| Show uma f V M adventurers CLUB i HEADLINES FROM THE LIVES OF PEOPLE LIKE YOURSELF 1 the iron serpent H HELLO ELLO EVERYBODY well sir weve had two or three yarns in in this column about strong men who have been in danger of being crushed to death by huge snakes twenty or thirty feet long but jim evrard elrar d of brooklyn N Y went up against the great all the reptiles jims snake was three hundred and sixty feet long it was made of solid steel links ten and a half inches long and five inches wide it was the great anchor chain of an ocean going goin g steamer and when you get one of those babies wrapped around your neck worse than any python or boa constrictor that ever lived it was on february 5 1918 anthe army cargo transport U S S Hatteras that it happened jim evrard had joined thi the a navy as a radio operator in 1917 and here he was on the hatteras somewhere out in the atlantic ocean the hatteras had sailed a week or so before from hampton roads va A few days out of port she had run into a bad storm that had wrecked her steering gear and left her wallowing helplessly in mid ocean the captain had dropped both of the ships ship 3 three ton anchors they helped very little but beside the point the point is that those anchors were down if they been jim would have had no adventure hed have won no ten dollar bill and wed have had no story when morning came the storm subsided once the anchors were down they had to stay down until the storm was over while the gale was raging the ship pitched and rolled so violently that it would have been dangerous to try to pull them up but to our horror the chain was running wild on the morning that the storm subsided the crew rigged an emergency gear and began bega noto to hoist them aboard I 1 where jim evrard comes into the story jim was a radio operator but in a pinch aboard ship everybody turns to and lends a hand and jim was sent down into the chain lockers with a lad named piercy and another lad named white to lay anchor chain I 1 guess that sort of calls for a word of explanation the chain lockers on them the hatteras were a couple of rooms eight feet square just below deck up at the bow of the ship they were used of course to stow the anchor chains in while they were not in use up on the deck a big winch was hauling in the starboard anchor and as the chain came in it was passed through a hole in the deck down into the chain locker well sir if that chain were just allowed to lie in the locker any way it landed it would tangle and snarl next time the anchor was dropped it had to be laid in a neat coil as it came down and what jim and piercy and white were doing down there that fateful february day that old lady adventure had picked out to give three sailors the scare of their lives A choppy sea made footing insecure by that time all three of them were pretty tired the chain with its big ten and halt half inch links a was heavy the sea was still choppy making their footing none too sure but they worked away at the port chain until the doil coil rose high in the locker finally the chain stopped coming in they could tell by the size of their coil that the anchor was up and out of the water and ready to be heaved on deck the three lads had stopped work and leaning each in a different corner of the cramped locker bracing themselves against the pitching and tossing of the ship we were waiting for orders to go back up on deck says jim but the order was slow in coming imagine our surprise when we saw the anchor chain begin to pay out again it moved slowly at first and then quite rapidly after several seconds of 0 watching it increased its speed we realized to our horror that the chain was running wild and those lads had good reason to be horrified great loops ot of heavy chain began whipping in long swings striking the sides of the locker faster and faster it went and wider and wider were the loops that lashed out on all sides it was swinging with terrific force says jim if it hit us it would break our bones like cardboard or crush our s skulls k alls as if they were egg shells and there we stood not daring to t 0 move out of our corners wondering when the flying mesh of steel was going to whip in after us wondering when a chance lurch of the ship was going to throw us off balance out into the path of that whirling mass of metal the noise of the links was like a death knell the din was terrific our prison wind on our faces as the chain flew was small and we could feel tho tha by in wider and wider the links as they hit the walls arcs it swung sounded like to 0 au all of us I 1 the beats of a death knell wanted to faint fa nt but I 1 dare at all I 1 kept my mind powerless to do anything on the one thing that standing right might save me m SS where w I 1 was in the scant protection the afforded me m c corner of the roona r 0 loop after loop whipped its way around the little locker spun on up through the hole in the top and only few a more of those loops oops to go 90 now then all be safe last few loops and jim watched those go breathed a prayer of thanksgiving WERE they safe over in in their own chalky faced corners stood white and piercy but unhurt then they called to the deck who by that timet time doubted if officers ers up on any of them were alive the cause of the trouble they had himself A roll of the ship had thrown found had been old man neptune other roll over the anchor cho had caused the engineer and anck to out of gear ohp and throw the anchor winch the anchor had to be raised do down n lay y tte the ct chain the copyright next three again ien service says cadro had jim bett eirv er says but T luck we than we did sent |
