She was built at Scarborough in 1827. Arundel men owned the greater part of the vessel, one brother being the husband. A capt of Kennebunk owned a piece and also a capt of Arundel commanded her with his brother as mate.

 Now, she was bound from New Orleans to Liverpool, with full cargo of cotton near 300 bales. She was a vessel of 389 tons. This was her first voyage. In fact, she had never made a voyage.

 She was a good barque, black, sided with some stripes about her. The crew, some dozen or more, gathered at New Orleans, were all strangers, a mixed lot, with some foreigners among them.

 Now it chanced that a story passed amongst these men, that the vessel had brought a general cargo from some northern part of the southern city. And that a surplus of the money provided to purchase it was still on board, about $25,000; be that as it may ere long they laid plans to gain possession of the craft. They would kill the captain but not the mate as he might serve them later.

 Tales were told that the captain and mate were impetuous but a man who sailed on board as a passenger said it wasn’t so. The sailor’s plot accomplished, then they would scuttle or fire the barque. But it chanced that the cook, a swede, and who also was to perish, overheard the speech and warned the capt and he laid a counter plan of his own to secure them at the first appearance of a mutiny. Ere long several were seized, lashed with cords for there were no irons on the craft. Then in the milee the mate was injured. The vessel being short-handed the capt endeavored to make port at Boston. But wind and ride proceeded and when off this coast he chose to sail for Arundel for there his owner and family were. He also would place the men who refused to do duty on shore, and secure others in their place, would remain over a tide or two only. Ah friend, would that he had not made the mistake of anchoring in an open ??? instead of proceeding to Portland where there was a safe harbor and the US court sat before which the mutineers could be tried. Some persons asserted that the crew believed believed that they were sailing there and that the old observatory on Point Arundel was Falmouth Lighthouse.

 However, the ill-fated vessel anchored inside the fishing rock near the rivers mouth on Wed.

 May 2, 1838. Now when the report reached Kennebunk Village that the Horace was off the bar boys with spy glasses climbed the belfry of the Unitarian Church to see the vessel.

 The mutinous sailors were at once set ashore and transported to Portland.

 The wind came up and blew Friday and Saturday and the condition was serious for the vessel at anchor. A person living near the shore who viewed the vessel straining at her chains exclaimed, “ she will not weather the gale.” Several captains and crew members remained on the vessel. The gale was so heavy seawater was in the fields. The barque was with both anchors ??? with chain cables. Sat May 5 one of the chains parted. The captain feared the other would go and at 11:45 slipped it. And at the same time ordered all hands aloft to loosen the sails intending to work the vessel out to sea but in the extremity of tide and wind the barque would not obey the rudder. Ere the men found time to do their work the captain shouted for them to come down for you must know that he heard the breakers (dirge?) They had barely reached the deck when the vessel struck on the half-way wreck off oakes neck there ½ mile from the anchoring ground. Some call this ledge “wash rock” and declare the vessel left her chain lying across them. She remained there for 15 minutes bumping heavily lost her rudder stern post false keel bent an hogged by the rough usage and filling with water.

 Had the cargo been ought but cotton or had she laid longer on the rock the vessel would have floundered and all persons on board perished.  However, she rose on the ledge with a serge, beat over it and again drifted ½ a mile came ashore upright broadside on with all standing, at night, amid tremendous surf, at first beach some 150 yards from high water mark and hard on 2 acres lot (Lords Point)

The captain, mate and two crewmen swung overboard. He told the owners he would have perished with his vessel if he had it to do again.  Operations were begun to remove the cotton and dismantle the vessel. Many people being employed.     

Author unknown

Cape Porpoise Harbor has always been dangerous to seafarers unfamiliar with its hidden hazards but countless vessels have ventured forth anyway, seeking shelter from countless storms. Many never made it into the harbor, others never made it out.

 In October of 1804 The Salem Register reported that a Hallowell packet was lost at Cape Porpoise in a hurricane. Captain Weston sailed her onto the rocks. He, his crew and all 20 of his passengers, including twelve ladies, perished. Only the bodies of Dr. Appleton, Mrs. Appleton and their child, all of Waterville, were ever found.

 The American Coast Pilot called Cape Porpoise a “bad harbour” in 1806. “It is not to be attempted unless you are well acquainted, or in distress. A vessel that draws 10 feet will be aground at low water. The harbour is so narrow that a vessel cannot turn round.” Nevertheless, it was advertised as the only refuge in a storm between Portland and Portsmouth. During the years of coasting trade it was not unusual for 100 vessels to seek shelter in one storm, bumping and battering each other in the process. To address the dangerously rocky approach, local ship owners petitioned the United States Congress, in 1831, to establish a lighthouse on Goat Island and a buoy at Prince’s Rock. The whale oil in Goat Island Light was first ignited in August of 1833 and the Prince Rock buoy was placed the following year. Unfortunately, the frequency of shipwrecks was not much abated by these measures.

 Joshua Herrick, Kennebunkport’s only United States Congressman, promoted a plan in 1844 to construct an 852 foot stone pier between Savin Bush and Milk Islands, thereby blocking the surge from nor’easters and providing tie ups for vessels seeking refuge. It was proposed that the breakwater, 20 feet wide at its base and 10 feet wide on top, be built economically of stone available on an “unclaimed island” 1/2 mile east of Milk Island. The plan was perceived by Congress as an effort to improve commerce in Cape Porpoise and the bill was forwarded to the Commerce Committee. There it sat for nearly a decade.

 During the tremendous storm of 1850, just before Christmas, Cape Porpoise Harbor was littered with disabled vessels. The schooner “Wave” went ashore outside the harbor late on the night of December 22nd. Captain Tolman and his crew were saved but the schooner was a total loss. A few hours later schooner “Susan Taylor” of Frankfort went ashore on Green Island. Schooner “Helen Mar” of Deer Isle, was the next to run aground on the rocks between Vaughn and Green Islands. Her bottom was knocked out and her cargo of lumber strewn willy nilly.   Schooner Albert soon parted her anchor chains and drifted afoul of Schooner Elizabeth causing that schooner to go aground. No lives were lost but the crews of Helen Mar, Albert and Elizabeth all huddled together on Green Island, unsheltered from the raging weather until they were rescued late in the evening of the 23^rd.

 As Deputy Collector of Customs for the Kennebunk District, Enoch Cousens pleaded with Congress in 1853 to approve the Cape Porpoise breakwater project. Additionally, Cousens asked that a lighthouse be built at the mouth of the Kennebunk River.  The breakwater bill was again tabled but the proposed lighthouse was approved. A 6^th order lens perched atop a 21 foot white frame structure was lit for the first time on January 1, 1857 at the end of the eastern pier. The new lighthouse was unpopular. It caused a great deal of confusion among mariners being so close to Cape Porpoise Light. A storm took it away some time before 1870 and it was never replaced.

Originally most of Cape Porpoise Harbor had a depth of about 13 feet at low tide and the entrance was obstructed by a bar. Under a $70,000 harbor improvement project finally adopted March 3, 1899, the entrance of the harbor was widened to 200 feet and deepened to 16 feet at low water. An anchorage area about 3,000 feet long, 600 feet wide, and 15 feet deep at low tide was completed by the end of 1902. In 1907, the crooked entrance channel was straighten and dug to a depth of 18 feet at low tide for an additional $46,000. These improvements made the harbor much safer as a place of refuge but a few notable shipwrecks occurred during and after the project.  

The number of documented shipwrecks in the Kennebunks exceeds 100. Some of the wrecks at Goose Rocks Beach, Cape Arundel and Kennebunk Beach will be explored in a free illustrated lecture at Kennebunk Library tonight, (July 22, 2010) at 7 pm.

Steamer Clotilda went ashore at Wells Beach on December 13, 1870. 

The steamer ran into rough seas that caused her heavy cargo to move. Her Master, Captain Young, put into Dublin, Ireland where 100 tons of coal was dropped in amongst the cargo to prevent further shifting. Consequential to this considerable delay Clotilda’s destination was changed to Portland, Maine.

Contemporary accounts of the Wells Beach accident were published in the Eastern Argus and the Bangor Daily Whig & Courier. A statement of the “material facts” is also included in a subsequent lawsuit filed against the ship and her cargo by Nathaniel Lord Thompson of Kennebunk. It appears in Volume 1 of Reports of Judgments of Hon. Edward Fox U.S. District Judge for Maine District First Circuit, “The weather at the time was stormy, dark and foggy, and blowing a double reef top-sail breeze with a heavy sea. The beach is of sand, quite flat, affording very poor holding-ground, and is at the head of Wells Bay, exposed to the full force of the winds and waves. The vessel went on at a low run of tides, near high water, and the sea broke heavily over her stern, she being fast in the breakers”. Clotilda’s stern, rose and fell digging her deeper and deeper into the soft sand.

The officers went ashore and found lodgings at the house of Mr. Owen Davis, who lived nearby. Robert Cleaves of Kennebunk approached the captain and offered his services to salvage the cargo. Young proposed to pay 1/4 of the shipped value for the discharge of the cargo on the beach above the spring tides to make the ship lighter and easier to get afloat. Cleaves accepted the proposal and the same evening a written contract was signed. Cleaves paid his men $2.00 per tide and ox teams with drivers were paid $4.00 per tide to unload all the soda, and glass, a portion of the sails and about 3/4 of the ferry parts. As the cargo was removed the lightened steamer moved 500-600 feet up the beach and turned broadside to the water with some of her hull being 13 feet deep in the sand. 150 tons of that sand worked its way into the ship. Having done all he could Cleaves assigned his contract with Young to Captain Nathaniel Lord Thompson of Kennebunk.

Thompson released the ship and her remaining cargo to the underwriters who, in March of 1871, hired the New York Coast Wrecking Company to get Clotilda afloat. An article in the Eastern Argus published July 7, 1871 described their Herculean task. “The wreckers first had to cut her round so that her stern would point off shore. By the aid of two steam pumps, a steam winch of great power, and four anchors weighing 4,000 pounds each, one twenty inch and three sixteen inch cables they turned her and hove her 1,000 feet to where she floated. Five times these heavy anchors were hove home and had to be replanted. As fast as they moved her down the beach they had to fill her with water to keep her from breaking up. On the full spring tide of the second month they expected to get her off, but their anchors failed. It was very difficult to work upon her as she listed so that cleats had to be nailed upon her decks for the men to walk upon”. The steamer finally floated off on June 29, 1871 and was towed to Union Wharf in Portland. Clotilda was not in good condition after sitting on Wells Beach for six months. The Eastern Argus reported, “She is the picture of a wreck: rusted, woodwork off, smoke stack and lower masts standing, dismantled and decks encumbered with the wrecking paraphernalia.”

The steamer was repaired and then sat at Union Wharf under the control of the United States Marshall for almost another year pending Nathaniel Lord Thompson’s lawsuit but was finally cleared from Boston for Liverpool, England in May of 1872.

The frequently repeated explanation of how the area of Biddeford called Fortunes Rocks got its name, like most such legends, has a seed of truth that over time has been generously fertilized with imagination.   

Francis Fortune, the story goes, was a 15 year old sailor who, after being captured by the British in 1778, was released on account of his youth. He was soon shipwrecked off Biddeford Pool and made it to shore “barely alive.” A local farmer named Rossater and his wife Peggy nursed the boy back to vigor. He repaid their kindness by remaining with them as a farm hand. It is said that after employing the shipwreck survivor for many years Mr. Rossater died. Francis married Peggy Rossater and together they had two sons, both of whom went west in the gold rush of 1849. Uncle Fortune and Aunt Peggy were beloved by the people of Biddeford. They supposedly bequeathed their saltwater farm to the town in exchange for comfortable support through their final years. The area was named after them in appreciation. 

Examination of the Biddeford Town Record Book V reveals that Francis Fortune was of Marblehead, Massachusetts when he married the widow Peggy Rositer on March 31, 1824. Marblehead records make no mention of Fortune’s ordeal with the British in 1778 but captive 15 year old sailors were typically released. Marblehead records do prove that Francis married Elizabeth Cloon in 1794 and fathered several of her Marblehead-born children; Samuel Cloon Fortune being the oldest. Elizabeth succumbed to consumption in 1818 and Francis went to sea as first mate aboard the Boston ship “Saco.” A near death experience off Gibraltar ended Fortune’s career on that vessel. He sailed next on the brig “Elizabeth,” of New York.  

The morning of December 15, 1823, the “Elizabeth” was headed for Portland, ME in a blinding snowstorm. Her captain, Charles D. Gardner, sailed her into Winter Harbor and dropped anchor there alongside several other vessels seeking shelter from the storm. 

Gardner later told a correspondent for the Eastern Argus how he and his crew came to be lashed to the rigging for five hours while the sea washed over them.

