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 Disappointing
There have been a few books written on this disaster at sea, and this book got good reviews.... But I found it disappointing. It seemed to me like a longggg magazine article. Maybe the problem was that the characters are all so very unlikeable. After the fire and the chaos, for which there was no excuse, there are many good words written about passengers, but the crew was, almost to a one, petty, ignorant of their duties, and just basically unlikeable, so I didn't care about what happened to them. I don't like cruise ships, anyway; I find them claustrophobic and boring, unless perhaps if you drink and gamble, which I don't do. I am aware of improvements over the past many years since this incident, but still we read about almost-disasters happening in our seas week after week. After reading this book, it just confirms my refusal to ever go on another cruise.
 A good, if limited, offering.
This is, by my reckoning, the fourth book-length treatment of the Morro Castle disaster. It is also arguably the best of the lot, while not without its flaws.
Thomas Gallagher's "Fire At Sea," published initially in 1960 and reprinted a few years ago by Lyons Press, told what was a compelling tale on the surface; however, some of the author's claims fall apart on closer scrutiny, in no small part because he presented as fact incidents that could kindly be called apocryphal (some of which were known, at the time, to have been false). "Morro Castle" (Hal Burton), while a competent offering--here the author sticks to the facts--breaks no new ground. "Shipwreck" (Thomas/Witts) I've seen compared--accurately, it should be said--to a screen treatment; the writing is dramatic in all the worst ways, and the authors make some factual leaps in service to their story, rather than sticking to events as they happened. Each of these books covers slightly different facets of the event, giving a Rashomon-like quality to a narrative whose true nature may never be known.
Against this backdrop, "When The Dancing Stopped" appeared in 2006. Hicks takes as his protagonists passenger Doris Wacker and crew member Tom Torreson, whose stories are covered, to varying degrees, in the previous books. He does, however, further flesh out their stories, and much of the rest of the back story both of the vessel and the Ward Line, the company that operated her. He further makes use of FBI files that had previously been unavailable, shedding some new light on the character and actions of the disaster's "hero," Chief Radio Operator George Rogers.
On the other hand, much of the Rogers material had been uncovered earlier by Gallagher's research, and much of what Hicks has "unearthed" merely corroborates that part of Gallagher's story. Furthermore, Hicks, like Gallagher, builds the case against Rogers without giving serious consideration to the other possible causes of the fire. One would grant, based on the evidence presented in these two books, that if the fire was caused by arson, Rogers is the prime, if not the only, suspect; however, this is far from an open-shut case.
Burton's book, while acknowledging the possible Rogers connection, raises another possibility. While it's more prosaic, it's every bit as plausible, and is compelling in its own right. Without giving the game away, I would refer you to yet another book: "The Aspirin Age," edited by Isobel Leighton, which contains an essay on the Morro Castle that lays out in depth the case that Burton makes only in brief.
But I digress. Hicks has delivered a well-researched, eminently readable book. While it doesn't close the nearly 75-year-old case, it's a more-than-worthy addition to the (sadly limited) canon on this disaster. But there's a caveat... Hicks managed to avoid his predecessors' shortcomings and pitfalls, save for one: I can't help but think, based on the evidence, that the author allowed his narrative to shape his research, rather than seeing where the research took him, and writing accordingly. I wonder what this book could have been if that hadn't been the case, and it's what kept a very good book from being an excellent, perhaps even definitive, one.
 Riveting Retelling of a Classic American Mystery
The strange story of the cruise liner S.S. Morro Castle is truly one of history's most intriguing "stranger than fiction" mysteries. The Depression-era Morro Castle sailed regularly between New York and a then pre-Communist Cuba. But even though old Havana was a prized tourist destination in those days, the political turmoil of the island in and of itself infected the Morro Castle with intrigues. The Morro Castle's cargo business involved it in what can only be called gun running, and the repressive "banana republic" governance found in Cuba lead to political agitation amongst her crew. Labor unrest in general seemed to be a constant since the liner's owners seemed a bit too ready to take advantage of the desperation of the crew for jobs while the Depression raged. And as the troubled liner plied her trade, her captain, Robert Willmott, himself became more and more troubled. Mysterious fires broke out on the ship during her runs. Stories reached the captain about explosives and toxic chemicals being smuggled aboard to either sabotage the ship or injure him personally. On the Morro Castle's last voyage, Willmott had become so paranoid that he had nearly cutoff all contact with passengers and crew.
