Nothing relevant to offer but I recently read a book on the Mary Celeste and the one theory on what happened (in fact there was far moe evidence for what happened than I ever realized - suspect the evidence was omitted from accounts to make it seem more interesting and mysterious) is that the swelling timber cargo (packed frozen IIRC) cracked and sounded just like a fire burning. Indeed it wouldn't have been the only ship to be abandoned for exactly that reason.

I appreciate this is of no help at all but it's kind of relevant to your post and I've typed it out now so I'm hitting the button anyway!