Untitled - Memorial University's Digital Archives - Memorial ...

156
intcresling--if all too obvious--point is that tragic songs of local composition, apan from
two murders, consistcnlly relate the exceptional ravages of the sea bUI never those of the far
morc frequent killers--lUberculosis and childbirth. The case justifies "I'hisloire des
mcnlalitcs," which denies any mechanical link between demography and ideas in the face of
a hislOriographical tradition which entirely relied on the hard facts and figures of official
sources, but consciously ignored others, such as those of traditional culture. I Canon
Earle's suggestion of "a native view" of tragedy is in line with Laws' explanation
concerning the prevalence of disasters dealt with in native American balladry. namely thai
"multiple deaths in onc calamity always seem more terrible than the same number
geographically disuibuted:"2
IP: Was there more grief for a tragic death and a young person dying?
CE: Yes, we used to feel, we had one or two drownings and all pouring to
the funeral, and the whole place would feel it, yes, but, yes, mOSI of the
deaths home were older ones and apan from these families where TB.
set in, you know, it's surprising how few drownings there were when
you think they were all using the water and boats..
IP: That wasn't the major cause of death?
CE: ot the major cause at all, no, not the major; they were emphasized
more because they were something like aircrashes now, when a lot of
people went down. Tragedies was when you got the schooner from
Fogo that ran aground and everybody on it was drowned. I think, three
from one family, yes, that's the one of great tragedies that's still talked
about, and leaving the orphans behind, this sort of thing.... We had a
complete absence of violent deaths. I think, the hard ones, yes, ('II tell
you the hard ones, they were mostly connected with the sea but, we had
two brothers on Change Islands, I was a very small boy, I just
remember the occasion, and these twO brothers Scammel, they went off
in their boats to get seals and they were never heard of again and they
assumed they swamped. They had too much of a load in the punt and
the wind came; that was very tragic because they were still, they were
my fmher's age, they were probably in their late 30's or 40's, there
were young families left, two or three children, and in time the widows
packed it up and left Change Islands, and you still go back there now
70 years later, and "that's where Alex Scammel used to live," and lhat
really shook it, that kind of a sudden drowning, these two brothers.
IP: Were the txxIies recovered?
CE: No, no sign of it, yes, they got the bodies, yes, they didn'1 mind so
mllch, you see, they understood; oh yes, they were drowr1t:d. They
wondered what they went through before they died. Now, they had
some in Joe Ban's Arm, lhree or four sealers drifted off on the ice and
were never heard of again, but somebody found a gaff, that is a boat
hook, and somebody had cut in it "this is the day we lie down to die,"
1This point was made earlier in section 2.1 of this thesis, and rderred to Vovelle.
-attitudes.- 120·)2.
2Laws. Natille 108.