainous wave swept over the ship and carried him far astern with no hope of rescue in those black waters.
Hurricane winds whistled through the ropes and ripped and whipped through the yardarms. The ship groaned from stem to stern as one huge wave after another buffeted her. The main mast sprung and everyone on board thought the end had arrived. But the sturdy little craft held on throughout the storm and when it had passed, Capt. Burt headed the Triumph for the port of Rio De Janeiro in Brazil for repairs.
By the time repairs were completed, those aboard the Triumph had been away from home for many weeks. But the trip was not half completed, and the most dangerous stage of the journey was yet to come. The Gazette’s Parker described the looming adventures.
After undergoing repairs and loading on new sail, the Triumph left Rio De Janeiro for the great test, the journey around Cape Horn. Falling in with a fleet of clippers, also California-bound, Capt. Burt raced his ship down the coast of South America toward Cape Horn and the wild, turbulent seas which forever make that area a maelstrom of danger.
Nearing the Falkland Islands, in the middle of January, when the Horn was at its wildest, the ships separated and the Triumph was left to battle as best as she could the soaring, storm-swept seas ahead. Everyone on board realized that the most dangerous stage of the journey was at hand, and that many fine ships had been lost rounding this very Horn. All thought and talk of California and gold was dismissed as the passengers and crew spoke only of the durability of the Triumph when she encountered the thundering seas and bitter cold of Cape Horn.
Soon the Triumph was in the midst of a real Horn reception. Heavy seas swept constantly over her hard-pressed decks and rain and hail ripped and tore through her canvas as she ran before the shrieking winds with shortened sails. For days Capt. Burt went without sleep as he stood on the bridge directing his half-frozen helmsman. The entire crew and passengers were wet to the skin as the seas roared and pounded across the decks and tore some of the hatches loose. The rigging and the little sail she carried was coated with frozen snow. No warm food was to be had as the galley fire had been washed out. No warm or dry clothing was to be found and anyway it was useless to wear it. The passengers at times accused Captain Burt of being a poor sailor and he was forced to wield an iron hand to keep them in restraint.
For two months the Triumph was in the grip of the Cape Horn with seldom a let-up from the whistling gales. But then there came a day when the Horn was passed and the thundering seas had been left behind. Sunny skies and fresh winds were a revelation as the men on board watched the porpoises and flying fish following in the boiling wake of the Triumph.
The Triumph survived the siren call of the Horn. Already four months into the voyage there were 8,000 miles to go. Capt. Burt anchored at Juan Fernandez Island off the coast of Chile to replenish his food and water supply. Juan Fernandez is the island on which Scottish sailor Alexander Selkirk (who was the basis for the fictional character Robinson Crusoe) was marooned for four months in 1750. The island was uninhabited. When Burt arrived, the 19 square mile island boasted a population of 4 people.
Safe and resupplied for the final leg of the journey, the mood on board was optimistic and jovial. But the sea would still not cooperate as told by John Parker.
After crossing the Equator of the Pacific, Capt. Burt experienced considerable difficulty in keeping the passengers disciplined. He wrote [in his journal] that for weeks the ship was becalmed beneath the unbearably hot sun of the Equator. The torrid rays beat unmercifully on the decks of the Triumph; below deck was a veritable oven; the pitch bubbled in the deck seams; the sea was like a mirror as not a semblance of a breeze stirred. More delay. He wrote that he was disgusted with the trip and with the passengers and never again would he attempt another such voyage.
For weeks the Triumph stood up under the terrific heat, finally catching the breeze and driving onward toward her long-sought goal. As she neared her destination the Triumph was surrounded on all sides by other sailing vessels, large and small, form every port in the world, their masters also steering a course for San Francisco to unload their cargo of human freight to seek out the treasure of John Sutter’s valley.
Two-hundred and seven days, or a little over seven months after she had left Boston, the Triumph swept into San Francisco Bay. A collective gasp arose from her decks. More than 500 vessels swung on their hawsers in the tide, deserted. They had reached their journey’s end and had been abandoned for the riches of the valley beyond.
[A skyline of masts in San Francisco Bay, 1850. Telegraph Hill is in the background]
No sooner had the Triumph dropped anchor than her passengers and crew were in the boats and rowing with might and main to be the first to land on California soil and become part of the reckless arena of bloodshed and terrorism that was San Francisco in 1850, where fortunes changed hands by card or gun and no man’s life was secure.
Two-hundred and seven days, over seven months, 17,000 miles. So much for the four month “guaranty.”
Capt. Burt’s brother, Henry, was among the passengers who dashed for the gold fields although Hiram was very concerned. “Brother Henry’s health is very poor and I fear he has the consumption [tuberculosis]. I fear he will never reach home again.”
And he didn’t. Henry made his way to the Campo Seco mining camp in Tuolumne County in search of his fortune. Henry had married Eunice Horton Staples in Taunton in 1848. Per the Censuses of 1850 and 1860, Henry was residing in Tuolumne County and plying his trade as a miner. There is no record of Henry ever returning to Massachusetts. By 1859, Eunice had married Terrence McManus in Taunton and they had three children.
Hiram’s nephew, James Phillips, also ignored his uncle’s pleas, and made his way to the mines. He wasn’t heard from until 30 years later. It turns out by 1854 he had boarded a ship for New South Wales in Australia. He married a girl from Sydney, raised a family and became a licensed victualler providing food, beverages and other supplies to sailing vessels. He also owned a large hotel in Wala Walla. Australia was a British colony at the time and in 1868 James became a British citizen.
James older brother, John Marshall, returned home to Taunton where he, too, became a sea captain.
In November 1849, around the time the Triumph began her voyage, a fellow Tauntonian C.C. Bradbury wrote a letter from Sacramento that was published in the Taunton Daily Gazette. He’d been in California for almost a year and was working in a bakery. He himself was headed for the mines, feeling lucky. Bradbury provided a clear picture of the hardships, problems and exaggerations confronting the thousands who descended upon Northern California.
I have seen many from the mines and hundreds are returning as fast as they can get here. Some have been here one and two years and have dug so much gold, but have been sick so much that they have exhausted the whole, and are now quite poor. Hundreds have died, whose friends will never hear or know of their fate. If I wished to return now I could not from the fact that the passages are all taken up for six months to come, mostly by persons who have just arrived and who are so disgusted with everything here that they do not even go to the mines. The whole country is being completely overwhelmed with foreigners of every nation under heaven, perfect desperadoes and it is predicted that hard times will be seen this fall and winter.
The reports that have been in the states since I left, like those we had when I was there, are almost rascally and shamefully exaggerated, as there is not one in a thousand that does one quarter as well as represented. If a man gets from $10 to $20 a day, he is considered to be doing very well, and there are hundreds who do not make $6 a day where there is one who gets his $16; but you know I expect to be one of the lucky ones and get a little more. I think I shall not stay in this miserable, unhealthy, dreary country for more than one year from this date or before, if lucky, I shall leave for some other quarters, but I hope you will not be discouraged about me.
Many of the men who made the journey to California on the Triumph, like Henry Burt, were never heard from again. Others became sick and discouraged and worked their way back to Taunton and other New England cities, thoroughly convinced that many of the stories they had heard about the riches to be made were but false rumors.
