Adelsverein - The Gathering - The Book Locker

Chapter 3 – Voyager
Thinking on it much, much later, after a long and eventful life,
Magda Vogel would remember crossing the Atlantic on the emigrant
ship Apollo as one of the most horrific experiences of her life; a long
purgatory of darkness and misery, jammed together with her family
and dozens of others in the reeking ‘tween-deck, and only let abovedecks
when the weather was fair and they would not be in the way of
the sailors.
It had not seemed quite bad at first, settling into the
Steinmetzes’ crowded little corner, once Mutti had got over the shock
of seeing where they were supposed to live. They spread out their
bedding in the four bunks, and screened them with blankets for an
illusive speck of privacy. Other families streamed down the
companionway from the upper deck, pushing past them, searching for
their own; a stout Swabian farmer and his wife with six children
trailing after, an older man in clerical black, he and his wife both
clutching bundles. Presently the traffic from above ceased and not a
moment too soon, Magda thought. The place between the curving
wooden walls was packed with families, all settling themselves into
the shelf-like bunks. A sailor came halfway down the ladder-stair,
shouting, “The captain orders everyone to stay below, while we’re
casting off. As soon as we’re underway, we’ll let you on deck, by
turns - as long as you stay out of our way!”
New and strange noises came from overhead, the rattle of
chains, and sailors chanting, and Magda gasped as the deck
underneath her feet swayed with a wider motion. Mutti sat down
heavily on the bench, her eyes suddenly wide and dark and the older
man in clericals took his wife by the hand and declaimed fervently,
“So the Lord said to Joshua, ‘be strong and of good courage, for you
shall go with this people unto the land which the Lord has sworn to
their fathers to give them …it is the Lord who goes before you, he
will be with you, he will not fail or forsake you, do not fear or be
dismayed.’”
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