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George Piercey, Page 2

George Piercey

'It was locked with the biggest padlock I had ever seen,' Piercey said later. 'I got a rock and broke it.'

They walked into the little house and thought they'd have done just as well to stay in the open. The wind blew in through the large cracks and seams in the walls. 'the cold was bone chilling,' Piercey said. Fate had played a cruel trick on the three shipwrecked men. They had escaped drowning and now had to avoid death by hypothermia. Their clothing, soaked with seawater, was now heavy with ice and snow.

Woodland collapsed from exhaustion shortly after entering the hut. 'Ah, boys, here's where I dies,' he said to his companions. Piercey told him to 'have heart,' but the mate, too weak to go any farther, lay down to die. Piercey and Elford made him as comfortable as possible under such deplorable conditions. They told him they were going on and would bring back help. With that, Woodland uttered the last words he ever spoke: 'Yes, tell them I'm here.'

Knowing that they were somewhere in the vicinity of Grole, Piercey and Elford set out once more in the winter storm. They struggled along, up to their waists in snow, and sometimes plunging through thin ice into rivers and mud holes. Cold, hungry and nearing exhaustion, they pushed on, though each step was now a tremendous effort. They knew that stopping would mean certain death for, in their wet clothing, they would freeze very quickly. The two comrades tried to offer each other some words of comfort and encouragement and prayed to God to help them. Elford was beginning to feel the effects of their ordeal by now.

'George, I'm going to cut some boughs, I'm going to lie down on them, and then I'm going to die,' he told Piercey. Only a desparate and exhausted man, near the end of human endurance, could have made such a statement.

'Damn the dying! We've got to go on,' retorted the plucky Piercey. He refused to go on alone and encouraged the Captain to try again, putting one arm around Elford to help him along through the snow.

Cold, exhausted, lost in the stark whiteness surrounding them, they both knew they couldn't go much farther. Night passed into day, and then into night again. They were still struggling through the hostile whiteness seeking help. Then Piercey told Elford he thought he could see a man in the distance, coming towards them.

'Ah, my son, your poor eyes are playing tricks.'

It was no mirage, however. It was 70-year-old Matthew Burton and his son, Robert, who were out cutting wood.

'We're shipwrecked,' Piercey said as the old man approached the two stragglers. At once Burton sent his son for help. The young man 'was off like a shot out of a gun,' Piercey later recalled.

Help arrived from the community of Grole within minutes, with kettles of hot tea, grub boxes, and sleds. Piercey and Elford were taken to the Burton home where they received warm, dry clothing and food. It was their first taste of food since abandoning their ship on the icy rocks some 64 hours before.

Upon hearing that Woodland had been left behind in the ice house, without adequate shelter, a group of about 20 men set out after him. Sadly, it was too late. Woodland was dead, there in the little hut, a victim of the harsh winter elements. Piercey and Elford mourned the loss of their friend but realized there was nothing more they could have done. If they had stayed behind with him, all three would have perished. Henry Burton assisted in building a coffin and the deceased Woodland was laid out in the schoolhouse.

On Christmas Eve, 1934 the two survivors were put on board the 'S.S. Cape Aguthas', along with the body of their friend, and brought home to Fortune. Their nightmarish ordeal was over and they reached home in time to spend Christmas with their families. Saddened by the loss of their comrade, they were, nevertheless, thankful to be home.

The day after arriving home, Piercey suddenly took ill. His illness was most likely caused by the severe beating he had sustained from the ocean. He was taken to hospital where he spent nearly a month recovering.

Story © Fay Herridge 1990

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