A GREAT LAKES SAILOR
Remembered
Honoring Captain Walter C. Iler, Part 2
by Janis Stein

As the Great Storm of 1913 roars on, Captain Walter C. Iler grows weary as he commands the George G. Crawford on an angry Lake Huron.

In his travels south, Captain Iler passed the upbound Argus. According to author David G. Brown in his book White Hurricane, “It was still just light enough to see other ships through the swirling snow. Captain Paul Gutch (of Harbor Beach) in the pilothouse of the steamer Argus watched the Crawford making heavy weather as it lumbered down the lake. Both vessels were struggling in the mountainous seas. Aboard the Crawford, Captain Iler was also able to make out the upbound Argus as it smashed headlong into the seas…Something happened just before the two ships lost sight of each other that haunted Walter Iler the rest of his days.

“‘The Argus seemed to crumple like an eggshell,’ he said. ‘Then, she was gone.’”

“One minute the other ship (the Argus) was struggling to stay out of the deadly trough, and the next it was gone with twenty-four sailors…The indelible image of a modern steel freighter simply folding up and sinking could not be erased from the minds of the men who witnessed it.”

The hurricane winds raged on, leaving sailors aboard the Crawford little time to deal with their thoughts about the fate of the Argus. Sunday was anything but peaceful.

By 1 a.m. on Monday, November 10, Captain Walter C. Iler figured his location was nearing the southern end of Lake Huron. Two options lay before him. He needed to run ashore or drop anchor in an attempt to turn the Crawford around. For Iler, running aground would be a last resort.

With the skill of a seasoned pilot, Captain Iler backed the Crawford full speed until the mate said her headway had stopped. At the Captain’s order, the mate dropped the first anchor.

According to David Brown’s words in White Hurricane, “Unable to climb out of the troughs, and running out of sea room as he approached the southern end of Lake Huron, Captain Iler had no other alternative than to attempt to anchor. He put down first one and then the other bower on their full lengths of chain. Both anchors dug into the bottom and the ship came head to the seas, but not for long. The strain was too strong for the port chain, which parted not far from the anchor. The starboard chain was not up to taking all of the strain. A few minutes later it parted near the ship. The Crawford was once again at the storm’s mercy.”

Iler noted that at 1:10 a.m. on the morning of November 10, both anchors were lost, and he and his crew faced a blinding snowstorm. Winds from the north gusted at 75 to 80 miles per hour. At the rate they were going, the Crawford would soon be at the end of the lake with no way to fend off the inevitable.

The 50-year-old captain was growing weary. Captain Iler, though, would not go down without a fight.

I decided I would keep trying to turn around until she went on the beach and then I would feel as if I had done my part and done all any other man could have done to save his ship, but at 2 A. M. the wind shifted from north to northwest and lull came with it and I got her head to wind and heading north and started back up the lake and at noon on Monday it had stopped snowing and I was back up abreast of Pointe Aux Barques.

Captain Walter C. Iler, his crew and the George G. Crawford had survived the worst of the Great Storm of 1913, but the Crawford still had the journey ahead before she made it safely to port. Though Captain Iler tried to assess any damage the ship sustained, the Crawford’s deck and sides were so laden with snow and ice, he could not determine the full extent of her damages. And while the crew knew only the fate of the Argus, they had yet to find out the calamity this hurricane storm caused.

Be sure to look for the conclusion next month to learn the reaction of the Lake Carriers’ Association to the Great Storm of 1913, and why The Marine Review ensured its readers that the weather bureau was not to blame for the tragedies on the lakes.

© 2010 Stein Expressions, LLC