Captain Joshua James - Lifesaver Nonpareil

Joshua James (1826-1902) today is still acknowledged to be the most distinguished seafaring lifesaver in the history of the United States. This dedicated Massachusetts man from Hull has left behind him, in the annals of the Humane Society of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts and the United States Life Saving Service, unparalleled achievements in human rescue during great sea storms covering a period of sixty years. It was the Humane Society which established the lifesaving service in America in 1785. The United States Life Saving Service, formed considerably later, became part of the U. S. Coast Guard in 1915.

From the age of fifteen until his death at 75 on active duty with the United States Life Saving Service, Captain James was credited with saving hundreds of lives as a volunteer member of the Massachusetts Humane Society. During his lifetime, he was well known not only up and down the Atlantic Coast, but throughout the maritime world as well and was honored with the highest medals of the United States Congress and the Massachusetts Humane Society.

Joshua James was born 22 November, 1826, in the coastal town of Hull, Massachusetts, the ninth of twelve children born to William and Esther James. His father, born in Dokkum, Holland, had served as a soldier in the Dutch army, then ran away to sea, came to America, and worked as a seaman. He settled in Hull and eventually prospered enough to own a fleet of twelve vessels. As his sons reached manhood, he provided each with a vessel of his own. William James also was celebrated for his piety, and saw to it that his children read the Bible every day.

Joshua James’ career as a lifesaver began in the boats of The Massachusetts Humane Society. Family tradition has it that a vessel foundered on Harding’s Ledge, in 1842. As usual, Humane Society volunteers tumbled into the local lifeboat and put off for the wreck. When the steersman accounted for his crew, he found fifteen-year-old Joshua James among them. From that day forward, he was a regular member of the crews that put out from Hull in the boats of the Society.

James went into business for himself at 25, hauling, lightering, and carrying freight in the family maritime tradition. He remained active in these pursuits until he was appointed Keeper of the Point Allerton Station in the United States Life Saving Service at the age of 62, the only man in the history of the Service for whom the maximum age limit of 46 years was waived.

At 32 he married Louisa Lucihe, age sixteen. He had known her from babyhood and it is said that he waited for her to grow up. She, too, was a lifesaver, having saved a swimming companion from death two years before her marriage. Ten children were born to this union, of whom five girls and one son grew to maturity. His son, Osceola, became a sailor, ship’s master, and owner, a captain of Hull volunteer lifesavers, and a gold medal winner with a record approaching his father’s.

Since the records of the Massachusetts Humane Society were destroyed in the Great Boston Fire of 1872, a complete account of Captain James’ services in the Society’s boats is not available. In the James’ collection of medals now at the Coast Guard Academy is a bronze medal for one of his earliest services in the rescue of the crew of the French Brig L’Essait at Nantasket Beach, 1 April, 1850. Examination of news clippings from Boston papers detail stories of hundreds of wrecks on the New England coast in those days. The fact that in 1876 he was appointed Keeper of the Society’s four boats at Stony Beach, Point Allerton, and Nantasket Beach is proof of his earlier and continuing lifeboat experience. Although no family records were kept, his daughters testify that it was commonly accepted in the family that their father had participated in dozens of rescues in the years before he became world famous.

In 1886 The Humane Society of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts presented Captain Joshua James with a large silver medal with the following inscription:

TO
CAPT. JOSHUA JAMES
For Brave and Faithful Service of More Than 40 Years In The Lifeboats of The Humane Society. 1886

The 1888 Annual Report of The Humane Society of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts contained the following in connection with the presentation of the medal. “To Captain Joshua James, the silver medal of the Society and $50, in recognition of his conspicuous bravery and ability during his connection with the Society’s lifeboats from the year 1842, when he was only fifteen years of age. During this time he assisted in saving over 100 lives. The Society in sending him the above desires to offer its congratulations and thanks for exceptionally gallant service.”

The most remarkable thing about this citation is that, although Joshua James was sixty years old at the time, he was in the prime of his career and his most famous rescues lay ahead of him. In the next fifteen years he was to become world famous for a record of devotion to duty and successful saving of human lives.

To single out any one of his heroic efforts is only to make it small by comparison with others. Perhaps his reputation should rest upon the events of the great gale of November 25-26, 1888, when he directed the breeches buoy rescue of nine men from one wreck and was coxswain of the lifeboats involved in saving 29 lives from four other vessels. In testimony to the gallant efforts of the men of Hull, Captain James, his son, Osceola, and eight other members of the volunteers received the coveted Gold Life Saving Medals of the Treasury Department. In addition, a special, enormous gold medal of The Humane Society was especially struck for Joshua James for his skill, daring, and indomitable courage during the 24 hours this terrible storm raged on the New England coast.

