Hope for the safety of three men who left the Main Ducks Islands last Friday for Bath, Ontario, was given up Thursday, following the discovery of a piece of the speedboat in which they set out for the mainland, washed up on the beach at Amherst Island in the Bay of Quinte.

Those missing and believed victims of a winter gale and storm are:

Captain William Sheldon, Charlotte, New York
Cecil Phillips, Kingston, Ontario
Anthony Kane, Solvay, New York

A searching party consisting of Stanley Fairbanks, Russell Wemp and Walter Riley took a power boat Saturday to endeavor to locate the missing men, setting out from Bath, and were themselves caught in a heavy sea and rising water and were forced to take shelter at the False Duck Islands, and with the wind and sea moderating were able Thursday to reach Amherst Island, from where they sent word to Kingston, Ontario, that they were safe, but that unquestionably the other boat and its crew had been lost. They searched all possible island refuges and found nothing but a piece of the engine cover of the missing speedboat and a cushion, both readily identified.

Sheldon, Phillips, Kane, and a fourth man left Bath, Ontario, in a heavily powered motorboat on December 24, and were missing for several days until they were finally located on the Main Ducks, where they had put in to make repairs to the 12-cylinder motor of their boat. Airplanes were sent out from Kingston and located the boat there, and then a fishing boat made the trip from Kingston to the islands, on which the fourth member of the crew returned to Kingston and came to Oswego. It was his return that gave rise to the report Wednesday in the Palladium-Times that the other three were safe and that the boat was somewhere on the south shore of the lake.

Instead, after the departure of the fourth member of the crew, Sheldon and his two associates left the Main Ducks, probably for Bath, although they did not make their destination known. That was the last seen of them, but shortly after their departure there was a change in weather and a shift of wind, with the start of bad weather.

Efforts earlier in the week to get a plane from Kingston to make a search failed when the plane crashed trying to take off on a snow-covered field. The tug, Salvage Prince, made a trip from Kingston, but failed to secure any information other than that which had already been known.

Sheldon is well known along both sides of Lake Ontario. He is not a bootlegger, according to border patrolmen, but has been master of small boats in smuggling ventures from Canada to the United States, and had been known for his hardiness and willingness to take chances in all kinds of weather. He operated for several years through the channels made in the ice floes on the lake between Charlotte and Cobourg, Ontario, and once was arrested by border patrolmen off Sodus Point when his motorboat froze in the ice.

Phillips is a Canadian, either a former aviator or an aviation mechanic and an expert on motors.

Kane has been operating in and through Oswego for several years and owned at one time several fast motorboats running between the North and South shores. He had recently been convicted of violating the Volstead Act and customs laws in smuggling illicit alcoholic beverages into the country, and had served 12 months in the Federal Penitentiary in Atlanta, and had been paroled. One of the conditions of his parole was that he remain away from Lake Ontario and former associates. He was said in Syrause to work for his brother-in-law, George Snyder, and relatives said last night he was not missing. However, Thursday morning they called Oswego again and asked for information on his whereabouts.

Anthony Kane of Syracuse, Captain William Sheldon of Rochester and Cecil Phillips of Bath, Ontario, were aboard the Firefly, parts of which have been found.

Examination of the body was made Tuesday afternoon at Trout Hole, between Wilson Bay and Fuller Bay, three miles west of Cape Vincent by Jefferson County authorities. In a pocket of the coat was found a New York state automobile registration card made out in the name of Anthony Kane, of Solvay, said to be on the ill-fated Firefly when the speedboat left the Main Ducks for Bath, Ontario, or some other destination.

The body showed a scar on the back and two teeth had gold crowns. Acquaintances of Kane in Oswego said the description answered that of the missing man whose relatives until today when notified the body had been found had stubbornly insisted the Solvay man was not in the boat but was employed in driving a truck for his brother-in-law, George Snyder of Syracuse. The body will be taken to Syracuse for burial in accordance with instructions sent by Kane’s relatives Tuesday afternoon.