Once upon a time storm of 33

Storm of ’33 - Davis Shore Just after daylight the next morning, someone noticed a skiff loaded with people, and it was Mama’s brother Carlie, his wife, his little girl, and his neighbor, wife, and their little girl.

This neighbor of Carlie’s was a very smart woman. She had dry clothes for her family and a big pan of “Davis Shore” lightrolls, all packed in a 50-pound lard can.

The tide had left its mark at the third stair step at our house, and everything was in a big mess. The cow had lived through the storm somehow, and so had the hogs. The fall garden was gone, and there were plenty of drowned chickens.

Sometime during that day, [a group of men] asked Papa to go with them to the Banks’ “Old Hunt Club” in search of Paul’s parents … Papa’s boat, the “Hilton,” was the only boat left on the shore. Papa said he didn’t see much need of going, but he went.

Papa had carried a small skiff in the hull of the “Hilton,” and [they] poled up to the Club House. The folks were all living, but they had had a bad night, and most of the Club House had been destroyed. Late that evening they started back for Davis, and found a lot of concerned people on the shore to welcome them back home.

Source: Mabel Murphy Piner, Once Upon a Time: Stories of Davis, North Carolina, 2002, Carteret County Historical Society.