Unlike so many of this fellow mariners, Capt. Burt would have no part in the gold rush. He sold the Triumph to Amos Rogers in San Francisco for $4,000 and continued as her master in the Pacific waters for two years before returning to Taunton on another ship. He was back home by 1853.
Captain Burt never again sailed a ship to California but commanded many fine vessels to and from the Eastern ports.
By 1857, at the age of 45, Capt. Burt was the master of the 120-foot brig Marine, based in Boston, and owned by Elisha Atkins, Esq. A brig (short for brigantine) was two-masted, square rigged with sails on both masts. The Marine had a crew of ten sailors. The cabin was scarcely larger than a single stateroom on one of the steamships of the day. There were four bunks in the cabin and three more in the captain’s and mate’s quarters.
In September of 1857, the Marine was hauling a load of molasses, tar and sugar from Cardena, Cuba to the Port of New York. On September 12, on the tail end of a massive hurricane, fate, or perhaps divine intervention, caused Capt. Burt and the Marine to cross paths with the SS Central America 150 miles off the coast of South Carolina.
The Steamships Sonora and Central America
By the early 1850’s, it became critically important to shorten the trip between the coasts and more safely and quickly transport the immense amount of gold mined in California to the banks on the East Coast that were financing the country’s expansion into the West. To solve this problem, the U.S. government subsidized the construction of several steamships designed to carry large amounts of cargo and large numbers of passengers in relative comfort. To eliminate the need to navigate around Cape Horn, the U.S. built a 47-mile railroad across the isthmus of Panama which is roughly where the Panama Canal is today. A trip that used to take 3 to 6 months could now be made in less than four weeks.
One boarded a steamship in San Francisco and reached the west coast of Panama in about 12 days. After a two-hour train ride across Panama, the passengers and cargo were transferred to another steamship for the nine-day voyage to New York City with a stop in Havana.
On August 20, 1857, 491 passengers, including 60 women and children, boarded the steamship Sonora in San Francisco. Earlier that day, Ansel Ives Easton married Adeline “Addie” Mills at the Howard Street Congregational Church. Ansel, originally from New York, had made a fortune with his laundry and mattress manufacturing businesses in the Bay Area. Addie was also from New York, and she came to California with her brother, Darius, by steamship in 1852. Darius had already established a successful banking business in Sacramento and several mining towns fueled by the Gold Rush. Easton’s wedding party travelled with them to the dock and helped carry trunks full of beautiful clothes, gifts, hampers of wine and choice biscuits and cakes. The thundersous ring of the ship bell on the Sonora welcomed the wedding party. The Easton’s settled into their first-class cabin.
Little did the Easton’s know that their “promise before God to love and comfort each other until death do us part” was so nearly short-lived.
Many of the passengers that boarded the Sonora were miners who had swarmed the gold fields and toiled for riches in tough, colorful towns that sprung up literally overnight such as Rough and Ready, Hell-Out-for-Noon, Gopher Hill and Seven-Mile. They were among hundreds of thousands of men drawn by the magnet of the Gold Rush and the opportunity to strike it rich and change their lives forever.
Samuel P. Swan, 33, was one of those men. He boarded with his 18-year-old wife, Mary Sawyers, and their 18-month-old daughter, Lizzie. Samuel travelled by wagon train from his home in Canonsburg, Pennsylvania to the Rough and Ready Camp in 1850. In 1854, Mary and her family made the four-month journey from Missouri to California also by wagon train. They ended up at Rough and Ready, and a year later Mary married Samuel. Within three months they welcomed their first child, Marth Elizabeth “Lizzie.” Sam had some luck. He carried aboard a money belt laden with about $10,000 of gold dust and coin (about $300,000 worth in today’s dollars). Sam was taking his young family back to Pennsylvania. They saved their money and got bunks in steerage (economy class) with 332 others.
The trip from San Francisco to the west coast of Panama was smooth and uneventful.
On September 2, 1857, the steamship SS Central America, captained by 43-year-old Wm. H. Herndon, was docked at Aspinwall on the Caribbean side of Panama as it welcomed the 491 passengers that had travelled on the Sonora. Tons of cargo were transferred from the Sonora to the Central America including 30,000 pieces of mail and $2 million of gold bars and coin minted in San Francisco (worth about $140 million in today’s dollars). That didn’t include the copious amounts of gold carried by the passengers. That same day the Central America, with a crew of 105, took off for New York City.
The Hurricane
The Central America enjoyed fair weather and smooth seas and arrived in Havana on Monday, September 7. The passengers did not go ashore. Cuba was riddled with the deadly Yellow Fever disease. The next day Captain Herndon set sail and steam for New York City.
The mood was jubilant on board the Central America. Men who never before had a nickel they could call their own were now carrying thousands of dollars in California gold. Sweat, toil and back-breaking labor had brought it to them. The cabins rocked to song and laughter as passengers boasted of their exploits in the mines and what they were going to do with their new found riches when they got back home. Everybody was upbeat. They were surrounded by wealth. What better way to go to New York than one of the finest ships afloat?
The wind began to pick up on Wednesday, and by Thursday, September 10, the Central America was battling an intense hurricane with ferocious winds producing thirty-foot waves. At this point the ship was about 75 miles off the southeast coast of Florida.
Addie Easton described the deteriorating conditions.
Thursday there came up a severe gale, which increased in violence, producing a heavy head sea. Many anxious questions were asked the captain, bur he was cheerful and encouraging…All Thursday night the storm raged, and Friday was no calmer. We were all more or less seasick and nearly everyone went to their staterooms. About noon on Friday the vessel suddenly careened to one side, and looking toward our port-hole, I noticed it was entirely under water.
‘Ansel, Ansel,’ I cried, ‘we are sinking!’
Forgetting our seasickness, we both hastily threw on our wrappers over our night clothes and hurried to the salon. One glance at the appalled faces made us realize the imminent peril we were in…Not a sound was heard; no tears or hysterics. Despair seemed written on every face, and there was only the marvelous silence of a hushed and awe-stricken throng. The captain’s voice at the door added a thrill of horror, as he said: “All men prepare for bailing the ship. The engines have stopped, but we hope to reduce the water and start them again. She’s a sturdy vessel and if we can keep up steam we shall weather the gale.”
Flooding swamped the bottom deck steerage compartments where Mary and her baby Lizzie were riding out the storm in one of the top bunks. As the ship was tossed by mammoth waves, Mary was thrown from her bunk onto the wooden floor and severely bruised.
The flooding extinguished the coal and wood burning fires that drove the steam-driven engines and paddlewheels. The Central America’s sails were ripped to shreds and she lost her forward mast.
Dismay and apprehension seeped over crew and passengers as the mighty ship wallowed and groaned under gigantic seas. Song and laughter were replaced with prayer and gloom. There were no thoughts of gold and good times back home. The only thought was that of survival.
Mary Swan described the scene for The Sacramento Bee.
