New signage along the Pubnico Point trails
The new signage along the Pubnico Point trail is very well made and very informative. These signs tell what to expect and what to observe along the trails. They describe plant life, flowers, native birds and animals and much more.
One sign near the tip of the Point trail tells an abbreviated story of the schooner Lily E that ran aground there in the late 1800s. It reminded me that I had written that story many years ago. In my opinion it is well worth re-writing.
Many of the old fishermen, no longer living had information and stories on this ill-fated schooner. For most of the following information I am very grateful to Jerry Titus of Yarmouth who did lots of research on the history of this wreck.
The Lily E ran aground on Pubnico Point on January 13, 1888. This sailing ship had a cargo consisting of flour, of meal and oil, which were landed on the beach partly damaged. The Yarmouth Herald of January 18, 1888 reported: “Loss of schooner Lily E. Caeser Doucette, master, from Boston for this port, stuck on Pubnico Point on Friday night last. She pounded heavily, filled with water, broke sternpost and loss rudder. Her cargo consisting of flour, meal and oil had been landed on the beach, damaged by seawater. This vessel has been condemned and stripped and now a lie high on the beach, all efforts to float her proves fruitless. The Lily E. was launched at St. Martin, N.B. in 1885, was 118 tons registered and owned by Messrs J.R. Blauvelt of Tusket and Mr. Harvey Perry, Beaver River. Vessel insured in the Boston Marine. The cargo is also partially insured”.
On January 25, the same paper reported that the contract for repairing, launching and delivering the Lily E. to a Pubnico wharf was awarded to Foreman Hatfield of Tusket, the price being $2,700.
List of shipping for Jan. 1, 1889, had J.R. Blauvelt et al, as owners of the Lily E., according to a much later list; the schooner Lily E. was condemned in 1895 and they did not give any more reason on why a ten-year old schooner was condemned. The local people had a lot to add to what this early Yarmouth paper had to say. Stories they had heard from those who remembered the day when this vessel ran aground in a snowstorm.
The late Alphonse Amirault (1917-2012) remembered his father saying that all the trees on the point had been cut for firewood and because of this the Lily E’s captain could see the East Pubnico lighthouse sooner than on his previous trips and altered his course too soon, entering the kelp covered ledges instead of our harbour.
There were also some who remembered hearing of a bunkhouse, with cooking facilities, being built on shore for ship builders, or re-builders in this case, to stay in comfort while refitting the unfortunate schooner.
Harold A. d’Entremont, who loves these types of stories, had good memories of his grandmother, Mary, telling stories about the East Pubnico men rowing their dories to Jean Square’s wharf just below her house and later walking to the site where the Lily E. was being repaired.
The East Pubnico craftsmen were known as great shipbuilders. My cousin Germain L. d’Entremont had heard from his elders that two steam operated tug boats from Shelburne came to the rescue of the illfated vessel only to be stuck in our ice-bound harbour of a long, long ago January. According to stories passed down the generations, rocks were cleared at the low water mark, making room for a “slipway” of sorts, to tow the schooner high and dry for repairs.
One cannot help but wonder how many teams of oxen were utilized on this project, no one seems to know.
While the venture of restoring the stricken schooner was a great success, I am sorry to report that this story had a rather sad ending, at least for some. Even though the Lily E. and her crew survived the beaching, and the boat was rebuilt and lived to sail again, her captain was not so fortunate. The Yarmouth Herald, of an unknown date, had a story on the “Hoppomenes” which sailed from Yarmouth on December 8, 1888, (same year as beaching of Lily E) for Barbados with a cargo of fish and lumber.
This vessel “never reached its destination and was not afterwards heard of”, the paper wrote. The captain was Anthony J. Goodwin, and the first mate was none other than the unlucky Caesar Doucette, the former captain of the Lily E., now immortalized as part of our sailing or marine history.
According to stories passed down the generations, rocks were cleared at the low water mark, making room for a “slipway” of sorts, to tow the schooner high and dry for repairs.