In memory of L’il Daisy.

[curiouswombat]

Today it has been wet and windy – but only a bit wet and only quite windy. The weather 100 years ago to the day was much, much worse.

How do I know this? Because it is a day for remembrance here on the island – it is exactly 100 years since the Ellan Vannin sank.


She is the only Steam Packet vessel to have sunk in passenger service (many others were lost during both wars, requisitioned by the UK government). As I mentioned in the post last week with the pictures of the Ben-my-Chree, we all regard the Steam Packet vessels as ‘our boats’, and this was a major tragedy for the island.

Built as a paddle steamer in 1860, she was first named the Mona’s Isle (another good Manx name); when she was refitted with propellers in 1883 she was renamed Ellan Vannin (Which is the Manx name for the Isle of Man). By 1909 she was the smallest and oldest vessel in the fleet, and known to her crew as L’il Daisy. At 226 feet long she was only a touch over half the length of the current Ben-my-Chree, and sat a good deal lower in the water.



She sailed from Ramsey at about 1am into a blustery night with a moderate sea. Without the aid of modern forecasting methods, sadly Captain Teare did not realise that the weather would change drastically - by the time L’il Daisy reached the region of the Bar Light Ship that marks the beginning of the approach to Liverpool the weather was Force 11 or 12 – hurricane force, with seas reported as "mountainous".

It is likely that she was simply hit by a wave too big for her to take, filled with water and went down like a stone. Not one of her 21 crew and 15 passengers survived.

For a small island this was a terrible loss.

The Steam Packet have a habit of recycling ship names – a song by the folk group The Spinners about the Ellan Vannin tragedy starts “Snaefell, Tynwald, Ben-my-Chree…” and all those names have been reused many times. But there has only ever been, and only ever will be, one IoMSPCo ship called Ellan Vannin – and today she has been remembered in a ceremony on board a ship over the spot where she was lost, in one on the quayside at Ramsey, and at a third this evening in a church in Ramsey.

For anyone who wants to know more there is a good account here.

The Spinners singing ‘The Ellan Vanin Tragedy can be found here - I would have embedded it, but the video maker keeps including shots of a sailing ship – about as relevant as shots of a bus in a video about a train crash… Although there are good pictures of both Ramsey, Ellan Vannin and some of her crew and passengers. (Who, despite what the song says, were certainlt not all Liverpool Business men there were families and at least one babe in arms. Nor were her crew all Manxmen – one was a good Manx woman!) I think the Edmund Fitzgerald had a better song, too, to be honest.

However – this is my tribute – here is a picture of the gravestone of one of her passengers; Mark Joughin of Ballawhannell in Bride.



I took the picture this September – I hope someone has given him flowers today – I will try to pop and see on Saturday.

Comments

[julia-here.livejournal.com]

Stop me if this bugs you, please, but Li'l Daisy reminds me a lot of the boats of the Puget Sound Mosquito Fleet, and in looking for a photo of those vessals, I came across the story of the Clallam (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clallam_(steamboat)) which is much like Li'l Daisy's.

When I was writing "Rose" I spent alot of time studying the persistance of sail travel after the inventionof steam; the fear of fire kept steam travel from being popular until after most sailing ships aged out of the fleet.

Julia, who meant to respond to the tragic loss of life but the shields slammed down.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

It certainly doesn't bug me - I am fascinated. The ships of the two areas are so very similar - I think it not surprising that so many Manx ended up on Vancouver island and the general area - they must have felt quite at home.

And Clallam does look so like Ellan Vannin - to us they just don't look big enough to cope with the sort of weather they were often out in.

So many small ships so tragically lost over the years - and each remembered, I hope, in its own community still.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

I'm sorry... Thank you, by the way, for the absolutely beautiful card which arrived today.

[inzilbeth-liz.livejournal.com]

I can imagine that something like that is never forgotten in a small community. I'm glad to know there is still a memorial held on the spot they went down.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

They don't do it every year - which, considering that the Mersey is pretty busy even yet, is probably a good thing - but she is still remembered.

For example - I have just been talking to my daughter on the phone, and I said "It is the 100th anniversary of the Ellan Vannin today," to be met immediately with a chorus of 'Snaefell, Tynwald, Ben-my-Chree...'. Mind you she was quite surprised to discover that Hugh Jones who wrote the song was still alive - he was out there on the boat on the Mersey Bar today according to the local news.

[petzipellepingo.livejournal.com]

That's a much smaller boat than the freighters we see around here but that was probably a good thing since more lives would have been lost if it was bigger.

Shipwrecks are always so sad and how nice that the Island remembers them.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

There were probably wee boats that size on the lakes 100 years ago, too.

Ellan Vannin was actually registered for up to 300 passengers - but this was a mid-winter sailing and so she was almost empty apart from post and cargo. A blessing.

There had been passenger vessels lost before - but somehow this one holds a place in our hearts.

[keswindhover.livejournal.com]

They may have some of the facts wrong, but I like that song, and especially the refrain. It has an elegaic quality.

Here's to the crew and passengers of the Ellan Vannin, who died before their time. *clicks glass*

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

I'm so glad you went to listen to it. It is rather haunting - I think if you were to strike up the first couple of chords in any pub on the island at any time almost every local would know all the words.

