Date: Late June, 1970
Equipment: US Divers DA Aqua-Master regulator, USD steel 72 with 1/2" J valve, Voit oval mask, Voit Viking fins, USD knife so big it was almost a short sword, USD weight belt with 5 lbs. of lead attached.
It was on a Saturday afternoon in late June, 1970. The telephone rang and it was my mentor, Harold, on the other end. The Sheriff's Office had just called him with a request for assistance. A young girl had fallen into the river and had not been seen since. She had obviously drowned and dragging the river for her body had been unsuccessful. Would Harold and his buddies conduct a search for the body?
At that time, our local law enforcement agencies did not have divers on the payroll and depended on civilian volunteers for underwater work. This would change a few years later but, at the time of this story, volunteer divers filled the gap.
Within an hour of receiving Harold's call, I was parking my 1960 Chevy station wagon amongst several emergency vehicles parked next to the river. Harold, John, Boomer and Carl were already there and waiting for me. Harold had his compressor in the back of his Ford pickup and it was thumping away, filling a tank. Mine was the last one to be filled and, while we waited, Harold outlined the way we were to conduct the search.
Harold would take the west side of the river, about thirty feet from the bank. Boomer would be next out from Harold; I would take the middle of the river and John would be next out from me. Carl would be on the east side of the river. The plan was for us to zigzag slowly back and forth as we worked our way downstream.
We waded into the water and swam, on the surface, to our start positions. At Harold's signal, we jack-knifed and swam to the bottom. The current was slow and the visibility was about eight feet. The depth averaged fifteen feet at the middle. I glided along about three feet from the sandy bottom, swiveling my head back and forth. At the end of my third or fourth zig, I came face to face with Boomer. He shook his head and turned away.
A few minutes later, I met John and we exchanged head shakes to indicate that we had not found anything. As time passed, I began to worry that we would not find the body before we ran out of air. Did I miss her? Had I passed over her without seeing her? How far had we come? How far had the current carried her?
My air was running low and I figured I had about five minutes left when I encountered an old sunken log half buried in the bottom. As I swam closer and the log became more visible, I saw a patch of blue checked gingham caught on a branch of the log. A little closer and I saw her. Her blue eyes were open and staring straight at me. Her long, auburn hair flowed gently in the sluggish current. My breath came faster and my heart pounded. I had to fight the urge to bolt to the surface. I felt as if I wanted to throw up and scream at the same time. Not because of the sight of a dead body. I had seen those before. It was because I knew the girl. She had lived in my neighborhood, on the next street over.
My J valve kicked in and I reached back to pull the rod. From my jeans pocket, I pulled a fishing bobber and a roll of monofilament line. I tied the bobber to the end of the line and let it go. When the line stopped paying out, I tied it off to the log and headed for the surface. I broke the surface half screaming and half crying. I waved to the people on the shore that I had found her. Harold and the others had already left the water and were on the bank. Boomer grabbed a spare tank and jumped into the water. He passed me as I headed for shore. He patted my shoulder as he went by, then dived for the bottom. Harold and Carl helped me out of the water and out of my harness. A few moments later Boomer reappeared, towing the girl's body. I spent the rest of the day in a sort of haze. I managed to get home and went straight to my room to change clothes and flop onto my bed. A couple of days later, I learned that the girl's drowning had not been an accident. It was suicide.
The girl was thirteen years old an one of ten children. Her father was an alcoholic and physically abused his wife and children. A strict disciplinarian, he would beat his wife and children for the slightest of "offenses." The girl had been keeping company with one of the neighborhood boys her age and they had been, shall we say, intimate. She had learned only a few days before her death that she was pregnant. This terrified her. Or, rather, the thought of what her father would do to her, when he found out, terrified her.
That Saturday, she had gone to babysit for a woman who lived beside the river. When the job was finished, she left without waiting for her pay and went straight down to the river. Witnesses said that she hesitated for a few seconds, then jumped in. She didn't even try to swim. She just went down and never came back up. An autopsy confirmed that she had been ten weeks pregnant.
When her family was informed of her death, her mother broke down and had a nervous breakdown. Her father, on the other hand, merely shrugged and commented that it would be just one less mouth to feed. In the end, the mother was committed to an institution where she died a couple of years later. The rest of the kids were placed in foster care and the father left the area and has not been heard from since.
I was sixteen years old at the time.
