Rower Retraces Smuttynose Murder Route |
HISTORY MATTERS
"What drives me nuts," I told David Kaselauskas," are all the crazy people who think Louis Wagner could not row a boat to the Shoals, kill those women, and row back in one night." (Read full article below)
I was talking, as always, about the book I'm writing on the
"How long was Wagner missing that night?" David asked.
"About 11 hours," I said. "He had no alibi from 8 pm until almost 7 o'clock the next morning when he was spotted near an abandoned dory in Little Harbor."
"Hmm," David said. "I think I know a guy."
And that's how this little adventure began.
Dan and Dave
David Kaselauskas is a tall, tanned, lanky lobsterman. He's been fishing out of Kittery Point for 46 years, but the old timers still call him "The Carpetbagger." The "guy" he spoke of turned out to be Dan O'Reilly, an engineer who hails from Casco Bay and now lives in from "North Kittery" near the
"Dan says he'll do it," David told me a few days later.
"Do what?" I asked.
"He'll row out to Smuttynose for you," Dave said.
"For me?" I was still confused.
"Well, it was your idea," Dave said.
"What idea?" I asked.
"To prove how long it takes to get there," he explained.
So we ended up at the Commercial Fishing dock at
Dan paddled by a few minutes later in his little Piscataqua wherry. Dan bought his classic, hand-made, wooden rowing boat at
"I used to row pretty serious," Dan says, "but not as much these days. I know a lot of good guys that can row better than I can."
He's being modest. Dan has won a healthy share of races. Years ago he held the record in the famous Blackburn Challenge. Each year competitors row 20 miles in memory of Howard Blackburn, a dory fisherman from
Dan figured that this jaunt out to Smuttynose might be a good warm-up for the next Blackburn Challenge coming in July.
CONTINUE "TIME TO KILL" essay
Murderer's Row
It is roughly 10 miles from the base of old
Despite the facts of the case, modern armchair detectives (many of whom have never been in a wooden dory, much less rowed one), keep telling me it was "impossible" for the murderer to travel that far on a winter's night. But Louis Wagner was a dory fisherman who worked in all seasons. He was tall and muscular, much like Dan O'Reilly, but with one key difference. On the night of the murders, Louis Wagner was 28 years old. Dan is 75.
"We're both ancient," says Dave Kaselauskas, who is also 75. "Why Dan and I can remember when rainbows were black and white and the Dead Sea was only sick."
"Dan's an avid rower," Dave says, "and strong for the age he is. If you stay physically cooking, you do a lot better than if you sit around and vegetate."
CONCLUSION OF Smuttynose Rowing article NEXT PAGE
Off to the races
David Burke, a
Dan left early on a Friday morning. catching a swift outgoing tide similar to the one that Wagner experienced 140 years ago. Half a dozen of us followed him along with Jersey Girl acting as our "chase" boat. We brought sandwiches, drinks, cameras, and rain gear. Dan took only a compass and a quart of Gatorade. The minute Dan's wooden boat hit the swirling river he was out of sight.
"Where the hell did he go?" Dave asked, scanning the horizon.
By the time we caught up with Dan, the lone rower was "in the zone," pulling rhythmically on the oars, feathering them parallel to the surface of the water with each stroke, then digging back into the salty Piscataqua.
Following Wagner's likely route, Dan stuck to the
"Almost three miles in 30 minutes!" Dave called out to Dan. "You're a rock star!"
Time to kill
At the mouth of the Piscataqua Dan's colorful dory seemed to shrink as the sea opened up and took over the horizon. The rush of the tide diminished, and yet, Dan reported, he could feel the underwater currents still urging him toward the Isles of Shoals for miles. Wagner would have passed the same two lighthouses in 1873, and then been drawn by the night beacon of White Island Light. A small weeping leak forced Dan O'Reilly to pause and bail a little water, then he rowed on like a small mechanical toy in the distance. Before we knew it, the islands grew larger and the 75-year old rower glided between
Entering
"Two hours and 14 minutes!" Dave shouted. "You did it with time to kill."
Dan wasn't even sweating. We all paddled into Smuttynose Cove and I gave a quick tour of the murder site. Then we pulled Dan's flat-bottomed boat onto the deck of the Jersey Girl and motored home. We were back at the
"Your worst day on the water's better than any day on land," Dave said as we parted.
Lots of people row to the Shoals these days in sleek fiberglass kayaks and plastic ocean-going shells. It can still be a dangerous trip if you don't know the weather and the sea. But you won't see many 19th century wooden dories making the trip these days. Dan proved my point. He wasn't driven to Smuttynose by adrenalin and greed. Dan was just taking it nice and easy.
"I wanted to tell Dave I wasn't ready for this," Dan O'Reilly confessed to me on the phone two weeks later. Turns out he was suffering from a bad case of strep throat that morning. He should have been home in bed.
"But when I heard you were all coming to watch, well, I felt like I ought to go do it," Dan said.
If he had not been sick, and if he did not have to pause to bail a leaking boat, Dan says, he's certain he could row the distance again in under two hours. Thanks, Dan. I rest my case.
Copyright © 2013 by J. Dennis Robinson, all rights reserved. Robinson’s history column appears in the Portsmouth Herald every other Monday and exclusively online at his independent Web site SeacoastNH.com. He is the author of 11 books including UNDER THE ISLES OF SHOALS and