THE MATAWAN MAN-EATER
PART II
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HUMANITY STRIKES BACK
With two people dead, and one wounded, the citizens of Matawan demanded their revenge. They unleashed their fury on the creek itself. For twenty-four hours they shot, stabbed and dynamited the water in an effort to kill the ocean beast that had caused all this horror. Those living in the area must have at first thought that the Great War in Europe had arrived at the State of New Jersey as blast after blast could be heard rumbling along the salt marsh.
Two days after his death, at 5:15am, the body of Lester Stillwell surfaced about 250 yards upstream from the site of the attack. Two railroad employees discovered it floating in the creek at the railroad trestle that spanned it. A storm the night before had probably dislodged it from the bottom. The local undertaker reported the body had been horribly disfigured by the shark feeding on it. The time had come for Matawan to bury its dead.
On July 15, 1916, funeral services for both Lester Stillwell and Watson Stanley Fisher were held. Stillwell's service was held at his parent's home on Church Street, and Fisher's was held at the Arrowsmith Funeral Home on Main Street. Both were buried at Rose Hill Cemetery in Matawan in ceremonies attended by scores of friends, relatives and curious onlookers.
Six days after the attacks, a shark was finally caught in the Matawan Creek near the spot where it empties into the Raritan Bay. The skilled fisherman who netted it was none other than Captain Cottrell, who placed his "Matawan Beast" on display at his shop. Over the next few days, 3000 people paid ten cents each to view the body. However, was it really the killer? In retrospect, probably not, as the real killer may have been captured four days earlier off the coast of South Amboy a few miles north on the Raritan Bay. Michael Schleisser, a New Yorker who was hunting for sharks like hundreds of others, netted a nine foot Great White Shark (Carcharodon Carcharias). When it was towed into South Amboy and cut open, it was found to contain fifteen pounds of human flesh and bone, including the shinbone of a boy and a human rib. If it was not the Matawan Man-eater, it was definitely a man-eater.
Sharks continued to be seen and hunted along the
Jersey coast throughout the summer of 1916. Although many of the
sightings may have been a result of hysteria and misidentification,
there is no doubt that there had been a great influx of sharks into
the area. Theories abounded, but most experts agreed that 1916 was,
for whatever reason, a "shark year." These occur
infrequently, but they do occur. Needless to say, the summer season
ended early that year at the Jersey shore.
In the months following Stanley Fisher's death, an interesting story was revealed. A few months prior to that horrible day, Fisher had begun selling suits at his shop in an effort to increase business. Just days before he entered the Matawan Creek in search of Lester Stillwell, he had accepted a $10,000 life insurance policy in lieu of cash. Although his friends ridiculed this transaction, perhaps he had a premonition of doom. His parents used the money from the policy to purchase a stained-glass window of the town of Bethlehem for the Methodist Episcopal Church on Main Street that they and Stanley attended.
There is almost nothing left today to remind us of the Matawan shark today. The drawbridge where Captain Cottrell first sighted has been replaced. The railroad trestle where Lester Stillwell's body was found burned down in the 1930's and was replaced by an embankment. The stained-glass window Fisher's parents purchased was lost in the 1970's, when the church was torn down. Stanley Fisher's grave is missing. Even the roads and footpaths leading down to where the attacks occurred are gone. All that remains is the Matawan Creek itself, still shallow, narrow and flowing with the tides. When viewed today from Route 35 or the New Jersey Parkway the question that haunted Captain Cottrell and all the citizens of Matawan still resonates. How and why did a man-eating shark attack there?
SOURCES:
BOOKS:
Images of America - Around Matawan and Aberdeen
By: Helen Henderson
Arcadia Publishing, 1996 ---- BUY
THIS BOOK
Images of America - Keyport
By: Timothy E. Regan
Arcadia Publishing, 1995 ---- BUY
THIS BOOK
Images of America - Keyport, Volume II
By: Timothy E. Regan
Arcadia Publishing, 1997 ---- BUY
THIS BOOK
In Search of the Jersey Man-Eater
By: Richard G. Fernicola
George Marine Library, 1987
Shadows in the Sea
By: Thomas B. Allen
The Lyons Press, 1996 ----
BUY THIS BOOK
The following books were released after the publication of our story and therefore not used by us for research. They are, however, exhaustive accounts of the shark attacks and well worth reading.
Twelve Days of Terror: A Definitive Investigation of
the 1916 Shark Attacks
By: Richard G. Fernicola
The Lyons Press, 2001 ---- BUY
THIS BOOK
Close to Shore: A True Story of Terror in the Age of Innocence
By: Michael Capuzzo
Broadway Books, 2001 ---- BUY
THIS BOOK
NEWSPAPERS:
The Matawan Journal
Matawan, NJ
The New York Times
New York, New York
The Newark Evening News
Newark, NJ
The Newark Star-Eagle
Newark, NJ
SPECIAL THANKS TO:
The Matwan Historic Society
Matawan, NJ
The Matawan Public Library
Matawan, NJ
The Newark Public Library
Newark, NJ
TITLE PHOTOGRAPH COURTESY OF:
Graham Lambert
The Grey Lamb