The second day of the storm the steamer sprung a leak and her hold rapidly filled with water. The pumps were put at work, but proved ineffective. Then the first step which was to disclose glorious manhood took place. The California miners aboard the doomed vessel, with a wealth of the yellow metal in their possession, commenced to bail the ship of its burden of water. Every vessel which could be secured was brought into requisition—buckets, barrels and the like. [The] battle continued with nearly all the men thus engaged grasping buckets and other vessels with hands from which the flesh had been worn, exposing bare bone. But not a soul aboard the fated ship faltered in his work. There was no day, no night, but work, work, through a period which seemed eternity. At times the women on the ship assisted the men in the contest against the encroachments of the sea. But the wailing of an infant, crying out for its mother’s sustenance, the sobs of children, temporarily neglected in the fight to avert impending doom, caused the mother’s heart to beat with quickened pulsation and to leave the fight for life to stronger hands.
Every available man, passenger or crew, first class or steerage, engaged in the frenetic efforts to bail water from the hold of the slowly sinking ship. They worked non-stop all-day Friday and into Saturday. Mrs. Easton said,
Nothing had been cooked on the steamer all day, the store-rooms of the ship being filled with water, and with the strenuous work and no food man after man became exhausted. About eleven o’clock Friday night I thought of the hampers in our stateroom, and with great difficulty reached the room and brought out boxes of biscuits and some wine…As I passed among the men they eagerly took the crackers and wine, only stopping long enough to eat them and then going on with the work of bailing. All night I went the rounds until everything we had was used. How little our dear friends who brought us these things dreamed the use that would be made of them, or what a help they were to be in our dire need…
At about three o’clock Saturday morning, the captain appeared and said, “If we can keep the ship up three or four hours more, we certainly shall see a sail and help will come. You remember, the San Francisco floated for eleven days. “Never was daylight more gratefully welcomed than on that Saturday morning, the last that ever dawned on many a noble heart. Everyone was wet, cold and hungry; the waves dashed over the deck and the vigil [looking] for a sail began again. More barrels were rigged through the skylights and for a time they seemed to gain on the water; the clouds began to break away and the wind to lull. Every countenance brightened and all labored more heartily. But no sail in sight yet, and alas, even with all our increased efforts it was soon evident the water was gaining, and to our unspeakable dismay the fury of the storm returned.
By noon on Saturday, September 12, Herndon realized the ship could not remain afloat much longer. The captain flew distress flags and fired rockets to attract attention of any nearby ships. In those days there was no radio, wireless or any other form of communication.
Captain Burt and the Brig Marine to the Rescue
At about 1:00 p.m. on Saturday, September 12, Captain Burt of the brig, Marine, spotted the SS Central America, badly damaged and floundering in the high seas. As he maneuvered the Marine closer, the Central America’s captain called out. “With all the calmness of an ordinary occasion,” recalled Burt, “Captain Herndon hailed the Marine, saying ‘We are in a sinking condition, and you must lay by us until morning.’” Captain Burt hailed back, “I shall stay by you as long as I can.”
When they sighted the Marine even the most stout-hearted men aboard the Central America lost control. There was shrieking, crying, agonizing elation. A flush of excitement raced through the ship. Friends and families embraced. They thought their prayers were answered.
Then a terrible fear set in that the seas were so high the Marine, over a mile away, could not be reached.
Although the wind had abated some, the sea was still boiling with monstrous waves. The Marine had also been damaged in the storm and was barely seaworthy. Herndon couldn’t tie off his ship to the Marine because he had lashed all of his hawser lines around broken-off masts to create drag in a desperate attempt to keep the Central America pointed into the wind. Those efforts failed.
Herndon ordered the 60 women and children to come on deck and prepare to board the lifeboats that would carry them to the Marine. The Central America’s deck was continually swamped by the high waves, and the ship was listing badly. The steamer was equipped with six lifeboats, but one was lost during the hurricane, and another was smashed as it was lowered to the sea.
Addie Easton described her painful goodbye and treacherous departure from the Central America on the third lifeboat.
I went to my stateroom and put on a dress skirt to cover my night dress wrapper, which I afterwards took off, as I thought I might get in the water and it would cause me to sink, then went to my small trunk which was in the room and took my dear mother’s miniature, also one of my brother James. Taking a shawl and putting on a life preserver, I started to go above. Ansel could not come to help me as he was working hard on deck, but just as I reached the door of the room he came in.
“Hurry, dear!” he said, “We shall all be saved, but the women and children are to be taken off first.”
‘Oh, I can’t go without you,’ I cried, my courage vanishing at the thought of leaving him on the sinking ship.
Ansel hurried to the trunk, taking out a coat, into the pockets of which he put nine hundred dollars and some valuable papers and rolled it into a bundle. He and Mr. [Robert Turnbull] Brown helped me to the deck just as the second boat-load was completed.
“All ready,” said the captain, and with my husband’s kiss upon my lips and breathing a prayer for his safety, I found myself swinging from the deck, and as a huge wave brought the boat underneath, the rope was lowered and I dropped to the bottom of the boat. It was a dreadful moment, for we were in great danger of swamping or being dashed to pieces; but even in that moment of terror, a touch of the ridiculous helped to bring me back, for the contents of one of the barrels used for bailing came down on my head, completely drenching me. Ansel threw me his coat containing the money and also took off the coat he was wearing and threw it to me to put about my shoulders. These were all the things we saved.
With a mighty effort the men got the boat under headway, when suddenly a huge wave rolled over it and it was half filled with water. It was a good thing just at this moment, when I felt I could not keep from breaking down at the parting with my dear husband, that I had to rouse myself for action. The men were all needed to row the boat, the other women were hysterical and so the long mile we had to go before we reached the brig was spent in bailing the boat. The old tin I had to use was large, and it was a pretty tired out individual that was pulled up out of the boat over the rail, to the deck of the Marine.
The lifeboats could only approach the sidewheeler between waves, so the women and children had to remain suspended on the ropes for a minute or more until the wave had passed. The waves often drove them under the side of the steamer. Some women lost their nerve, plunged into the sea and had to be fished out. Others were smashed and bruised as they were dropped into the lifeboats.
As each boat pulled away from the Central America, cries of “Good-bye,” and “I love you,” came from the boats and from desperate husbands and others on deck of the ship.
The young mother, Mary Swan, and her baby were on the next lifeboat. Mary never forgot her own agonizing goodbyes with her husband, Sam, and the harrowing rescue effort.
When the order came for the women and children to prepare for lowering to the lifeboats, my husband left his place at the pumps and came to me. He said, ‘I don’t know that I shall ever see you again.’ He was very glad to think that I could be taken off. He wanted me to go, and said that he did not care about himself, if it were possible that I could be saved, and the little child. He told me that he would try to save himself if an honorable opportunity should present itself after all the women were taken off. He had been sick for three or four days before the disaster, but notwithstanding this, he persisted in keeping his place at the pumps. As I was leaving the ship, my husband tied about my waist a heavy belt containing about $10,000 in gold dust and nuggets, saying: ‘If you are saved this will be a good friend to you—if you drown, it will help carry you to the bottom.“
He lashed Lizzie on Mary’s back, kissed them goodbye, and returned to the pumps. That was the last they saw of him.
Mary told the Sacramento Bee in 1901 that as she was preparing to leave the Central America, Captain Herndon gave Mary his gold pocket watch and chain. He asked her, “If you should survive, and I pray to God that you do, please try to get these to my wife and daughter in Albany, New York.”
When the lifeboats finally reached the Marine, Captain Burt devised a way to get the women and kids out of the boats into his. They would wait for the enormous waves to lift the boats up close to the Marine’s deck, thus enabling Captain Burt and his sailors to reach down and roughly grab the arms and legs of the soaked and terrified women and children. The Captain said later, “It was no time for courtesy.”
