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| Survirors Kevin Gross, 12, Sashia Hart, 13, Diana Horwood, 17 and Anne Abdalla, 11. |
The old time spirit of ruggedness permeated the way parents raised their children well after World War II, and it surely resulted in much good, but occasionally it led to some awful results.
Fifty years ago a group of nine campers from Camp Macaza, based in l'Annonciation - all from well-heeled families - canoed out onto the massive Lake Baskatong north of Montreal.
Camp authorities drove the nine campers to Baie des Sables for a five day canoe trip.
By day three - Wednesday July 31, 1968 - the trio of canoes was about halfway down the lake when winds started blowing. One of the canoes capsized at about noon. Campers paddled the other two canoes over to help but they too ended up capsized far from land.
Only four of the nine managed to cling to the wreckage. They did so for about an hour before swimming 400 yards (.36 km) to an island.
Those four survivors huddled in shock and terror for 25 hours until a passing Canadian International Paper tugboat captained by John Gunette, 62, of Maniwaki, spotted and rescued them.
Survivor Diana Horwood described the terrifying event that claimed the lives of their five friends.
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| 2 of the victims: Ward Bailey, 17 and Elizabeth Richards, 17. |
The waves were high - about three or four feet. We were thinking of pulling into shore when one of the canoes tipped when hit by a large wave. it was as huge wave, followed by a gust of wind.
The Counsellor in the other canoe and I paddled close to the three children in the water.
Our canoe tipped over and about two managed to clamber into the last canoe, still upright. A wave broke over it and capsized it as well. We were all in the water about 500 yards from shore.
The waves were so high that I couldn't see the others. I knew some of them were going to go under. We were all good swimmers, but the waves were so high.
We were on our own. I lost sight of the others but four of us somehow ended up hanging onto the same canoe.
The wind let up a couple of hours after and we swam to an island. We couldn't have hung on much longer anyway.
There was no sign of the other five. They must have gone under.
We got to the island and it got colder and colder. Because of the water we didn't even have any dry matches to start a fire.
We spent the night just trying to keep warm.
I wondered if we were ever going to get rescued.*
The dead were Elizabeth Richards, 17 of 101 Percival Ave. Montreal, Ward Bailey, 17 of 17 Strathearn Ave. Montreal, Catherine Faughanan, 11, of 11582 Poutrincourt St. Montreal, Donald Vien, 12, of Winnipeg and Barbara Joan Doehler, 12 of 241 Strathearn.
The four survivors were Diana Horwood, 17, of 611 Victoria Westmount, Kevin Gross, 12 of 167 Portland Ave. Montreal, Sashia Hart, 13 of 67 Hamilton Ave. Montreal and Annabella Abdalla, 11 of 233 Monsignor Durand, Montreal.
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Another story with a happier ending, sort of.:Dr. Alexander Pagacz and his wife, of St. Lambert, brought their five kids to Rawdon on August 20, 1972 with the aim of enjoying nature.
Panic began, however, when little Freddy got lost alone in the forest.
Freddy was the third of five children and - perhaps rather strangely - fled out of sight whenever he was spotted in the forest.
Possibly even stranger was the fact that the family did not alert police or other authorities for about 35 hours after the boy was lost.
Eventually a 25-man search and rescue team set out to find him and were able to locate him by following the Polish candy wrappers that he had left out in the forest.
In all, he was alone in the forest for 40 hours but was unharmed by the experience.
"How came when we came here I had to sleep in the forest," the boy later asked.
Fred grew up and lived a normal life in the Montreal area until he died suddenly in 2005 at the age of 41.
*2 Aug 1968 Ottawa Citizen pg. 41.