sexta-feira, 27 de junho de 2014

Pesca do bacalhau


O naufrágio do lugre bacalhoeiro "Maria Carlota"
Continuação

Quadro com a imagem do salvamento dos náufragos
Pintura da autoria de Gunnar van Rosen
Comandante do navio "Charles A. Stafford"

Há nas muitas histórias por conhecer relacionadas com a pesca do bacalhau, casos e situações de tal forma insólitos, que por serem reais justificam em absoluto a sua publicação. Nesta circunstância, trata-se de na notícia publicada sobre como foi visto o salvamento dos náufragos do lugre “Maria Carlota” pelo capitão do navio americano, em cujo relato revela o reencontro de um antigo tripulante do navio bacalhoeiro, a bordo da baleeira do navio integrando a equipa de socorristas. Abaixo transcrevo essa notícia, que se explica por si, como segue:

ARMY SHIP RESCUES 31 FISHERMEN
New York - CP* - A back-breaking struggle with wind and waves in the tossing North Atlantic was yast another volunteer job to the seven lifeboat crewmen of the U. S. Army Hospital Ship Charles A. Stafford who rescued 31 Portuguese fishermen from a foundering schooner.
The report of the two and a half hour ordeal at the oars last Tuesday 640 miles southeast of Newfoundland was told yesterday when the Stafford docked here.
Two trips were made in waves 30 to 35 feet high to take off Capt. Antonio Fernandez Matias, master of the three-masted fishing vessel, Maria Carlota, and his crew of 30. Last to leave the schooner, the captain set it afire to sink it.

PUMPING AND PRAYING Capt Gunnar van Rosen, 63, of Brooklyn, master of the hospital ship said "I wasn't afraid we couldn't make it. I wouldn't have my men attempt anything if I didn't think I could do it personally. If the seas had been too rough, I would have rescued the men with a breeches buoy. "When we first hove to near her," Van Rosen said, "everyone on board was a-pumping and a-praying."
The master of the stricken ship said none of the men had slept' for 48 hours, because "we didn't dare relieve one man from his bailing duties.”

PERSONAL MISSION A radio message relayed from the Maria Carlota, Nov. 4, said she was in a sinking condition, her decks almost awash. Rescue craft were dispatched by the coast guard, and the British liner Queen Elizabeth changed its course to go to the schooner's aid. The Stafford reached the stricken ship in five hours and the other aid was recalled.
It was a personal mission to Proudencio Camacho, 31, of Queens, who pulled an oar in the lifeboat put out by the Stafford.
Half-way on the hazardous quarter-mile to the foundering ship, he learned it was the Maria Carlota, on which he had shipped in 1943 for voyages between Lisbon and the Grand Banks off Newfoundland. Nineteen of his former shipmates were aboard the sinking ship, he learned later.

RETURN ARRANGED The 31 Portuguese were expedited through the Immigration Naturalization Service, and will be housed at the Seamen's Church Institute until Nov. 14 when a Greek liner, the Nea Hellas, will take them to Portugal.
The rescued seamen told through an interpreter that some of Camacho's former shipmates recognized him as he strained at an oar in the lifeboat, and a cry went up: "Look who comes to rescue us. He is the answer to our prayers."
One of those at the oars of the lifeboat was Joseph Daly. 67, a short, stocky boatswain's mate, of Cliffside Park. N. J. Daly, who had two sons in the navy and one in the army in World War II, has been at sea since he was 14 years old.
(In “Binghamton NY Press Grayscale, 1947)

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