When Mary’s lifeboat arrived at the Marine, Captain Burt and crew tried three times to hoist her and Lizzie into the boat. Each time they lost their grip and the pathetic pair plunged into the sea. Mary’s battered body and the additional weight of her baby and money belt no doubt contributed to the difficulty. However, the fourth try was a success and Mary and Lizzie were brought safely aboard; “safely” being a relative term because no one on board the Marine was out of danger—far from it.
The lifeboats could only take a few passengers at a time because of the rough seas. The wind was blowing the Marine and its skinny crew of eleven further away from the Central America by the hour. These boats were powered only by the arms and backs of sturdy sailors. It took the first boat about a half hour to reach the Marine. The boat that made the 9th and final trip reached the Marine, now seven miles away, in two and one-half hours.
Once all the women and children were safely aboard the Marine, Herndon permitted the male passengers to begin boarding the lifeboats. This process was less disciplined with several passengers and crew leaping into the boats or into the water to be picked up.
Mrs. Easton anxiously watched as the lifeboats came to the Marine loaded with men, and grew ever more despondent Ansel was not among them.
I put my face down in my hands, too wretched to speak, reproaching myself that I had not stayed with him, regretting that I had not defied Captain Herndon and all when they commanded us to leave.
Someone touched me on the shoulder and the kind voice of Captain Burt said, “Here’s a letter from your husband, Mrs. Easton, brought by someone in the last boat.”
I hurriedly opened the scrap of blue paper, on which was written in pencil:
“My Dear Wife- If the captain of the “Marine” will send a boat forward for me you can give him what he will ask. I will watch for it and be on hand. Your affectionate husband, A. I. E.”
‘Oh, Captain, do send one more boat back!’
“My dear Mrs. Easton, I wish I could, but in such a sea as this and in the darkness a boat could not make the trip.”
‘But Captain, Captain, they may all die before morning. Anything-ten thousand dollars if you will send another boat.’
“My dear lady, if I could send it, one should go without a cent of money, but a boat such as we have would not live a moment. I will try to take the brig nearer the steamer and she will probably float until morning.”
Forty-nine men made it to the Marine; 23 crew members and 26 passengers. Ansel Easton and Samuel Swan were not among them.
The Last Moments
The last moments on the Central America were relatively calm. Resignation set in that there would be no more lifeboat rescues. The brig Marine had now blown more than eight miles away. The crews of the last two lifeboats to reach the Marine refused to return and hid on board the brig. They were beyond exhausted. One mate, boatswain Black, over a nine-hour period made seven trips between the steamer and brig and rowed an estimated 23 miles in the rough seas. His was the last lifeboat to return to the Central America before she sank.
The men knew death was inevitable. As the Central America lurched and tossed, the men undertook an incredible ritual—divestiture of their gold. Treasure belts were taken off, bags were opened and gold scattered on the cabin floors. Full purses, in some instances containing thousands of dollars, were tossed on sofas or the floor or thrown wildly in the air.
One passenger opened a carpet bag and dashed about the cabin telling all who would listen to “Take it. Help yourself.” When no one moved to accept the gift, he flung it across the cabin, yelling hysterically, “$20,000 in gold and nobody wants it.”
The 487 men remaining on the Central America prepared for the inevitable sinking of the ship. Many removed their shoes and extra clothing. They wanted no extra weight when they went into the ocean, and even a coat or an ounce of gold might be too much. They mustered into their cork and tin life preservers. They hastened to fashion make-shift rafts from doors, decking, furniture and anything else that could float. Some elected to lock themselves into staterooms, drink copious amounts of alcohol and smoke a final Havana cigar, rather than suffer the fate of the open water.
About 8:00 p.m. Captain Herndon and his officers changed into their dress uniforms. Herndon fired one more rocket low across the darkened horizon, lit with a Havana cigar handed to him by Ansel Easton—a signal the ship would soon go down. Mary Swan (now Mary Cook at the time of her interview with the Sacramento Bee in 1901) had not forgotten that moment from forty-four years earlier.
Here Mrs. Cook paused and it was several minutes before she could proceed. Then she took up the narrative and told how, when safely aboard the brig Marine, she had looked out upon the waste waters and had seen in the gathering dusk of the evening the rocket sent skyward from the deck of the Central America, which told her that the ship was doomed.
Mrs. Cook had prayed that her husband might be spared to her, but when the rocket lighted the heavens she knew that hope would never be realized. She gave a cry in the agony of despair, but at once a hand was laid upon her mouth and further outcry was stifled.
A whispered word in her ear told her she must be brave: that all the survivors aboard did not know the significance of the fleeting illumination of the skies, and too crushed and weak to offer protest, she did as she was bidden.
So it was, Mrs. Cook says, that outside the officers of the brig, only two or three aboard knew that the ship had sunk, carrying with her over 400 brave souls to a grave beneath the storm-tossed waves.
Two enormous waves crashed over the deck of the Central America, now sitting very low in the sea, and many men were washed overboard. Captain Herndon barked out his last orders: “Buckle on your life-preservers! We are going down!”
A bright flash of lightning lit the deck, revealing the entire scene, and a tremendous sea struck the Central America. She shuddered, plunged stern first at an angle of 45 degrees and, with a simultaneous cry from the engulfed mass, she disappeared at 9:00 p.m.
The Central America sank 7,200 feet to the ocean floor about 125 miles east-southeast of Cape Hatteras, South Carolina. The force of the hurricane and strong current had blown her over one hundred miles off course.
Utter chaos, panic and horror enveloped the men pitched into the sea. Some were killed within the first few minutes: struck by pieces of broken ship; others entangled in rigging, locked in their staterooms, or sucked deep by the force of the sinking ship. There were those who lost preservers or something to hold onto and could not swim. However, many survived the early aftermath of the sinking by clinging to their preservers and floating debris in the pitch dark.
This was different from the conditions that took so many lives when the RMS Titanic was lost in 1912. The air and waters of the North Atlantic were near-freezing, and those in the water were overcome by hyperthermia in a matter of minutes.
The Central America went down in the relatively warmer waters of the Atlantic Ocean’s Gulf Stream. The major threats facing those men were the roiling seas, hanging on to something sturdy, fighting off other men trying to grab them or their piece of wreckage, exhaustion from bailing water from the ship non-stop for almost two full days and nights, and no other boats nearby to rescue them. These factors resulted in a slow death for too many. When they finally lost sight of the brig Marine, hope was all but abandoned.
The Central America was not the only casualty. More than 300 ships were lost all over the Atlantic as a result of what became known as the Great Storm of 1857 and the worst American storm ever recorded up to that time.
On the Brig, But Not Out of the Woods
The seas were still roiling and Captain Burt was concerned that his own little vessel might founder. With unbelievable skill, and despite the loss of one of his two masts, Captain Burt chartered a course for Norfolk, Virginia, over 200 miles away. Handicapped by the loss of the mast and other gear, and with an exhausted crew, everything Captain Burt ever knew about the sea had to be put in play.
