Once upon a time in our Christian nations history we were such a spiritual country we buried our dead in churchyards.
The following is from American Clipper Ships 1833-1858:
...the Milton, flying before the gale in a heavy snow storm, struck on a rock...A quarter of a mile off shore,... An eyewitness said:
"I was one of the first on the spot. The shore looked like a wrecked shipyard. But for the breakers you could have walked for yards on broken masts, spars and timbers. There was the mainmast, four feet through, snapped off like a pipe stem. Every plank was made into kindling wood and every timber torn out of her. Only a part of the bow was left tossing and crunching on the rock where she struck, being held there by the attached anchors. The bodies of the crew, all frozen stiff, were on the beach, some covered with snow or thrusting up a hand or arm above the drift. One negro must have come ashore alive for he had dragged himself some distance up the sand but had soon frozen. The ship's log book came ashore , also some trinkets and furniture, but that was all."
The captain, three mates and crew of 22, being all-hands aboard, were drowned or perished. The three mates and eighteen of the crew were buried in the old churchyard at Easthampton....
The deceased were all members of the United States Merchant Marine.
Captain Bill Schweitzer U.S. M. M., missionary
Mountaintop Sea Ministries International
Without menses-malice
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