Mary Celeste chapter 1

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New York Harbor 7 November 1872:

The Brigantine MARY CELESTE out of Boston carrying 1,701 Barrels of poisonous alcohol ["denatured alcohol"] departs New York for Genoa, Italy...

New York Harbor [forty-five years to the day later]:

SS ERIN out of Boston carrying twelve (12) passengers and a cargo including 1,701 barrels of denatured alcohol; one ton of Cabbages; one ton each of apples, oranges, limes, asparagus, canned fish, and coffee; two tons of sausage, wheat, and flour; three tons of potatoes; thirty cases of bibles; and twenty cases of machine parts departed New York for Valparaiso, Chile.

As the ship entered the Atlantic, Tom Dodge and his son Tom Junior walked the deck...

"Tell me a sea story dad! "
"Forty-five years ago this very day, a ship called The Mary Celeste left New York for Italy. A month later the ship was sighted by another ship. When no one returned a signal, the second ship launched their ship's boat and boarded the Mary Celeste. There was no one on board! There was food on the table in the mess. It looked like the crew were about to sit down for dinner but for some unknown reason left the ship? The ship's boat was missing. The Captain,s sword was found under his bed with strange blood on it! On the bow, there were strange marks as if the ship had struck another vessel or had been attacked by a huge sea monster!"

"Wha What happened to the crew?"

"No one knows, some say the ship was attacked by pirates. Some say the ship was attacked by a giant squid. Some say the Captain went mad and killed all of the crew. No one knows to this day what happened to the crew of the Mary Celeste."

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Comments

Re: Hoping it was mermaids

In the Disney Movie The Little Mermaid (based upon a Fairy tale by Hans Christian Anderson), the Movie Splash, and a Big Closet Serial (still in progress), Mermaids are cute and friendly creatures.

However, you should be careful
What you wish for...

Many sailors (a superstitious lot) believe that mermaids seduce men and drag them into the sea to be drowned!

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When the passengers and crew begin to panic and start accusing everyone else of being a serial killer, the prime suspect will be accused of being a mermaid...

At the time , it was thought

At the time , it was thought leaking barrels caused the crew to abandon ship, however alcohol on fire, can be put out with water.
This sounds good and also spooky.

Karen

re: At the time, it was thought

I believe that in 1872 (during the salvage hearing) piracy was suspected by the DEI GRATIA (ship that "found" the MARY CELESTE). The available evidence was inconclusive resulting in a very low salvage award which prompted speculation into other causes including an attack by Muslim Pirates or an attack by a giant squid.

The cause you mentioned is the most plausable and was the subject of a 2006 TV show.

there was also a theory of

there was also a theory of sea quakes throwing the ship about and scaring the crew off of the boat to head for a nearby island but why would you abandon a perfectly good ship for a smaller one if you were worried about getting tossed about, unless the area was too shallow to get the bigger ship into. plus the ship was reported to be under full sail so it would have been very difficult to launch a boat from it with it still moving unless the wind died completely.

pirates seem to be far fetched too, why wouldn't they have either boarded the ship to raid it and then taken it with them or just sunk it if they couldn't board it, very unlikely they would have just left it if the crew abandoned it.