The conditions aboard the Marine were deplorable. Designed to accommodate a crew of no more than 15, there were an additional 109 passengers crammed into every available space. Some of the injured women (including Mary Swan) and children were cramped into the seven available bunks in the tiny cabin and captain’s quarters. The others sat or lay on the floor in ankle deep water, clothed in soaking rags. The rescued men, crew and a few women had to make the best of it on the exposed deck which was wet, windy and cold. A few tried to find shelter in the hold of the ship, but the stench of the cargo of tar and molasses quickly drove them out.
Addie Easton and another woman quickly fled the cabin.
The cabin was a little space and the waves had dashed over the hatchways so that the water was about three inches deep all over the floor. Here were huddled thirty women and twenty-six children, many of them sleeping on the floor. The scene was indescribable…
With another woman friend, who also mourned her husband lost on the ship, we went back to the deck. The captain brought a large piece of sail cloth and spread it on the deck at the prow, and we were just getting ourselves on it when a wave came over the ship, completely drenched us; but such was my agony of mind that I was not conscious of my physical sufferings.
After some time, Captain Burt came back with another large piece of sail, and putting it on top of the hatchway my friend and I lay down on it and were covered with another heavy piece of canvas. That was our bed for six long, weary days and nights.
The captain’s kindness I can never forget. During those long night hours he would tell us of the many wonderful rescues he had known and always ended with the cheering words, “Something tells me that you will meet your husband when we get to port.”
Of the thirty-two women on board, 18 had husbands aboard the Central America when it sank and were worried sick about their fates. Food and fresh water were pitifully and dangerously scarce.
Mary Swan shared this heart-rending memory with The Sacramento Bee:
The women and children aboard made serious inroads in the larder of the little ship, so that for a week each person’s allowance was a small piece of “hard tack” [a biscuit] a quarter of the size of one’s hand, once a day.
Upon this scanty fare depended the life of Mrs. Cook and her baby girl, just taken from the breast. None could foresee how long these conditions would last, and it looked for many weary days that they had escaped drowning only to meet death by starvation.
One day one of the survivors saw Mrs. Cook moisten her hard tack in a cup of water and feed it to her starving little one, while in every line of face and feature of the mother grim hunger was revealed.
Approaching the mother he tendered his scanty store, begging that it would be accepted. He had a wife and two children in Albany, New York, he said, and if a mother could give her all for her child, he, as a father, could do as much in memory of the little ones he might never see.
The starving woman took the proffered mite, and for this act she says she owes a debt of gratitude to mankind which can never be repaid.
The crew was exceedingly generous, sharing their clothes, food and fresh water. But it was barely enough, and after four days everyone was near starvation.
On Wednesday evening of September 16, a seaman on the brig spotted a ship some six or seven miles away. A small boat was made ready and one of the rescued first-class passengers, Theodore Payne from New York, volunteered to “go speak to her.” After crewmen rowed several miles, Payne boarded the clipper Euphrasia. Payne explained their dire situation to Captain William Lanfare, and he generously loaded their boat with fresh supplies including two barrels of sea biscuit, fresh water, two barrels of potatoes, three hams and six chickens.
Payne described Lanfare as “one of those genuine sons of the ocean, whose hearts are ever ready to respond to the distress of others.
Capt. Lanfare followed Payne back to the Marine. He witnessed the disheveled, sunburned and blistered passengers suffering from extreme exposure and strewn upon the deck. With tears in his eyes, Lanfare said to Addie Easton, “Heaven knows, I’m sorry for you! You can have anything I have.”
Down to the last ration of water, Capt. Burt thanked Lanfare, for had he not so generously resupplied the Marine, all aboard would have been “driven to great straits with hunger as well as thirst.” As Lanfare departed the brig, all on board shouted out three rounds of cheers to him. Lanfare refused any reimbursement.
The Marine made little headway over the next three days due to light winds and the damage suffered by the ship. Capt. Burt determined the only way the Marine would be able to make it into Norfolk Harbor was to be towed. On Friday, September 18, Thomas Payne and some of the brig’s crew took the Marine’s small boat and headed for Cape Henry near the entrance to Chesapeake Bay in search of help. Within a few miles, Payne saw a vessel approaching them. Payne flagged down the propeller-driven steamship, City of Norfolk, explained to her Captain Greene their situation and asked for a tow. Payne described what happened next.
“Greene asked, ‘What will you give?’ I replied, ‘Anything that is right, $100, $150, $200.’ Greene said he wouldn’t do it for less than $300, to which I said, ‘Well, we are helpless and must submit to your terms to go out to the brig.’ As the City of Norfolk ran alongside the Marine, and seeing the desperation of the circumstances, the mercenary Greene increased the charge to $500. Capt. Burt protested, but as Greene prepared to move away, Burt reluctantly agreed. The hat was passed among the passengers and Greene was paid the extorted $500. The City of Norfolk towed the brig toward port.
The Easton’s are Reunited Thanks to a Frigate Bird
As the Marine entered the bay, Capt. Burt received joyful news that 49 others had been rescued from the Central America by another ship, but none of their names were known. Addie Easton told what happened next.
I felt very sad and downcast and could hardly speak. An intense fear that my dear husband might not be among the saved seemed to numb me. In a little while the steamer Empire City who we last saw in Havana came in sight. She stopped, a small boat was lowered and Captain McGowan came aboard. His first inquiry was, “Where is Mrs. Easton?” and added, “Tell her her her husband is waiting for her in Norfolk.”
I scarcely knew what I did for a few moments. A number of the ladies threw their arms about me and even the rough sailors heartily congratulated me on the safety of my dear husband. As Captain McGowan came on board he took me by the hand and we both felt too deeply to speak for some minutes. Then he said:
“He is safe and anxiously awaiting you. This morning I was sleeping on my ship in the Norfolk harbor when suddenly I was awakened by someone knocking on my door. ‘Who is that?’ I said, rather gruffly, I fear. ‘Easton.’ ‘My God man, where did you come from?,’ I shouted as I opened the door, for I knew something must have happened.”
“Is he hurt?” I hurriedly asked.
“Not a bit, my dear Mrs. Easton. He’s as hale and hearty as ever, only very anxious about you.”
The Captain then told me what happened to Ansel that dreadful night.
“Well, after he sent you a note he watched until dark for a boat.”
“Oh, I tried so hard to send him one,” I said.
“He was standing on the wheelhouse with Captain Herndon and several others when his friend Brown came up and gave him a life preserver and a coat. Mr. Easton put on the life preserver and threw the coat about his shoulders, buttoning it at the neck. The Captain turned to Mr. Easton and said, ‘Give me your cigar, Easton, for this last rocket,’ and as he was handing it to him the ship gave a great plunge and in a moment Mr. Easton felt a man’s arm about his neck and in the terrible suction made by the sinking of the ship, he was drawn down with bewildering rapidity.
“Struggling to free himself from the death grip, he thought to unbutton the coat. It slipped from his shoulders in the hands of the first mate. At the instant of relief he shot upward and found himself among hundreds of human beings, each struggling for life. A large plank which had been the front of a berth floated by and this he grasped. On this he floated for eight hours.
“At first he could see the lights of a ship off in the distance. He thinks he must have been a little delirious for he had no fear of drowning and seemed to feel that he was reaching out to a far country.
