ghost ship
by Jason Smith

Ghost Ship of Diamond Shoals: The Mystery of the Carroll A. Deering. By Bland Simpson. University of North Carolina Press, 256 pages, $24.95.

     COAST GUARD WASHINGTON D.C.
UNKNOWN FIVE MASTED SCHOONER STRANDED DIAMOND
SHOALS SAILS SET BOATS GONE NO SIGNS OF LIFE SEA ROUGH STATIONS
NUMBER 183 184 186 UNABLE TO BOARD SCHOONER 1630
     SEVENTH DIST.

he telegram scuttled up from the Pasquotank River in Elizabeth City to National Coast Guard Headquarters on Monday, January 31, 1921. It was 4:33, an ugly, blustery afternoon, and the Seventh District Guardsmen of Cape Hatteras Station were calling it quits. They could do no more for the great ship that was stranded, all sails up, just out of reach on Diamond Shoals. All day they'd pushed their power boat out, with oars and engine, and all day the sea rebuffed them. Now they'd just have to wait for better weather or a better boat.

.: The Carol A. Deering of Bath, Maine. Photo courtesy of Maine Maritime Museum; click to enlarge. :.

The foundering ship was the Carroll A. Deering of Bath, Maine, but it would be four days before the Coast Guard could get close enough to read her name. Men from the salvage boat Rescue boarded the wreck, by now firmly wedged into the sands of the shoals, with the sea still breaking over her decks. Rescue Captain James Carlson could tell the sea had finished her, that she would not sail again.

ll sails but the flying jib were set, and the wind had shredded two. The anchors were gone, the forecastle empty. In the galley the men found a pot of pea soup, a pan of spareribs, and a pot of coffee on the stove. The Deering's two boats were gone, broken or cut loose in a hurry, and her steering wheel and gear were destroyed — before she hit the shoals? wondered Captain Carlson, noting the nine-pound sledgehammer nearby. Her running and distress lights were burned out. An ocean chart lay across a table in the chartroom. The Deering's nautical instruments, chronometer, papers, and ship's log — missing. Deering Captain Willis Wormell's bed was left unmade. His trunk and grip and large canvas bag were gone.

The Rescue's crew salvaged four sails, an American flag, a Union Jack and signal flags, a couple of chairs, three lights, and a bell. Carlson sent Wormell's Bible to the missing captain's family in Bath. Finally, Carlson plucked from the Deering three nearly-starved cats, to be adopted by the Rescue.

Three cats. No captain. No crew.

n his new nonfiction novel Ghost Ship of Diamond Shoals, Bland Simpson explores one of North Carolina's most puzzling maritime mysteries: What happened to the Carroll A. Deering on her final voyage, and what became of her crew? Simpson scoured newspapers, FBI reports, ships' logs, and personal letters to tell the Deering's story using the voices of the mystery's key players: W.O. Saunders, crusty editor of Elizabeth City's Independent newspaper; Christopher Columbus Gray, the fisherman who sparked an international sensation when he claimed to find a message in a bottle from the Deering; and Lula Wormell, the missing captain's daughter who wouldn't rest till she knew her father's fate, even if it meant stirring up President Hoover and the U.S. Department of Commerce.

Simpson grew up around boats in Elizabeth City. "The Deering story was one of a handful of great shipwreck tales we heard," he says. "I've known it all my life, in abbreviated form, and always wanted to know more. I still do!"

Pirates? Mutiny? Murder? You decide.

Simpson, assistant professor of English and director of Carolina's creative writing program, is the author of Into the Sound Country, The Mystery of Beautiful Nell Cropsey, The Great Dismal, and Heart of the Country.

Jason Smith is online designer and print production manager of Endeavors magazine.
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