Murder most foul? The mystery of the Cork shipwreck from 100 years ago
There may still be a few old salts living along the West Cork coastline who will recall that refrain from their younger days.
It’s a reference to one of the worst shipwrecks of the past century - 100 years ago this week, the Cardiff Hall was sunk at the Seven Heads Peninsula during a ferocious storm. The entire crew of 28 were lost on that fateful night of January 13, 1925.
The tempest was terrible - hence that enduring refrain - and the treacherous West Cork coastline has long acted as a siren call for shipwrecks: it’s no coincidence that the pews of the Star of the Sea Church of Barryroe are made almost entirely of wreck timbers.
However, the Cardiff Hall was no lightweight; she had a tonnage of almost 4,000 and had seen service at Gallipoli in World War I. Her skipper, John Bowen, was a Welsh sea dog with 36 years’ experience at sea.
Just two bodies were recovered after the disaster, one of them that of Bowen, and here is where the bones of a mystery lie.
The inquest found what appeared to be knife wounds on one of the bodies, as well as the type of lacerations you would expect when a vessel explodes at force onto rocks.
It sounds far-fetched, but for 100 years, experts have puzzled over the fate of the Cardiff Hall.
Why was no distress call sent from her radio? And what happened to cause her to be driven back several miles from the Old Head to Trevarra, as witnessed by locals who held lanterns on the clifftop and saw the disaster unfold?
The most common answer at the time was engine failure, but divers later insisted the propeller was revolving when it hit the rocks, as it had been sheared and was found a good distance from the wreck.
Divers also saw evidence that the ship was showing its age and its engine was becoming worn.
The mutiny theory does sound far-fetched, and the inquest recorded verdicts of drowning on the two victims whose bodies were found. I doubt we will ever know the truth.
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There is another side to this tragic story, which provides a fascinating insight into life on the Cork coastline a century ago.
In those dirt-poor times, a shipwreck could be a time of bounty for local people. And the Cardiff Hall was carrying gold... well, a precious item that is gold-coloured: Maize - 6,000 tons of the stuff, bound for grain supplier R and H Hall Ltd in Cork city.
As the ship sank, and the dying cries of the men on board rang in the ears of the locals helplessly watching from the cliffs, something remarkable happened. The onlookers were stung by a hail of flying maize, which was hurtled over the 120ft cliff and carried 100 yards inland.
Soon after, the maize began drifting onto Travarra Strand, along with hundreds of smashed planks from the vessel.
The next morning dawned clear and calm, and an amazing sight presented itself. The rocks looked as if they had been gilded, as a covering of maize caught the rays of the rising sun. The bed of the bay had assumed a dull gold colour of maize mixed with sand.
The locals quickly realised the hard maize could be recovered, separated from the sand, and dried, without being seriously damaged by the water, and at once set about retrieving this treasure that fate had cast on their doorstep.
From early morning, Travarra was a scene of feverish activity as the salvage work began.
Down on the rocky beach, with the tide low, men and boys with buckets, pans, saucers, and every similar utensil gathered up the maize that came ashore with every wave. All day, too, women and children came with food for the salvagers and to assist. Horse and donkey carts lined the road nearby.
Several pieces of mangled human flesh were discovered among the maize, but the grisly finds failed to stop this unexpected harvest.
A mill was set up to grind the maize and lorries drew loads to all the towns of West Cork.
When the grain on the foreshore had been gathered, a large quantity still remained on the bed of the bay. A way of recovering it was perfected using a boat and a home-made trawl - a huge makeshift bag dragged along the sea bed behind a boat, fixed to a big iron hoop. The manufacture of these hoops kept the forges in Butlerstown busy for many days.
Boats came from as far away as Kinsale, Dunowen, Ardfield, Ring, Ballinglanna, and Courtmacsherry, and returned laden to the gunwales with maize. For three months, observers on the clifftop at Travarra could see an armada of small rowing boats moving to and fro across the mouth of the bay.
One man who worked a boat with his father and brother spoke of making £100 (around €8,000 today) “the first bit of money we had in the world”.
Forty years after the tragedy, well-known Cork adventurer and diver, Joe Kerrigan - father of Jo Kerrigan of The Echo parish - recounted delivering to R and H Hall - its intended final destination - a sample of maize he had found inside a steel pipe in the wreck.
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The lost crew of the Cardiff Hall was made up of Arabs and the Welsh captain, John Bowen.
The 52-year-old had an eventful career, being shipwrecked and torpedoed, surviving both, and also steering the Cardiff Hall to safety two years earlier, minus the bridge, navigation gear and two seamen who were swept overboard in an Atlantic gale.
Sadly, John’s 19-year-old son Trevor was among the crew in 1925.
John’s funeral was delayed so his brother and brother-in-law could visit the scene, and they identified him from a photo that appeared in the Cork Examiner of his body being removed on a cart.
The two relatives visited the scene of the wreck and dropped wreaths on the waters, taking home a few small pieces of wreckage and some maize, sad mementos of the tragedy.
A few years ago, the anchor of the Cardiff Hall was retrieved from the sea and now stands as a monument to the tragedy in Butlerstown.
A poem about the ship concludes with this verse:
App?
