Island of the Lost (31 page)

In his written notes, Musgrave estimated that the body belonged to a man who had been about five feet seven inches tall, with light brown hair, a low forehead, high, prominent cheekbones, a protruding upper jaw, which was missing one front tooth, and a pointed chin. The skeleton was clothed in a sou'wester hat, three mufflers, a dark brown cloth coat with
matching trousers, a blue serge vest, three shirts, “cotton drawers next to the skin, trowsers and woollen drawers over all, and three or four pairs of woollen socks and stockings.” What Musgrave thought might be a Roman Catholic locket was strung about his neck; he removed this, along with “a lock of the unfortunate man's hair,” as possible aids to identification. Beside the bed was a small pile of limpet shells, and a couple of glass bottles, one holding drinking water. “He has no doubt died from starvation,” he somberly concluded.

The news of the loss of the
Invercauld
and the rescue of three survivors not having reached New Zealand yet, Musgrave, George, and Captain Cross could only make up theories about the dead man's fate. Perhaps, Musgrave speculated, a ship had foundered and this man had been the only survivor, though he had evidently managed to salvage a number of garments from his unfortunate shipmates before their bodies were carried away by the surf. Maybe a number had survived, and the rest had wandered off, leaving their wounded comrade behind. Or, worse still, the dead sailor could have been a man who was marooned by some brute of a captain.

Oddly, though it seemed as if the house had once sheltered this man, it looked as if it had fallen apart since his death. “When he died he was, no doubt, under the shelter of an old frame-house,
then
partly in ruins; and since his death, and very recently, it has fallen down entirely, but without touching the body, and leaving it exposed to the weather,” Musgrave guessed, without suspecting that the boards might have been deliberately removed.

Inevitably, he meditated how this could so easily have been the fate of the
Grafton
castaways. “This lamentable spectacle
would undoubtedly give rise to serious thoughts in anyone, but how infinitely more in me, whose bones might at the present moment have been lying about the ground under similar circumstances, had not the hand of Providence showered such great mercies upon me, perhaps the least deserving. What a field for serious reflection!”

The inspection of the corpse finished, the men dug a grave, and buried the skeleton after saying a few brief prayers. Later, Musgrave told Raynal that they placed a wooden cross at the head of the mound, and also lit a fire of green branches, raising great clouds of smoke to attract the attention of any others who might be in the vicinity. There was no response from the silent hills surrounding the ruined settlement, and searching the area on foot was too difficult to pursue for very long, partly because of the violent, snowy weather, and partly because the scrub was so extremely dense.

For Musgrave, this was most unsatisfactory. As he related after getting back to Invercargill, they had been unable to establish beyond doubt that there were no castaways left alive on the island—“and I confess the doubt torments me. The thought that some poor wretch should be left upon it to suffer what
we
suffered pursues me incessantly.”

However, there was nothing more they could do. Captain Cross and Musgrave were very anxious to get to New Zealand—“for we are all heartily sick of the protractions of the voyage.” Not only was Musgrave aware that Raynal and Alick, back in Invercargill, were tensely awaiting his return with Harry and George but his thoughts were constantly with his wife and family in Sydney, who should have received his letter by now.

At nine in the morning of September 13, the anchor was raised and the cutter was rowed out of Port Ross on the breast of the ebbing tide. Outside the heads there was a tremendous sea rolling in from the east, with torrential rain, but a favorable easterly gale blew up, driving them so swiftly to New Zealand that they dropped anchor at Port Pegasus, on the southeastern tip of Stewart Island, at eight that same night.

TWENTY-TWO

I
n Invercargill, just as Musgrave guessed, Raynal and Alick had been counting the weeks. “Supported on one side by Alick, who gave me his arm, and on the other steadying myself with my cane,” Raynal wrote, “I spent the greater part of every day upon the quay.” There they handed a telescope back and forth, and “examined every white speck upon the horizon, in the hope of recognising the
Flying Scud
, and every evening we returned sadder of heart to our generous host, Mr. Collyer.”

Time was plodding by. “A month passed, then another fortnight, then the seventh week. This extraordinary delay filled us with the greatest anxiety.” The weather had been awful—had the little oyster-cutter foundered? The inhabitants of Invercargill, who shared their fears, were talking of mounting a second expedition when one morning the semaphore at the mouth of the New River estuary signaled that a cutter was in sight.

Was it Captain Musgrave? Raynal and Alick hurried to the dock at the back of the town. “It drew near; it was the
Flying Scud
!” Hearing the news, the entire population crowded to the shore as the little cutter glided up to the quay. Raynal's eyes
were blurred with tears of excitement, but then he recognized the familiar shapes among the men standing on the deck. “Here he is! He lands! George and Harry are with him!”

It was September 15, 1865, the forty-ninth day since the departure of the
Flying Scud
from Invercargill, but at last they had arrived.

M
USGRAVE'S PUBLISHED MEMOIR
concludes here, with the words, “the Journal of Thomas Musgrave, master mariner, recording the wreck of the
Grafton
and the adventures of its castaways on the Auckland Islands, may fittingly be brought to a close, with deep thankfulness to a gracious Providence for saving my companions and myself from a miserable fate.”

