Page 116 - Encyclopedia of the Unusual and Unexplained Vol. 3

96 Mysterious Creatures

It swam sideways in the water, like a snake. It water, fearing that the hideous beast might at
was longer than his 66-foot boat, and he esti- any moment resurface and eat them. The
mated its girth as about 15 feet around. Rebecca Sims, under the command of Captain
Gavitt, pulled alongside her sister ship, and the
Some cryptozoologists, individuals who
study the possibility of such creatures as sea crews of the two ships began discussing the
and lake monsters truly existing, have theo- strange monster that they had encountered.
rized that plesiosaurs, one of the giant reptiles The next morning, the crewmen had
of the Mesozoic Age, which ended about 70 pulled in only about half of the line when the
million years ago, could have survived in the massive carcass suddenly popped to the sur-
depths of the relatively unchanged environ- face. It was much greater in length than the
ment of Earthl’s oceans. Because some sea ship, which measured 100 feet from stem to
monster sightings occur in cold waters, other stern, and it had a thick body that was about
researchers favor the survival of an ancient 50 feet in diameter. Its color was a brownish
species of mammals, such as the ancestor of gray with a light stripe about three feet wide
the whale known as Zeuglodon or Basilosaurus. running its full length. Its neck was 10 feet
The Basilosaurus had a slim, elongated, snake- around, and it supported a grotesque head that
like body measuring more than 70 feet in was 10 feet long and shaped like that of a
length which the huge creature propelled by gigantic alligator. The astounded crewmen
means of a single pair of fins at its forward end. counted 94 teeth in its ghastly jaws—and
each of the three-inch, saberlike teeth were
The debate over what monstrous creatures
best wear the mantle of “sea monster” could hooked backward, like those of a snake.
have been solved for all time back in 1852 Seabury was fully aware of the ridicule
when two New Bedford whaling vessels, the accorded to sailing masters and their crews
Monongahela and the Rebecca Sims, were drift- who claimed to have encountered “sea ser-
ing slowly in the Pacific doldrums, their sails pents,” so he gave orders that the hideous head
limp from lack of wind. When the lookout’s be chopped off and placed in a huge pickling
shout of “something big in the water” caused vat in order to preserve it until they returned
Captain Seabury of the Monongahela to use his to New Bedford. In addition, he wrote a
telescope to view the object; he could distin- detailed report of their harpooning the sea
guish only a huge living creature, thrashing monster and he provided a complete descrip-
about in the water as if in great agony. The tion of the thing. Since Gavitt and his crew
captain’s immediate deduction was that they were homeward bound, Seabury gave him the
had come upon a whale that had been wound- report in order to prepare New Bedford for the
ed by the harpoons of another whaler’s long- astonishing exhibit that he and his men would
boats and was now dying. bring with them upon their own return.
Seabury ordered three longboats over the If only Seabury would have transferred the
side to end the beast’s pain, and he was in the grisly head to Gavitt’s vessel along with his
first boat as it pulled alongside the massive report of the monster, the doubting world
thing that he still believed was a wounded would have had its first mounted sea serpent’s
whale. The instant a harpoon struck the beast, head more than 150 years ago. Captain
a nightmarish head 10 feet long rose out of the Seabury’s account of the incredible sea serpent
water and lunged at the boats. Two of the long- arrived safely in New Bedford and was entered
boats were capsized in seconds. Before the into the records along with the personal oath
monster submerged, the terrified whalers real- of Captain Gavitt. But the Monongahela never
ized at once that they were dealing with a sea returned to port with its incredible cargo.
creature the likes of which they had never seen. Years later her nameboard was found on the
shore of Umnak Island in the Aleutians.
Unfurling her sails to catch what little wind
there was, the Monongahela managed to come M Delving Deeper
alongside the capsized longboats and began to Carrington, Richard. Mermaids and Mastodons. Lon-
pick up the seamen who were bobbing in the don: Arrow Books, 1960.

The Gale Enc y clopedia of the Unusu al and Unexplained