Here’s a Post that let’s you, the reader of Annie Tillery Mysteries, wallow in the trivia of forensic science and history.
For instance, did you know that the United States Life Saving Service, mentioned in The Madonna Ghost, was the precursor to the U.S. Coast Guard? The men of the U.S.L.S.S. rescues our ghost who later perished from her ordeal. In the span of their existence they were responsible for assisting 669 vessels between 1877 and 1915, according to the Annual Report of the U.S.L.S.S. One such wreck occurred off Cherry Grove, Fire Island in February of 1895, the wreck of the Louis V. Place. As the crew members, clinging to the frozen rigging, waited to be rescued, they fell, one by one, to their death, or were rescued, only to die from the effects of their exposure to the elements. When all was said and done, only one survived, seaman Claus Stuven. He returned to the sea, and continued to serve on ships.
Read more, Fire Island, Heroes and Villains by Jack Whitehouse.
It was the rich, and sometimes lurid history of Fire Island, that sparked me to create my ghost.
