The Tribune

By ERIC WIBERG

During World War II the loss of the nondescript wooden Canadian cargo ship Bernardo to fire off Governor’s Harbour would probably been overlooked except this happened while a search was underway for dozens of US aviators missing in a large seaplane.

After the war a large landing craft, USS LST 291, veteran of D-Day came to grief on Eleuthera’s reefs and was freed after nearly two weeks of blasting the reef, only to be scuttled later. This is the story of these two different ship casualties at Eleuthera.

The wooden cargo freighter Bernardo was built by JB Robichau in Meteghan, Nova Scotia and launched in 1929. She was 96ft long, 23ft 1in wide, 8ft 8in deep, and was 122 gross tons. Her owners were Hygeia Steamship Company of North Sydney, Canada, with official number 155212. Her first home port was Yarmouth, on the Bay of Fundy, then Parrsboro, also in Nova Scotia, in 1934. On the afternoon of October 28, 1943, Bernardo was passing to the east of Eleuthera when the small ship was rocked by an explosion from either the galley or the engine room. The ensuing fire spread so quickly that captain Mattis Eckholm headed for shore, however before they could reach James Cistern, Eleuthera, all nine crew were forced to jump overboard as the ship neared a reef. Fortunately, boats filled with brave souls who saw the smoke from shore and put out from Eleuthera came to their aid and all the sailors were pulled from the water by.

The loss of this vessel was later mixed up with a huge air-sea-rescue search or the US Navy PB4Y missing with all hands between Abaco and Grand Bahama on 11 March 1945. During the search, a plane was reported ablaze and sinking a mile west of Governor’s Harbour; however, this turned out to have been a boat. A search for a burning boat in central Eleuthera in World War II only turned up the Bernardo.

A mortgage was recorded on October 9th, 1937 on the ship owned by Hygeia Steamship Co Ltd. This mortgage was discharged on 17 July 1943, and in a note drawn across the Bernardo’s registration papers in hand by registrar L. H. Paddington, we read “vessel destroyed by fire off Eleuthera Bahamas October 28, 1943. [Registration] cancelled and delivered per advice received from HBM, vice consul at Miami, Florida, USA.”

Another ship lost in the bend in Eleuthera’s east coast known as James Cistern, was a large landing craft for tanks (LST) named USS LST 291. This 328ft-long behemoth was launched from the American Bridge Company in Pennsylvania in November, 1943, and took part in the Allied invasion of France on 6 June, 1944, known as D-Day. The industrial-looking ship had a 50ft beam, and 14ft keel. Early in 1947, it was decommissioned then in 1951 recommissioned. In May of 1954, LST 291 was on her way to Florida from Vieques, Puerto Rico, where her officers and crew had been training when she ran aground at James Cistern. There were very high winds when she grounded firmly in the coral reefs whilst carrying 56 tons of military supplies and 114 rolling stock, or vehicles. For the next 11 days, a variety of specialists, from rescue boat operators to engineers, divers, towboat operators, salvors, demolition experts and others worked on getting the ship free. They even blasted a 1,000-foot channel through the reef.

A detailed account of this episode appeared in the US Navy magazine All Hands in June 1954, and is posted at ProjectEleuthera.org. It features colorful captions like ‘blasting their way to safety,’ and ‘underwater Jeep driving’. Under Lt Malcolm Gesner, the heavily loaded ship was some 1,800 yards off James Cistern when “the crunching of steel and stone shattered the silence of the night: the LST had hit a submerged coral reef. The grounding tore a 2ft hole in the evaporator room and twisted, warped and gashed the heavy steel skin in other parts of the ship’s hull.”

Unfortunately for the sailors on board, the ship’s compartments quickly flooded, and her people were ordered to go over the side. Despite Eleuthera being under a mile away, “heavy seas and razor-sharp coral played havoc with the small boats, and at least three of the landing craft ripped holes in their hulls on submerged reefs in getting ashore.” Remarkably, no one was drowned or seriously injured.

In daylight, the priority became lightening ship by off-loading cargo and vehicles. Since a Mayday was sent, US Navy ships promptly diverted assets towards the wreck, starting with destroyer escort USS Osberg (DE 538) and USS Heyliger (DE 510). These ships took off LST 291’s shipwrecked and stranded people, and left behind in Eleuthera a volunteer salvage party under Commander RK Thurman, who directed operations. They first flooded all the LST’s compartments to halt its progress towards the beach. Navy divers called frogmen from Underwater Demolition Team Two arrived and planned clearing a 900-foot-wide channel through the reef. There were 25-knot winds and other contrary weather conditions. A channel out was marred by coral pinnacles up to 100ft wide. The divers used 400 pounds of explosives to blast a way out, with more flown in.

Many ships, including USS Carter Hall (LSD 3), USS Wyandot (AKA 92), USS Oglethorpe (AKA 100), USS Tanner (AGS 15) and USS Donner (LSD 20) removed cargo and assisted. The divers became underwater jeep drivers, removing vehicles in the ship’s flooded tank deck. A diver, donning his helmet, would seat himself in a submerged vehicle, then steer it to the surface as a heavy crane pulled it out. Holes in the hull were patched and water pumped out. Finally, LST 291 was filled with compressed air and refloated. Then Naval salvage ships USS Recovery (ARS 43) and USS Opportune (ARS 41) washed streams of water under the LST’s stern, and she moved, though the tow cable suddenly went limp when the ship was caught on a coral pinnacle.

Once extracted from the reefs, navy salvors towed LST 291 to a drydock in Jacksonville, however since “the damage she sustained was too extensive, she was decommissioned, struck from the Naval Register on 19 May 1954, and sunk as a target in July 1954.” So ended the saga of a ship so close to home which was blasted from a certain grave.