As I said, I would have embedded it but I couldn't find one with the Spinners singing it apart from that one, and the sailing ship might have given people the wrong idea!

Talking of raising our glasses to the memory - there were three stone masons, working building the church where they were holding the memorial in Ramsey tonight, from Liverpool. All were due to sail home on the Ellan Vannin - but one raised a glass to many in a local hostelry and was too much the worse for wear. He missed the boat...

[keswindhover.livejournal.com]

Heh - a bit hard to draw a moral lesson from that, isn't it?

Your song got me thinking about another folk song - the Mary Ellen Carter (just because of Ellen/Ellan, and the fact they're both about a shipwreck). Worth a listen sometime if you've never heard of it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5NPuBEZPgjY

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

Ah - I can see why you might know it...

I don't think I had heard of it - thank you so much! I like the other song on You tube with it too - someone for me to look out for.

[keswindhover.livejournal.com]

I think he's a bit of a Canadian national treasure - sadly dead, but he's left his songs. I got to this song by random Googling, as you might guess, and then bought several of his cds.

He's better at telling a full story than the Spinners, I think, but their tune stands up fine.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

I was reminded of something when I was over on You-tube. No-one here would ever think of calling a boat Ellan Vannin - we are too superstitious.

However in the late 1990s or early 2000s someone decided it would be a good name for an old schooner that was to be used as a sail training vessel around the Irish Sea. I'm not sure anyone from here ever actually sailed on her... before she broke her moorings in a storm in Whitehaven and was wrecked in 2004. We said it was a bad name for a ship.

[keswindhover.livejournal.com]

*plays spooky music*

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

You may mock.... :~P

[winsomeone.livejournal.com]

I think it's important in a community to remember the tragedies as well as the triumphs. Here we have a memorial for the U.S.S. Blackthorn, a coast guard cutter which went down at the point of our peninsula during inclement weather with all hands.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

Such memorials are a timely reminder of the power of nature. And I, too, think it is right that we remember them.

[zanthinegirl.livejournal.com]

Fascinating. We tend to take the power of the ocean for granted, don't we?

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

Thank you. Your comment suddenly brought this (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ztDkr61ikHQ) to mind, even though your ocean is the mighty Pacific.

Actually I might post it embedded tomorrow - I think it's worth sharing!

[zanthinegirl.livejournal.com]

Oh, totally worth sharing. I discovered Runrig via you, and I really enjoy them! However my "greatest hits" album doesn't have that song, and I like it a lot! Very well done video too.

Not sure what a "Might Pacific" vid might look like. The mind shudders!

[melegyrn.livejournal.com]

Thank you for sharing this. We are lucky here in that the waters of our Sound are relatively tame. I was reminded while reading about the Ellan Vannin of when I first heard Gordon Lightfoot's song about the Edmund Fitzgerald. I've sat looking north and east from the northern shore of Lake Erie, where it opens out and you cannot see land ahead, and thought about that song, and it gave me chills.

Now off to listen to the Spinners...

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

Our sea is anything but tame. I think I would rather like tame sea!

The thing that interests me most, I think, about the songs is that both Hughie Jones and Gordon Lightfoot were still writing traditional-type songs about shipwrecks, just as their predecessors had for so many years.

I think if I sat there looking at Lake Erie I would think of the gales of November as well.

[lindahoyland.livejournal.com]

I've known the song for many years as I like the Spinners, but had no idea it was a real ship.I listen to the song more thoughtfully in future that it was based on real life.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

I think it is always quite odd to discover something like that is actually real history.

What is almost as odd is that someone was trying to convince me on Sunday that it hadn't been written by Hughie from the Spinners but by local song-writer Stuart Slack - he was totally convinced that he was right!

[gillo]

I notice his sister died very young too - how dreadful for the family.

When we were last in Liverpool we learnt quite a bit about just how treacherous that entrance to the Mersey can be, which is why for many years they had a lightship there.

A sad loss, and one easily avoidable today. May there never be another such loss.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

Ellan Vannin was almost within hailing distance of the lightship - the lookout thought he saw a green flash, but the weather was so terrible, and he saw nothing else, so he thought either he had imagined it, or it was of no importance.

The Victoria channel - the channel marked out by the lightship and the buoys all the way from the bar to the river, was actually sounded and charted by a Steam Packet captain.

We used to go up top once we came near the bar so that we could spot the masts of sunken vessels when I was a child - so many were still visible from the war, back then.

[thismaz.livejournal.com]

I knew the song, obviously, but I didn't know that the Island still holds a memorial. That gives me a warm, sort of sad feeling.
Having been in force 11/12 out in the open ocean, the idea of those winds in a shallow sea with little to no sea room, is terrifying. The waves would indeed have been mountainous.

[curiouswombat.livejournal.com]

I have to admit that we don't do it every year - more like every ten. They have put a new memorial to the Ellan Vannin's passengers and crew in Ramsey near the actual spot she sailed from. I must go to look on a day without rain!

I don't think I'd like to be out on any vessel in any waters in an 11/12,but you are so right, crossing the Mersey Bar in that sort of weather must have been horrific - I can remember doing it on a more recent Mona's Isle (http://www.shipsofmann.org.uk/images/00560.jpg) as a child in an 8 and that was pretty unpleasant.

I can't say I envied the crew of the bar lightship the night the Ellan Vannin was lost, either.