The Storm of His Century- The Captain's Adventure
Grandpa Raeburn, aka Ernie or The Captain was said to have been a great story teller. Beth said she loved to sit and listen to her father’s stories when he was home for the winter. Some cousins were lucky enough to have heard some of those stories. Of all the stories noted by my cousins or Aunt Beth, I had never heard of a story that was of the time he thought he’d ‘never see land again’. His newspaper interviews at that time were brief and non-descriptive. He never had an interview after returning home to the Soo, perhaps to not put fright in the minds of his wife Ethel and his children who were still young in 1924, Beth not yet born. Captain Raeburn was interviewed in 1955, and it was at that time that he mentioned the storm of 1924 in the Gulf of St. Lawrence as “the one time I never thought I’d see land again.”
I decided to find that storm through numerous newspaper articles of the day. Having never been a mariner myself, I have done the best I can to recreate in my mind what grandpa and his crew might have experienced during the end of the shipping season leading to the storm in 1924.
(Fun with AI photo generation, with the BGSU photo)
The Long Forgotten Witch of November 1924, Story of the Kenora
It was nearing the end of the Great Lakes shipping season, and
the Kenora had one more run from Lake Superior to Montreal. Heading up, the
Kenora arrived at Sault Sainte Marie on Friday, early morning at 4am on October 31st.
The Kenora steamed on and continued to Fort William. A Lake Superior storm was
brewing.
The first day of November saw the first “Gales of November” sweep
across Lake Superior from the west. The SS Glenlyon was thrown off course by
heavy seas that were reported as ‘mountains high’ and the ship was dashed upon
the rocks near Menagerie Island on the southeastern end of Isle Royale on the
west end of Lake Superior. The mate and watchman left the ship in a lifeboat,
and their fate was presumed lost for some time time but later accounted for;
all others had been rescued soon after she ran aground.
Through this, the crew of the Kenora headed west in Lake
Superior and was in Fort William, in the Canadian Thunder Bay by November 3rd, unloading freight, and then went on to Head of Lakes to load up on 592
tons of oats on November 4th, and soon after set out to Montreal. By
November 5th Storm Warnings were hoisted for Lakes Superior,
Michigan, and Huron. Captain Raeburn and his crew sailed through without much
ado as they headed east on the lake.
By Saturday, November 8th, the Kenora had passed the Soo by 2am and was on Lake Huron heading toward Detroit. The air temperature in the upper lakes had reportedly dropped 31 degrees in 10 hours with 4 to 6 inches of snowfall and a howling gale of 48mph across Lake Huron. Gales had swept north from Kansas, reported as a blizzard in Lake Superior, and winds westward from the Lower St. Lawrence Valley had merged in Northern Michigan and the upper Great Lakes, and this is reported as the first severe storm of the season and the Kenora pushes on in the path of this gale in Lake Huron. The captain checks in at Detroit Monday, November 9th at 1:10pm, unscathed.
On November 12th, the Kenora is reported @
Port Colbourne in Lake Erie and through the Welland Canal to Port Dalhousie by
1:10pm that afternoon. It is becoming
colder with fresh southwest shifting to west winds. There is indication a tropical
storm near Bermuda and is making its way towards Novia Scotia in the Atlantic
Ocean.--
The crew reached the Lachine canal just west of Montreal on
Saturday, November 15th at 3pm, and were cleared for Montreal and
above to head eastward. This trip east to St. John’s on the Island of Newfoundland
was a last-minute request of the company and would take no more than a week to
complete and that would end the season for the Kenora.
They proceeded without issue to Newfoundland. The weather was
partly cloudy and cool with showers and fresh westerly winds. Behind them to
the west was stormy weather. By November
19, lake traffic was reported ‘at a standstill’ in the lower Great Lakes. To the east, 70-mile gales in the Northern
Atlantic were reported.