“He did not see the ship, the Ellen, which finally rescued him, until she was very close. He was perfectly composed, took the rope thrown out to him, ascended, put on dry clothing provided and went to work assisting in caring for those who were saved and calling out the names of everyone he knew, hoping to get a response from the water.
“Mr. Easton felt most keenly for Mr. Brown’s loss and begged the captain to stay until they found him. Finally, after some hours and no more persons being found, Captain Johnsen of the Ellen said, ‘I think these are all there are.’ Mr. Easton said to him, ‘Oh, Captain, tack just once more and then if we can’t find him, we can go on.’ This the captain gladly did, and for some time Mr. Easton stood at the rail shouting, ‘Brown, Brown.’ In the distance a small dark object was seen and as it came nearer they saw it was a hatchway with two men on it-Mr. Brown and Mr. Dement.
“The captain of the Ellen told them that early the evening before he had been on the outlook with one of his officers when a large bird flew in his face. He beat it off and a second time it came; again he thrust it from him, and a third time it came. Being a little superstitious he said to the mate, ‘I believe there’s trouble some where; I’m going to turn the ship and go in the direction the bird has flown.’ This he did and within an hour came upon the crowd of floating men, and forty-nine were saved.”
Captain Johnsen recalled pulling the last men from the sea. “[Brown and Dement] were first discovered at three o’clock in the morning, but immediately afterwards they unaccountably disappeared. At nine o’clock I saw them again, ran down for them, and threw them a rope, which they caught, but could not retain. After making one or two tacks, they drifted alongside, and I got them safely on board.” They were the last to be found, although Captain Johnsen continued to search for another couple of hours.
The first news of the disaster was telegraphed from Charleston, Virginia to New York City on the evening of September 17, and appeared in the morning newspapers the next day.
Addie Easton and Mary and Lizzie Swan were among the eighty-five rescued passengers that left the Marine and boarded the more seaworthy Empire City, but not before the grateful group presented Captain Burt and his crew with $850. One of the passengers said the money had to be forced upon Capt. Burt before he reluctantly agreed to take it.
They boarded small boats and were rowed the seven miles into Norfolk to spend the night. They were given lodging, food, and fresh clothes. Their condition and appearance were shocking with one observer saying, “it spoke of the extreme poverty of their condition and painfully recalled the suffering through which they had passed. The men were so thinly clad that many of them feared to encounter the exposure of the deck, and the women were forced to make apologies for their destitute and ragged appearance. The children were nearly naked, and many of them crying.”
Sheets from the Marine had been cut up to make underclothes for the children, and rags were tied around the feet of those who had no shoes.
Addie Easton was disappointed to not see her husband when she and the others arrived at the hotel in Norfolk. In his impatience to see her, Ansel had taken a boat out to the Marine, only to discover Addie and others had already left for the harbor.
Addie recalled, “Of our meeting a few hours later I cannot speak. Great joy is too deep for words. Kindness loaded us with everything we needed.”
Three other women also received the joyous news their husbands had been rescued by the Ellen and were soon reunited. Mary Swan was among the 14 newly widowed.
The Empire City arrived in New York City the following day, Saturday, September 19, one week after the sinking of the Central America.
When the passengers received word to go ashore, Mary Swan burst into tears and, wringing her hands, wailed: “Where shall I go after I go ashore?” When asked, she said: “No, I have no friend in New York, nor in all the world, now that my husband is lost.”
She and Lizzie along with some of the other women and children got into carriages and the drivers drove them to hotels, refusing to take any pay.
Addie Easton recalled, “It was a joyous meeting, when after our many tribulations we were met by our loving family and friends in New York. As ever in the world, the sad and amusing, the pathetic and the ludicrous are side by side, for we came back from the perils of the deep to find ourselves real live curiosities.”
The Heroes
Merriam’s Webster defines “hero” as (1) a mythological or legendary figure often of divine descent endowed with a great strength or ability; (2) an illustrious warrior; (3) a man admired for his achievements and noble qualities; (4) one that shows great courage. Capt. Burt checked at least three of those boxes.
Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper said, “Captain Burt has obtained a lasting popularity from the prompt manner in which he came to the rescue of the wrecked passengers of the Central America and will long be held in esteem as an honor to the commercial mariners of our country.”
Passenger Theodore Payne spoke for those on the Marine saying, “We are under lasting obligations to Captain Burt and his officers, as well as his crew, for the kind attention paid us while on the Marine. There efforts on our behalf were unceasing.”
Ansel and Addie Easton leaned upon their connections at the highest levels of U.S. government to obtain awards and recognition for Captain Burt and the Ellen’s Captain Johnsen who were instrumental in their rescues. John Graham, a friend of the Easton’s and a personal advisor to then President James Buchanon, wrote a letter to the President affirming “that public sentiment highly approved the conduct of Captain Burt, commander of the brig Marine…his bringing into Port…safely…96 human Beings, attributable entirely to his coolness, seamanship and humanity, is under all the circumstances truly miraculous and in the highest degree praiseworthy.”
Expressing his additional support of an award to the Swedish Captain Johnsen, Graham went on to say, “Our people feel that in doing an honor to one of a foreign country we should not overlook our countryman who saved the greatest number of lives and won for himself universal praise for his manly conduct.”
Addie Easton fondly recalled, “Captain Burt and Captain Johnsen were both true sons of the sea…brave, generous and kindly, and but for their timely and unselfish aid, no one should have been saved to the tell the story of the wreck. My husband’s friendship and gratitude to them lasted throughout his life.”
Thanks to the Easton and Graham efforts, Captain Burt received an award of $600 and a gold watch.
There were, of course, other heroes in this tragedy: Captain Wm. Herndon of the Central America and Captain Lanfare of the schooner Euphrasia, who resupplied the desperate Marine.
Mary Swan told the Sacramento Bee in 1901 that, “It is my belief that the majesty of manhood stood forth to the world in all its grandeur when those California miners gave their lives to the rule of the sea: Captain Herndon’s order ‘Women and children first’ will ring in my ears until I depart this place.”
And there was also Captain Colin Shearer. Nine days after the sinking of the Central America, he and his crew aboard the bark Mary, hauling a load of molasses and sugar from Cuba to Cork, Ireland, spotted a small boat. As they approached, they observed three men, near death, vainly attempting to row to their ship. These were the last men rescued from the Central America: Fireman Alexader Grant, Second Engineer John Tice, and passenger George Dawson. Captain Shearer altered his course and took the men to New York City.
Certainly not Captain Greene of the City of Norfolk.
Captain Burt cast his vote in favor of the women and children.
“I was only doing my duty.”
Captain Burt sent this letter published by the New York Times after heaps of praise were bestowed upon him for the brave efforts of he and his crew in the rescue of 109 passengers of the Central America and their safe return to New York City.
The Boston Transcript added the following postscript: “The brig, Marine, which so opportunely rescued about one hundred of the passengers of the ill-fated Central America is owned by Elisha Atkins, Esq. of this city. It is creditable to that gentleman that he declined compensation for the assistance rendered by the brig, although much expense was incurred by the detention. In the midst of so much gloom, the above fact shines forth with peculiar brightness.”
