This month marks the 84th anniversary of the infamous Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor in December 1941. The surprise assault sank four battleships, killed thousands and hurled the United States headlong into the Second World War. However, a persistent coastal Maine legend suggests the Axis powers actually fired their first fatal shot on an American vessel five months earlier, 5,000 miles east of Hawaii and not far from Bailey Island.
That long-running rumor claims a German submarine torpedoed a pleasure boat full of tourists bound for Monhegan Island. It probably isn’t true, but nobody can say for sure because there were no survivors and the wreck has never been found.
One thing is certain: The mystery has kept the East Harpswell excursion boat Don in Mainers’ collective memory for more than three-quarters of a century — along with the names of the 34 passengers and crew who went down with her, somewhere west of Seguin Island.
Sunday, June 29, was supposed to be a fun day on the water. A group of 32 tourists, mostly friends from Rumford and Mexico, Maine, chartered the Don for a trip to Monhegan Island. They paid Capt. Paul Johnson and his deckhand, Albert Foster, $2.50 each for the trip, plus two lobsters apiece at a clambake on the island. Passengers caravaned to the dock at Dyer’s Cove in six cars, carrying a guitar and a Victrola record player. They arrived around 8 a.m. and were aboard the boat and underway an hour later.
The 44-foot Don had seen better days. It had once been long, sleek and fast — good for running rum past the authorities off Lynn, Massachusetts, during prohibition, when Johnson captained it for suspected mafioso figures, including Lucifer Ingraffia and Dodo Henry.
“Paul Johnson, owner and captain of the Don, is generally regarded as a sort of dare devil fisherman,” reported the Lewiston Evening Journal three days after the Don vanished. “That is, he will go out when the other fellow stays in. It is said that he established a reputation for daring back in the days of the 18th Amendment.”
But in Maine, more than a decade later, Johnson had added an upper deck to the Don, increasing its height by 5 feet. The new deck made the narrow boat top-heavy and susceptible to rolling side to side, even in moderate swells. Johnson piloted the Don from a perch atop the open upper deck, where passengers could also ride, though there was no railing of any kind.
An hour out of Dyer’s Cove on the day of the ill-fated excursion, the Don docked at Phippsburg’s West Point, procuring clams and lobsters for the impending picnic. It then headed past Seguin Island, where the assistant lighthouse keeper, just about to start his shift, noted its passing just after 11 a.m. The keeper also recorded hazy skies, 4 miles of visibility, and six to eight people sitting on the upper deck with Johnson.
Disaster struck soon after the keeper lost sight of the Don. When fishermen began to find the first bodies a day later, several still wore watches. All had stopped around 11:40 a.m.
At first, authorities suspected the Don had somehow exploded. The Lewiston Evening Journal speculated the boat may have been hit by lightning or that a recently repaired fuel tank valve had malfunctioned. One Coast Guard officer said the Don had “undoubtedly” exploded.
“One body recovered today, that of Elizabeth Howard, Rumford bank employee, was badly burned,” the Evening Journal reported on July 1.
Other Maine newspapers reported scorched bodies, clothing and debris as well. Later, however, a Brunswick coroner told reporters the bodies only looked burned because of prolonged exposure to the sea, and all victims showed unmistakable signs of drowning. Suspicions then turned to the Don’s top-heavy design, suggesting it capsized, perhaps after hitting a ledge.
By July 3, after a massive search by authorities, fishermen and local Boy Scouts, more than 10 bodies had been located, some near Harpswell’s Ragged and Jaquish islands.
“Today, 11 lifeless bodies, lying in scattered morgues from Brunswick to Rumford, give grim testimony of the tragedy which overtook the ‘Don’ in one of the greatest marine disasters in the history of the Maine seacoast, and the weary search goes on,” The Brunswick Record wrote that day. “The fog, which for 48 hours, had hampered the search for victims, has long since lifted, but the mystery of how the ill-starred little craft vanished remains unsolved.”
Accompanying the front-page story, the Record ran a photo of state police officials examining Capt. Johnson’s lifeless body as it was brought to shore. It was found near Pond Island Ledges, east of Bailey Island, clad only in underwear and socks. A wooden tuna-fishing keg, normally used as a buoy, was tied around his waist.
Years later, the 2011 documentary film “Gone: The Mystery of the Don Disaster” speculated Johnson had stripped and tied the keg around himself while trying, in vain, to dive for survivors before he also drowned.
The 14th and final body was found 14 days after the tragedy, off Cape Elizabeth. In all, 12 bodies were those of women while just two, including Johnson, were men.
Later in the year, an official investigative panel made up of state authorities and Bailey Island fishermen concluded the Don likely capsized, possibly while carrying too many people on the dangerous upper deck, making the boat unstable. The panel noted that Johnson’s captain’s license had expired and the Don was just shy of the size limit that would have made it subject to federal safety inspections.
Neither the report nor any contemporary news story made mention of the Nazi U-boat theory. That rumor didn’t appear in print until decades later, and its origin is unclear. German submarines definitely operated off Maine’s coast throughout the war. One even sunk a Navy ship off Cape Elizabeth in the final days of the war in 1945.
The 2011 film goes so far as to speculate that the Germans took most men prisoner before sinking the Don, thus explaining why most of the victims found were women. There is no evidence for that — but there’s no evidence to substantiate much of any other theory, either.
The persistent mystery has fueled a steady stream of interest in the Don in recent years, from books to films to divers searching for the wreck. Still, nothing is known for certain. In 2008, a memorial stone bearing victims’ names was placed in Mexico.
On Sunday, July 5, 1941, simultaneous memorial services were held on Bailey Island and in Rumford. Hundreds of mourners attended each service. A pastor read the names of the dead aloud on a wharf at Mackerel Cove.
Then, a small group of mourners boarded boats and set out to sea. Near Mark Island Ledge, south of Bailey Island, they cast flowers into the water and said a final prayer for the dead.