On that last voyage on the last night of the cruise, the beleaguered captain dropped dead under circumstances that can only be called mysterious in the light of subsequent events. The exhausted up-since-dawn first mate, William Warms, has to take charge only to find himself piloting the ship through the most bizarre weather imaginable. A hurricane is traveling up the East Coast from the south while simultaneously a Nor'easter is traveling south - trapping the Morro Castle between the two and leaving her no escape from gale force winds. Three A.M. sees the ultimate horror when a fire breaks out amidships in one of the few rooms aboard that is not fitted with smoke detectors or sprinklers. In minutes the fire burns out of control and cuts nearly everyone off from lifeboats. Most of the passengers and crew find themselves forced to decide whether to burn to death or jump into storm tossed seas. Over a hundred die from the fire or in the water off of the New Jersey coast and in an eerie coda, the burned out liner herself drifts ashore at Asbury Park and draws gawkers to watch her smolder for weeks on end. The sequence of events that night was so bizarre that speculation began immediately that the suspicious fire wasn't accidental but was purposely set.
The story didn't end there, however. It became even more disturbing. One of the ship's officers - one of the few that ended that night being lauded for his heroism - proved in subsequent years to be a homicidal sociopath. It was discovered that he had a criminal history prior to his time aboard the Morro Castle. Not only was he convicted for robbery, but he was strongly suspected of having committed arson to hide his burglaries. After his time on the Morro Castle, he attempted to murder a co-worker with a homemade bomb, was suspected of poisoning a water cooler at his place of work, and finally was sent to prison for life for the gruesome murder of his elderly neighbors. Although this proves nothing about the events of that awful September morning, the path of devastation this man wrought in his life can't help but fuel speculation as to whether he had a role in the death and destruction that took place on Morro Castle's last voyage.
I have the distinction of having read every book written about that terrible fire at sea, although that's not that impressive an accomplishment given the fact that Hicks' is only the fourth. Since I read the other three so long ago, however, I don't feel it fair to compare this newer book too directly to those others. There is admittedly not too much new here to those who also may have read a prior book about the Morro Castle. What Hicks' narrative has, however, is a tremendous driving energy that pulls you as deeply into the events of that night as possible. Even though I knew exactly what was due to come next, I still found myself seized with a tremendous foreboding with the recounting of each new ominous turn in the story. In fact, I think that this masterful narrative drive is actually Hicks' biggest contribution to the historical record as well. As well acquainted as I was with the story, I still never realized just how bad the hand William Warms was dealt that night. Up since dawn, finding a respected friend dead in the middle of the night, and having to assume command in the middle of not one but two tropical storms, he must have been a nervous wreck well before the fire started. One can always argue that a different man might have better risen to the occasion that morning, but past accounts of this tragedy have tended to paint the poor man as an incompetent bungler - a portrait that seems grossly unfair in light of the mounting series of problems he faced.
What also becomes clear from Hicks' account is how thin the line was between nuisance and outright disaster. In fact, it's not even clear that the fire wasn't already out of control the moment it was discovered. When one thinks of maritime disasters, one inevitably recalls the Titanic. But the Titanic sank over the course of four hours, giving plenty of time for all aboard to react in the best manner possible. The Morro Castle fire was more in the nature of an engine falling off an airplane wing - the pilot has one split-second decision to make that determines whether the plane crashes or lands safely. In some ways the situation aboard the Morro Castle was even worse in that successfully fighting the fire or saving as many people as possible would have entailed a series of split-second decisions by scores of crew members located all over the ship. Once the fire had spread out of control, the lifeboats were already essentially inaccessible by the passengers. This left the crew with little they could do to save lives. The fire also quickly spread to the engine room and knocked out the ship's engines. This left no way for the bridge to control the ship and left the ship's acting captain helpless to do much to save passengers. Crew incompetence is a big part of earlier recitations of this story but even though there were some incidents of undeniable cowardice on the part of the crew, it's not easy to see how the crew could have lessened the disaster in a substantial way once the fire spread out of control.