The Marine Redowa
In November of 1857 a musical composition was commissioned and dedicated to Captain Burt. The piece is titled “The Marine Redowa” and was written by French composer, Edouard Vienot. The sheet music cover includes a lithograph of the brig Marine receiving lifeboats filled with passengers rescued from the crippled SS Central America in the background. The dedication reads:
Dedicated to the brave, energetic and whole souled Capt Hiram Burt, of the Brig Marine, who rescued from a watery grave a large number of the passengers of the ill-fated Central America.
A Redowa is a Bohemian ballroom dance, similar to a waltz or polka, that was popular in the 1800’s.
J.H. Bufford was the lithographer and the composition was published by Oliver Ditson & Co. It is not known who commissioned the composition.
The James Neilson- Another Close Call
At some point after 1857, Captain Burt was the master of the schooner James Neilson. Enroute to Trujillo, Honduras, the ship ran aground on a reef in Omoa Bay on the Caribbean coast of Honduras. He and his crew became desperately ill with fever, and while stranded on the reef his ship was boarded by the crew of the Honduras schooner, Bolu de Ora, who proceeded to dismantle and destroy Burt’s ship.
The indomitable Burt crawled out of his birth, revolver in hand, and threatened to shoot the first man who dared cut another rope. The effect was immediate and the pirates fled his ship. Under Capt. Burt’s direction, the James Nielson was freed from the reef, and repairs made to render the ship seaworthy. The news report of the incident said: “Capt. Burt has had a very discouraging part to perform—extremely ill, without friends or means, in a strange country, where there is no Consul to assist him—he has succeeded in surmounting all obstacles, and has saved his vessel, which would have been destroyed.
“Addie Easton”
Hiram Burt married Frances Deborah Hood in July of 1838. She, too, was born and raised in Taunton. He was 25 and Frances was 20. Between 1839 and 1856, they had six children, all born in Taunton: two boys and four girls. Sarah Adeline was a middle child born in 1848.
Hiram invited his wife and Sarah (who was 8 years old at the time) to make the trip from Taunton to New York while his brig Marine was undergoing repairs following the storm and rescue of passengers from the steamship Central America. During their visit, Capt. Burt introduced them to Addie Easton, who by then had become a good friend. Mrs. Easton gave Sarah a doll. Because the doll represented a girl of about the same age as Sarah, Addie felt it would be a good companion and friend for Sarah. Sarah named the doll “Addie” after Mrs. Easton. Coincidentally, Sarah’s middle name was Adeline, same as Mrs. Easton’s first. The doll remains in the hands of descendants of Captain Burt.
Appendix
Lizzie Borden Took an Axe
Many will remember the creepy “nursery” rhyme from childhood:
Lizzie Borden took an axe
and gave her mother forty whacks.
When she saw what she had done,
She gave her father forty-one.
In 1892 there were two horrific murders that grabbed the undivided attention of Massachusetts–the whole world, in fact. Andrew Jackson Borden, an enormously wealthy Scotsman, and his second wife, Abby Durfee Gray, were savagely hacked to death with an axe. Their daughter-stepdaughter, Lizzie Borden, was charged with their murders. After a lengthy and acrimonious trial in 1893, she was found not guilty of the charges. Free from jail, but never from the ostracism of public opinion who held her responsible, Lizzie lived the remainder of her years in her hometown of Fall River, Mass. And she spent those years as a very wealthy woman, she and her sister, Emma, having inherited the bulk of their father’s substantial estate.
In the “Triumph and Tribulation” section of this story, we mentioned Cook Borden was one of the co-owners of the brig Triumph that made the 17,000-mile voyage from Boston to San Francisco in 1849. Cook was Lizzie’s great-uncle. He was a lumber merchant and a member of another very prominent textile family in Fall River. After Lizzie was acquitted of the murders, she changed her name to Lizbeth. Cook became her business manager and helped Lizzie and her sister purchase new houses and kept the transactions out of the public eye.
What became of Ansel and Adeline Easton?
The Easton’s cancelled their honeymoon trip to Europe and returned to San Francisco. In 1860 Ansel bought 1,500 acres on the peninsula south of San Francisco, and Addie’s brother, D.O. Mills acquired another 1,500 adjacent acres. That property became the affluent communities of Burlingame and Hillsborough.
They had two children, Jennie, and Ansel Mills. Their father, Ansel, died in 1868 at the age of forty-nine. Addie never remarried.
D.O.’s banks became the Bank of California. Jennie Easton married Colonel Charles F. Crocker, son of Charles Crocker who was one of “Big Four” who financed and built the Union Pacific Railroad. Jennie Crocker died shortly after the birth of her daughter, Jennie Adeline, and Addie Easton raised her and her brother, Charles.
Adeline Mills Easton died in Burlingame in 1916, and she was buried at St. Matthew Episcopal Church. In the 1860’s the Easton’s acquired the ship’s bell of the Sonora and had it inscribed with the account of their adventure on the SS Central America. Addie donated the bell to St. Matthew’s. The bell that rang on her wedding day in New York City, rang sixty years later at her funeral.
In 1990, fortune hunters located the wreckage of the SS Central America. In addition to the gold, one of the Easton’s travel trunks, still intact after 120 years, was pulled from the bottom of the Atlantic. The trunk contained a well-preserved issue of the July 20, 1857, New York News, together with numerous items of clothing, jewelry, a hairbrush, cologne and writing instruments.
In 1911, Addie told the story their adventure aboard the Central America to Nellie Olmstead Lincoln. The 40-page “The Story of Our Wedding Journey,” was privately published in San Francisco.
What became of Mary Sawyers Swan and her daughter Lizzie
Mary and Lizzie were met in New York City by her husband’s younger brother, William, a well-known newspaper publisher in Washington County, Pennsylvania. He brought them to his mother’s house in Canonsburg. By 1860, they were living with Samuel’s older brother, Monroe, and his family in eastern Ohio.
William Swan wrote these beautiful words in the obituary for his brother.
He was a calm, brave and high-hearted man; fond of travel, and amazingly endowed with the true wanderer’s faculty of suiting himself to every emergency. We venture to say that of all of the toiling men who stove to save the sinking ship, not one worked with a more unflagging courage and determined spirit than he-when last seen he was working the pumps. Poor wanderer! It was not permitted him to see his native land-to press to his heart his wife and child, his gray-haired mother and loving brothers and sisters. But far away from the household Gods of home-young, brave and high of hope-he was stricken down, and now sleeps the “last long sleep from which there is no waking”- with the myriads of uncoffined dead whose resting place is the deep, deep sea.
When the Civil War broke out in 1861, Mary joined the Union Army as a field nurse caring for wounded soldiers in Pennsylvania.
In 1863, Mary married George M. Cook, a successful farmer in Washington County. Mary and George had their first child, Harry, in 1864, and four more sons and two daughters over the next nine years. In 1875, the Cook’s youngest daughter, Cora, passed away at the age of two.
In October of that same year, Lizzie Swan was tragically killed in a horseback riding accident. Lizzie was an accomplished horsewoman, but while riding that day her saddle became loose and she was thrown. Lizzie was a month shy of her 20th birthday and engaged to be married. The tombstone above her grave in Washington Cemetery is inscribed, “M. Lizzie Samuel, born November 4, 1855, Died Washington PA Oct 6, 1875, Daughter of Saml P. and M.E. Swan. Her father Saml P. Swan was lost on the Steam Ship Central America in the Atlantic Ocean Sep 12, 1857.”
