At midday on Monday, November 13, 1961, an oil tanker crew spotted Captain Julian Harvey, a retired airman, floating on a dinghy in the Atlantic Ocean. With him was the body of seven-year-old René Duperrault, the youngest member of a family that had been traveling for the past week with Harvey and his wife on a ship called the Bluebelle.
Once he was rescued and taken to the coast guard, Harvey told them how a storm swept in at midnight, breaking the masts and triggering a cascade of events where his only option was to flee the burning boat, alone. He said he came across René’s body in the water and tried to save her life, but was unable to do so.
That would have been the official story of the Bluebelle, if not for a second ocean rescue days later. Three and a half days after the Bluebelle sank, eleven year old Terry Jo Duperrault was found barely clinging to life atop a disintegrating float. Her story about how the Bluebelle sank — and how she managed to survive for days on the ocean without food, water, or shelter — would change everything.
But first, Zoey is here with a Something Something that qualifies as a Something Southern AND a Something Spooky: the haunted Calcasieu Courthouse in Lake Charles, Louisiana!
CW: suicide.
Sources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bluebelle_(ship)
“Orphaned on the Ocean: The Story of Terry Jo Duperrault” by Lily Rowan, History Daily.
An excerpt from Alone: Orphaned on the Ocean by Tere Duperrault Fassbender and Richard Logan, Ph.D.: https://www.today.com/popculture/orphaned-sea-tere-now-tells-story-wbna36964672
“Survivor of Sinking Reported on Way to Full Recovery,” New York Times, Nov. 20, 1961.
“6 KILLED AS KETCH SINKS IN BAHAMAS,” New York Times, Nov. 14, 1961.
Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.), 20 Nov. 1961. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045462/1961-11-20/ed-1/seq-2/>
Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.), 27 Nov. 1961. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045462/1961-11-27/ed-1/seq-32/>
Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.), 18 Nov. 1961. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045462/1961-11-18/ed-1/seq-3/>
Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.), 24 Nov. 1961. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045462/1961-11-24/ed-1/seq-5/>
Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.), 19 Nov. 1961. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045462/1961-11-19/ed-1/seq-6/>
Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.), 23 Nov. 1961. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045462/1961-11-23/ed-1/seq-1/>
Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.), 23 Nov. 1961. Chronicling America: Historic American Newspapers. Lib. of Congress. <https://chroniclingamerica.loc.gov/lccn/sn83045462/1961-11-23/ed-1/seq-6/>
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