The Rechabite
I began composing this, the third movement, in the last week or so of July 2010, and completed it on August 7th - the fastest I have ever written snything. The Flow has been worked at on-and-off for a couple of years at least [although only recently in earnest] yet Rechabite came into being with great ease and great speed. Only when it came to the ironic little waltz-like section heralding the coda did I find that my ideas for the naturally flowing and vaguely programmatic form falter for a moment. The Rechabite [built at Lawrenny in 1840] was owned by a collection of individuals who mostly came from the St Davids area. The smack was around 19 tons, half-decked and rigged as a sloop, and plied a route regularly to Porth Clais with culm [anthracite dust] and limestone - up to 30 tons. When heading up north through Ramsey Sound the load was less, to allow a higher freeboard for the rougher tidal waters. It was on just such a voyage to Fishguard one Wednesday, on September 4th 1861, that disaster struck. Times were hard, and not only were crews reduced to the barest minimum to sail the ships but often loads would exceed what was prudent and safe - either just overfilled with whatever was being carried, or the contracted load would have been augmented by separate goods carried by the ship's captain as a means of making some extra money. In any event the load meant that the Rechabite was perilously low in the water, with precious little freeboard [that is the distance between the deck or upper edge of the side of the vessel and the waterline]. This would mean that any bigger waves or a sudden swell would easily swamp the boat. The Rechabite's openness, a virtue when it came to loading and unloading, would hugely compromise its seaworthiness.
Thus did the ship begin to make its way up through Ramsey Sound on that fateful Wednesday, only she was lying desperately low in the water. Upon hitting the first rougher waters of the sound, the Rechabite's bow ploughed down through the water and sunk, taking the two crew with her. It must have been an awful sight for the horrified onlookers. Had Levi Davies [owner and captain] and his single crewmember John Llywellyn any misgivings when they set out, or had their fears about being overloaded not filled each with a fear of sinking? Did either stand any chance of surviving or was the ghastly occurrence too sudden and possibly unexpected? Had either of them any sense of the mortal danger they were in except at the very end? I have sailed over the very same bit of water many, many times, and the souls of the dead - many more besides these two unfortunate sailors - rise up from the sixty feet of raging depths to fill my imagination. Such a beautiful place, yet so savage. Fate is truly irrevocable is these waters....
The name 'Rechabite' is biblical - a Rechabite was a descendant of Jonadab, son of Rechab, who neither drank wine nor dwelled in houses. The reference comes from The Book of Jeremiah, chapter 35, vv 6-7. A temperance society was named after this. Was Levi Davies teetotal? Did he live on his ship, like a nautical nomad?
Thus did the ship begin to make its way up through Ramsey Sound on that fateful Wednesday, only she was lying desperately low in the water. Upon hitting the first rougher waters of the sound, the Rechabite's bow ploughed down through the water and sunk, taking the two crew with her. It must have been an awful sight for the horrified onlookers. Had Levi Davies [owner and captain] and his single crewmember John Llywellyn any misgivings when they set out, or had their fears about being overloaded not filled each with a fear of sinking? Did either stand any chance of surviving or was the ghastly occurrence too sudden and possibly unexpected? Had either of them any sense of the mortal danger they were in except at the very end? I have sailed over the very same bit of water many, many times, and the souls of the dead - many more besides these two unfortunate sailors - rise up from the sixty feet of raging depths to fill my imagination. Such a beautiful place, yet so savage. Fate is truly irrevocable is these waters....
The name 'Rechabite' is biblical - a Rechabite was a descendant of Jonadab, son of Rechab, who neither drank wine nor dwelled in houses. The reference comes from The Book of Jeremiah, chapter 35, vv 6-7. A temperance society was named after this. Was Levi Davies teetotal? Did he live on his ship, like a nautical nomad?