Like A Virgin: NL’s Madonna Iceberg

FolkloreFact

May 18

Recreation of Newfoundland’s 1905 Madonna Iceberg

On Sunday, June 24, 1905 the Most Rev. Michael Francis Howley, the newly proclaimed Archbishop of Newfoundland, stepped out of the Basilica and looked toward St. John’s harbour. Just outside The Narrows he saw an enormous iceberg and, depending on who you ask, something Supernatural.

Like A Virgin

Hayward’s image of ‘Our Lady of the Fjords‘

As the story goes, on June 24, 1905 there was a large iceberg just outside of St. John’s harbour. It was Causing a Commotion among the people of St. John’s, many of whom made their way to see it.

Among them was Thomas. B. Hayward, an artist and photographer. He snapped a picture of the berg.

As you can see in Hayward’s image (which may have been painted/retouched), one end of the berg had a high peak while the other had an almost human-shaped pillar of ice. Some witnesses claimed it wasn’t just any human. It was, they believed, the Virgin Mary rendered in ice. The appearance of the berg, they believed, was a divine sign — a blessing on the city and island.

Like A Prayer

The overwhelmingly Christian population of St. John’s may have been primed to interpret a human-shaped ice pillar as a message from heaven. There was a lot going on in the city at the time.

Once again, as the story gets told, the iceberg appeared on the feast day of St. John the Baptist, the man for whom the city was named (according to some stories). Still more, it was the anniversary of John Cabot’s arrival in Newfoundland. On top of that, the iceberg-spotting archbishop Howley, had just been invested as First Archbishop of the newly-created ecclesiastical Province of Newfoundland. On the day prior to the berg’s arrival he was conferred the 'pallium,' a symbolic ecclesiastical vestment.

The presentation of the pallium not only spoke of Howley’s importance in the Catholic Church but recognized Newfoundland itself within the organization. If you were the kind of person for whom the church mattered — and in 1905 many Newfoundlanders were in that camp— it was a big deal. You need only look at the papers of the time — Howley and the pallium received extensive coverage.

“You only see what your eyes want to see”

— Madonna, Frozen

So, with religious talk very much in Vogue, it would have been easy to interpret an ill-defined human shape as having divine significance. More than that, interpreting the image as a blessing was probably comforting, especially as the Catholic Church was evolving on the island.

Archbishop Howley certainly seemed Hung Up on the idea, and favoured the interpretation of the berg as a form of devine Celebration — of the island, the church and possibly himself. He penned a sonnet titled Our Lady of the Fjords which appeared in a 1909 edition of the Newfoundland Quarterly that recounted the iceberg. He called it a “Shimmering Shrine” and “bright Atlantic Lourdes”. He linked it to John the Baptist, Cabot and the pallium.

Hail Crystal Virgin, from the frozen fjords
Where far-off Greenland’s gelid glaciers gleen
O’er Oceans bosom soaring, cool, serene
Not famed Carrara’s purest vein affords
Such sparkling brilliance, as mid countless hordes
Of spotless glistning bergs thou reignest Queen
In all the glory of thy opal sheen
A Shimmering Shrine; Our bright Atlantic Lourdes.
We hail thee, dual patron, with acclaim,
Thou standest guardian o’er our Island home.
To-day, four cycles since, our rock-bound strand.
First Cabot saw: and gave the Baptist’s name:
To-day we clothe with Pallium from Rome.
The first Archbishop of our Newfoundland!

Aside from his poem, he wrote a piece for a church publication in Boston about the berg and authorized the sale of postcards featuring Hayward’s iceberg image. In fact, it is probably owing to his interest in the ‘Virgin Berg’ that it is remembered at all today.

An impressive but non-miraculous iceberg off Twillingate, NL

In trying to learn more about the story of the ‘Newfoundland’s Miraculous Iceberg’ I read as many newspapers from the time as I could. There was, as I noted, lots of writing about Howley and the pallium but no reference to any sort of noteworthy iceberg on, or in the days immediately around, June 24th, 1905. None that I can find, anyway. The press at the time wrote of icebergs a lot as warning to mariners.

Which made me wonder, did it happen as we’ve been told?

Deeper and Deeper

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If you poke around the internet long enough, you can find insinuations that it was a hoax. I think the doubt mostly lies in the fact that, some versions of Hayward’s supposed photographs appear to be paintings, or so heavily retouched as to be difficult to distinguish from paintings.

I don’t have any trouble believing Hayward took a picture of ‘Our Lady of the Fjords’ or that the Archbishop believed an iceberg was a divine apparition. I think the berg existed because newspapers of the time said it did — but the reference I found wasn’t in June.

I broadened my search to include dates further from June 24th. The first mention I can find of any similar sounding iceberg was a week and a half later on July 04, 1905. The Evening Telegram reported ‘A Pretty Iceberg’ was outside the narrows with a human figure statue on one end.

I think this must be ‘Our Lady of the Fjords’. It’s not very likely that two ‘statue bergs’ would arrive in a 10 day span. That said, I wonder if an iceberg that appeared as a Frozen, icy statue on June 24th would still look like one 10 days later. It’s possible, I guess, but I’m doubtful.

I’m thinking an unusual iceberg from early July got remembered as happening alongside some historic, noteworthy dates in late June because, well, people wanted there to be a connection. It’s Human Nature to try to make meaning.

And the attempt to Keep it Together does make for a good story.

So as far as I’m concerned, it’s no hoax.

An iceberg with a human-shaped pillar of ice arrived in St. John’s somewhere between June 24 and July 4, 1905. It became Something to Remember owing to the efforts of an archbishop who, through his Words and encouragement of the sale of postcards/images, helped people cast it as a blessing of the events on, or around, June 24, 1905.

Whether you agree with the archbishop interpretation of the ice, well, that’s between you and your faith.