Fascinating. He was so hungry he thought his wife was a sheep and he grabbed a knife. This is a very short interview story of dramatic Survival and death on Lake Superior, Isle Royale - Mott island (on right).
NOTE - Mott Island is actually about 1.4 miles long, (not 3/4).
I’ve been to Mott Island several times in my boat, very isolated rugged and rocky and open to the great lake.
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The Story, by wflem:
In the winter of 1843, together Charlie and Angelique Mott suffered
an ordeal that only Angelique lived to tell. In July of that year, Charlie and Angelique were hired to protect a copper claim by camping on tiny Mott Island, Lake Superior, off the shore of Isle Royale. Dropped off on the lonely shore, they were promised supplies in a few weeks. And to be picked up in October when their job was done.
In the meantime, provisions were sparse, a barrel of flour, six pounds of rancid butter and a few beans. They fished with a net and a canoe.
September came, with no sign of a supply boat, Their net broke and a storm swept away their canoe. October and then November passed and still not a soul appeared. Not a scrap of food was left. December brought the snow. The lake froze. They lost hope of rescue.
In a newspaper interview she gave in 1845, Angelique conveyed the anguish that they left,
"Nothing seemed left to us but sickness, starvation and death itself. All we could do is eat bark and roots and bitter berries that only seemed to make the hunger worse. Hunger is an awful thing. It eats you up so inside, and you feel so all gone, as if you must go crazy". Charlie grew weaker and lost heart. Around Christmas crazed with fever, he seized a knife, and wheeled on his wife. He growled that he must kill a sheep, that he must have something to eat. For hours Angelique watched him like a hawk, finally wrestling the knife from him. Then the fever passed. "I saw him sink away and dry up until there was nothing left of him but skin and bones. At last he died so easily that I couldn't tell just when the breath did leave his body".
Angelique now struggled to survive alone, her husbands body beside
her in the hut. "How could I bury him when the ground was frozen as hard as a rock. I could not bear to throw him out in the snow. For three days I remained with him in the hut, and it seemed almost like company, but I was afraid if I kept up the fire he would spoil", she decided to build a second lodge and leave him in the hut.
Occasionally Angelique visited her husbands frozen body. It was then
she met her greatest fear. "The hunger raged so in my veins that I was tempted, to take Charlie and make soup of him". At that point in her fight she saw rabbit tracks outside the hut. Tearing out a lock of her hair, she made a snare. The first rabbit trapped, Angelique was so hungry that she ripped off its skin and ate it raw.
Rabbits, faith, and an astonishing will to survive brought her through
the endless winter. One morning in May she heard the firing of a gun. She
almost fainted. On shaky legs, she ran to the shore. There was the man who had abandoned them tens months before. She led him to the hut where Charlie's body lay. "He saw that Charlie was dead, that I had not killed him but that he had died of starvation. He began to cry and to try to explain things, I thought his own conscience ought to punish him more than I could do"............. http://archiver.rootsweb.com/th/read/QUEBEC-RESEARCH/2003-12/1070504500
From: WFlem72706@aol.com
Subject: [Q-R] Excerpt of History
Date: Wed, 3 Dec 2003 21:21:40 EST
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Bert says - Note: the original account and interview was much longer and so much more dramatic, her thoughts and feelings and other crisis she had to endure. An amazing story to never forget. If I can find the full story I’ll post it
