Reprinted from Our Life on Lear’s Room Labrador by Greta Hussey, 1981
Pages 87 and 88.
Another tragedy occurred at Batteau, in 1946 [1945], when two men drowned in the harbour. One was Hayward Vey from Long Beach, Trinity Bay and the other was a young man by the name of [Eli] Cooper from Queen’s Cove, Trinity Bay. Uncle Herbert John Vey was a floater. That is, he owned his own fishing schooner in which he travelled to the Labrador coast and, if there was no fish in one harbour, he would move to another. While enroute to Labrador, in 1945 [1944], he had the misfortune to lose his schooner when she wrecked on Groais Island. So, when 1946 [1945] came in, he decided to take a crew to Batteau and build a summer cabin there. Building materials did not cost much because they had their own sawmill in Trinity Bay. Allan Tucker agreed to take Herbert John, his crew and the building materials along on his schooner, the now famous Norma and Gladys, which Allan and his family had recently had built for them. After the Veys had been landed at Batteau and had settled into their cabin, the crew had to go in the bay for firewood. Uncle Herbert stayed at home. The wind increased and by the time they had the load of firewood and got back to the harbour, it was too rough to land their load. They did the only thing they could and that was to put their boat on the collar and row ashore in the small punt. As Uncle Herbert’s son, Hayward, stepped into the small boat, she overturned and he was drowned immediately. Young Cooper clung fast to the upturned boat but he too drowned before drifting the short distance to shore. The rest got to shore and safety. Coffins were made for Vey and Cooper and they were salted in and placed in Ryan’s store until seven days later when the Kyle arrived and their bodies were taken home to Newfoundland for burial.
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Transcribed by Wanda Garrett, March 2015
These transcriptions may contain human errors. As always, confirm these as you would any other source material.