INTRO: OLD MAN MOYER - A Novel by Joe Lyon

“For the wise man, like the fool, will not be long remembered; in days to come both will be forgotten. Like the fool, the wise man too must die!” -Ecclesiastes 2:16

FORERUNNER
100 miles off the coast of North Carolina.
September 16, 1857

The Columbia lurched again as another hammering wall of black water came striking down mercilessly upon her decks. In the middle of the hurricane she made her way through the night. Bright fingers of lightning struck across the darkened swirling sky in an abrupt spider's web of bright crackling light. The wind whistled loudly through the ship’s rigging. The sky crackled with energy over the pummeling waves.

The Captain, standing on deck, endured the pummeling forces of the hard hitting waves with his first mate. At once a mountain of water appeared behind them, then gliding up the crest of a giant wave, they once again appeared to be high above the dark clouds of the storm. Once more, as in the last two hours, the Columbia lifted suddenly, only to come crashing back down with a deep bite into the rolling ocean.

"Secure that hatch!" The captain bellowed his commands barely audible over the howling wind. "There, there!" He shouted again to the first mate and pointing to an open tackle. Anything not securely fastened was already lost to the onslaught of the storm. The Captain held on to the rigging, swaying back and forth, silhouetted in front of a rapidly rising and falling black sea. “For God’s sake man!”

The skipper's mate briefly turned to look back at his Captain. As he waited to make his move another powerful wave hit him square in the face causing him to flush out the salty water in a breathless spit and take another quick breath before the next wave. He remained holding tightly onto the railing panting. The Captain could plainly see the fear in the young man’s eyes.

Captain Thomas Herndon had been a sailor for forty years. He leaned into the pitch of the ship and surveyed the situation. He navigated these waters many times, rode out many a dreadful storm over the years. He made the trip to Spain all of fourteen times during his career but this time he knew he was in an awful altogether different kind of ride tonight. He knew full well the dangers of being out in the Atlantic during the late fall, and months before he left he feared this part of the trip the most. He thought he might get lucky enough to dodge the unexpected storms this season like he had in years past. Now, with his thick gray beard parting nearly perfectly in the stormy winds and with all his white hair blowing loose over his wet face, he cursed himself for knowing better.

Quite unexpectedly, the first mate let go of the railing and moved with rapid purpose to the unsecured hatch. He slid across the deck, losing his footing and falling hard on his hip as another wave crashed over the bow. He managed to grab a hold of the open hatch and fastened it by the clasp. He wiped some of the pelting rain off his face and took a fright filled moment for himself as he paused to catch his breath. Then another wave violently swept over the bow and the first mate slid off again holding on to the railing for dear life.

“Good work Dobbs,” the Captain shouted and protruded his fist in a show of strength. Both men shared a reassuring smile. This show of emotion was sufficient to hide a tear in the Captain's eye and his loss of any real hope.

Wave after wave crashed over the bow of the Columbia. Already she had taken on three feet of water. The hold was flooding. The engine fires had gone out. The crew was having trouble getting coal from the stores to the furnace. The pumps were rendered useless. As a result, the crew formed a bucket line to manually rid the Columbia of the water. After nearly an hour of back breaking labor the crew made significant progress to the point that they could now try to re-fire the furnace that supplied the steam to the engines.

The furnace fired up again and was fed a steady stream of coal. In turn the furnace began to feed power back into the engine and pumps. The Captain could now steer the Columbia again and try to head her into the swirling wind instead of taking water across her bow.

Lucy Shaw shivered in the cold below the creaking deck, her three children desparately holding to her for dear life. Eight hundred passengers sat huddled with her in the darkness in worried silence.

In the galley the pots and pans dully clanked and thudded together swinging from hooks in the ceiling beams, occasionally coming free, and crashing down loudly upon the thick wooden floor. The cook was hiding under a butcher block to stabilize himself from the unrelenting motion of the tossing ship. He looked up from underneath his hat to nervously stare at the others. His kitchen staff, wide-eyed and hiding in various spots around the room, had little to say. He could have given them a reassuring smile, an encouraging word, but he did not. He was too scared. Suddenly, a chicken went flying through the room. The cook scrambled across the floor, falling down, grabbing the chicken, and holding it close to him. He then returned to his place under the butcher's block, and with a dirty, sweaty hand he tried to calm the both of them.

Suddenly, a huge wave crashed so hard upon the deck of the Columbia breaking the main paddle housing on the side of the ship into splinters. A massive wave blew through the horse stalls and tore them apart taking all twenty of the horses out to sea. The horses swam in the rolling seas for several sets of waves then they disappeared and they were never seen again. Nearly all the topside payload broke free and either sunk or floated away on the waves. The ship immediately took six feet of water in the hold as the water poured through the splintered housing. The furnaces immediately went out again in a large plume of steam. The paddle wheel was gone, heading to the bottom of the ocean, leaving only a few planks that floated away across the black waves.