There are those who think his greatest moment came on the morning of December 16, 1896, when the three-masted schooner Ulrica foundered off Point Allerton in a northeast gale and snowstorm. Joshua James, then seventy, during the third attempt to launch a lifeboat, was whipped from his steering oar by a grasping wave and thrown overboard. He managed to grab an oar and climb aboard and continued the rescue of every man still alive on the schooner.

Perhaps it may be that he scaled the heights of fame in the 48-hour period of the storm of November, 1898, considered by those still living as the worst in the history of New England.

Regardless of which of these rescues, whether that of 1888, 1896, or 1898, deserves to be called his most outstanding, the most celebrated rescues of his career took place on November 25-26, 1888. With the clearing skies that followed this famous storm, his name became a household word in the maritime world and his fame spread internationally.

The story can best be told in his own words:

“Upon request of Lieutenant O. C. Hamlet of the United States Life Saving Service, I make the following statement of work done by myself and others who joined me as boats crews in saving the lives of shipwrecked persons off the beach of Hull and Nantasket, Massachusetts, during the gale of November 25th and 26th, 1888, viz: On the morning of November 25th, I went up on Telegraph Hill, Hull, to lookout for vessels, as a heavy gale was blowing and the weather was rainy and stormy. Vessels anchored off in the Lighthouse Channel, about ½ mile S.W. of Boston Light, could easily be seen, and, as near as I do now remember, there were five schooners and one coal barge in a position exposed to the sea and N.E. gale.

“Three of the schooners afterwards drifted ashore although all of them dragged their anchors more or less.

“As the gale increased I saw, by taking ranges on the anchored vessels, that they were dragging towards the rocky shore, and after dinner I started with some others to bring the Surfboat R. B. Forbes from the boat house to where the vessels would be apt to come on shore. About 2 P.M. we got the boat down. The Schooner Cox and Green had then struck on the beach, a short distance west of Toddy Rocks, and the sea was so heavy that I considered it too risky to launch the boat. The beach apparatus were fetched down and used, and the crew, eight in all, were successfully landed with the breeches buoy. Many of the people in Hull assisted in placing and working the beach apparatus. Neither myself or any person assisting me was in this case exposed to any danger.

“Shortly before landing the last man from the Cox and Green, the Schooner Gertrude Abbott had her flag in the rigging, union down, and struck the rocks about one eighth of a mile to the eastward of where we were at work.

“The beach gear was immediately moved over abreast of the Abbott but she was too far off to be reached and no attempt was made to use the gear after the sand anchor had been placed. It was then quite dark; the tide was up, and the gale and sea was so furious that I concluded to haul the Surf Boat over abreast of the vessel and wait for low tide before launching. We built a large fire on the high bluff to light up the vicinity and enable us to see the vessel.

“Owing to the gale blowing into the Bay the tide did not fall much and between 8 and 9 P.M. we launched the Surf Boat and succeeded in getting safely out through the heavy breakers. Two men were constantly employed in bailing the boat with buckets to keep her from filling.

“The Schooner was lying head in, and we got a line from her bow.

“We were some time in getting the men into the boat and this gave the boats crew a chance to rest after the heavy pulling they had done coming off from shore.

“As soon as the eight men were all in, we started back, but the boat was crowded and there was a poor chance to work the oars. She was hard to manage. The sea and wind swept along the shore, which made it more dangerous, and the boat struck a rock about 100 fathoms from the beach, filled and rolled one side deep under.

“The men shifted to windward and straightened her up. One of the crew got overboard but was hauled in by the rest. I called to the men as loudly as I could to stick to the boat, no matter what might happen.

“The boat struck a number of times on the rocks, swung around and drifted along. The few oars left in her were used in pushing her off and keeping her headed for the shore as much as possible, in order that she might not be thrown in by the sea. It seemed like a miracle that she was not thrown bottom up by some of the breakers when striking the rocks.

“When she finally struck the rocks in shoal water on the beach, we all jumped out and waded on shore. The starboard side of the boat was stove in and some of the gear lost. I think it was between 9 and 10 o’clock in the evening when we landed. The following men composed my boats crew at this rescue, all of Hull, Massachusetts, viz:

Osceola F. James¹
Alonzo L. Mitchell
H. Webster Mitchell
Ambrose B. Mitchell
John L. Mitchell
Eben T. Pope
Jos. T. Galiano
Louis F. Galiano
Fred’k Smith

“We went home after having hauled up the boat, in which we were assisted by a number of people on shore.

