John Maxson crouched low over the reloaded mortar. Shoving the blowing sand and snow away, he carefully repositioned the artillery piece for a second shot. The northeast gale had carried Maxson's first shot to leeward of his target, the English bark Aryshire. Squinting through the heavy weather, Maxson adjusted his aim to the left. Satisfied, he touched the glowing end of a slow match to the mortar's vent and ducked aside as a bright flash erupted from the muzzle simultaneously with its report. A 4??-inch iron ball arced toward the ship. The shot fell true.
Maxson's actions on the stormy night of 11-12 January 1850 were not designed to sink the ship but rather to save her passengers and crew. As fate would have it, he was leading the first shipwreck rescue originating from a U.S. government lifesaving station. Stranded in heavy surf about 200 yards off Squan Beach, New Jersey, the Ayrshire was crowded with 202 people, mostly Scottish and Irish immigrants. Their lives depended on the efforts of Maxson and his volunteer rescuers.
Before 1848, no federal agency was charged with protecting the lives of persons shipwrecked along the U.S. coastline. Many states promoted the rescue of shipwrecked persons by regulating the management and salvage of wrecked ships and their cargos. Private organizations, most notably the Massachusetts Humane Society and the New York Life-Saving and Benevolent Association, augmented the state efforts. These groups were also economically linked to the marine underwriters and maritime commerce associations at their ports. With private funds, they established coastal rescue stations and encouraged the formation of cohesive groups of volunteer lifesavers.
The U.S. government became involved in lifesaving on 14 August 1848 when Congress appropriated $10,000 "for providing surfboats, rockets, carronades and other necessary apparatus for the better protection of life and property from shipwreck on the Coast of New Jersey between Sandy Hook and Little Egg Harbor." The lifesaving equipment was to be distributed between eight unmanned rescue stations along the 60-mile stretch of partially connected beaches. During a northeast gale, this becomes the dangerous lee shore for any vessel headed to or from New York Harbor.
The stations were to be under the operational supervision of commissioned officers of the U.S. Revenue Marine, part of the Department of the Treasury. But during emergencies they would be manned by local volunteer watermen. These coastal mariners took the name "surfmen" to differentiate their skills in handling small craft in surf from the abilities required of sailors on board ships.
Secretary of the Treasury Robert J. Walker designated Captain Douglas Ottinger of the Revenue Marine to cooperate with local persons in selecting sites for the eight stations. The secretary further charged Ottinger with negotiating leases for the land on which the stations would be built and with acquiring their necessary equipment.
One of the first buildings, designated Station No. 5, was completed in May 1849 on a leased parcel of property along Monmouth County's Squan Beach. Nearby was an inn operated by John Maxson, which had been his family residence since 1837. When sportsmen hunting game fowl on Barnegat Bay frequented the inn, Maxson served as their host and guide. By the fall of 1849, the station was fully operational and Captain Ottinger had given Maxson responsibility for holding the key to the new building.
To Reach and Rescue Shipwreck Survivors
At the outset of his assignment, Ottinger realized that he needed a means of establishing contact between the shore and ships that grounded on the sand bars, known as outer bars, situated about 200 yards off New Jersey's beaches. On occasion, some rescuers had successfully cast fishing leads from the beach to stranded vessels to establish a means of communication, but no one could cast a lead to most of the outer bars. Captain Ottinger's research eventually led him to an English-designed line-throwing gun—the Manby mortar, sometimes called an eprouvette (test tube) mortar. A shot from the mortar could carry a light line across a wrecked ship; rescuers could attach stronger cordage to the line, which sailors on board the wreck could haul in.
After obtaining one of the mortars and the use of Revenue Marine cutters, Ottinger set out to test the gun. To avoid the initial acceleration of the mortar shot from breaking the light line, the captain had a wire spring attached to an eye that screwed into the ball. A leather lanyard was fixed to the other end of the spring, and the light line to the opposite end of the lanyard. The shock absorber worked, and Ottinger determined the mortar had sufficient range to throw a shot and line over a vessel stranded 200 to 300 yards offshore.
For rescue boats, Ottinger was referred to Joseph Francis of Greenport, Long Island, a well-reputed builder of corrugated, galvanized iron lifeboats. Surfboats, the primary craft for rescuing people from wrecks off the Jersey coast, had drawbacks, the main one being that during storms the surf often ran too high to safely launch them. Francis' solution was to design a small covered lifeboat that could be suspended by short chains from a hawser stretched between a stranded ship and the shore. The boat, whose only opening was a sealing hatch, could then be hauled back-and-forth through rough water, bringing several passengers ashore per trip. Francis named his device the "life-car."
