We find ourselves here, with a rudderless ship filled halfway with water, waiting for death at any moment. A terrible hurricane lies ahead and the boat is leaking. We have been working all day, but the water is rising and the storm refuses to cease. My strong old helmsman and two men went overboard at dinner, and the rest of us will likely not see old age.

The quote is from a letter written by sea captain Karl Johan Lundberg to his wife Christina and their four children. Lundberg was the commander of the steamer Dansätter, which vanished together with crew and cargo in early January 1918. The letter was reportedly found in a bottle handed over by the state department to Christina Lundberg later that year.

Dansätter, just 30 metres long, was built in 1890 at the Rättaregården shipyard in Lödöse, a few miles north of Gothenburg. The ship was first intended to be built as a barge for Transport AB Motala, but the construction contract was changed in December 1889 to indicate a steamship. The 30-horsepower steam engine was supplied by Motala Verkstad. The ship was owned at the time of the accident by Rederi AB Transit in Stockholm.

It is New Year’s Eve, 1917. Dansätter departs Rönne on Bornholm carrying a cargo of clay and bricks for the journey up to Stockholm. When the ship passes the northern tip of Öland, she springs a leak and quickly takes in water. Lundberg and his crew realize that any rescue efforts would likely be in vain. As a final greeting home, Lundberg writes a letter that he places in an empty bottle and casts off into the sea. The letter is dated 2 January 1918.

Lundberg writes, “Our boats are destroyed, so there is no hope of being rescued”. He ends the letter with “A thousand kisses to you and the children”. How the letter was found or how it ended up with the Ministry for Foreign Affairs is unclear. But in the end, his wife Christina in Sundsvall received her husband’s last greeting.

The letter from captain Lundberg is shown below: