A Bay Of Skeletons

Ian woke to the sound of the ships propeller screaming as the stern of the ship left the water and the revolutions increased; one minute she was bow down and the screws left the water, the next she was pooping massive amounts of water over the stern. Ian scrambled from his bunk and stood in a foot of water that was slopping around on the cabins deck; it was then he knew they were in deep trouble. As he stood there he could feel the injured vessel as she tried to mount the next wave, only to be held back by the massive amounts of water that she had in her belly.

Ian MacAllister had joined the S.S. Barclay as the new boatswain when she had docked in Port Elizabeth. Two seaman had been injured and an engineer had broken his arm in a fight ashore, and whilst docking, the old boatswain had also broken his arm falling down the gangway.

The S.S. Barclay was a four-hatch ship, two hatches on the fore deck and two aft, with accommodation amidship and crew recreation, and a mess room on the poop. She had triple-decked derricks and two jumbo derricks fore and aft. She was in fact an old Liberty Ship built in the United States during the Second World War to bring supplies to Europe. The captain and mate were two old grizzled scotsmen and had been at sea as long as the ship they sailed in.

They had left Port Elizabeth the next morning bound for Cape Town just down the coast. They docked  the following morning and procceded to load mining supplies for Port Harcourt. 

They sailed for Port Harcourt on a sultry overcast morning, the sky to the east was a sickly red, streaked with dirty grey wisps of cloud; it looked like they were in for a blow. They were heading north up the westerly coast to the Gulf of Guinea under Africa's armpit where they would be in the lee of the land and any easterly weather. The ship kept well clear of the famed Skeleton Coast where strong tides and many outcrops of uncharted reefs lay ready to tear the hull of any ship that came close, a graveyard of many fine ships and passenger liners. As she progressed up the coast a low-pressure system had crept up on them. The oily swell that had been with them since leaving Cape Town had now turned into a heavy and confused sea. The easterly weather had turned into a north-easterly  force ten storm and the wind seemed to come from every direction, the ship was heavily laden and one gigantic sea had ripped open number two hatchboards. For some reason she had been taking water on board, but with the hatch boards gone she was taking on even more water. The crew couldn't go on deck even with safety lines on, for the danger of being swept to their deaths.

The waves were crashing with increasing force across the decks and with the amount of water on board she was losing the battle. Ian had gone below just two hours before and had been on the bridge for twelve hours and was exhausted. He found his seaboots, struggled into his already soaking wet weather gear and went topside. The sight that met him was astounding , no horizon just massive waves and spray that felt like shards of glass blown by a wind off the scale. Ian fought his way up to the bridge and here it was more terrifying, because three miles away was the coast of Africa. She was being run ashore at a rate of knots; one look at the captains face told the story. He said. "Go below and tell the rest of the crew she's going to hit, tell the radio room to get off a mayday, then tell them to get their lifejacket on, don't go for the boats as they won't survive, and stay inboard till she hits, then it's every man for himself and may god help them.

Ian gathered the crew in the mess room, he gave them the captains orders. He struggled into a lifejacket himself, then heard the telegraph ring finished with engines. If they struck with the engines full ahead they were doomed. The engine room crew came running up the steel ladders, he felt the ship lurch to starboard, she then came upright and then she heeled hard to port, he was thrown in a pile of bodies, his head banged against the bulkhead and everything went black. Ian tried to breath and got a lung full of water, his head broke surface, it was like being at the bottom of a waterfall. He couldn't swim and the waves were just throwing him around. Up ahead was a sudden blackness and before Ian could do anything he was flung against rocks, again he plunged into darkness......