Burial at Sea - a Short Story

Johnny was a man of small stature, 4-foot-11, and no taller than 5-foot-1. He was a longshoreman and the type that was always in trouble. You name it and he did it.

When putting into port, all of the longshoremen always left the ship to find the nearest bar. As he customarily did, Johnny rented a room above the bar so he wouldn't have far to go when he finished drinking. All of the shipmates had a custom of "open house", which meant whichever one of them had money would declare an open house and all the drinks were on him until his money ran out. On this particular night Ol' Johnny drank until he was ready for bed and went on up to his room. As this was Johnny's "open house", when the shipmates ran out of drinks, they would go up to Johnny's room where he had passed out and get enough money from his pant pockets to buy a round of drinks, putting the balance of the money back into his pockets.

The next morning they discovered that Johnny had died in his sleep and had been dead during the time they had gotten money from his pockets. So, they got together to plan Johnny's funeral and decided it would be fitting if he were buried at sea. They made plans to rent a tourist cruise boat, buy a pine box and pass the word to all the other shipmates as to the time and place of the sea burial.

On the day of the burial, they all boarded the cruise boat, which they had loaded down with beer and other drinks. The Captain of the cruise boat told them that, in order for this to be legal, they would have to go out far enough to reach international waters and it would take two hours to get to the breakwater near the island and another hour to get to sea. By the time they had gotten to the breakwater, all aboard were drunk and the water had gotten choppy. It was at that point the men decided that they had gone out far enough and it was time to bury Johnny Surprise.

They started to toss Johnny Surprise overboard when the Captain protested, saying they had not gone out far enough. Well, they were drunk, did not listen, and tossed Johnny overboard anyway. The coffin floated and wouldn't sink. The Captain circled the boat around the coffin so they could use crowbars and punch holes in the pine box and to everyone's surprise, the pine box sank and Johnny Surprise floated. Finally, after a time, he, too, sank and they all headed back to shore.

As luck would have it, a couple of days later a body washed ashore. You guessed it. It was Ol' Johnny Surprise.

The shipmates were worried what would happen if anyone found out what they had done, so they made a pact among themselves and, when the police came to the ship to question everyone, not one person admitted to attending Johnny's sea burial.

Memorial services were held in the days that followed and Johnny Surprise was finally laid to rest in peace with all his friends in attendance.