“The gale increasing with great violence, snowing very thickly about 4 pm the hemp cable parted and we continued to ride by the chain cable. We sent down our top-gallant mast, fore-top gallant yard and fore-yard; during which time we perceived her to draw her anchor toward the shore, the gale still increasing – and notwithstanding our utmost endeavors to save the vessel, about 7pm Monday she struck on the Lobster Rocks, so-called, near Fletcher’s Neck, in Biddeford, and shortly after bilged. About half past eight, the water being up to the cabin floor she keeled over to the starboard, on her beam ends, the sea, making fair breaches over her. In this perilous situation, we continued to cling to the wreck, if possible to save our lives til morning, not expecting assistance before.” 

By 2 am the exhausted crew was greatly relieved to see Winter Harbor men making their way toward the wreck in a boat. The tide had ebbed sufficiently to expose the rocks that were breaking the brig “Elizabeth” apart. One by one the frozen seamen were lowered from her bow on a rope and the Biddeford boat conveyed them safely to shore. It was reported in the Argus that “Captain Gardner was slightly frozen and two or three of the crew were severely so.” 

Francis Fortune was about 60 years old when Messrs. Bunker and Hussey of Winter Harbor rescued him from the wreck of the brig Elizabeth, off Lobster Rocks.  Presumably, he was one of the severely frozen crewmen carried ashore by widow Rossiter’s neighbor. According to census records, Peggy Rossiter was in her fifth decade when Fortune was delivered to her by sea. Three months later they were married. Both had children by previous marriages but it seems unlikely that Peggy bore any Fortune offspring and none appear in census records. 

Soon after Francis married Peggy, his son, Samuel Cloon Fortune, legally changed his name to Samuel Cloon.  It was the already wealthy Cincinnati, Ohio merchant, Samuel Cloon who in 1848 paid off John Benson’s mortgage on Francis and Peggy’s oceanfront property. It was he who provided for their comfort during the remainder of their natural lives.  

When Francis Fortune died December 10, 1858 at the age of 95, his wife Peggy had already passed.  Never in their lifetime, had the land thenceforth known as Fortunes Rocks, ever been conveyed to the town of Biddeford. In 1862 Samuel Cloon sold Fortunes Rocks to William Curtis who later sold it to summer resort developer, Warren C. Bryant. 

Francis and Peggy Fortune were simple people who played the cards they were dealt. The lives they actually lived are worthy of acknowledgement.

The leonine month of March lived up to its reputation in 1960. Nearly a foot and a half of snow fell on coastal York County March 4th. The following week, gale winds blowing from a southeasterly direction scoured Kennebunk Beach in an unusual way exposing the remains of a shipwreck that few remembered.

Bill Calder and Charles Robinson were the first to see crudely constructed ribs projecting 18 inches out of the sand on March 11^th and they called George Stevens, photographer for the Kennebunk Star. Some of the ribs were 2 feet wide and a foot thick giving the wreck an ancient appearance.  A six inch trenail (a wood fastening peg) removed from the planking had an unusual diamond-shaped wedged hammered into the end of it.

Sandy Brook, Editor of the Star, contacted marine expert and author, Edward Rowe Snow, at his home in Marshfield, Massachusetts and invited him up to examine the unusual wreck.  By the time Mr. Snow arrived with Marine Architect, Bror Tamm, the timbers were almost entirely covered again by the shifting sand. Kennebunk’s Fire Chief, Harrison Coleman was persuaded to dispatch a fire truck from the Washington Hose Company and volunteers removed enough sand with a high pressure fire hose to give the experts a good look at the 65 foot wreck where she lay some 70 feet from the seawall on Mother’s Beach.

Mr. Snow, who was perhaps best known as “The Flying Santa Claus” for his annual delivery of Christmas presents to the families of New England lighthouse keepers, returned to Massachusetts to write an article for the Patriot Ledger. In his column, Snow theorized that the Kennebunk Beach wreck was the remains of a coasting packet, the “Industry” built in 1770 by Irish shipbuilders in St. George, Maine.  “A colony of ship builders from Northern Ireland settled in St. George. They were the only ones to use a diamond-shaped wedge at a convex angle in the end of their trenails,” explained the maritime historian. Wreckage of the “Industry” superstructure had also been found in this area after she was lost on her maiden voyage. 

Fascinated by the story, Dick Bedard, who now lives in Columbia Falls, Maine and three of his friends dug down four feet in an effort to reach the keel of the vessel. “I have a trenail that I carefully removed from one of the rib stumps, and often show it to people,” Dick said recently.  The young men also found some broken pottery, pieces of leather punched with small triangular holes, unidentifiable chunks of a heavy, hard, black substance and half a pulley carved from lignum vitae, a wood species only found in South America and the West Indies.  Remains of an old leather boot, a bone and a china plate were also uncovered and turned over to the Kennebunkport Historical Society. 

