Authors: Stephen Puleo
Dark Tide (44 page)
By far, the most thorough and beneficial analysis I found on the economic benefits of rum and molasses to the American colonies was John J. McCusker’s
Rum and the American Revolution: The Rum Trade and the Balance of Payments of the Thirteen Continental Colonies
(New York & London, Garland Publishing, 1989). Within this remarkably rich and well-documented work is a chapter most valuable to my research entitled: “Molasses in the Continental Colonies: Its Importation, Consumption, Distillation, and Re-exportation.”
As for the slave trade itself, I also drew from and found most helpful Phyllis Raybin Emert, ed.,
Colonial Triangular Trade: An Economy Based on Human Misery
(Carlisle, Mass., Discovery Enterprises, 1995); James Pope-Hennessy’s
Sins of the Fathers: A Study of the Atlantic Slave Traders, 1441–1807
(New York, Alfred A. Knopf, 1968); Peter Kolchin’s
American Slavery, 1619–1877
(New York, Hill and Wang, 1993); Daniel P. Mannix’s
Black Cargoes: A History of the Atlantic Slave Trade, 1518–1865
(New York, The Viking Press, 1962); and Isidor Paiewonsky’s
Eyewitness Accounts of Slavery in the Danish West Indies and Graphic Tales of Other Slave Happenings on Ships and Plantations
(New York, Fordham University Press, 1989).
There are many books about tension in the American colonies leading up to the American Revolution, much of it spawned by the Sugar (or Molasses) Act, and fueled by the Stamp and Tea Acts. Two of the best are I.R. Christie’s
Crisis of Empire: Great Britain and the American Colonies, 1754–1783
(New York, Norton & Company, 1966); and Pauline Maier’s
From Resistance to Revolution: Colonial Radicals and the Development of American Opposition to Britain, 1765–1776
(New York, Random House, 1972).
For a broad overview of Boston history, including its rough-and-tumble politics during this time period, see Jack Beatty’s
The Rascal King: The Life and Times of James Michael Curley, 1874–1958
(Reading, Mass., Addison-Wesley, 1992); Richard D. Brown’s and Jack Tager’s
Massachusetts: A Concise History
(Amherst, Mass., University of Massachusetts Press, 2000); and university historian at Boston College and preeminent Boston historian Thomas H. O’Connor’s
The Boston Irish: A Political History
(Boston, Northeastern University Press, 1995) and
The Hub: Boston Past and Present
(Boston, Northeastern University Press, 2001).
Finally, I found the following works helpful for background on topics specific to this book and for general historical background. Articles and listings included: H.W. Frohne’s “The Hotel Belmont,” in the
Architectural Record
(July 1906); J. B. Martindale, founder,
Martindale’s American Law Directory
(New York, G.B. Martindale, January 1919, January 1924, January 1930), and
The Martindale-Hubbell Law Directory
(New York, Martindale-Hubbell, Inc., 1940);
Moody’s Analyses of Investments
and
Moody’s Manual of Investments: American and Foreign
(New York, Moody’s Investors Service, various issues 1914–1936); Distinguished Biographers Selected from Each State, eds.,
The National Cyclopedia of American Biography
(New York, James T. White & Company, various years).
Books included: Edward Behr’s
Prohibition: Thirteen Years That Changed America
(New York, Arcade Publishing, 1996); Pete Davies’s
American Road: The Story of an Epic Transcontinental Journey at the Dawn of the Motor Age
(New York, Henry Holt, 2002); Gina Kolata’s
Flu: The Story of the Great Influenza Pandemic of 1918 and the Search for the Virus That Caused It
(New York, Simon & Schuster, 1999); and Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr.’s
The Crisis of the Old Order: The Age of Roosevelt
(Boston, Houghton Mifflin, 1957).
W
riting may be a solitary act, but I can verify that writing a
book
is far from a solo effort. I’m deeply thankful to the many friends, family members, colleagues, and well-wishers who have helped me along the way with encouraging words and kind deeds.
