Salt Tide
Cycles and Currents of Life Along the Coast
Curtis J. Badger
A well–written book telling of the author’s adventures and explorations in the lagoons between the Virginia barrier islands and the shore, both as a boy and as a man. It contains several very good sketches appropriate to the text.
In one chapter he writes about his great–grandfather John Badger who, at age 16 and with his brother Thomas, age 23, left the farm in 1849 and joined the gold rush in California. The brothers left no record as to how much gold they found, but within a few years each was able to purchase ocean–going schooners and enter into the shipping business, which had been their goal. John returned to Virginia and bought a ship and began shipping between Atlantic coastal cities and the West Indies. Thomas stayed in California and shipped goods between San Francisco and Hong Kong. In 1857 he married, and he and his wife Jennie set out for Virginia to introduce the bride to his family. They sailed to Panama and after crossing the isthmus, boarded the luxury side–wheeler Central America.
The hull of the Central America sprung a leak in a severe hurricane off the coast of Georgia. As the ship was going down, Tom and Jennie stuffed all their gold in a carpet bag and placed it in the captain’s cabin. They then embraced for the last time and she boarded a lifeboat with other women. Tom stayed with the ship and, having had experiences with typhoons in the Pacific, helped the captain organize a bailing brigade; when that failed, he helped other passengers abandon ship.
Jennie was rescued by the brig Marine and taken to New York. Tom remained with the captain until the Central America went down, and when it finally went under he climbed on a piece of wooden decking and held on through the night. At dawn the bark Ellen was patrolling the area and Tom was found still clinging to the piece of flotsam. He was rescued and taken with other survivors to Norfolk, Virginia. Tom went to New York and after several days he found Jennie. They returned to Virginia and she finally got to meet the family.