According to Cyrus Eaton in his 1877 book, “Annals of the town of Warren,” Waterman Thomas had a store of West Indies goods in St George and leather shoes were made there before 1770 by Jonathan Nutting. The coasting packet, “Industry” was the first vessel ever built in St. George.  She was lost on her first trip to Boston in the fall of 1770 and no one onboard was ever heard from again.

Her captain was a promising young man who had invested in the vessel after sailing the coasting route for several years with Reuben Hall.  Captain David Patterson, 2^nd had built his bride of two years, Anna James, an elegant home in St George and their first child, David, had just been born.  

Mrs. Benjamin Packard was also aboard the ill-fated “Industry” with one of her children. Her husband, a carpenter, owned a share in the Industry and likely had a hand in building the ship. He and Anna Patterson, the Captain’s wife, soon commiserated in their grief and married each other.

Captain Patterson’s unmarried cousin, Abigail Patterson was also lost as were George Briggs, John Porterfield, Robert Gamble, John Mastick, David Malcolm of Massachusetts, Alexander Baird and Samuel Watson.

 The loss of the vessel was briefly noticed in the October 25, 1770 issue of The Boston News-Letter. “We hear that Capt. Patterson, in a vessel which sailed about three weeks ago from St. Georges, at the Eastward, bound to this place, having on board a number of passengers, is supposed to be lost in a storm which happened the day they sailed, as she has not since been heard of –and ‘tis said the wreck of a vessel was lately seen a little without the capes.”

 During the two weeks in 1960 when the shipwreck was visible, a piece of the stern post was examined by Robert W. Morse and Gerard Aycrigg, members of the restoration Dept. of the Mystic Marine Museum. They confirmed that the vessel was more than 100 years old but with such limited examination, would not support or refute Edward Rowe Snow’s identification of the “Industry”.

The Nowell brothers had a lot to prove to the people of Kennebunkport. When they were young, their father, Brigadier General Simon Nowell had operated an extensive business in town, mostly on borrowed capital. It failed in 1830 and many private citizens were compelled to accept less than $.50 on the dollar for their investments. Some even blamed the General for the failure of the Kennebunk Bank in 1831. The Nowell family moved to Bangor Maine but Thomas, Robert, George and Hiram all returned as adults to sail out of the District of Kennebunk.

Captain George W. Nowell and his wife Frances, the daughter of the wealthy Captain William Jefferds, built an elegant home in 1854 that still stands on Temple Street, next door to the Kennebunkport Post Office. Unlike his father, George rarely borrowed money. He did invest in several of the ships he sailed but had the fiscal foresight to insure his interests against loss. Diarist, Andrew Walker reports that Nowell also insured his own life for $3000. George had very good reasons to buy life insurance. The perils he faced on every voyage put his young family at risk.

He became master of the ship “Tropic” shortly after she was launched in 1855. On a return voyage from New Orleans in January 1857, the 882 ton vessel encountered a heavy gale off Bristol, RI. She lost her foresail and spent 36 hours on her beam ends. Though she eventually righted, her cargo had shifted and she listed to the starboard all the way home.

The odds of returning from a trip around Cape Horn were worst of all. In 1860, Nowell sailed the “Tropic” to San Francisco. Caught in a heavy fog on her return voyage, the Tropic was tacking to the starboard when suddenly she was run into on her port side by a large unknown bark. Captain Nowell later told a reporter for the New York Times, “Her jib boom went through our foresail and main topmast staysail; it broke short off and remained on board, with everything attached and the bark went clear. We shortened sail and hove to and laid by 12 hours. At noon the next day the weather was clear and nothing being in sight from aloft, filed away and proceeded.”

A few days later the Tropic came upon the disabled schooner “Potomac” of Franklin Maine. She was filling with water in a blowing gale. Nowell attempted to go alongside her but the seas were too rough. Captain Winslow Ray jumped overboard the schooner as did his mate and two crewmen. Nowell sent out a boat and successfully hauled to four men to safety.

January 6, 1862, the British brigantine, “Village Belle” was on her way from Clyde River, Nova Scotia to Trinidad with a cargo of lumber when she was dismasted in a heavy gale and began to take on water. By the time the “Tropic” came upon her she had 3 feet of water in her hold. Captain Nowell rescued the crew and landed them at Havre, France.

