Wreck of the City of Columbus (I), The

DESCRIPTION: "'Twas the wreck of the fatal Columbus, On the Devil's Bridge rocks near Gay Head." A hundred people perish on the rocks. Captain Wright tries to comfort the victims. Harden officially gets the blame, but the singer thinks the Glaucus ignored the wreck
AUTHOR: unknown
EARLIEST DATE: 1929 (collected by Huntington from "Harris the cook")
KEYWORDS: wreck ship disaster death
HISTORICAL REFERENCES:
Jan 18, 1884 - The steamer City of Columbus, which is off course, strikes the Devil's Bridge rocks near Gay Head (the westernmost point on Martha's Vineyard). After the ship hit the rocks, Captain Shuler E. Wright gave orders which caused the ship to hit again. Captain Wright tried to tell the people aboard what to do; while he was doing so, many were swept into the sea. Of 45 crew and 87 passengers, only 29 survived (17 crew; 12 passengers. Summary based on Wikipedia and Huntington's notes)
FOUND IN: US(SW)
REFERENCES (1 citation):
Huntington-TheGam-MoreSongsWhalemenSang, pp. 96-97, "The Wreck of the City of Columbus I" (1 text, 1 tune)
Roud #27538
NOTES [279 words]: According to Dennis M. Powers, Taking the Sea: Perilous Waters, Sunken Ships, and the True Story of the Legendary Wrecker Captains, American Management Association, 2009, pp. 163-164, "In 1884, the City of Columbus had sailed south from Boston around Cape Cod and through Nantucket Sound. The 2,200-ton ship was a typical early iron steamer with auxiliary sails.... On the early morning of January 19, the 275-foot ship was off the western shore of Martha's Vinyard. The lookout suddenly yelled out that the vessel was close to the Devil's Ridge buoy....
"The ship struck the double ledge of submerged rocks at Devil's Ridge. When the captain's attempts to move the ship off the rocks by steam and sail didn't work, he gathered the eighty-seven passengers and forty-five crew members together. While he tried to explain their precarious situation... a giant wave rose over the gunnels, struck down the boat with a thunderous roar, and swept overboard nearly all of the men, women, and children on deck." The rough seas also smashed two lowered lifeboats.
Locals, including members of the Gay Head Indian tribe, tried to rescue people. a Lieutenant Rhodes was particularly heroic, swimming through the storm and pulling people off the wreck.
Powers, p. 164, reports that 29 people survived an about a hundred died. (By his numbers, if 29 survived, then 103 would have been lost.) The Wikipedia article on the wreck said that the survivors included 17 of the crew and 12 passengers.
Although Huntington lists a tune which he apparently collected, it really feels to me as if this was meant to be sung to "My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean." That's just a feeling, though. - RBW
Last updated in version 5.2
File: HGam096

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