In 1849 each of the Jersey lifesaving stations was equipped with a life-car and a galvanized iron surfboat manufactured by Francis and a Manby mortar. Ottinger and Francis would later have a major falling out over the innovative enclosed rescue boat, with each man claiming credit for the invention. In any case, the novel life-car had not been tested in an actual rescue operation, but the opportunity was not long in coming.
Stranded on an Outer Bar
On 16 December 1849, the Ayrshire departed Newry, Ireland, bound for New York. The voyage seemed to have been uneventful until its final leg. While approaching New York Harbor, the bark encountered a severe nor'easter—a blizzard with gale-force winds—that blew her to leeward, or to the west and south. While not recorded, it may be surmised that the Ayrshire was then drawing about 12 feet of water.
The ship faced several serious problems. Safety concerns called for shortening sail, but doing so also reduced the vessel's maneuverability. Moreover, the angle of the northeast wind on the Ayrshire's starboard quarter imparted leeway, pushing the vessel's track line to port and toward New Jersey's lee shore. If the shipmaster carried too much rudder to starboard to offset this wind vector, the vessel ran the risk of grounding on the Long Island shore. In addition, northeast gales create surface currents, the strength of which depends on how long the gale has been blowing. This "set," or deflection by wind, sea, and current, increases the rate at which the ship will close on the lee shore.
Taking soundings would have been of critical importance, and if crewmen had been heaving lead lines at least every 15 minutes and keeping a keen lookout, the Ayrshire's captain might have expected to discover the impending New Jersey coastline about 30 minutes before he plowed up on one of its outer bars.
In the event, however, on the evening of 11 January 1850 with little or no apparent warning, the ship grounded and then stranded on the outer bar abreast of Station No. 5, about 39 miles south of Sandy Hook. The bark was likely stuck with her bow facing to the south, which fits with the typical scenario whenever a sailing vessel attempted to wear ship after finding herself too close to the New Jersey shore during a nor'easter.
On board the Ayrshire, the officers and crew as well as the passengers quickly understood their critically dangerous situation. In addition to exposure to freezing temperatures, they faced the possibility of being washed overboard and drowning or being struck by falling spars as the violent wave action relentlessly pounded the ship's hull against the hard bar. That in itself could cause the vessel to disintegrate.
Because of the high surf, launching a boat from the ship was futile, as was swimming to shore through the roiling, 40-degree water. The best the passengers and crew could hope for was that the bark would hold together until the storm abated. Then perhaps a ship's boat could be safely launched or, possibly, a boat might come out from shore.
Bringing the Shipwrecked Ashore
All surfmen knew that shipwrecks were most likely to occur during northeast gales, especially during periods of low visibility. During those times, surfmen periodically surveyed the beaches for any telltale signs of trouble. Perhaps John Maxson was on such a patrol on the night of 11-12 January when he discovered the Ayrshire stranded abreast his station. He quickly gathered available help, including members of his family. John S. Forman, a court-appointed wreckmaster, later reported that rescue operations were in progress when he arrived on the scene at dawn.
The station's boathouse housed a Francis surfboat on a boat wagon, the life-car on a handcart, and "beach apparatus"—a line-throwing mortar, shot line stored on a coiling frame, a single-sheave tail block, a hawser, a sand anchor, ground tackle, and necessary ordnance accoutrements. Maxson recognized the futility of trying to launch the surfboat—no open craft could survive in the stormy breakers then pummeling the shipwreck. The life-car, mortar, and related equipment were the only options.
After Maxson's successful mortar shot over the Ayrshire, the ship's sailors hauled the attached shot line. Tied to it was the tail block through which an endless whip, or line, that extended back to the beach had been run. The sailors fastened the block to a mast above the wash of the waves. Next, the surfmen attached the hawser to the whip and hauled away. When the end of the heavy line arrived at the wreck, sailors secured it to the mast a few feet above the tail block.
Back on the beach, the surfmen deeply buried the sand anchor so that only its iron ring was visible. Their end of the hawser was passed through a metal ring at the end of one of the life-car's two suspension chains. Because the other chain's ring was missing, a rescuer improvised by using a rope grommet. The hawser was then fastened to ground tackle that, in turn, was attached to the anchor ring. The tackle would allow the rescuers to maintain the necessary tautness on the hawser. The surfmen next raised the heavy line to rest over an X-shaped crotch, thereby allowing the life-car to hang suspended. Separating the endless whip, they attached one end to the seaward end of the car and the other to its shore end, enabling them to haul the boat to and from the wreck. They then began pulling away on the whip, and the rescue boat sped across the wave tops to the Ayrshire.