The odds finally caught up with Captain Nowell. His next voyage was to be his last. The ship “Tropic” cleared Philadelphia on December 11, 1862 with a cargo of coal for the Pacific Mail Steamship Company in San Francisco. She and her crew of twenty were never heard from again. Diarist, Andrew Walker reports that among the local sailors lost were very young men named Twambley, Larrabee, Wildes, Heckman, Tripp and Curtis.

George was not yet 40 when he perished. His youngest son Frank never met his father and was only 8 years old when his mother passed in 1872. Shipbuilder, David Clark bought their Temple Street home and George’s brother took his children to live in Bangor. The Nowell name was again extinct in Kennebunkport, but not forgotten.

The captain’s reputation as a prudent and charitable man was recognized by Victoria, Queen of England. She awarded Captain George W. Nowell, of the ship “Tropic”, an engraved spyglass in testimony of his humanity in rescuing her subjects, the crew of the Village Belle, of Nova Scotia. The Telescope and a certificate, signed by the Queen, have been proudly protected by the Kennebunkport Historical Society.

The people of Biddeford began preparing for a Presidential visit as soon as William Howard Taft was inaugurated on March 4, 1909. The first lady’s sister, Eleanor More, had a summer cottage at Biddeford Pool. Her husband, the noted evolutionist, Dr. Louis T More, told the local press to expect an August visit by the first family.

Unfortunately, Nellie Taft suffered a stroke soon after moving into the Whitehouse and the family’s vacation plans were curtailed. Mrs. More stood in for her convalescing sister at all official events and accompanied her to Beverly Massachusetts for the summer. By the end of July Eleanor felt confident enough about her sister’s condition to slip away to her cottage at Biddeford Pool for a few days. To facilitate the trip, the Presidential yacht, “Sylph”, was placed at her disposal.

The impressive 123 foot vessel was anchored near the mouth of the Saco River on the evening of July, 30, 1909. As an entrepreneurial venture, Captain Earnest Vinton of Saco offered a moonlight excursion to closely view the Presidential yacht from his motor launch, the “Item”. Twenty-nine tickets were sold. Captain Vinton had to borrow extra life preservers from the Captain of the “Nimrod” to comply with federal safety regulations that he carry one for each passenger aboard.

It was reported in the Boston Daily Globe that the overcrowded little launch set out from Island Wharf at twilight. After rounding Wood Island she approached the illuminated “Sylph” and passengers gathered on her port side to get a closer look. The little party boat heeled dramatically with the shifting weight. Following an instinct to compensate, the passengers all “jockeyed about” causing the “Item” to suddenly “turn turtle” near Sharps Rocks, spilling her human cargo into the inky water.

Commander of the Presidential Yacht, Lieutenant Roger Williams, heard some of the women cry for help as they struggled to stay afloat in their heavy layers of clothing. He immediately ordered the “Sylph’s” tender, with a five man crew, to the scene of the accident and trained his searchlight on the overturned party boat.

The launch “Nimrod” was the second boat to reach the scene. She carried all the rescued passengers to Saco and Biddeford; all but Mrs. Eugene A. Cutts who had sustained internal injuries when she became entangled in the gearing of the power boat. Mrs. Cutts was taken to the McBride cottage where she died the following day. As the capsized “Item” was towed to Basket Island and beached, the body of a 19 year old Biddeford girl, Miss Katie Lynch, who had probably been trapped inside the cabin, washed ashore on the island. Her companion, Miss Margaret Harvey, 25, was later reported missing but her body would not be recovered until two weeks later.

The accident was investigated by the County Coroner’s office. Benjamin Jackson of Biddeford Pool, who had built the “Item” in 1903, testified that she was designed to carry an engine weighing over 2 tons. A few months before the accident, Vinton had replaced her original engine with one that weighed only 10% as much. While examining the “Item’s” seaworthiness one juryman stepped down from the wharf into the boat and as he did she heeled over very suddenly. “We find from the evidence and from inspection that the said boat “Item”, owing to its form, is unstable, easily capsized and entirely unsafe for the carrying of passengers,” reported Coroner Walter Dennett. Captain Vinton had fulfilled the only existing safety requirement of carrying a life preserver for each passenger so no charges were filed but the loss of three lives rocked the towns of Saco and Biddeford.

