“No, sir,” replied Ralph.
At the order, “Lay aloft,” the young men streamed up the rigging. Richards was first and right after him came Ralph. Each went over the futtock shrouds to the topmast rigging, disdaining the lubbers’ hole, and in a moment were high up the topmast. In going over the crosstrees the ship was making a quick roll to leeward, and Richards tripped and lost his hold, and was thrown downward head first. As he half turned around in a vain effort to clutch something Ralph saw a white, agonized face, and a second later he heard a scream of, “Man overboard,” which brought terror to every heart. No fancy drill ever inspired the frightened tones of that particular cry. It was immediately followed by sharp, quick orders from the officer of the deck, Lieutenant Minturn.
“Hard down!” he shouted to the helmsman. “Let go the life-buoys! Lay down from aloft! Silence fore and aft! Every man to his station! Clear away the lee life-boat! Main clew garnets and buntlines! Weather main and lee cross-jack braces! Clear away the bo’lines! Up mainsail, brace a back!”
The six enlisted men and the coxswain forming the life-boat’s crew jumped into her. Two enlisted men rushed to the boat’s falls and commenced to lower it. They were overanxious; the man at the forward fall threw the coil off the pin; the man at the after fall did the same and both men started to lower the boat rapidly.
“Belay forrud, I’m jammed,” shrieked the man at the after fall. But in the din about the deck, men rushing about, pulling and hauling at the braces, his frightened cry was unheard, and the bow of the life-boat came down rapidly while the stern was still high in the air. In another instant a heavy sea crashed into the life-boat and wrenched it clear from the ship.
In the meantime the executive officer, Lieutenant-Commander Roberts, had rushed up from below and had taken charge. He soon had the other life-boat in the water; it immediately shoved off in the hope of picking up the men who had been swept into the sea. It found but one man. Two others had clutched the pendant of the stern Jacob’s-ladder as it trailed behind and were hauled aboard. But nothing whatever was seen of Midshipman Richards who had fallen overboard nor of the four men of the first life-boat’s crew, nor could the life-boat itself be found.[2]
An indescribable gloom settled upon the ship. Awful death had in the twinkling of an eye snatched five lives from the ship’s company. Officers, midshipmen and enlisted men went about in a subdued, quiet way. The running of plebes ceased, and there was no more pell-mell scrambling aloft.
The Chesapeake arrived at Annapolis August 28th and the upper classmen all went on leave for a month. Ralph Osborn’s classmates during this time were again quartered aboard the Santee and were drilled mornings and afternoons, and when the school year commenced, October 1st, they were all eager to begin their studies.