Shipwreck Has Happy Sequel: Schooner Days DCCXXVII (727)

by C. H. J. Snider

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AN interesting couple celebrated their golden wedding anniversary during the past week in Toronto. The handsome celebration spoke well for the healthy, vigorous life led by those whose post office address is Carrying Place—the real Carrying Place in Murray township, near the Bay of Quinte not the fiction one in Major Angus Mowat's fine book of that name.

It was just 50 years ago last Tuesday, on a clear, snowless day in 1896, that Rev. H. V. Mounteer married young Minnie Alida Tweedle, daughter of Mr. and Mrs. William Tweedle of Smithfield, to Bertie Scott Hutcheson in the United Church at Smithfield, up in the air on the high ridge that runs between Brighton and Trenton a mile or so back of the Murray Canal.

Three stalwart sons carry on the Hutcheson name, Orman Claude Hutcheson of Toronto, Frederick William Hutcheson of Toronto, and Charles Everett Hutcheson of Arlington, Va. It was at the home of Mr. Orman Hutcheson, Lewis street, that the golden wedding reception was held, and there was a family dinner party at the Walker House.

At the tea table, afternoon and evening, Mrs. Hutcheson's sister, Mrs. H. E. Hamilton, from Detroit, presided, assisted by Mrs. Mabel Walters. Mrs. Hutcheson's brother, Frederick Tweedle, of Calgary, was fortunately able to be present, but her other brother, Mr. Charles Tweedle, was unable to get up from Florida.

LIFETIME BY THE LAKE

Following their marriage, Mr. Hutcheson took his bride to live on his father's farm, a tract of land stretching to the shores of Lake Ontario, near Weller's Bay. Five years later the family moved to Mount Carmel on the Murray Canal, but finally settled at their present home at Barcovan Beach, south of the canal, at the head of Weller's Bay and near Lake Ontario. There, Mr. Hutcheson for years has kept a hunting and fishing camp, spending his winters with Mrs. Hutcheson either in the city or traveling about the country.

An out-door man all his life, Mr. Hutcheson, now 72, was born in Brighton township, the son of the late Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Hutcheson. Since he was brought up on a farm by the lake, his love of boats, fishing and wild life is natural.

"From the time he was ten," smiles Mrs. Hutcheson affectionately, "Scott has scarcely had a gun or fishing rod out of his hand." Or a hammer, or a knife or a lathe, she might have added. For Mr. Hutcheson is very "handy" with his hands and is one of those men with an uncanny ability to make "most anything."

Mr. Hutcheson has many small craft to his credit, designing and building them himself at Barcovan Beach. Indeed, one of his fishing boats, a 28-footer powered by a star motor, and appropriately named Row No More, figured in a lake rescue. Two young girls, out for a Sunday afternoon row, underestimated the time and became lost in the gathering dusk. As night closed in and they failed to appear, cottagers became alarmed and appealed to the police.

Search parties combed the surrounding waters all through the night with little success. Asked by police to aid in the search, Mr. Hutcheson set out in his "Ronomore" and found the distraught pair just at daybreak. He relates with a good natured chuckle that the girls had packed a lunch and had a thermos bottle with them, but were too frightened all night long to touch as morsel of food.

WRECKS ON STONEHOUSE POINT

Mr. Hutcheson's first experience with the elements of Lake Ontario occurred when, as a child, he saw two shipwrecks at once, those of the "Queen of the Lakes" of Kingston, and of the "Ida Walker" of Picton.

The Ida Walker was a fine fore-and-after, launched in Prince Edward County on the very first Dominion Day, when our Canada was born, almost eighty years ago. She was christened New Dominion and hailed from Picton. Passing into American hands she changed her paint and name and became the Ida Walker, smartly garbed in black above and brown below, with brown doublings, mastheads and trim. But she came back to the Canadian register, and was sailed by Capt. John Allan. He was drowned from her off Oswego with his son, Alfred, the mate, who tried to save him. It was shortly after this she was wrecked.

The Queen of the Lakes was refloated after her crew had been rescued from her cabin top, and saw twenty years more service, but the Ida Walker was a total loss. By a curious sequence, Scott Hutcheson, who saw the wrecks, lived to haul his own boats out with the centreboard winch salvaged years afterwards from the Ida Walker, and he has also dragged up two of her pumps and some rigging, deadeyes and planking from her bottom. The wreck, bedded in the sandy bottom, is visible in the clear water on still days. It is only a short distance from his camp.

The vessels drove in on the two sides of a point a little west of Barcovan Beach where now stand the gaunt ruins of an old stone house, burned thirty years ago, formerly the home of the Terry, Snow and McCullough families. Oliver, David and Henry Terry still live near Barcovan Beach, but the stone well of the old home, and the roadway which once ran along the shore south of it, are now out in the lake, so much of the point has been washed away. Scott Hutcheson has another souvenir of the two wrecks, to which romance clings.

ROMANCE OF A ROLLING PIN

For it was at this time that he obtained a fine white maple rolling pin, washed ashore from the flooded galley of the "Queen of the Lakes" as she pounded on the treacherous bar of sand and gravel in the bay. With pride a few years later—they seemed many then but few now, looking back through a golden half century—he diffidently presented the unique kitchen implement to his bride; and for fifty years Mrs. Hutcheson has put this "little piece of history" to good use.

"I do my own housework," she stated briskly, "and love to bake." Mrs. Hutcheson's pies are well known in the Weller Bay district for their crusty flavor and fine texture. She also revealed that she actually likes washing dishes and ironing the family wash—two tasks shunned by most housewives.

An active worker in the Mount Carmel United Church, this 70-year-old lady finds time to participate in all the community activities and gives of her cookery to all the church affairs.

With their foxhound, "Bobs," Mr. and Mrs. Hutcheson want to retire from their resort life at Barcovan Beach. Of course, Mr. Hutcheson would still like to carry on with his boats and fishing, and Mrs. Hutcheson doesn't want to relinquish her interest in her home and the church; but both are agreed that they should sit back now and take their "next fifty years" at ease. Wherewith Schooner Days agrees with the proviso that the supply of pies be continued.

HAPPY TOGETHER FOR FIFTY YEARS

MR. AND MRS. SCOTT HUTCHESON, of Barcovan Beach, Carrying Place post office, Murray township, as they prepared to cut the wedding cake at a very pleasant celebration of their golden wedding anniversary in Toronto this week.

THE IDA WALKER from crayon drawing signed by "Gibson & Hunt," when she was still known as the New Dominion.

FAMOUS PIE-MAKER EXAMINES ROMANTIC ROLLING PIN

Mrs. Scott Hutcheson in a creative mood