Some have selflessly shared their time and talents to lend a hand with the technical aspects of the book, such as helping with research or reading the manuscript. Others have provided me with emotional strength by expressing enthusiastic interest in my progress, or displaying an unconditional willingness to listen to my (endless) chatter about the story. A few have done both. I can be a bit of a “molasses geek” once I really get rolling on this topic—I’m grateful that no one ever made me feel that way.
The strength of any nonfiction book starts with good research, so I’ll start there as well. My profound thanks go to Elizabeth Bouvier, head of archives, Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court, who tracked down Hugh Ogden’s damage awards and his final report, and later, discovered the forty-volume transcript of the molasses flood hearings. Neither of us was sure the latter
actually
existed, which was why one of the highlights of my research was Elizabeth’s call to me on an August morning to say that, after much dogged searching, she had located the transcripts (I was at the Social Law Library in Boston that afternoon to begin reading the first volume). Elizabeth also found Judge Bolster’s inquest notes.
I’m indebted to Brian Harkins, head of reference, June Strojny, director of library operations, and the entire staff at the Social Law Library in Boston, who were helpful, courteous, and efficient during the course of my research. That includes the copy center team, one of the most responsive groups I’ve seen. The time I spent at SLL at a small desk in a quiet upstairs nook, perusing thousands of pages of transcripts, was among my most enjoyable on this project.
Other repositories that have my thanks are the UMass-Boston Healy Library, where I spent hours in the microfilm room, the University of Pennsylvania archives, Harvard Law School archives, MIT Special Collections Library, and the library at Boston University.
Bill Noonan, Boston Fire Department archivist, provided me with most of the photos in this book, and dug up general BFD records and information on individual firefighters (George Layhe, Bill Connor, Nat Bowering, and others). The BFD has a storied history and a proud tradition, and Bill is an outstanding chronicler and custodian of each. I’m appreciative of his enthusiastic support from the very beginning.
For encouraging this book in its early stages and his kind comments thereafter, author Thomas O’Connor, university historian at Boston College, has my gratitude, as does my friend, BC professor of history Jim O’Toole, for his strong support and the regular conversations we share on writing, history, and politics.
I offer my sincere thanks to Cecile Wright, Peter Stavropulos, and Jonathan Burbank, my colleagues and friends at Bull Information Systems, for giving me the chance to pursue my dream of writing this book.
Dark Tide
certainly would not be in your hands today—and may never have been finished at all—without their flexibility and willingness to try something different. I hope I have lived up to the confidence they have shown in me. I will never forget it.
My longtime and dear friend Ellen Keefe provided invaluable assistance and encouragement throughout this project. She spent tireless hours helping me with the research, reading the manuscript, and lending her legal expertise. She has also served as a “molasses ambassador” of sorts, spreading word of my progress and building anticipation for this book with her family, friends, and professional colleagues. I cannot thank her enough for everything she has done.
Dark Tide
is a richer work for her involvement; I am richer for her friendship.
My agent, Joy Tutela, at the David Black Literary Agency, has believed passionately in this book from the start. She has been an advisor, a confidante, an editor, and a friend, and has fulfilled those roles with grace, enthusiasm, honesty, humor, savvy, and class. She has helped temper my expectations when necessary and celebrate my achievements when appropriate. Her first name is also an apt description of what it’s like to work with her. There would be no book without her. Thanks for everything, Joy.
Amy Caldwell, my editor at Beacon Press, had the “big picture” vision to recognize that
Dark Tide
was more than a disaster story, and edited the manuscript thoughtfully, shrewdly, and with great care. I was also inspired by the enthusiasm Amy and the rest of the Beacon team showed for the book.
I’m immensely grateful to my parents, Rose and Tony Puleo, for their interest, their pride, and their love. They have always encouraged me, and have been in my corner each and every day, throughout this project and always. I’m honored and humbled by all they have done for me.
My final and deepest debt of gratitude is to my “First Lady,” my wife and best friend, Kate. There are no words that can convey either the full measure of her contributions or the miracle of our love. She is my music and my inspiration, a great source of my creative strength. Throughout the research and writing, she has stood where she always stands—at my side—supporting and encouraging me, fulfilling the role of counselor and confidante, offering gentle criticism and unabashed enthusiasm, listening to my daily updates as though nothing could be more important. If that weren’t enough, she is one of the best copy editors and proofreaders I know. To say that I could not have completed this book without Kate seems like the most inadequate of tributes—I can’t imagine making it through the day without her. For all of these reasons, and because she is the greatest blessing of my life,
Dark Tide
is dedicated to her.
Each of these people has contributed immeasurably to this book, and their efforts have only enhanced its quality. Any shortcomings, mistakes, errors of omission, or faulty analysis are my responsibility alone.
I
received a copy of the preceding letter in April 2004—more than eighty-five years after it was written and eight months after
Dark Tide
was published—from a woman in Lunenberg, Massachusetts. “I have just finished reading
Dark Tide
and enjoyed it very much,” Elizabeth Burnap wrote in her cover note to me. “I was particularly eager to read it because I knew the man who would later become my father-in-law had been at the scene when the tank collapsed. I thought you might be interested in reading his first person account of it. I had thought some of his gruesome descriptions might be slightly exaggerated due to his age but they seem to closely parallel the ones in your book.”
On January 15, 1919, Cameron “Cam” Burnap was a seventeen-year-old merchant mariner stationed aboard the training ship
Nantucket,
which was moored in Boston’s inner harbor adjacent to the Commercial Street wharf, just a couple hundred yards from the molasses tank. When the steel receptacle collapsed just after 12:30 p.m., Cam and his fellow crew members rushed to help the unfortunate souls who were swallowed by the wave of molasses. They worked for hours pulling victims from molasses so thick that “it acted just like quicksand,” and hours more washing their clothing before the molasses dried. That night, as he readied for bed, Cam decided to write to his mother. He had scrubbed away the molasses that covered his face and snarled his hair, but he knew his memories of the day would be more difficult to wipe away. The
Nantucket
crew members were first on the scene after the flood engulfed the Commercial Street waterfront. Exhausted and still shaken from his ordeal, Cam penned the following five-page letter to his mother:
Dear Mother,
Well I suppose you are wondering about how I am after the explosion. I am all right so there is nothing to worry about. The big molasses tank burst about 12:30 just as we were going to dinner. We all rushed out immediately to do what we could for the unfortunate people caught in the flood of molasses. The tank was only about two hundred yards from the ship so we didn’t have to go far.
There was no explosion, only a loud hissing as the tank burst and the two million gallons of molasses came flooding out. It swept houses and every thing out into the middle of the park where we drill and piled them up in great wrecks. The molasses was from two to four feet deep and we had to wade around in this with all our clothes on, shoes, leggings, jackets and sweaters for it was cold and we had time to take nothing off. Lots of people were drowned in the street by being knocked down with the force of the first flood of molasses. Once down under three feet of molasses it was impossible to get up with out help because the molasses was so thick and it acted just like quicksand. The fellows from the
Nantucket
were the first on the scene and went right to work clearing the houses of people who were caught in them when the flood came. Most of them were caught and pinned way at the bottom of the wreckage and we had to use axes and crowbars to get at them, and some of the sights that we had to look at were enough to turn a fellows stomach, men and women with legs and arms gone insides squashed out. Eyes, ears, and jaws missing. They were all covered with molasses and so were we and it was hard to get any kind of hold on them to carry them away. Another fellow and I saw a pair of legs sticking up out of the molasses and we went to pull out what we thought was a person but nothing but two legs and a part of some hips came out when we pulled.
We worked over an hour getting one man out who was caught under a building but was up out of the molasses so that he was not smothered. There was a door and two or three beams over him and his legs were caught in a pair of stairs. He certainly was game because he was talking to us most of the time and tell us what to do. The doctor gave him two shots of dope and a lot of whiskey. I don’t know whether he was alive when he got to the hospital or not.
I may get home Friday or Saturday as I hear that they are going to give us some extra liberty, but then you never know until the last minute.
We all had to wash every stitch of clothing that we had on before the molasses dried. It came out pretty good. I had it all over my face and in my hair. We are all going around in whatever kind of clothes that we can get together tonight until our others get dry. Well I shall have to close now as I am pretty tired, and see if I can get a little sleep, although I doubt it, after seeing all that I saw today.
Lots of love, Cam.
P.S. Received your letter this A.M. You will probably find a lot of mistakes in spelling and etc. but I am so tired that I don’t know which is what. Cameron.
Cam needn’t have worried about mistakes. His letter is vividly descriptive and surprisingly lucid, given its author’s youth and his fatigue at the end of a harrowing day. It is a rich recounting of the first day of the molasses flood, a primary source I wish I had uncovered while I was researching
Dark Tide,
and I’m grateful to Elizabeth Burnap for sharing it
.
Knowing what I know today about Cam Burnap, he almost certainly would have appeared as a character in the book. Yet the fact that the letter surfaced months after
Dark Tide
’s publication is part of a different and compelling story in its own right, one that began to emerge immediately after the book appeared and has continued to develop: the many connections I have been fortunate to make with descendants of those involved in the flood saga, and the impact the book has had on their own histories.
In the ten months following the publication of
Dark Tide
in September 2003, I made more than fifty speaking appearances before several thousand people at bookstores, libraries, historical societies, classrooms, and community events, engagements that continue today. In general, the molasses flood story strikes a visceral chord with audiences: they identify with the book’s real-life characters, welcome its historical context, and express thanks that a full accounting now exists of one of the nation’s most unusual disasters. I am grateful for and humbled by their response. But most rewarding for me has been meeting and corresponding with the relatives of a number of players in this drama and hearing their reactions to the book. Many say
Dark Tide
bridged the genealogical gap in their families’ histories that had persisted for nearly a century. Most had heard pieces of the flood story, perhaps as a snippet of family folklore shared at holiday gatherings, passed down by a grandmother or an elderly uncle, but factual gaps and the passage of time had blurred the line between myth and reality. “I remember hearing something about this from…” was the way most letters or meetings began, but for years they had longed for the full truth.
One woman approached me at a book signing, her eyes brimming with tears. “I am John Callahan’s grandniece,” she said to me with a catch in her voice. Callahan was the forty-three-year-old paver for the City of Boston who died from shock and pneumonia on January 20, 1919, five days after the molasses flood, at the Haymarket Relief Station. On the night of the flood, Callahan’s wife, Kittie, and her cousin Mary Doherty visited him. John Callahan, in terrible pain from a fractured pelvis, asked his wife to leave the room and fetch water to wash molasses from his hair. With his wife out of earshot, John confided to Mary Doherty that he was “sinking fast” but said that he did not want Kittie to know. “We knew he had been killed in the molasses flood, but we never really knew how he died until you wrote this book,” Callahan’s grandniece said. “Now we know about his final hours and we know he was courageous to the end. Thank you.”
There were many others for whom
Dark Tide
seemed to satisfy a craving to learn more about their ancestors’ role in the molasses flood story. I met the elderly children of Peter Curran, who was caught in the molasses wave as he was delivering hogs to the Commercial Street wharf. Curran suffered broken ribs, a severely bruised thigh, a wrenched back, and “severe nervous shock,” and he was bedridden for a month after the flood. His children, who never knew the full extent of his injuries, told me that their parents applied the monetary settlement from U.S. Industrial Alcohol toward the purchase of their first home, “so at least some good came of the disaster.”
I met others whose ancestors were killed in the tragedy who expressed shock and dismay at the victims’ suffering but also shared their deep gratitude that
Dark Tide
finally told their relatives’ stories: the grandnephew of Flaminio Gallerani (whose body was fished from the harbor eleven days after the flood), the grandson of the sister of Maria Distasio (the ten-year-old girl who was killed), and the granddaughter of Michael Sinnott (at seventy-six, the oldest person to die in the flood). “It must have been a terrible way to die, especially for an elderly man like him,” Sinnott’s granddaughter said. For others,
Dark Tide
illuminated the shadowy corners of family history. “My husband and I [just] realized how tragic this accident was,” wrote the wife of the grandson of Patrick Breen, a forty-eight-year-old teamster for the City of Boston Paving Department who was hurled into Boston Harbor by the molasses wave and died four days later from pneumonia and infection. “No one in his family spoke about it much; perhaps because Grandma just wanted it that way….”
This afterword begins with a document written by an unsung hero on the first day of the molasses flood story. While Cam Burnap is not a character in
Dark Tide,
his family restored his involvement in the flood’s history by preserving his remarkable letter to his mother. It seems appropriate to conclude this account of familial connections at the other end of the spectrum, with the observations of grandchildren of a hero who was an
integral
part of the book, and whose contributions occur much later in the flood saga: the plaintiffs’ lead attorney, Damon Everett Hall.
I was lucky enough to hear from several of Hall’s grandchildren, who not only offered their opinions on
Dark Tide
but also added brushstrokes of color and texture to their grandfather’s portrait that only family members can highlight. “You have portrayed our grandfather in a most favorable light,” wrote Martha Hall Bliss Safford, one of Hall’s five grandchildren. “You might want to know a little more about the man called Damon Hall.” She described an educated, family-loving, tough, quick-witted, fair-minded man, the son of a minister, whose influence spanned generations. “In his search for the truth he was honorable, but relentless, exposing the man or woman who wouldn’t tell the truth or covered it up,” Safford wrote to me. “You [describe him as] ‘feisty’—not if it means ‘touchy’ or ‘quarrelsome,’ but its
second
meaning (American Heritage Dictionary)—‘full of spirit and pluck, frisky and spunky’—that, I
certainly
would agree with!” Two other grandchildren, Sandra Hall Sampson Sloan and her brother David Synnott Sampson wrote jointly: “Our general feeling about Buba [the nickname Hall’s grandchildren gave him]—as passed down by his wife and our parents—was that he personified the law and all that was good about it. He made it an honorable profession because he was an honorable man who believed deeply in the power of the law to create justice.” He was also a man with a sense of the mischievous when it came to his grandchildren and their friends. “The only time I was aware of his steel-trap legal mind was when he ‘proved’ to a young friend of mine that he hadn’t been born because he couldn’t remember the event!” wrote granddaughter Sara Stedman Russell. “Our young neighbor ran screaming home!”
All of the grandchildren described Hall’s love of family and devotion to his wife, Mimi—their grandmother—as the cornerstone of his character. “[They] lived in a wonderful house in Belmont that overlooked Boston,” wrote Sloan. “It was a wonderful place for children, with a dumbwaiter in the kitchen, an old globe in the den, and lots of hiding places and books. He died in the house, but while he lived, it was the center of his family universe…. He repeatedly stressed to his three daughters—and they to us—the motto that was engraved over the gates of Williams College [Hall’s alma mater]—‘Climb high, climb far, your aim the skies, your goal the stars.’ We have letters from him to us even when we were just infants. He already felt we were important enough…to get our own beautiful letters.” Reliving her own memories, granddaughter Susan Alden lamented: “One of life’s disappointments is that grandchildren don’t know their grandparents when their grandparents are young and in their prime, and grandkids don’t know enough to ask questions about the past.”