On Board Cunard Steamer Batavia,
At Sea, November 20, 1872.
To
the Royal Humane Society
20 November 1872 • SS Batavia en route from
Liverpool, England, to Boston, Mass.
(Boston Advertiser, 26 Nov 72, UCCL 00833)
Click to add citation to My Citations.
To the Royal Humane Society:—1
Gentlemen,—The Batavia sailed from Liverpool on Tuesday, November 12. On Sunday night a strong west wind began to blow, [&] not long after midnight it increased to a gale. By four o’clock the sea was running very high; at half-past seven our starboard bulwarks were stove in & the water entered the main saloon; at a later hour the gangway on the port side came in with a crash & the sea followed, flooding many of the [staterooms] on that side. At the same time a sea crossed the roof of the vessel & carried away one of our boats, splintering it to pieces & taking one of the davits with it. At half-past nine the glass was down to 28.35, & the gale was blowing with a severity which the officers say is not experienced oftener than once in five or ten years. The storm continued during the day & all night, & also all day yesterday, but with moderated violence.
At 4 p. m. a dismasted vessel was sighted.2 A furious squall had just broken upon us & the sea was running mountains high, to use the popular expression. Nevertheless Captain Mouland3 immediately bore up for the wreck (which was making signals of distress), ordered out a life-boat & called for volunteers. To a landsman it seemed like deliberate suicide to go out in such a storm. But our third & fourth officers & eight men answered to the call with a promptness that compelled a cheer. Two of the men lost heart at the last moment, but the others stood fast & were started on their generous enterprise with another cheer. They carried a long line with them, several life buoys, & a lighted lantern, for the atmosphere was murky with the storm, & sunset was not far off.
The wreck, a barque, was in a pitiable condition. Her mainmast was naked, her mizen-mast & bowsprit were gone, & her foremast was but a stump, wreathed & cumbered with a ruin of sails & cordage from the fallen fore-top & fore-top gallant masts & yards. We could see nine men clinging to the main rigging. The stern of the vessel was gone & the sea made a clean breach over her, pouring in a cataract out of the broken stern & spouting through the parted planks of her bows.
Our boat pulled 300 yards & approached the wreck on the lee side. Then it had a hard fight, for the waves & the wind beat it constantly back. I do not know when anything has alternately so stirred me through & through & then disheartened me, as it did to see the boat every little while get almost close enough & then be hurled three lengths away again by a prodigious wave. And the darkness settling down all the time. But at last they got the line & buoy aboard, & after that we could make out nothing more. But presently we discovered the boat approaching us, & found she had saved every soul,—nine men. They had had to drag those men, one at a time, through the sea to the life-boat with the line & buoy—for of course they did not dare to touch the plunging vessel with the boat. The peril increased now, for every time the boat got close to our lee our ship rolled over on her & hid her from sight. But our people managed to haul the party aboard one at a time without losing a man, though I said they would lose every single one of them—I am therefore but a poor success as a prophet. As the fury of the squall had not diminished, & as the sea was so heavy it was feared we might lose some men if we tried to hoist the life-boat aboard, so she was turned adrift by the captain’s order, poor thing, after helping in such a gallant deed. But we have plenty more boats, & very few passengers.
To speak by the log, & be accurate, Captain Mouland gave the order to change our ship’s course & bear down toward the wreck at 4.15 p. m.; at 5.15 our ship was under way again with those nine poor devils on board. That is to say, this admirable thing was done in a tremendous sea & in the face of a hurricane, in sixty minutes by the watch,—& if your honorable society should be moved to give to Captain Mouland & his boat’s crew that reward which a sailor prizes & covets above all other distinctions, the Royal Humane Society’s medal, the parties whose names are signed to this paper will feel as grateful as if they themselves were the recipients of this great honor. Those who know him say that Captain Mouland has risked his life many times to rescue shipwrecked men—in the days when he occupied a subordinate position—& we hopefully trust that the seed sown then is about to ripen to its harvest now.
