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Updated: June 1, 2025
As night drew on, the clouds darkened and the wind freshened, so that when Maud and I ate supper it was with our mittens on and with me still steering and eating morsels between puffs. By the time it was dark, wind and sea had become too strong for the boat, and I reluctantly took in the sail and set about making a drag or sea-anchor.
The sea-anchor remained just under the surface of the ocean in a perpendicular position. A long line, in turn, connected it with the schooner. As a result, the Petite Jeanne rode bow on to the wind and to what sea there was. The situation really would have been favorable had we not been in the path of the storm.
It made a fairly good sea-anchor, with the forestay strong as any chain for a cable, and she lay snug under the haphazard breakwater and benefited by the protection, as the seas must first break their heads over the wreckage before reaching her.
In three hours it was midnight, I well remember, and as dark as I had ever seen it on the sea the wind, still blowing out of the south-west, rose furiously, and once again I was compelled to set the sea-anchor. Day broke and found me wan-eyed and the ocean lashed white, the boat pitching, almost on end, to its drag. We were in imminent danger of being swamped by the whitecaps.
Well, I wish I'd only had those crack sailors of the Bohemian Club on board the Snark the other night for them to see for themselves their one, vital, unanimous judgment absolutely reversed. Run? It is the one thing the Snark does to perfection. Run? She ran with a sea-anchor fast for'ard and a full mizzen flattened down aft. Run?
A sea-anchor may be rigged up by tying sails and oars together, with, if possible, a weight attached just to keep them under water, and then pitching the lot overboard.
We put out a sea-anchor to keep the 'James Caird's' head up to the sea. This anchor consisted of a triangular canvas bag fastened to the end of the painter and allowed to stream out from the bows. The boat was high enough to catch the wind, and, as she drifted to leeward, the drag of the anchor kept her head to windward. Thus our boat took most of the seas more or less end on.
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