Polish Captain Wladek Wagner and his English wife Mabel once discussed writing “his” and “her” versions of their story. So she drew on his large trove of documents to write her book Lest I Forget: The Wagner Family, Pioneers of Trellis Bay, Beef Island, BVI. She had virtually completed it by 2007, 15 years after his death, but did not publish it until 2012 — following the first Wagner Sailing Rally here in the Virgin Islands.
Ms. Wagner died in Florida on Feb. 24, 2022, at age 96, and her book has long been out of print. I have felt impelled to write these commentaries to make the book better known and to verify the accuracy of the events portrayed in it, particularly Ms. Wagner’s references to individuals and dates. In Part 40, on Sept. 25, I related that Ms. Wagner recovered from a nervous breakdown precipitated by having to host a film company at Trellis Bay Club for three months without any training or professional staff to help her.
She vowed to change the lifestyle which had damaged her health.
She wrote that the advance party of the filmmakers arrived in Trellis Bay from London on Sept. 1, 1957. A little later, the rest arrived, occupying every room at the clubhouse and all three cottages along the shore opposite — and filling the hotel on nearby Guana Island. The Beef Island airstrip was nearly finished by Sept. 3 of that year, when a pilot from St. Thomas landed on it to test its safety for conveying them (as recounted in part 30 of this series on Feb. 27).
Subsea cable
Coincidentally, on Aug. 28,1957, the American Telephone and Telegraph Company had announced Tortola’s connection to the United States by subsea cable, enabling callers to speak directly to New York. And on Sept. 8, 1957, an article by Jeanne Harman, titled “Primitive tropics: the advent of telephone fails to disturb seclusion of British Virgin Islands,” appeared in The New York Times, based on notes she’d written some months beforehand.
Ms. Harman reported from her earlier visit to Tortola that the island could only accommodate about 30 visitors at a time, including 12 at a hotel built on the ruins of an old fort in Road Town, run by a former London stockbroker and his American wife — costing $19 per couple per day with the full American plan — and two small “native boarding houses”: Mistress Jennings’s and The Social Inn.
Ms. Harman noted that next to the government’s new airstrip on Beef Island were a guest cottage and modern clubhouse with six double rooms — costing $28 for double occupancy or $15 for single occupancy (with meals included) — belonging to the owner of the shipyard.
According to Ms. Wagner, Mr. Wagner had installed a Frigidaire Ice Cube Maker that Herbert Lee, his business partner, had bought and shipped from New York for the grand opening of the clubhouse (as recounted in part 19 on July 25, 2024).
Reporter
I also related in part 42 on Oct. 23 that “the shipyard’s owner” told Ms. Harman — who he knew not as a journalist but as a tourist from St. Thomas — that he planned to sell plots of land on long-term leases for about $50 a year, with the option to build cottages similar to his own for $4,000 to $5,000. He also mentioned that flights connecting with British airlines were being planned (recently formed LIAT wanted to provide scheduled flights linked with British West Indies Airways routes to London).
Apparently, however, Mr. Wagner did not reveal his role in building the airfield, nor that he had an English wife (I wonder who cooked and served the meals he provided) — being less forthright than the man who Ms. Wagner was to describe as being angered a few months later at accusations in the Legislative Council of only wanting to build the airfield because it would benefit himself.
Ms. Wagner says that he retorted that the whole colony needed to be connected with the outside world, including the hotels on Guana and Buck islands and in Road Town, and he resigned his post (as recounted in part 24 on Aug. 24, 2024).
Change in behaviour
I will now take another look at the way in which their story unfolded and question what might have accounted for the change in his behaviour.
Ms. Wagner says that Mr. Wagner had leased various plots of nearby land since they bought Trellis Bay, including some on Great Camanoe. Visitors from Boston, Massachusetts — Herbert and Belinda Lee — were so impressed by the development of Trellis Bay that Mr. Lee discussed entering into a partnership with them.
Ms. Wagner writes that they were completely nonplussed by the offer, but her prime concern was how it might affect their children’s future. Ms. Wagner says they decided to accept the offer after seeing how much sooner it could fulfil their dreams. The agreement was finalised from Puerto Rico with Mr. Lee’s attorney in March 1956.