In 1876, the Cooks moved to Willits in Mendocino County, California. Mary was reunited with her family, early settlers of Willits, whom she had not seen in over twenty years. Mary and George raised their six children and, with the expertise acquired as field nurse, Mary became Willits’ defacto “doctor.”
Tragedy again tracked Mary down in 1901.
A massive wildfire driven by the dreaded Diablo winds destroyed much of the town including most of the commercial buildings and residences. There was only one casualty. In his valiant, albeit in vain, attempts to put out the fire at their house, George Cook suffered extensive burns on his hands and arms. He died of blood poisoning a few weeks later.
The last years of Mary’s life were spent relatively peacefully in Willits. She was well looked after by her five surviving children, twelve grandchildren and five great-grandchildren. She passed away in her home in 1924, surrounded by family. She was 85.
Mary’s obituary in The Willits News featured one of the last photos taken of her and was captioned LIVED AN EVENTFUL LIFE. “She was one of the oldest pioneers of Little Lake Valley and one of the forerunners who helped to build this great west into what it is today. She lived an interesting life, half a century of which she had spent in Willits.”
[If you would like to learn more about Mary’s story, please visit MARY SAWYERS SWAN COOK (1839-1924)]
What Became of Captain Herndon’s Watch?
As mentioned, just before Mary and her baby evacuated the Central America, Captain Herndon gave her his gold watch and chain. Upon arriving in New York, Mary did not have the opportunity to make the 150-mile trip to Albany, but the watch, with the awful tidings of the disaster, were carried to the Captain’s wife and daughter by a man who volunteered to perform the sad service. It is believed fellow passenger and rescuee, Thomas Payne, delivered the watch to Mrs. Herndon.
Ellen was twenty years old when she lost her brave father. She became engaged the year before to a young lawyer named Chester A. Arthur. Chester became very active in the Republican Party, and in 1880 he was selected to run as Vice President alongside Presidential candidate James A. Garfield. Chester Arthur became the 21st President of the United States when President Garfield was assassinated in September of 1881.
Arthur served as President through 1885, but due to failing health elected to not seek reelection. He passed away in 1886 from kidney failure.
The significance of the watch, young Mary’s sacrifice in getting it into the hands of Captain Herndon’s family, and the overwhelming circumstances of the tragedy—Mary and Frances Herndon both losing their husbands amidst the staggering loss of life from the biggest maritime disaster of its time—forged an irrevocable bond among Mary Sawyers Swan Cook, Frances Herndon and Chester and Ellen Arthur. Up until the time of his death, President Arthur and Mary corresponded regularly. The Captain’s watch was passed down to President Arthur’s son and he too occasionally wrote to the woman who braved the wreck of the SS Central America with his grandfather.
Chester and Ellen Herndon Arthur
Footnotes and References
Introduction and Dedication
Ancestry.com
Triumph and Tribulation
John Parker, “Voyage of Triumph to San Francisco Called For Courage,” Taunton Daily Gazette, July 6, 1935
Addendum to Appendix on Jacob Haskins’ Diary, by Elizabeth Vodola
Certificate of Naturalization, New South Wales, February 5, 1868
Normand E. Klare, The Final Voyage of the SS Central America 1857, The Arthur H. Clark Co. 1992
Frank Leslie’s Illustrated Newspaper, October 17, 1857
“The Journal of Captain Hiram Burt-Boston to San Francisco-Around Cape Horn,” November 11, 1849-June 6, 1850
The Steamships Sonora and Central America
Nellie Olmstead Lincoln, The Story of Our Wedding Journey, privately published 1911
Vernon Case Gauntt, Mary Sawyers Swan Cook, a Pioneer Mother of California, 2018
(Mary Sawyers (1839-1924) is the author’s third great aunt)
The Hurricane
Olmstead-Lincoln, Our Wedding Journey, 16,17, 20-22
“Women and Children First, “The Sacramento Bee, November 23, 1901
The Rescue by the Brig Marine
Klare, The Final Voyage of the Central America, page 85
Olmstead-Lincoln, Our Wedding Journey, 23-28
John F. Parker, “Millions in Gold Glittered as the Central America Sank,” The Taunton Gazette, September 7, 1980
The Last Moments
Olmstead-Lincoln, Our Wedding Journey, 28
Fred N. Holabird, “The California Gold Rush and San Francisco,” SS Central America ‘The Ship of Gold,’ Holabird Western Americana Collections, LLC, 2022
On The Brig, But Not Out of the Woods
Olmstead-Lincoln, Our Wedding Journey, 29-30
It is believed the unselfish man who shared his food with Mary Swan was fellow steerage passenger Mr. M. Dougherty from Albany, New York.
Klare, The Final Voyage, 132-133
The New York Times, September 22, 1857, No. 1875, 8-4
The Easton’s Are Reunited Thanks to a Frigate Bird
Olmstead-Lincoln, Our Wedding Journey, 34-35, 37
Robert Turnbull Brown, 36, was from New York, and established his business in Sacramento in 1850. He was a good friend of the Easton’s, attended their wedding and occupied a First Class Cabin. Lt. John Dement, 31, was a Mexican War hero and a member of an Army artillery unit in the Oregon Territory. Originally from Washington D.C. Dement joined the Army in 1846. He’d previously made several trips to and from the East Coast. His two-month-old son was too young, so his wife and baby remained in Oregon City. His older brother, William C. Dement, came on the first wagon train to Oregon in 1843.
Klare, The Final Voyage, 126, 140, 149
Capt. Thomas Badger, William Birch and Bernard Seeger were the other husbands rescued by the Ellen.
The New York Times, September 21, 1857
The Heroes
Klare, The Final Voyage, pages 213-214
Olmstead-Lincoln, Wedding Journey, page 37
The New York Times, September 23, 1857
The Marine Redowa
The cover page and sheet music courtesy of Daniel Schalk
The James Nielson-Another Close Call
Klare, The Final Voyage, 230
Appendix
Lizzie Borden Took an Axe
Cook Borden and Co. Account Books (1863-1914), Robert S. Cox Special Collections, UMass Amherst Libraries
What Became of Ansel and Addie Easton?
Klare, The Final Voyage, 232
“Ansel I. Easton and Adeline Easton,” Peninsula Royalty: The Founding Families of Burlingame-Hillsborough, available online, burlingamefoundingfamilies.wordpress.com/
What Became of Mary Sawyers Swan and Her Daughter and Lizzie?
Samuel P. Swan, Nevada Democrat (Nevada City, CA), November 11, 1857
Thomas Carnegie Burnett, The Family of Mary Elizabeth Sawyers (Swan) (Cook), Mendocino County Historical Society
What Became of Captain Herndon’s Watch?
The Willits News, “Lived an Eventful Life,” July 4, 1924
It’s possible the Captain’s watch was delivered to Herndon’s widow by Mr. M. Dougherty, a fellow passenger of the Swans in steerage also rescued by the Marine, who lived in Albany, New York.
Special Thanks
A special thanks to Dan Schalk (Capt. Burt’s Third Great-Grandson), Greg Darnstaedt, and Bronson Michaud, Curator of Collections, at the Old Colony History Museum in Taunton, Massachusetts, for their invaluable contributions to this story.
Christopher Ramirez
Steve Date
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