At the time of the tragic accident, President Taft was in Florida witnessing Wilbur Wright’s record breaking 10 mile flight, during which the homemade plane reached amazing speeds in excess of 42 miles per hour. Mr. Taft was a big fan of new-fangled modes of transportation. He was finally persuaded to spend one night in Biddeford Pool in 1910. He arrived on an even larger official yacht, the 275 foot “Mayflower”. After enjoying a motorcar ride through the Pool he gave an informal speech at the Abenaki Country Club. The President spent the night at his sister in-law’s cottage and sailed away on the “Mayflower” at 10 o’clock the next morning.

Taft quietly returned to the Pool to visit his family once again just before Woodrow Wilson won the Presidency away from him in 1912. Even in Biddeford, William Howard Taft came in a distant third, after Wilson and Taft’s predecessor, President Theodore Roosevelt.

Thirty-six years after the British steam freighter Wandby piled up on the rocks near Walker’s Point, William D. Gilbertson, the assistant engineer on watch in the steamer’s engine room on March 9, 1921, wrote letters to the editor of the Kennebunk Star providing a firsthand account of the calamity.

Captain David Simpson mistook the whistling buoy off Cape Porpoise for the buoy on Cashes Ledge southeast of the Portland Lightship. “I got the order ‘full ahead,’” wrote Gilbertson. “The captain left the bridge for a well earned rest and as he passed the engine room he informed the chief engineer that we should be in Portland at about 1 p.m. as he had just picked up a buoy and from its markings. We found from the chart we were 40 miles due east of Portland. Just at that moment the lookout reported ‘breakers ahead’ and the captain rushed back to the bridge and rang the telegraph to me, ‘full astern.’ Sensing something was wrong, I swung the engines full astern without shutting down the steam at all, (bad practice) but I felt justified as I knew this must be an emergency. There was a terrific grinding and bumping going on and still the engines pounding over at full astern. At approximately 10:30 the captain rang stop and finish with engines.”

William Goodwin, winter caretaker of the George H. Walker estate, was the only Kennebunkport eyewitness to the shipwreck. He told the editor of the 1921 Ogunquit and Kennebunkport Bulletin that the noise of the enormous hull grinding on the rocks that foggy morning was strongly suggestive of a boiler factory falling down two flights of stairs. It was heard as far away as Cape Porpoise and soon nearly everyone living within a two-mile radius made their way to the scene of the accident. At Turbat’s Creek, artist Louis Norton grabbed his pastel box and headed toward the sound knowing that something worth capturing had just occurred. Coast Guard cutter Ossippee was summoned, but because of the dense fog she could not locate the steamer. School was cancelled in Kennebunkport so the kids could watch efforts to pull the 3991 ton freighter off the rocks.

By 3 p.m. the fog had lifted and the crew of the Wandby could see the crowd gathered not 20 yards away. “They assisted us to rig up a ship to shore emergency exit in case the ship broke her back,” wrote the engineer. “This was accomplished by putting a bosun’s chair on a wire from the forecastle head and moored to a large boulder on the shore.” A boatswain’s chair is a seat consisting of a board and a rope; commonly used while working aloft or over the side of a ship. As the tide receded the damage to the steamer was revealed. The hull had been pierced by the rocks to a depth of three feet and a crack extended 30 or 40 feet toward the bow. At the next high tide the engine room filled with water and efforts to float the Wandby off were abandoned. Captain Simpson conferred with agents for Lloyd’s, the underwriter and it was decided to land the crew.

William Gilbertson and Captain Simpson stayed with the Eldridge family in Kennebunkport Village. Their hosts filled every minute of their stay with entertainment. They went to Cape Porpoise dances, dug for clams, took day trips to Portland, etc. Four cases of real Scotch whiskey were brought off the Wandby and sold to eager Kennebunkport consumers for five dollars a bottle. Close friendships developed to the extent that tears were shed when the crew was sent back to England three weeks later.

Author Kenneth Roberts read Gilbertson’s letter in the Star and with his typical directness, wrote to him for clarification on a few points, such as, “How the Wandby, in coming straight in on the rocks, had contrived to miss both the Nubble and Boon Island Lights?” and “What happened to the Captain of the Wandby for losing his vessel?” Gilbertson replied that the fog had been dense for several days and no land had been spotted since the freighter left Algiers. Captain Simpson, as a result of the accident, was demoted to 1st mate on another vessel owned by Wandby owners, Ropner & Company, but within two years he was reinstated as master.