On board the ship, officers and crewmen supervised the debarkation. The first survivors started ashore at about 1100. Three to five people at a time, depending on size, would board the car for the dark, bouncy ride to shore. Once there, the survivors were taken inside the nearby station house to warm up. Landing each boatload and returning the life-car to the wreck took about 15 minutes. By midday, the snowfall slackened and the wind diminished. Around 1800, the surf began to flatten out, reducing the risk that the ship's hull structure would fail overnight.
The rescue operation was suspended at nightfall, with 120 persons having been saved that day. One fatality, however, occurred during the last trip ashore. Against the orders of the ship's captain, a Mr. Bell had clambered onto the outside of the departing life-car, which at the time contained members of his family. He apparently believed he could hang on and ride the boat ashore, but breaking seas swept him to his death.
By the morning of the 13th, the surf had "laid down" sufficiently for the rescuers to launch the Francis surfboat, which some of them maneuvered under the wreck's lee to receive passengers as well as a block to replace the suspension chain's rope grommet, which needed continually to be replaced. A sailor attempted to throw the block down to the boat as well as jump into the bobbing craft, but both ended up in the water. The surfmen pulled the sailor aboard and rowed him ashore, but further attempts to bring the surfboat alongside the wrecked brig and use it to rescue passengers were unsuccessful. The life-car, meanwhile, continued travelling back-and-forth, and by 1100, the last of the shipwrecked passengers and crew had been brought ashore.
The efforts of John Maxson and his volunteers were praised by the New York Life-Saving and Benevolent Association, which awarded the station chief a gold medal for his leadership. The importance of the life-car in the rescue operation was not lost on Maxson, who wrote that "Every soul—men, women, children, and infants—came through the surf during that cold snow-storm, dry and comfortable."
The natural actions of the sea eventually destroyed the unsalvageable Ayrshire, and her hulk slowly disappeared below the waves. About 30 years later, however, it reappeared after a storm. Surfmen from the nearby U.S. Life-Saving Service station who ventured out to investigate discovered a surprise: one of the two mortar shots John Maxson had fired the stormy night of 11-12 January 1850.
The Coast Guard's Lifesaving Roots1848: Congress appropriates $10,000 for the Department of the Treasury's U.S. Revenue Marine to purchase lifesaving equipment for distribution among eight New Jersey stations to be manned by volunteers. 1849: Funds are approved for additional stations along the Jersey as well as Long Island shores. 1857: Congress approves funds for the Treasury Department to hire a full-time keeper for each station. 1871: The Treasury Department receives $200,000 to upgrade lifesaving stations and hire full-time crews. 1874-75: Stations are added in Maine; at Cape Cod; along North Carolina's Outer Banks; at Port Arthur, Texas; along Florida's east coast; and inland on the Great Lakes' shores. 1878: The stations are formally organized as a separate Treasury Department agency: the U.S. Life-Saving Service. 1915: President Woodrow Wilson merges the Life-Saving Service with the Revenue Cutter Service to create the U.S. Coast Guard. |
Sources:
Robert F. Bennett, Life-Saving along the Coast, 1848-1871, pt. II, "An Appropriation of a Very Unusual Kind," (Toms River, NJ: Ocean County Historical Society, 2003).
Robert F. Bennett, Surfboats, Rockets and Carronades (Washington, DC: U.S. Government Printing Office, U.S. Coast Guard, 1976).
Robert F. Bennett, "The Life-Savers: For those in Peril on the Sea,'" Proceedings, March 1976, U. S. Naval Institute.
Robert Blachford, Sailing Directions for the Coast and Harbours of North America (London: Navigation Warehouse, no. 114, 1811).
George E. Burker, The Metal Life Car: The Inventor, the Imposter, and the Business of Lifesaving (Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, 2008).
Congressional Globe, U. S. government, vol. XX, 5 August 1848, pp. 1087-1089 Edwin H. Daniels Jr., Eagle Seamanship, 3rd ed. (Annapolis, MD: Naval Institute Press, 1990).
T. F. Rose, H. C. Woolman, and T. T. Price, Historical and Biographical Atlas of the New Jersey Coast (Philadelphia: 1876).
"Shot with a History—Wreck of the Ayrshire," Washington Star, March 11, 1898.
The Life-Saving Benevolent Association of New York. A Copy of the Charter. Premiums, Awards, List of Managers, Donors and a Portion of Its Correspondence, as published in 1857.
"Wreck of the Ayrshire," Via the Port of New York, New York-New Jersey Ports Authority, April 1963, pp 18-19.