Legends & Lore of Cape Cod (American Legends) by Smith-Johnson Robin

Author:Smith-Johnson, Robin [Smith-Johnson, Robin]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Arcadia Publishing Inc.
Published: 2016-05-23T04:00:00+00:00

ILL-FATED SEA VOYAGES

There have been many stories of old shipwrecks and missing seamen. Due to Cape Cod’s position as an arm sticking out into the Atlantic Ocean, many perished along its coast. Here are some tales of lost ships and heroic rescues.

A little-known story is that of the 1877 sea voyage of Captain Thomas Crapo and his wife, Johanna. The young couple (ages thirty-four and twenty-two) set out from New Bedford on May 28, 1877, in a twenty-foot-long, two-masted cedar dory bound for England. The pair had only biscuits, canned meat and water on board. Originally, Captain Crapo had planned a solo journey, but his wife insisted that she accompany him. With lots of advance publicity, the couple’s exploits were newspaper fodder countrywide.

Unfortunately, as soon as their journey started, the dory took on water and the couple had to pull into Chatham to repair their boat. After staying with Captain Darius Hammond for four days, they were ready to embark again. The long-anticipated journey quickly turned into a nightmare. Johanna was seasick, their bed was too short for them to stretch out completely and then it started raining. Sleeping became even more uncomfortable. To add to their misery, Captain Crapo had to take watch duties for twenty hours a day to look out for bigger ships with his wife keeping watch the other four hours. Also, they had to contend with playful whales that often ventured close to their boat. As their trip progressed, they hailed passing ships to give them news to send back to the newspapers back home.

Finally, fifty days after leaving Chatham, they arrived at Penzance, England, on July 21 at 11:00 p.m. Because it was late at night, there was no one to greet them, but the next day, they received a hero’s welcome. They capitalized on their growing fame by turning their adventure into a sideshow exhibit. For four months, they traveled around England telling their story. Then, in January 1887, they returned to New York aboard a steamer. They performed at Madison Square Garden and later toured with a London circus. When they grew tired of traveling, they returned to New Bedford with their profits. Although Johanna declared that she was done with sea life, her husband had enough money to buy his own schooner and made a living delivering cargo, including making deliveries to Provincetown.

In later years, Captain Crapo captained several ships, returning only when one sank off Cape Hatteras in 1885 with half of its crew missing. With his funds dwindling, he decided to write a book about his adventures. In 1883, he published his autobiography entitled Strange but True . Then, in 1899, at the age of fifty-seven, Captain Crapo drowned when his skiff became entangled in fishing nets off Sakonnet Point, Rhode Island. It appeared that he had been trying to remove his boots so he could swim more easily but was too entangled to free himself.

Outliving her husband by ten years, Johanna spent her remaining years in a New Bedford rooming house.

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