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Clarence Dewliing, who compiled much of the information on the storm, also composed a song, as he states"written in an idiom of the time when songs were sung, unaccompanied, by the elderly people of our outports". On July 1, 1999, at the opening performance of the Trinity Pageant, a play that depicts the history of the area around Trinity, his song was incorporated into the program and performed publicly for the first time. The text of the song follows.

                     THE TRINITY BAY DISASTER

          Come all ye fine youngsters and listen to me
          I'll tell of a disaster that happened at sea
          That happened off shore in the year '92
          Just what indeed happened I'll now tell to you.

          Now Trinity Bight on the north of the  Bay
          Was swarming with swiles on that Saturday.
          On Saturday morning (no school, you see)
          So boys joined their masters and fathers with glee.

          February Twenty-seventh - the morning broke clear
          The sun shining brightly, no stir in the air
          The air was so calm and so calm was the sea
          That it beckoned to them like I'd beckon to ye.

          Two hundred fifteen of both men and both boys
          Took to their punts with shouts and with cries.
          Cries of delight for the first seal hunts
          They took off from shore in some fifty odd punts.

          The bullies were manned by a crew about four
          To take the hunters out around five miles from shore
          The shore far behind and the ice out ahead
          Scarce was the man who now felt any dread.

          With all the hard pulling they reached the flow soon
          All things were so tranquil right up until noon
          At noon the wind from the north west did blow
          At hurricane force and then freezing snow.

          With the ice heaving madly, the wind blowing wild
          Fear was entertained for each man and each child
          With wind blowing off shore and temperatures dipped low
          Twas no home or haven out there in the flow.

          By nightfall that day the toll was complete
          Twenty-five persons their maker did meet:
          Some on the ice and some more on the shore.
          Seventeen hunters were seen nevermore.

          Small English Harbour took the worst blow
          Forty-nine men in fourteen boats did go
          Thirty-two returned to their families so dear
          While seventeen perished in the bay way out there.

          Twenty-eight men made it to the Horse Chops
          Their six boats just made it through ice laden lops
          The lops were so big that half frozen and weak
          The men found in Hay Cove just what they did seek.

          They hid in the forest and chewed on some wood
          While two trekked homeward to do what they could
          They could and they did; On them so much relied
          Before rescuers came six more men had died.

          While out in the bay with the coming of night
          Boats were pulled on the ice for protection so slight.
          Not slight was the wind for the coming of day
          Two had reached Heart's Delight on the South of the Bay.

          Captain Dick Fowlow from Trinity East
          Sometime next day before the searched ceased
          Found two frozen bodies adrift in a boat
          From Green Bay again they never would float.

          The S.S. Labrador under Captain George Hann
          Brought a hospital patient at Trinity to land
          Gave him over to sealers out there in the Bay
          They have never been heard of right up to this day.

          Now thank you for listening to my story so dear
          Of one terrible happening of that terrible year
          Many are the stories with our history are laced
          Of the dangers so often that our fishermen faced.

---

Transcribed by James Butler, 1997
Revised by Jim Butler, September 2002

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