“During the afternoon of the 25th, I sent over to Point Allerton and had the surfboat Robert G. Shaw taken down to Stony Beach Station.

“We were engaged in keeping a lookout along the beach during the night and at 3 A.M., November 26th it was reported to me that a Schooner was close to the rocks near the Cox and Green. It was raining heavy and blowing harder than I had seen it blow for years. I immediately had the surfboat Robert G. Shaw carried from Stony Beach to Pemberton wharf where I could launch her in safety As soon as daylight made, we could see men in the rigging of the schooner and we started to their assistance. It took a long time to get to the vessel, owing to the heavy sea and furious gale, but the men in the rigging were finally rescued. There was no immediate danger in this effort as long as we could keep clear of the rigging of the vessel. The sea broke over her fore and aft and we managed to get the seven men into the boat between seas. The Captain and mate had been swept overboard and drowned during the night. The schooner was the Bertha Walker; she had struck and sunk some distance west of Toddy Rocks. The landing of the crew after leaving the wreck was effected without much danger or trouble. My boats crew was composed of the following persons, all of Hull, Massachusetts, viz:

Osceola F. James
Francis S. James
John L. Mitchell
William B. Mitchell
Louis F. Galiano
Reinier James, Jr.
Alonzo L. Mitchell
Eugene Mitchell
Jos. T. Galiano
Alfred A. Galiano

“When we reached the shore from the Bertha Walker, it was about 9 A.M. Before the boats crew left the boat, I requested a tug-boat to tow me out to a schooner anchored a short distance from Toddy Rocks, showing a flag in her rigging. After getting along side of her, we found her to be the Puritan of Boston. She was in no danger as long as her anchors could hold, but wanted to be towed in.

“We returned to Pemberton Wharf the second time and I was then informed that there was a vessel ashore [the H. C. Higginson] in a dangerous position off Nantasket Beach.

“As this was on the outside beach I concluded to take the large surfboat Nantasket which had been carried across from Station No. 20, and towed up Weir River with the same tug. We landed on the narrow beach, inside of Hotel Nantasket, hauled the boat over, launched on the other side and pulled along inside of the breakers to get abreast of the vessel.

“We had to make a landing in order to haul the boat over a narrow point of land and launch again on the other side of it. While making the landing, the boat was stove in on the rocks, but temporary repairs were soon made and lead patches put over the holes.

“While we were repairing the boat, Captain Anderson, in charge of the Humane Society’s beach apparatus, fired a line to the vessel and sent off a whipline and hawser; but fouling with some wreckage, his gear became so tangled that the breeches buoy could not be operated.

“As soon as the boat was repaired, I launched and went off to save the men who could be seen in the rigging.

“The sea alongside of the vessel was terrible. She laid head out and one of the men in the fore rigging slid down from there to the mizzen by the hawser Captain Anderson had sent off. The others only reached the main rigging, and all were taken off by jumping overboard after bending on to themselves the heaving lines thrown them from the boat. Five men were thus taken off and safely landed. The Master of the vessel and one seaman had been swept off by the sea and drowned during the night, and another person had died while in the rig-

/s/ Joshua James

The damage resulting from this disastrous storm emphasized the need of additional Government Life Saving Stations, with full equipment and drilled and paid crews. It was natural that a station should be established in the vicinity of Hull and one was so established in 1889 at Stony Beach. When it came to the selection of a keeper, there was no doubt who was to be the man. On October 22, 1889, Joshua James took the oath of office as Keeper of the United States Life Saving Station at Point Allerton. He was sixteen years over the maximum age for appointment as Keeper and his is the only recorded case of the Life Saving Service granting a waiver for age.

Captain James selected his crew of seven from men of Hull and during the thirteen years he was Keeper of the Point Allerton Station, he and his crew saved 540 lives and $1,203,435 worth of estimated value of ships and cargo.

The Annual Reports of the Life Saving Service for those years detail the activity of the Point Allerton Station. One of the most notable was the rescue of the crew of the stranded Ulrica on 16 December, 1896. The Humane Society Volunteers and Captain James’ Life Saving crew arrived at the scene of the wreck at the same time. While one crew set up the beach apparatus, Captain James launched a boat. The third attempt to launch was successful but when the boat was halfway to the vessel, a tremendous wave stood the boat on end, spilled Captain James overboard, and threw the boat back on the beach. The 70-year-old captain managed to grab an out-stretched oar and was dragged onto the beach. Nothing daunted, he took charge of the beach apparatus and tried to get a line aboard. The third attempt landed on the Ulrica but was fouled so as to be useless in rescuing the crew. Captain James again took to his boat and hauled it out to the Ulrica with the aid of the fouled hawser. The crew of the schooner was so exhausted as to be incapable of helping themselves so members of the boat’s crew had to go aboard to help them into the surfboat. Once all men were aboard, with a wild shout, the crowd ashore ran the hawser up the beach and brought the boat safely ashore.

