[Lang]

Yes, he did not have enough fuel and as I said would have run out before Madeira. I think he said he had twenty hours sailing which would have left him about 50 miles short. They were very big news in Madeira and everywhere else for that matter and articles of the time indicate the frigate trip was a PR exercise offered by the authorities when it became clear they had survived the storm and needed fuel. They were not in a life or death situation.

I reread the story in my copy. Looks like we both failed to take notes.

He certainly said he had a hammer handy to tap a hole as you mentioned.

He tried to stop a ship at night with his torch SOS but it just sailed past after acknowledging the signal. The rescue did not come from the torch SOS. For some reason they let many probable rescue ships sail past because they were going in the wrong direction or for some other strange decision.

He tried the radio which was not cooperating but finally he "hooked" the tanker which I read to mean talked to him on the radio. I saw somewhere Carlin talking about this pick-up and he said the tanker came close to look at them out of curiosity. Maybe "hooked" a tanker mean't when it came to investigate they just jumped up and down waving?

Anyhow it is all just supposition and nit picking and the main message for me is they suffered a disaster, recovered, and instead of giving up after a fine try like most people, maintained their resolve into the next year to begin again.

Elinore obviously had the passion also and although she could have stayed with her family, returned to help preparations which despite her already proven susceptibility to seasickness led to the ultimately successful second departure. At that stage they were a team (with one Chief and one Indian) and she should be acknowledged for her courage and tenacity.

He was certainly rough on her. I thought his attitude to getting the rope caught in the prop was a bit off. "You got it caught, you get it out". He forced the poor girl to dive under the boat for hours while he pottered around inside working on the engine.

Anyone who has ever gone boating with a woman knows the sea has some magic effect of bringing on stupidity or maybe the problem is it has some magic effect of turning the male partner into a shouting Captain Bligh!

Lang