Far ashore in a little town
By name ’twas Ketchikan
Their wives looked fond on children sweet
As only mothers can
They never knew when the cold dawn came
That brave men fought the wave
They could not know that even then
That five were drowned in an icy grave.
The gas tank boomed as the tide was turned
Away from the high tide mark
Four men went down to an icy grave
In the home of the squid and the shark
No one knows how the gas tank flared
But we only know she sank
With never a skiff to carry them
And never a saving plank.
Helmsman died when the ship went down
For he never reached the deck
He was the first of the gallant crew
To sink in that awful wreck
The next to go was A. M. Accue
Fighting as a sea man can
He swam an hour in the icy sea
And drowned with the shore in scan
He must have know that the bitter fight
Was against the ebbing tide
He surely knew but he never stopped
But swimming sank and died
(Cont.)