I think Hicks has also improved on earlier accounts in his handling of the testimony of the enormously unlucky radio operator George Alagna. Past accounts of the Morro Castle's last days have tended to treat Alagna's tale as gospel. Frankly, I think this is because his testimony casts everyone aboard in the worst light possible. Hicks, however, demonstrates that Alagna was a bit of a hothead and troublemaker. This doesn't totally discredit his account by any means, but does imply that one should subject it to the same skepticism accorded to the testimony of any of the other officers onboard. Keeping Alagna's testimony at arm's length actually makes the story of that morning richer and more human. I'm sure that the Morro Castle's officers where good men who, had things not progressed to disaster so quickly, might have pulled together to salvage what they could of the situation. The fire, however, left them all in a hopeless situation. And what can be expected from men in a hopeless situation? Ego-clashes. Finger-pointing. Self-pity. None of these are pretty, but they are completely understandable. Hicks has done a great service here I think by humanizing these poor men while other books have tended to paint them to a man as hapless failures.
As I grow older I find myself less and less inclined to believe the sensational. It's entirely possible that the sequence of disasters that overtook the Morro Castle that night were nothing but bad luck. On that awful night in September in 1934, the fates may just have collided over the waters of New Jersey to make the Morro Castle the worst possible place on the planet to be. Certainly, no human agency is to blame for the freakish weather which in and of itself claimed the most lives that morning. Willmott's death - while suspicious - was not unambiguously murder. The man wasn't found stabbed or shot, and he had earlier complained of things like chest pains that point to the very real possibility of a heart attack. And just because there was a wicked man aboard that night capable of committing arson, it doesn't mean that the fire was definitely set. The biggest criticism I have of Hicks' account is his failure to mention a very real possibility as to the cause of the blaze. The writing room locker in which the fire was initially discovered was backed by the ship's funnel. It's certainly possible that this funnel was malfunctioning and running hot - not only sparking a fire in the writing room locker but also super-heating its surrounding walls on several decks. This would also explain why the fire so quickly spread as deck after deck could have been heated to ignition temperatures over the course of the evening by the hot stack. And yet, while I think a lack of discussion of this possibility is a real problem with Hicks' telling, I still absolutely loved this book and strongly recommend it. The strange tale of the Morro Castle is a fascinating part of American history, and I devoutly wish that Hicks' wonderful telling acquaints or reacquaints as many people as possible with it.
Mystery solved?
Having grown up only minutes from Asbury Park I have seen the many photos of the Morro Castle beached in front of Convention Hall for years, but never knew the details of the fateful voyage until reading this excellent book. Unfortunately too much remians unknown about the ships true fate, and many years have passed. The author does an excellent job of trying to solve the mystery, but the ultimate explanation will never be known. Nonetheless "When the Dancing Stopped" is a well written, suspenseful book; a worthy read for anyone interested in maritime history or the history of New Jersey.
Newly declassified files help to shed light on a 70 year old mystery
Every so often I come across a book that grabs my attention in the opening pages and keeps me fixated right until the very end. "When The Dancing Stopped" is just such a book. Author Brian Hicks relates the incredible tale of the cruise ship Morro Castle and fantastic events that led to its untimely demise in September 1934 off the New Jersey Coast. The Morro Castle, flagship of the steamship company known as the Ward Line, carried all of the mail between New York and Cuba. It was a lucrative government contract worth more than $750,000 per year. The ship was also outfitted to carry hundreds of passengers on its weekly jaunts to Havana.
None of the passengers or crew members of the Morro Castle could possibly have anticipated the bizarre and deadly events would unfold on that fateful evening of September 8, 1934. Within just a few short hours the ships captain Robert Willmott would be found dead in his quarters and a deadly fire would break out on board the Morro Castle. To make matters worse a tropical storm was rapidly approaching the disabled vessel from the South while a massive Nor'easter was bearing down from the North. All the ingredients were in place for a major catastrophe!
What makes all of this so disturbing is that there was ample evidence to suggest that Captain Willmotte just might have been murdered and that the fire was indeed no accident. What could possibly motivate an individual or group of people to perpertate such dastardly deeds? This is what "When The Dancing Stopped" is all about. You will meet the members of the crew and learn how they reacted during this tragedy. You will be appalled to learn why so many of the lifeboats on board were never even used. You will also learn the identity of the individual who many suspect may have been motivated to set these horrible events in motion. Brian Hicks does a splendid job in researching this book. Hicks also makes use of recently declassified government documents that shed new light on this 70 year old mystery. But the story does not end with the Morro Castle. The individual suspected of planning and executing the events on that fateful night would continue to wreak havoc for another 20 years. It turns out that this portion of the book is every bit as compelling as the story of the disaster itself. Whether you are a fan of disaster books like I am or enjoy murder mysteries I suspect that "When The Dancing Stopped" is a book you will certainly enjoy. Highly recommended!
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