Incredible True Story Of 'Sea Orphan' Terry Jo Duperrault (2024)

When an 11-year-old girl was found isolated, sunburnt and on the verge of death floating on a dingy in the middle of the ocean, her rescuers were left baffled.

Terry Jo Duperrault had no right to be alive, she had suffered sunstroke, was severely dehydrated and her life raft was disintegrating around her.

The story of how a young girl who lived on the American-Canadian border ended up in the middle of the sea between two islands in the Bahamas is even wilder than fiction.

Terry Jo's journey started off normal enough, her parents Arthur and Jean chartered a yacht the Bluebelle from Fort Lauderdale, Florida to the Bahamas for a family trip along with their three children, Brian, Terry Jo and Rene.

In November of 1961, the family journeyed from their home in Wisconsin to Florida where they met Arthur's friend Julian Harvey who acted as the skipper, along with his wife, Mary Dene.

Everything was going normally until the fifth night when Terry Jo woke up to the sound of screaming on the deck above the cabin she had been sleeping in. She was startled when she found that she was alone, her seven-year-old sister Rene was not in the room with her.

When she went up on deck in search of her family she was left horrified to see her mother and brother lying on the ground with her recalling 'there was blood all over'.

Only Julian had survived who immediately told her to go back down to her cabin, a naive 11-year-old girl did as she was told. It didn't take long until she realised that the ship was sinkig.

She returned to deck where Julian was trying to release the lifeboat, she tried to help him put the dinghy into the sea but the rope slipped through her fingers and the boat began to float off. A desperate Julian dived into the waves after it and that was the last time she saw the family friend.

It was up to Terry Jo to survive for herself, thankfully she knew there was a small life raft in the main cabin. She managed to get it into the water and watched the Bluebell and the bodies of her family sink. She was alone on the tiny raft with no food or water and only a pair of light trousers and a white t-shirt.

Within just a few hours she was soaked through after a torrential downpour hit her dinghy. She thought rescue had come when a small plane flew overhead but despite her best efforts, they didn't spot her.

She didn't give up hopes of being rescued, her spirits were kept high by the pod of porpoises that swam alongside her for some time.

See Also

Book 'Em: Alone, Orphaned on the Ocean

By the third day, Terry Jo was suffering from heatstroke and she was badly sunburnt.

However, just moments away from death when she awoke on the fourth day she saw a miracle in front of her in the form of a ship.

The second officer of the Greek freighter, Captain Theo noticed something unusual in the waters of the Northwest Providence Channel which divides two major islands of the Bahamas. He knew right away that it was too small to be a boat and too big to be debris.

It was his eagle eyes that saved Terry Jo that day. And she was quickly dubbed the 'sea orphan'.

After spending some time in hospital she moved in with her aunt and uncle. However, the thought of what happened to her family was never far from her mind.

Julian survived and was rescued just one day after the ship sunk. He told the Coast Guard in Miami was that he was the sole survivor of an accident at sea.

He claimed a sudden squall damaged the Bluebelle and that his wife, Dene, and the Duperraults were injured when the masts and rigging collapsed. He also claimed gas lines in the engine room ruptured, causing the ship to catch fire before sinking.

However, when he learned that Terry Jo had survived Julian died by suicide.

Police believe that the Duperraults and Dene had been murdered by Julian as he wanted to collect life insurance money from the death of his wife.

In fact, his plan was to collect Dene's $20,000 double indemnity insurance policy, which would yield double the insured sum if she had an accidental death.

It's believed Arthur witnessed Julian killing his wife, which lead to him killing everyone onboard, except for Terry Jo.

It is still unknown as to why he sparred the young girl's life but Terry Jo said, 'I always believed I was saved for a reason.'

Investigators believe that Julian thought Terry Jo would have died on the sinking ship.

After the tragedy, Terry Jo changed her name to Tere and never spoke out about the tragic story which led to being named the 'sea orphan'.

Tere, who is now married with three children, spoke to CBS nearly 50 years after the murders, saying that she hoped her story inspires others.