Around 2 a.m. Nov. 29, 1966, off the tip of Michigan’s Thumb in Lake Huron, two bangs as loud as canon fire jolt Dennis Hale, 26, a watchman aboard the bulk freighter Daniel J. Morrell, from his sound sleep. His books are toppling off the shelf in his cabin. His bunk light doesn’t work. The ship’s general alarm bell starts ringing.

“Something’s got to be wrong,” Hale thinks, according to his 2010 book “Shipwrecked.”

He puts on his lifejacket and lurches into the companionway dressed only in his boxer shorts. He makes his way to the spar deck.

Norm Bragg, a watchman and survivor of the wreck of the Henry Steinbrenner in Lake Superior in 1953, tells Hale and a couple other sailors that the freighter has buckled in the 20-25 foot swells and may have lost its bottom.

Bragg tells the men to tie themselves to the nearby raft.

“You don’t want to get separated from that raft,” Bragg says.

The raft is constructed of two eight-foot long steel drums joined by 5 feet of steel supports on top of which is bolted a wooden deck. The raft is too heavy to lift. The idea is to sit on the raft as the ship sinks under it. “It’s been good to know you guys.” Bragg says.

As the raft floats free of the ship’s deck, a pin is supposed to pull out of a carbide light, illuminating the raft. The deck of the Morrell is slippery with snow and ice.

Hale hurries back to his dark cabin and finds his peacoat. Still barefoot, he joins about eight other sailors on the raft. The ship is howling as its steel hull is wrenched and twisted in the storm. The men watch in horror as the one-inch thick steel deck of the Morrell tears in half like wet cardboard from starboard to port.

The stern half of the freighter has broken free of the bow and is running on its own.

“Now, as I’m looking over my left shoulder, I’m looking into Lake Huron as it whips and dances below,” Hale says in his book. “When I look straight ahead over the port side, I see the stern section of Morrell coming straight for us, still under power. The water hasn’t reached the boilers yet, as there hasn’t been an explosion. The deck and cargo hold lights are still on and I can see into the cargo hold … I’m thinking, God I hope the stern section doesn’t run over the bow and kill all of us.”

Art Stojek and John Cleary, both deckhands in their first year on the lakes, are the only sailors there. They haul him aboard the raft. A moment later, Stojek and Cleary drag Charles H, Fosbender out of the water, a wheelsman known as Fuzzy. Fosbender, 42, is from St. Clair.

Before daybreak, Stojek and Cleary die aboard the raft, lashed by waves that grow to 35 feet. The first swell extinguishes the carbide light. They are pounded the rest of the night by giant mounds of water they cannot see.

Against the 33 degree air, the black 44 degree waves sometime feel almost warm against their frostbitten bodies.

The storm wanes with the coming of dawn.

Fuzzy talks about his wife.”I’ve been thinking a lot about her. What will she do without me if I don’t make it?”

“I don’t want you to leave me, Fuzz,” Hale says. “We need to keep each other going. Just think how nice it would be to be home for Christmas.”

By mid-afternoon, with land in sight, Fuzzy Fosbender slips away.

Hale, barely conscious and experiencing near-death visions, will become the sole survivor of the 29 member crew. He is not rescued until a Coast Guard helicopter plucks him from the raft, 300 yards south of the Pointe Aux Barques Lighthouse, around 4 p.m. Nov. 30 and takes him to Harbor Beach hospital, according to the lighthouse society. Hale had been on the raft for 38 hours.

“The stern part ended up floating over four miles past the bow part,” said dive organization on its website. “The signature features on the bow are the mast, intact cabin, mushroom anchors and a long swim to where the ship broke in half. The stern offers just about everything to see as when it went down – life boats on the side, dishes in the galley, life ring down the stairs, and accessible engine room with gauges and machinery for the very experienced and trained divers.”

Fosbender was buried in Hillside Cemetery in St. Clair. His wife Janice, who died in 2003, is next to him.

Hale died in 2015 of cancer.

An exhibit dedicated to the Morrell debuted Aug. 7 at the Great Lakes Shipwreck Museum at Whitefish Point on the shores of Lake Superior.

“The event was primarily attended by surviving family members of Daniel J. Morrell,” said Bruce Lynn, executive director of the museum. “There were a few other folks who came in, speakers and what not. But it was mainly for family members.”

Jim Bloch is a freelance writer based in St. Clair, MI. Contact him at [email protected]. To see the original story, follow tis link to The Voice website.  https://www.voicenews.com/2021/11/29/marking-the-55th-anniversary-of-sinking-of-freighter-daniel-j-m...