The adventure was certainly not over, however. The next day Musgrave made his official report to the New Zealand government, which, as Raynal remarked, “this time thought fit to send a ship to explore the Aucklands,” telegraphing instructions to the port authorities in Dunedin, in the province of Otago, to fit out the steamship
Southland
for the search. The ghoulish tale that Musgrave, George, and Tom Cross related about the discovery of a body at the ruined settlement of Hardwicke undoubtedly had a great deal to do with this change of stance.

Macpherson's schooner
Swordfish
was lying at Invercargill discharging her cargo, and Raynal, Alick, George, and Harry were offered passage in her to Melbourne. George Harris turned down the chance, as he had heard enlivening tales of the Otago gold rush, and had decided to stay on in New Zealand. However, Raynal, Alick, and Harry were glad to accept. Musgrave could have gone with them, but instead he opted to
sail to Melbourne on a steamer that was also in port, and was commanded by one of his old friends—a coincidence that led to yet another voyage to the Auckland Islands.

After landing in Melbourne just one week later, Musgrave took passage to Sydney, where his wife and children were waiting impatiently. When she saw him, Mrs. Musgrave's feelings were compounded of irritation as well as vast relief. In her letter to Macpherson, thanking him for sending on Musgrave's message, she had expressed disappointment that her husband had returned to the Auckland Islands instead of coming straight to her side: “His protracted voyage back to the Islands is very distressing to me but I must try to bear up with it the best way I can.” However, as she had also promised in that letter, Musgrave found her well, and his little ones in good health, too, so his joy should have been unsullied.

Instead of relaxing in the arms of his family, however, he hurried to the New South Wales government offices to make his report, being still tormented with thoughts that other castaways might be suffering terrible hardships in the Aucklands. At the same time, he offered to head an expedition to the islands, if the government would fund it, and because of his story of the discovery of the corpse, he got an attentive hearing. While they declined his offer of leading an expedition himself, the governments of New South Wales, Queensland, and Victoria immediately requisitioned the colonial steamer
Victoria
, with Captain Norman of the Royal Navy in command, his orders being “to convey relief to any such persons as may be discovered on the islands.”

In a letter dated October 3, 1865, the three administrations begged Musgrave to accompany the search party, “as a cabin
passenger,” so that he could “advise and assist Commander Norman on all matters relating to the expedition, and specially to assist as pilot,” as they considered that his “recent and intimate knowledge” of the place would prove invaluable. Then, most gratifyingly, they went on to state that while they fully appreciated his handsome offer to head an expedition free of charge, they could not allow it. Not only would they pay for a suitable outfit of clothes and gear, to the amount of £20, but they would provide a sum of £25, “to serve as a remittance to your family,” and maintain them until he got back, when they would pay him “a further sum of £25.” This was an extremely generous allowance—at that time a shepherd earned just five pounds a year—but all they asked in exchange, apart from his invaluable knowledge, was that he should keep a journal.

The steamer sailed the very next day, Wednesday, October 4, 1865, heavily laden with 189 tons of coal and provisions for two months, and, as Captain Norman noted in his report, “having on board as passengers, Captain Musgrave and Lieut.-Colonel Smith, R.A., as passengers.” They arrived off the narrow western entrance to Carnley Harbour on October 10, “steam on, and all plain sail set,” and after chugging along the tall cliffs of the southern coast of Adams Island, turned north, entered the harbor through the two big headlands, fired a gun, and steamed up to the wreck of the
Grafton
. Captain Norman landed a boat, to find that everything at Epigwaitt was just as the
Flying Scud
had left it—“we fired another gun, and proceeded down the harbor,” and then anchored at Camp Cove, “but found that no one had been there since I left,” Musgrave wrote.

All night guns were fired and rockets sent up into the silent darkness, with the same lack of response from the land. At
dawn they got up steam again, left the harbor, and slowly sailed northward up the eastern coast of Auckland Island, exploring all the inlets by boat, and numbering them as they went. In the first, “Inlet No. 1,” they found the remains of two huts, which had been abandoned many years before, and had undoubtedly been erected by sealers.

In the second inlet, they found old ax marks on the trees and attributed that to sealers too. There were also some turnips growing close to the water, where the soil was sandy. Because this bay was directly below the mountain where the cutter's men had seen smoke, the bush in the vicinity was thoroughly scouted, but the party saw no signs of life save for a few birds and a young sea lion, which they shot. Over the next two days they explored the rest of the eastern inlets, finding some beautiful streams, and trails through the bush that had been made by large pigs. In the ninth inlet they found an old whaleboat and the remains of a wigwam, but again they credited it to sealers, so kept on steaming north, firing guns as they went.

On the thirteenth they entered Port Ross, where the surrounding hills were white with a blanket of snow, which sent out echoes with every report. “Captain Musgrave and Colonel Smith proceeded with me to the head of Lawrie's Harbor, examining the old whaling settlement of Messrs. Enderbys' on our way,” noted Captain Norman in his logbook. They found a brief inscription that had been carved on a rock by Musgrave when he had been here with the
Flying Scud
, but no sign “that afforded any probability of its having been inhabited for a very long time.”