Jerome of Sandy Cove - A castaway with both legs recently amputated, and who never spoke for the rest of his life
Jerome of Sandy Cove - A castaway with both legs recently amputated, and who never spoke for the rest of his life

en.wikipedia.org
Jerome of Sandy Cove - Wikipedia

I see this as the most likely explanation
It also seems pretty likely that Jerome was "Gamby," the known double-amputee from across the bay, as described at the end of the article
Why not both ¯(ツ)/¯
The identification depends on how correct Jerome's rescuers were in thinking his amputations were not completely healed and so were recent. Gamby showed up across the bay four years previous and was missing his legs then.