Fifty-seven years of heroic life saving brought Joshua James to his crowning achievement in the forty-eight hours of the great storm of November 1898. The weather was threatening in the afternoon and evening of the 26th. The feel of a storm must have been in the air for by evening vessels from far and near were scudding to port. Snow began to fall by ten o’clock, and the increasing winds drove the snow and sleet with hurricane force by midnight. Not since 1851, when the great storm of that year swept Minot’s Light from its foundation, had New England experienced such a storm. Not only were scores of vessels lost and damage ashore mounted into the millions, but this was the storm that took the steamer Portland with her crew and passengers of 229 to the bottom.

The worst scenes of desolation seemed to center around the town of Hull. There was hardly a building that escaped some injury; the railway seawall, constructed of heavy granite, was ruined for a mile, and the beaches dropped two to three feet in some places. Against this background, the surfmen of Point Allerton patrolled their beaches and brought their gear to wreck after wreck. On the morning of the 27th they brought two survivors from the two wrecks dashed to pieces on Toddy Rocks. Shortly thereafter they brought a stranded family to higher ground and then immediately turned to with the beach apparatus to take seven men off a stranded schooner. Next came a barge going to pieces on the rocks. At a great risk and prodigious effort, they took five men off by wading far out into the thundering surf. This operation took the rest of that day.

The patrol that night was worse than the night before. The force of the wind made breathing almost impossible and progress up the beach could only be made by crouching and stumbling along, back to the wind. Constant watch had to be kept for the crashing breakers rolling farther up the beach than had ever before been reported. By first light, the lifesavers found a schooner on Lighthouse Island. The sea was so heavy that the boat had to be brought over to the calmer waters of Pemberton Landing and towed out by tug. Five men out of eight were saved. No sooner had the boat landed but word came of three men stranded on Black Rock, some six miles to the southward. The boat was immediately launched and the rest of the day passed in the exertions necessary to bring back these men.

Not as many lives were saved in this storm as compared to the storm of 1888, but the dangers were as great and the duration of the storm was twice as long. Under these circumstances there was small comparison between the exertions and the hardships experienced by this small band of lifesavers. Captain James reported, “We succeeded in getting every man that was alive at the time we started for him, and we started at the earliest moment in every case.” Not only were there the actual rescues; the hours spent on patrol of the hurricane swept beaches probably called for more fortitude and produced more hardships than did the actual rescue work.

The extraordinary labors performed under the leadership of Joshua James are all the more remarkable when we remember that he had long since passed the allotted span of three score and ten. According to the regulations, each year he passed the annual physical examinations with flying colors and the certificate of his last examination, when he was fast approaching 75, shows that he was in every way fit to perform his duties as a Keeper of a station of the United States Life Saving Service. He still retained the strength and skill necessary to handle the boat in the worst of weather and his exceptional mental equipment and frame of mind made him invaluable to the Service.

The life and story of this great man came to a most dramatic and fitting end. On March 17, 1902, the entire crew, save one, of the Monomoy Point Life Saving Station lost their lives in an attempt to rescue the crew of the barge Wadena. When the news of this catastrophe reached Captain James, he was profoundly affected. He seemed to realize the dangerous nature of his calling and the importance of training as it influenced the success and very lives of his men. Accordingly, two days later, in the aftermath of the same gale, he took his crew out in the boat for a seven o’clock morning drill as if to assure himself and the men that they were ready for any emergency. They exercised in the heavy surf for more than an hour with Captain James at the steering oar. Satisfied with the boat, the work of his men, and himself, he ordered the boat back to the station. As the boat grounded on the beach, he glanced out to sea and remarked, “The tide is ebbing.”

How true were these words, for at that moment Captain Joshua James fell dead upon the wet sand.

Joshua James was laid to rest in Hull, the little community that had known him for all of his life and for whom there was no other. Appropriately, he was carried to his grave in a surfboat drawn by the station horses and attended by his crew.

Captain Joshua James today remains a vigorous reminder and symbol of the many lifesavers throughout the world who have with remarkable success accomplished the rescue of many in peril on the sea. They that go down to the sea in ships have long included the gallant lifeboat men, of whom Captain Joshua James still stands in the front rank. Americans rightfully are proud to recognize Joshua James in this long line of tarpaulin-clad heroes of surf and storm.