The men formed another bucket line, but this time no progress could be made. The water was coming in faster than they could bucket it out. Several men tried to plug holes with rags and towels, but it only slowed the inevitable. The Columbia was taking on more water through the engine compartment. They wrapped towels around the machinery and pipes in an attempt to slow the water from overtaking the ship. It was hopeless. They were fighting a losing battle. The Columbia was floundering.

The Captain sent up blue rockets in a steady succession while the men below continued to bucket the water out. Life vests were issued to the passengers and they were ordered on top of the rolling deck, every man, woman, child, and crew.

"Ship Ahoy!" Someone suddenly shouted. Everyone began to point to a small speck of light on the black horizon. While the passengers were coming up topside the Captain could make out the lights of another ship in the distance, North Easterly of their position.

The ship was the Manassas, a cargo brig, destined for Key West, Florida. The Captain signaled to the Manassas that the Columbia was going down. The Manassas signaled back a reply that it would provide help, turned toward the Columbia to give assistance, and proceeded to head in her general direction. The captain made the decision to start evacuating the women and children off the Columbia in what few lifeboats the ship carried and set them off toward the Manassas.

They barely had enough time. Three of lifeboats capsized immediately and sunk. But five more made it into the water successfully. These five were filled with as many women and children as they could find. Those lucky souls fortunate enough who did make it upon one of the five lifeboats ultimately made it safely to the Manassas. Most of the others did not.

Another wave struck the Columbia and sent her over completely on her side. Four hundred people spilled into the water. The screams of the lost could barely be heard over the roaring wind. The Columbia took the rest of the four hundred people down with her.
Captain Herndon was last seen struggling against the waves after his ship went down. He was never seen again.

The Columbia went deep to its grave upon the sea floor. A band of at least two hundred people huddled together in the ocean and bobbed up and down in the waves in the middle of the night. One by one they watched each other drop and float away and then disappear under the cold waters, never to be seen again.

"Tell my wife and kids I love them," said one man to another; in that very instant, the man he was speaking to succumbed to the fury of the ocean, sinking under the water, without a sound in reply. Still others who chose to stay with the ship until the very last minute were caught in the suction and were dragged far below the turbulent waves. Most of them drowned. Those who did make it back up to the surface, after being dragged down twenty or thirty feet, found that the life vests that were securely fastened around their waists were now missing, ripped apart by forces of the bubbling vacuum, along with most, if not all, of their clothes. As a result, some were naked, and they fought for their lives. They used the corpses that still possessed life vests to help them stay afloat and struggle against the waves a bit longer. Those that had neither life vests nor anything that floated were dead in the first minute they hit the water. Even with the life vests, breathing was a difficult struggle as the pounding waves swept over their heads.
The survivors huddled together, exposed in open water, fearing for sharks, but none appeared in the hours that followed the storm, and in the sinking of the Columbia.

At first, the Manassas had some trouble finding the wreck site after the Columbia went down, but after completing a sweeping search of the area, at last came across the five lifeboats and a long trail of debris that followed them. The women and children taken from the lifeboats confirmed the direction of where the Columbia went down. The Manassas followed the debris trail which led them to the floating band of survivors. Only sixty men were now left out of the the two hundred, huddled together, desperately clinging to each other in the cold water. They were all cold and rapidly losing their strength. All sixty men were brought aboard to safety, along with one old dog that they found floating on top of a small box.

Another sweep of the area found no other survivors. The Manassas stayed in the area until the Independence from Boston, was signaled and brought to assist. Most of the passengers were transferred to the Independence and taken to Wilmington, North Carolina. By morning, no less than five ships patrolled the area for survivors. No more were found.

Word of the tragedy spread. All of those expecting loved ones anxiously awaited lists of the saved and of the dead. It took four full days until the lists were complete.

For one man, William Shaw, his worst fears were realized. He had lost his wife, Lucy, and their three children on board the Columbia when she went down. He stared at the list of the dead, and saw the names of his three children, and it confirmed the certain fact that he already knew. They were gone, all of them. He knew it. His life would never be the same. He didn't understand it. How could they not have been in one of the five lifeboats? Why weren't they?
He turned away from that awful place. He vaguely remembered hearing the echoes of people offering sympathy to him, but it all seemed surreal. He could see other men weeping, women too, but he could not really hear them, or care about them.

All was lost for William Shaw. He was bitter, and decided to turn his back on life for awhile and go back to the farm. He headed out of town and into the country to start a new life.

But unknown to Willie Shaw, the worst was yet to come.