SCHOONER CHANCE 75 



Position Off Sandwich Bay 

 Wednesday, September 8th <J Weather Clear to cloudy 



Wind Light northerly 



THE morning was mostly calm but by sailing hard we readied 

 Stag Island by eleven. There we fell in with some fishermen. 

 Just as we had changed our course to run over near them, Johnny by 

 mistake threw Woody 's oiler coat overboard. We had to execute a 

 most undignified maneuver to recover it. The fishermen must have 

 thought us queer anyway because Johnny insisted on having me 

 throw sea water on him. The crew of all four schooners enjoyed this 

 greatly. Even with the wind very light we pulled away and soon in- 

 stead of following them, they were strung out behind us. After 

 lunch some fog set in. I made my course for Tinker's Island but the 

 fishermen, following their first boat, went a little inshore. When the 

 fog lifted I was on the course and they had to head up and follow me. 

 I imagine that their compass was not too good. 



After five o'clock the wind freshened and we soon had a five mile 

 lead. A nice breeze took us through Gready Run and luckily there 

 was just daylight enough for us to pass behind Wolf Islands thereby 

 saving fifteen miles. Since it clouded over, darkness set in early, but 

 as the wind freshened all hands looked forward to a fine night's run. 

 Although no icz had been seen to speak of during the day, I was 

 afraid that once outside the islands we would find it again. We 

 therefore had three on watch during the night. Strangely enough the 

 only piece we saw we hit square on. Oily claims it was ten feet 

 across. Anyway it was large enough to cause the schooner to raise. 

 It flew into a hundred pieces which passed mostly under the keel. As 

 luck would have it, we hit just at the time that one man was below 

 making toast for the middle watch and while the man forward was 

 relieving the third man at the wheel. 