Frank A. Howard purchased the wreck of the Wandby from Lloyds and had most of her broken up during the six months that followed the accident, but salvagers eventually abandoned the site. In 1937, Superior Court Judge Arthur Chapman awarded what scrap was left of the freighter to Everett Greenleaf, Charles Robinson, Richard Nadeau and Harry Shackford. A large boiler rising 20 feet off the ocean floor and pieces of the Wandby’s hull remain at the site to this day and are occasionally visited by shipwreck scuba divers.

The Alice S. Wentworth, previously known as the Lizzie A. Tolles, was the last commercial coasting schooner to regularly sail out of Wells. The two-masted, gaff-rigged vessel enjoyed some notable associations during her illustrious career.

Schooner Lizzie A Tolles was built in South Norwalk, Conn., in 1863. After carrying bricks, coal and oysters between Connecticut and Long Island, N.Y. for 28 years, she went ashore and her owners decided it was time to sell.

Arthur Stevens of Wells, and his brother Charles, purchased the schooner in 1891 even though she was showing her age. The young Stevens brothers freighted bricks, coal, coke, lumber, salt, granite and ice along the eastern seaboard. Arthur bought out Charles’ share of the old schooner and, in 1904, painstakingly renovated her with the finest lumber from his own Wells saw mill. She was re-launched the following year as the remarkably beautiful Alice S. Wentworth, having been completely rebuilt from stem to eagle-adorned stern.

John Furnace Leavitt, one time curator at Mystic Seaport, crewed on the Alice S. Wentworth as a boy and always admired her. “A deep sheer was the vessel’s outstanding characteristic,” he wrote in his 1970 book “Wake of the Coasters.” “She was painted a dark moss green from waterline to planksheer and had a black bulwark above it.”

When Zebulon Tilton, a Martha’s Vineyard seaman of legendary skill and personality, first saw the 72-foot Alice S. Wentworth in 1906, he too fell in love with her graceful lines. He sold his own boat and signed on with Arthur Stevens as captain of the rebuilt schooner. She was considered the fastest and most agile vessel in her class, but entering Wells Harbor was a challenge, even for her. The inlet was nearly dry at low water and there was a sand bar across the channel. On each trip home the crew went ahead in a yawl boat and buoyed the changeable harbor with stakes before poling the motor less Wentworth into port. She waited in Kittery for a month in 1910 before conditions allowed her to enter Wells Harbor.

Tilton finally purchased his beloved Alice S. Wentworth in 1921 and successfully sailed her out of Martha’s Vineyard for a decade, but in the early 1930s, his bills got ahead of him. He was in danger of losing her. Some Vineyard summer visitors formed a corporation to save the old schooner and Tilton’s livelihood. The corporation, which included Broadway actress Katherine Cornell, nationally syndicated cartoonist Denys Wortman and Hollywood actor, James Cagney, raised more than enough money to purchase the schooner for $701.

Cagney was having contract trouble with Warner Brothers over their unauthorized release of the movie “Ceiling Zero.” He filed suit against the studio and went into hiding for six months on Martha’s Vineyard. The movie star fell in love with the Vineyard and the Alice S. Wentworth, upon which he happily spent many exile hours. The schooner, with her charismatic captain and her star-studded associations, became world-famous.

Captain Tilton’s eyesight failed in 1943 and the corporation sold the Alice S. Wentworth to Captain Parker Hall. After World War II she returned to the Maine coast and was refitted for pleasure, sailing weekly windjammer cruises out of Boothbay and Portland Harbor until 1960.

The Alice S. Wentworth was almost 100 years old and leaking profusely in 1961 when the Lowell Sun reported that “Ann White, a sedate landlubber nearing 40 got so tired of waiting for her ship to come in that she just went out and bought it.” She didn’t know port from starboard, but had always dreamed of going to sea. As a maritime history buff, Ann knew that the Wentworth was reborn at the age of 40, so when the schooner was advertised for sale she took it as a sign. She quit her job and sank her life savings into the Alice S. Wentworth. After a few years she found herself in over her head; figuratively and literally.

Anthony Athanas, owner of Anthony’s Pier 4 Restaurant in Boston, purchased the schooner in 1965 for $13,500 at a U.S. Marshall’s sale and docked her at the restaurant for his patrons to admire. During the decade that followed she sank four times. Each time, at great expense. Anthony hauled her up and filled her hull with bales of Styrofoam to keep her afloat. The beautiful Alice S. Wentworth, the last commercial coasting schooner to sail the New England coast, finally broke apart in a 1974 storm at the impressive age of 111 years old.