THE CAPTAIN’S STORY.
“My name is Neilson, and I have been at sea since I was a boy. For many years I served before the mast, then as mate, and finally as captain, on many voyages in different parts of the world. Back in the fifties I was in command of a whaling ship owned in San Francisco, and we sailed from that port to the selected cruising ground in Behring Sea, between the Aleutian Islands and Behring Strait. Once we sailed through the strait into the Arctic Ocean, but the intense cold and immense masses of floating ice drove us back in a damaged condition. We secured a good many whales after some months’ cruising about, until, one day, a violent storm came up, and we were driven ashore on St. Lawrence Island, near North Cape. The ship was a total loss, but all the officers and crew succeeded in getting ashore, and a passing ship took us back to San Francisco. I stopped in the city for some weeks, and talked a good deal with an old friend, Captain Samuel, who had also been so unfortunate as to lose his ship on a whaling voyage. We looked about and found some capitalists who purchased a ship for us, and we determined to try our luck again, searching for whales in the Behring Sea. Captain Samuel suggested that I should be captain and he would act as mate, but I told him no, that he, being the elder and more experienced, should be captain, and I the mate, and it was so arranged. The captain of a whaling craft always has a share of the results of the voyage, and the mate another, but not so large as the captain’s. It was agreed between us that on this voyage we would divide the profits, if any, equally. It will be understood that at this time whaling voyages were very profitable, sperm oil often selling in the San Francisco market for two dollars and fifty cents per gallon.
“We shipped a crew of ten men, and a second mate, took on provisions for a long voyage, and sailed for Behring Sea. We cruised about over three months, and had remarkable success, having harpooned and secured several large sperm whales, so we felt that we were going to have a good voyage.
“The crew was a rough one, and sometimes we heard murmurs of discontent about the labor of trying out the oil, and about the food, but we paid no attention, thinking it only the usual growling among sailors. One day the captain and I were in the cabin, when he, hearing a noise, stepped on deck, and was at once assaulted by a man with a cutlass, and instantly killed. Hearing the uproar, I too rushed on deck only to be in season to see the prostrate form of the murdered captain, and a sailor with a drawn cutlass coming toward me. As I backed down the companion-way he hit me on the head, where the scar is, which has attracted your attention. I fell into the hold, and the mutineers, thinking I was dead, did not follow me. I found, in the hold, the second mate, unhurt, who staunched the flowing blood from my wound, and bound it up with some old canvas. At that time I was nearly forty years younger than I am now, and was as tough as men are made. The mutineers heard us moving about, and fired at us with muskets loaded with ball, but did not hit us. For some reason, they did not venture down after us, probably because they knew there were loaded muskets within our reach, and that we would be sure to use them. We found the muskets, but they were useless, having been wet.
“As every moment’s delay was dangerous, we being liable to be hunted down, killed, and thrown into the sea, to follow the body of our murdered captain, it became necessary for us to think and act quickly.
“We could hear the men, who were collected together directly over the cabin, talking loudly and excitedly. I knew where the magazine was, and getting a keg of powder, placed it directly under where the mutineers were standing, laid a train from it to the bow of the vessel, and touched a match to it. The explosion was almost instantaneous, and tremendous in its results, throwing to the right and left that part of the cabin over which the mutineers were, and killing or drowning every man except three, who, evidently thinking the ship was a wreck, hastily got into a boat and rowed away.
“We listened for some time, but hearing no noise, went on deck, and found on examination that the hull of the ship was perfectly sound, and that no damage had been done to the masts; so that with some assistance we could navigate her into port. We obtained the assistance required from a passing vessel, and in due season arrived at San Francisco. There was a good deal of valuable sperm oil on board, which was sold, and gave the second mate and myself quite a sum of money, the owners being disposed to be liberal under the extraordinary circumstances.
“After this, I concluded to abandon the sea, and went into the business of supplying water to ships in the port of San Francisco.
“I had followed this business for twelve years, when one day, as I was furnishing water for a whaling ship, I saw among the sailors a man who, I felt quite certain, was the ring-leader of the gang of murderous mutineers who killed our captain and came so near making an end of me. I communicated my suspicions to the captain of the whaler, but he said that his ship was ready to sail, and that he would take the man, but would keep a watch on him, and find out if he talked while at sea. When this ship returned, the captain sought me out, and said: ‘He is your man, for he talked during the voyage, and told about being on a ship on which an explosion took place, and he and two others were the only survivors.’ I had the man arrested, but the administration of justice was very lax at that time in California, and the time which had elapsed since the commission of the crime rendered proof difficult to obtain, so the man escaped the gallows.
“This, gentlemen, is the story of how I became scarred for life, as you see.”
Another tale related by one of the storytelling group ran as follows: