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     FEB-28-1855 [WED]  Mysterious Desertion (The James B. Chester, Found In Mid-Atlantic)

LOCATION:
Mid-Atlantic Ocean (600 Miles SW of the Azores)

WHAT HAPPENED:
The James B. Chester was found in the mid-Atlantic Ocean in almost perfect condition. The compass and ship's papers were missing but not one of the lifeboats was missing.

RESEARCH NOTES:  (1855-02-28/2015-07-26)     [TOP]

There's a little more information in our second source, but not much more than what we gave you up above. There was no bloodshed found, but there were signs of a hurried departure. Chairs and tables had been overturned and drawers pulled out and emptied onto the floor. Here's the very last sentence about this event from that same source, "But the strange thing about James B. Chester was that all the lifeboats were hanging in the davits."^[2]

One interesting tidbit about the area the Chester was found in is that it is known by some people as part of the Devil's Triangle which, like the Bermuda Triangle, encompasses a part of the Atlantic Ocean, except on a much larger scale as our image above shows.

After thinking about this for a little while, one possible answer to the how question, and that was that another boat had come along side and the J. B. Chester had been taken over without a shot being fired or any blood being spilled and the crew taken aboard this other boat to be disposed of later, or maybe they all went voluntarily because they all just wanted to disappear for whatever reason.

Now, even though this scenario is one possible answer, the next obvious question of course is why? No matter how it happened, there's still that troublesome why question. Why did this happen? Maybe it was just a sport-killing, killing just for fun or just for the sport of it, or there was something on the boat that those other people on the other boat wanted, or maybe one of the crew on the J.B. was an accomplice which is why the take over was so easy, or maybe it was a voluntary disappearance, or maybe there was something written on the map they took, but why the compass?

The compass is definitely a tricky one to fit in with our scenario, unless they didn't have one or they just liked the looks of it, or the Captain of the Chester grabbed it when they were taken over and put it in his pocket or threw it overboard. The compass disappearing doesn't seem to fit in with another boat boarding it and taking it over. It fits more with the scenario that everyone deserted the ship rather than that they were forced off it.

But that scenario doesn't fit in with the fact that none of the lifeboats were gone, unless they had a separate boat on board, or another boat came along side to help them desert. If none of that happened, how did they desert the ship, just jumped overboard and swam for it, and why?

That's the best we come can up with considering the small amount of information we started out with, but no matter how you look at it, this disappearance was definitely a strange one.

After Dave reread the Paul Begg book, Into Thin Air: People Who Disappear, he found he had missed three paragraphs. This happens way too frequently with us, but at least we do catch it before we move onto the next event, most of the time, hopefully.

Anyway, not to make excuses, but this time Dave remembers the paragraph before (and the two after) were about the Marathon, so he assumed the book was talking about another boat, which it was, but the Marathon was not just another boat, it was the one that found the Chester floating in the Mid-Atlantic. Ok, it's an understandable excuse, just not a good enough one, as excuses go.

What I find funny is that the first paragraph about the Marathon starts right off with the date of this event, which should have given Dave a clue, but all he did was shake his head and mutter something about how amazingly unfocused his mind is sometimes.

Anyway, here is the first paragraph, in full:

FROM (Chap. 6, p. 56): Into Thin Air: People Who Disappear

"On 28 February 1855, Marathon sighted a bark about six hundred miles from the Azores (about 30° N, 40° W). It 'was yawing back and forth and appeared to be sailing with no one at the wheel', reported Marathon's skipper."^[2]

The next paragraph gives the details we've already given you, the one after that explains how a large crowd had gathered to see her when it eventually arrived (with a skeleton crew from the Marathon) in Albert Docks, Liverpool, England.

The last paragraph debates the question of how and why, like we just did, but we speculated a little differently than the author did, but regardless, we all came to the same conclusion. This is a strange one, no doubt.

Even with the new information, these research notes are the best we can do with what we have right now.

There are some books and a newspaper listed at the back of the book as sources for chapter six which we'll eventually get, but until then, here at least is a list of most of those sources:

     "Brown, Raymond Lamont:
          Phantoms, Legends, Customs And Superstitions of the Sea
          (London: Patrick Stephens, 1972)
     "Edwards, Frank:
          Stranger Than Science
          (New York: Lyle Stuart, 1959;
               London: Pan Books, 1963)
     "Fort, Charles:
          Lo!
          (New York: Claude Kendall, 1931;
               New York: Ace Books, n.d.)
     "Gould, Lt. Commander Rupert T:
          The Stargazer Talks
          (London: Geoffrey Bles, 1943)
     "Miller, R De Witt:
          Forgotten Mysteries
          (Chicago: Cloud Inc, 1947)
     "Norman, Eric:
          Weird Unsolved Mysteries
          (New York: Award Books, 1969)
     "Potter, John S:
          The Treasure Diver's Guide
          (London: Robert Hale, 1975)
     "Sanderson, Ivan T:
          Invisible Residents
          (New York: World Publishing Co, 1970;
               London: Universal-Tandem, 1974)
     "Schurmacher, Emily C:
          More Strange Unsolved Mysteries
          (New York, Paperback Library, 1969)
     "The Times London:
          6 November, 1840
     "Villers, Alan:
          Of Ships And Men
          (London: Newnes, 1962)"[2]

If after getting some of these books, we get more information or details; we'll be back and fill you in, but until then we're off to start researching another event. Ta da for now and have a pleasant tomorrow.

BIBLIOGRAPHY/SOURCES:  (1855-02-28)     [TOP]
^[1] Page(s) 120 from:
       Mysteries of the Unexplained, Reader's Digest
^[2] Page(s) 56 from:
       Into Thin Air: People Who Disappear
^[3]
       

  LINKS:
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