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In early December of 1926 the Ryouei Maru (often called 'Ryo Yei' in contemporary sources), a small fishing boat with a crew of 12 under Captain Toshizou Miki, leaves western Japan to hunt for tuna in a fishing ground around 100 kilometers of the coast of Tokyo. A week later, as they return to port, a crankshaft in the engine breaks and the ship loses all power. The engine proves to be broken beyond repair, and the ship is left drifting eastwards, out into the Pacific. There is no radio on board, no way to tell anyone what has happened. The crew rig their auxiliary sail to try and get home, but the wind is against them and blows them further and further east. Attempts to contact ships seen in the distance prove fruitless. By Christmas, they're 1,600km from Japan. Captain Miki calculates that their supplies, carefully rationed, can last 3 months or more, and the crew decides that the best course left to them is to go with the winds and try to make it to America while hoping to meet encounter a ship that can rescue them along the way. No such ship is seen, and at the beginning of March the food runs out, a long way short of land. The first death, that of the chief engineer, comes on March 9th, with the rest of the crew gradually following. Captain Miki and one crewman, slowly starving, survive until the middle of May. The Ryouei Maru continues to float westward for several more months until it's finally discovered drifting off the entrance to the Straight of Juan de Fuca by the American cargo ship Margaret Dollar in October of 1927. A boat from the Darrar boards the Ryouei Maru and finds the bodies of the crew and the ship's log in which Captain Miki detailed their terrible journey until shortly before his death. Ryouei Maru is towed to Seattle. The crew are cremated and their ashes and personal effects are sent back to Japan, and the ship is broken up. Apart from a detailed Japanese Wikipedia page there's practically nothing on the internet, either in Japanese or English, about this story; some contemporary articles in the archives for the NYT and Post-Intelligencer, a few references in out of print books on Seattle history, someone's labor of love website on the Margaret Dollar, a couple of Japanese blogs debunking an urban legend that grew up around the story in the 1960s. Otherwise, there's nothing - "Ryouei Maru" mostly turns up links to modern-day ships with the same name, or 'The Ship of Mummies', the urban legend-y retelling of the story that sprang up in the 1960s that throws in cannibalism and a made-up ship's log with a bunch of supernatural happenings. When I first read the wiki page I had to look up the 1927 newspaper articles before I was sure it was a real story. It's stayed with me since, mostly because of the captain's letter. Among the personal effects sent home from Seattle was a letter that Captain Miki, around the time of his last log entry, when he knew there was no hope of being rescued, wrote to his family. He tells his wife to make sure that their son goes to school, and gives her the names of people who'll help the family now he's gone. He tells his daughter that he's sorry he won't see her graduate, but he knows she's a good, strong girl, and she has to be the one to help her mother now. The message to his son is one line long and reads: 'Son, I'm your daddy so you have to listen to me. When you grow up, you can't ever be a fisherman. Promise me this, you have to promise me. Do as your mom tells you from now on.'
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Jun 20, 2016 00:15
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| # ¿ May 2, 2024 20:54 |
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