The wrecked barque was the Charles Ward, Captain Bell, bound from Quebec to Scotland with lumber.4 The vessel went over on her beam-ends at 9 o’clock Monday morning, & eleven men were washed overboard & lost. Captain Bell & eight men remained, & these our boat saved. They had been in the main rigging some thirty-one hours, without food or water, & were so frozen & exhausted that when we got them aboard they could hardly speak, & the minds of several of them were wandering. The wreck was out of the ordinary track of vessels, & was 1500 miles from land. She was in the centre of the Atlantic. Our life-boat crew of volunteers consisted of the following: D. Gillies, third officer; H. Kyle, fourth do.; Nicholas Foley, quartermaster; Henry Foley, do.; Nathaniel Clark, do.; Thomas Henry, seaman; John Park, do.; Richard Brennan, do.
The officers tell me that those two [quartermasters,] the Foley brothers, may be regarded as a sort of permanent volunteers—they stand always ready for any splendid deed of daring.
John Park is a sturdy young sailor, but young as he is I overheard him say, “Well, that’s the third time I’ve been out on that kind of an expedition.” And then he added, with a kindly faith in his species that did him no discredit, “But it’s all right; I’ll be in a close place like that myself, some day, & then somebody will do as much for me, I reckon.”
When our lifeboat first started away on her mission it was such a gallant sight when she pinnacled herself on the fleecy crest of the first giant wave that our party of passengers, grouped together on deck, with one impulse broke out into cheer upon cheer. Officer Gillies said afterwards that about that time the thought of his wife & children had come upon him & his heart was sinking a bit, but the cheers were strong brandy & water to him & his heart never “went back on him” any more. We would have cheered their heads off only it interrupted the orders so much. Really & truly, these men while on their enterprise were safe at no time except when in the open sea between the vessels; all the time that they were near either the wreck or our own ship their lives were in great peril.
If I have been of any service toward rescuing these nine ship-wrecked human beings by standing around the deck in a furious storm, without any umbrella, keeping an eye on things & seeing that they were done right, & yelling whenever a cheer seemed to be the important thing, I am glad, & I am satisfied. I ask no reward. I would do it again under the same circumstances. But what I do plead for, & earnestly & sincerely, is that the Royal Humane Society will remember our captain & our life-boat crew; &, in so remembering them, increase the high honor & esteem in which the society is held all over the civilized world.
In this appeal our passengers all join with hearty sincerity, & in testimony thereof will sign their names. Begging that you will pardon me, a stranger, for addressing your honored society with such confidence & such absence of ceremony, & trusting that my motive may redeem my manner,
I am, gentlemen,
Your ob’t servant,
[Signed]
Mark Twain (Samuel L. Clemens),
Hartford, Conn.
We the undersigned, passengers by the steamer Batavia, eye-witnesses of the action described by Mr. Clemens, are glad of this opportunity of expressing our admiration of the gallantry displayed by the volunteers of the lifeboat, & the cool judgment & skill of Captain Mouland in directing the affair, & we feel sure that never has a case more deserving of honorable recognition been brought before the notice of the Royal Humane Society.
C. F. Wood, England.5
Edward W. Emerson, Concord, Massachusetts.6
Rev. Edmund K. Alden, Boston, Massachusetts.
C. J. Dobell, Albion, Edwards Co., Illinois.
Rev. Henry W. Biggs, Chillicothe, Ohio.
Rev. George E. Street, Exeter, New Hampshire.
E. G. Moss, New York.
Lafayette Devenny, Cincinnati, Ohio.
Sidney D. Palmer, New York.
George K. Kinney, Cincinnati, Ohio.
Colton Greene, Memphis, Tennessee7
A. A. Dorion, Lower Canada, Montreal.
James Hall, State Geologist, Albany, New York.8
C. C. Walworth, Boston, Massachusetts.
Mrs. C. C. Walworth, Boston, Massachusetts.
Mrs. C. M. Walworth, Boston, Massachusetts.
Mrs. L Devenny, Cincinnati, Ohio.
Mrs. A. B. [Denmead,] Cincinnati, Ohio.
Mrs. E. G. Moss, New York.
Explanatory Notes | Textual Commentary
Click to add citation to My Citations. 1
The Boston Advertiser published this letter on 26 November, the day after the Batavia arrived in Boston, describing it as a communication “from {Mark Twain’s}
pen, furnished to the Daily Advertiser” (“A Daring Deed,” 4). The typesetter for the Advertiser was probably working from an amanuensis copy, since the original manuscript (now lost) was presumably
sent to the Royal Humane Society in London. The society was instituted in 1774 “to collect and circulate the most
approved and effectual methods for recovering persons apparently drowned or dead; to suggest and provide suitable apparatus for, and
bestow rewards on, those who assist in the preservation and restoration of life” (Royal Humane Society). It was supported
by voluntary contributions.
