The Tribune

More than 300 mailboats have served The Bahamas over 200 years, and many dozens sank; whether from groundings, fires, system failures, waves, neglect, Cuban bombs in Miami canals, or otherwise. These are stories of those casualties, some of which claimed the lives of passangers and crew. While not comprehensive, it is illustrative of the dangers faced in shallow but perilous waters. The accounts are drawn from newspaper archives, interviews, and callers who provided details during a ZNZ Radio programme hosted by Spence Finlayson called “Immediate Response” in 2022.

An undated story is entitled “Andros residents rap sunken mailboat,” and describes how Mangrove Cay residents “are complaning that the continued presense of a sunken mailboat at the dock of Little Harbour, Andros, is causing hardship for residents wishing to import cars and othe oversized consumer items,” including fridges, and juke boxes.

The 80-foot mailboat named Captain Johnson Express sank at the town dock at Easter in 1973. A leading merchant told The Tribune that “the Captain Moxey has to anchor offside and supplies put into a dinghy and brought ashore. Locals brought the matter to the attention of a transport minister who was also district representative, but months later were still waiting action. An unrelated vessel named Betty Ann was beached in the mangroves nearby some years later, and when Queen Elizabeth II visited, it was set alight to remove the eyesore.

Not all emergencies lead to sinkings; in January, 1973 the Tribune reported that both Church Bay and Staniel Cay Express “were disabled with engine trouble on their way to Nassau and had to be towed into safe harbour”.

Staniel Cay Express had to be towed into Cistern Cay, Exuma by a Good Samaritan, arriving after 10pm due to an engine failure. The Church Bay had been a minesweeper built by Sir Roland Symonette in World War II, as was the Stede Bonnet, and had recently been in drydock in Abaco for engine repairs. It was towed by the tanker Texaco Bahamas into Ship Channel Cay, Exuma. The mailboat crew fixed one engine and limped into Nassau, completing a voyage from Cat Island to the capital, and the tanker carried on to San Salvador.

An unusual mailboat had been built as a mine layer in Jamaica for the Royal Navy in 1940. ML 371 was 112 feet long, wooden, 129 tons, motor and registered in Nassau in 1951. It served Mayaguana, Crooked Island and Acklins, Inagua, and Ragged Island between 1946 and 1951, under the ownerships of the Taylor and Williamson families, Henry L Roberts up to 1956, and one of her captains was Daniel Gibson. Unconfirmed oral history has ML 371 sinking east of Nassau, within sight of the capital. In March of 2000 Alma B, owned by Spence Brown, sank off Cat Cay, Bimini, with two persons perishing. Almeta Queen sank on its first delivery voyage to Abaco from Nassau in 1972, due to portholes being left open and water flooding in.

In 1975 diplomatic cables with US the South Andros Express had a galley fire, in response to which the US Navy deployed from AUTEC. The mailboat Nellie Leonora was destroyed at Rum Cay in a hurricane of August 1916. Arawak, built in Hatchet Bay for Austin Levy, sank on a voyage from Jacksonville to Eleuthera, Bimini Gal sank at her namesake island in 1972. Brontes was tragically lost in the July 1926 hurricane with 30 souls near Highbourne Cay. Captain Dean II caught fire and sank between Berry Islands and Abaco in 1968. The first Captain Moxey sank west of Great Exuma around 1998. Captain Dean IV was run aground intentionally near Sandy Point and the crew rescued by the US Coast Guard in 1977. Captain Dean V sank at the Frederick Street dock in Nassau during a fire which killed Captain Stanford Curry in September, 1986. Caribbean Queen sank off Cay Sal en route from the Florida Keys to the Dominican Republic in January of 1961.

Cat Island Princess (or Express) sank off the Berry Islands on a voyage from Grand Bahama with cement on 13 March, 2018. Clermont sank off Hole-in-the-Wall Light, in 1962. The schooner Defense wrecked by being smashed inside the harbor at Bimini in the 1926 hurricane per Wayne Neely. Bahamas Drake sank off Farmers Cay, Exuma on December 29, 1968. Eleuthera Express sank on a voyage from Haiti to Cuba in the late 1980s. Emmett & Cephas sank in 2001, and Gleaner Express ran aground at Harvey’s Cay Exuma, in the early 1970s; though it was towed to Nassau and repaired, the mailboat was taken out of service during the 1980s.

Perhaps the most unusual fate of a Bahamian mailboat was that of Goldfinger, which served Andros, Berry Islands, Bimini, and North Eleuthera from 1972 until 1977.

In August of 1975, during a time of heightened tension between Bahamas and Cuba over fishing rights at places like Cay Sal Bank and Ragged Island, Goldfinger was lying in Miami River when it was sunk by a terrorist bomb in August 1975 presumably by Cuban-American divers. The boat, which had served Imperial Lighthouse Service, was raised, repaired and salvaged, ultimately sinking in a storm northeast of Andros on 5 April, 1977.

Hazel Dell was a two-masted schooner built in 1906 for W. J. Pinder which caught fire and sank in 1960. Central Andros Express sank at Potter’s Cay, Nassau in July, 2014 and was removed in the fall of 2016. Lady Edina was sold to owners in Roatan Honduras about 2005, where it sank at or near Utila or Guanaja, outside The Bahamas. Lady Eula ran aground and sank at San Salvador in 1981, due, it is said, to navigational error. The first Lady Rosalind struck a rock and was damaged in 1997, then was towed to north-central Potters Cay, between the bridges, donated to DB Bahamas, and despite several attempts to refloat or scrap it to make space for commercial activities, its remains, fate uncertain.

Lady Tasha languished in a semi-sunken state on the northwest end of Potter’s Cay in the 2000s, then was towed to the southwest corner of Arawak Cay after 2016, only to sink again.

Mangrove Cay Express first sank in 1988, then, sometime around 2009 Joseph Moxey went to US to buy it and convert it to a mail boat. Though he delivered it to the Bahamas, it sank very soon after. Maxine sank in around 1999, and may be an artificial reef in Florida. Miss Beverley sank in Nassau on January 9, 1977, in a fierce storm which also claimed Air Swift, and was later salvaged.

Johnette Walker sank in Ship Channel Cay, Exuma during May, 1974 and was salvaged, only to sink again in 1977 off Andros, with AUTEC’s rescue vessel IX and others rescuing those on board. South Andros Queen is said to have caught fire and sunk.

Spanish Rose sank during daytime in 1997, and all were saved. Staniel Cay Express sank off Hope Town on 11 June, 1975 when the wooden seams of this former fishing boat once commanded by Captain Rolly Gray opened up. Stede Bonnet sank during Hurricane Betsy in September, 1965, in Marsh Harbour.

Willaurie sank three times, the final one she was being towed from Nassau out west to be scuttled when the tow parted and she went aground off Clifton Pier. She then became a dive site near Goulding Cay after being towed off the rocks at Christmas of 1988 by an enthusiastic young dive operator and friends. Wrecked mailboats have much to tell.