The S.S.Kenora of the Canadian Steamship Lines is a 250-foot
steamer freighter designed to navigate the current 1924 canals and lakes of the
Great Lakes region through Montreal, and now she is headed through the Gulf of
the St. Lawrence and into the Northern Atlantic Ocean . When the Kenora arrived
in Newfoundland by the 20th, there was an ongoing longshoreman’s strike, and
the crew was delayed. The Kenora is eventually reloaded with a reported 2500
tons of oil, fish, lobster, and other local produce and is on her way back to
Montreal.
The Great Lakes region begins to experience treacherous
storm conditions by news of the 27th. The Atlantic along the eastern
coast is also experiencing treacherous storm conditions.
Captain Raeburn and his crew aboard the Kenora left St.
John’s in Newfoundland on November 27 and steamed through a very heavy easterly
gale at her back all the way to St. Paul Island – in the Gulf of St. Lawrence.
There is a narrow gap in this region to sail. The Gulf presents with rocky cliffs and shoals
to avoid on any windy day, but now they are battling gale-force winds that can toss
the ship around and large waves that can capsize at any moment. The Kenora
cannot take on water because she could flood and would run the risk of sinking.
The crew is on high alert as they battle these easterly winds. The captain at
the helm had better have skill to keep this ship alive, back waves and winds
are treacherous to maneuver. There was no wireless communication on the
ship, and they were slowed down by this weather.
Every minute and every hour was a constant struggle with the
waves and wind, but this turned into days… The captain had to then put back to
Sydney, Nova Scotia to refuel as there were limited places to do so. This would
be their last communication with anyone beyond the ship for several days.
After a couple of days of battling the easterly winds, they
then encountered westerly gales with heavy, blinding snow at their bow and port
side. At some point, they took shelter in the Aspy Bay of Cape Breton. Just
before they approached the Cap Gaspe’ area, a sustained NW gale struck them.
This sustained gale put the Kenora in a perilous situation, battling
a grueling head sea that forced the bow to rise and drop, putting significant
pressure on the ship and potential structural damage. The Kenora could pitch or
roll, and there is engine strain battling these conditions. The crew is on
constant alert. They eat very little as
they constantly work. They are exhausted trying to keep the cargo and ship safe
and could very well sustain injury trying.
The captain is wondering if they will ever see land again, but maintains his fortitude and continues on.
This gale drove the Kenora back 150 miles off its course. She
is now long overdue, and no one has heard from them since they left Sydney; everyone
fears they are lost.
By this time, Ethel knows Ernie is long overdue. She
had just lost her father on November 1st and now knows nothing of
where her husband is. Nothing. No word whatsoever…
Captain Raeburn then had to work around on the westerly
shore and up along the Gaspe’ coast, steering clear of the shoals and rocky
cliffs that provided no ports along the way while battling the gales and waves
in the blinding snow.
The Kenora was able to reach Cap des Rosiers by December 9th, around 6:00, and by 8:30, they reached Fame Point [Lac de Fame
Point area], where they were finally able to send their first report back to
Montreal. Twelve days- after they had left Newfoundland.
From this point they had what the captain called ‘no
misadventures’ and sailed through northernly winds and snow of otherwise no
concern. Once the company received word that the Kenora was coming, The Lady
Gray, a Canadian government icebreaker, made passage for the Kenora and escorted her back to the port of Montreal with the additional escort aid of Marine Department tugs
and buoy tenders.
The Kenora arrived in port at Montreal on December 11 and
unloaded, reporting a 14 inch snowfall while in the gulf and much cold but no
ice until reaching Quebec. Fourteen days of grueling sailing, all the while
with no word out to anyone. An otherwise five-day trip. The Kenora had become
last ship into Montreal for the season, being a record breaker of 20 years. There
was no time to waste as the waters were freezing up and the Kenora had to sail
on to reach her winter destination. While Captain Raeburn is making way back to
the Great Lakes in the mid-December days between the 11th – 14th,
reports of vessels missing in storms in Lakes Superior and the Huron through
Ontario, and plummeting temps to zero. Storms are raging through the eastern
U.S. states.
The Kenora was finally ordered to dock in Kingston for the
winter; she could not go any further through the icy lakes.
Grandpa was quite unassuming in his interview. He had given all the credit to his crew and ship.
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