Click to add citation to My Citations. 3
John Elsey Mouland, captain of the Batavia, was born in Hampshire in 1828 and earned his master
mariner’s certificate in Cork in 1852. He assumed his first post on a Cunard vessel, the Arabia, in
1858. During the Civil War he served on at least two “blockade runners”—ships that attempted to
evade the Union blockade of southern ports to deliver arms and other goods to the Confederacy. On 26 May 1862 he was on the Cambria when it was captured by Federals while trying to enter the port of Charleston with a load of rifles,
saltpeter, and medicines. He later served on the Hibernia (1863–64), a ship in the Atlantic Irish
Royal Mail Steam Navigation Company. In 1864 he returned to Cunard, on the China, but for several years also
worked intermittently for other companies. On 3 September 1872 he assumed command of the Batavia, built in
1870 (Lloyd’s Register, 493; Wise, 63, 292,
307; New York Tribune: “Operations of the Blockading Squadron,” 3 June 62, 8;
“Ocean Steamers,” 21 Dec 60, 3; “Ocean Steamers,” 21 Oct 63, 5; “Shipping
Intelligence,” 26 May 70, 3; “Shipping Intelligence,” 19 Aug 72, 3;
“Arrivals,” New York Herald, 15 Sept 72, 12; information from the Cunard Line; see also
22 Jan 73 to Mouland).
Click to add citation to My Citations. 4
The boat, under Captain I. F. Bell, was actually bound for Sunderland, England, a seaport twelve miles southeast of Newcastle,
having left Quebec on 2 November (“A Daring Deed,” Boston Advertiser, 26 Nov 72, 4).
Click to add citation to My Citations. 5
See 26 Nov 72 to JLC and PAM.
Who do you think turned up among the passengers? Verily Mark Twain. He is a curious looking bird and has or
very probably affects a very broad and rustic speech and a drawl not exactly Yankee but rather like a Western man. He seems a
simple, countrified, serious man and you at once think of his book and think here really is an innocent abroad. His manner is just
the right one to make his conversation amusing and reminds one of the descriptions of his friend Artemus Ward, i.e., he would
appear to be serious and stumble into his jokes with an air of pathetic innocence. (Edward W. Emerson to Ellen Emerson, no date,
Forbes and Finley, 32)
Click to add citation to My Citations. 6
Edward Waldo Emerson (1844–1930) was the son of Ralph Waldo Emerson. In 1871, after two years at Harvard Medical
School, he went to Berlin to continue his studies. Having worked for a time at a London hospital, he was now returning home. He
described the voyage in a letter to his sister:
Click to add citation to My Citations. 7
See 3 Dec 72 to Mouland, n. 2.
Click to add citation to My Citations. 8
James Hall (1811–98), a renowned geologist and paleontologist, was the author of New York State
Natural History Survey: Paleontology (8 vols. in 13, 1847–94). Except for Wood, Emerson, Greene, and Hall, no
attempt has been made to identify the passengers who signed this letter; none of those remaining unidentified is known to have had
any further connection with Clemens.
Source text(s):“A Daring Deed,” Boston Advertiser, 26 Nov 72, 4, clipping in the Mark Twain Papers, The Bancroft
Library, University of California, Berkeley (CU-MARK). Since the clipping is
slightly damaged, the editors have also consulted a microfilm edition of the newspaper in the Library of Congress (DLC).
Previous publication:
L5, 222–227.
Provenance:numerous newspapers, including “Perils of the Sea,” New York Times, 26 Nov 72, 1;
“A Daring Deed,” Boston Evening Transcript, 26 Nov 72, 1; “Perils of the
Sea,” Hartford Courant, 27 Nov 72, 1; “Perils of the Sea,” Cleveland Leader, 30 Nov 72, 3; “Disasters at Sea,” London Times, 12 Dec 72, 7;
“Perils of the Sea,” London Morning Post, 27 Dec 72, 8; MTB, 1:471, brief excerpt; Brownell 1949, 1–2.
Emendations and textual notes:
& • and
staterooms • state-|rooms
quartermasters • quarter-|masters
Denmead • Demmead
