SURVIVORS IN WELLINGTON.

Evening Post, Volume XLVIII, Issue 109, 5 November 1894, Page 2

SURVIVORS IN WELLINGTON.

Messrs. Thomas Corrie, A. J. Dunbar, and two other survivors, arrived by tho Tasmania yesterday afternoon. Two more were landed at Napier, one of them being Mr. Wright, who was interviewed in>Auckland. > Mr. Dunbar, who was returning from Sydney to his father's station at Lake Heron (Ashburton district), informed a member of our staff yesterday that he was awakened in his cabin by the crash, and rushed on deck clad only in a flannel shirt He found tho passages _ blocked, principally with women and children, and efforts 'to induce them to make for the bridge were unavailing When the Btearaor heeled over, an indescribable scene of confusion and horror followed, and numbers were preoipitated into the water. Mr. Dunbar, with groat difficulty, worked his way to tho forward rigging, having two narrow escapes from being washed overboard. Mr. and Mrs. Ferguson were below him on the rigging. Mrs. Ferguson behaved admirably during the elbven hours they were foroed to remain in that trying position, and only gave way when placed on board tho s.s: — Argyle, when she went off into a dead faint. Mr. Dunbar heard no orders given as to the boats, although he admits they 1 might have been given unheard by him. He eventually reached the forward rigging in Bafety, where it was fonnd that the first and second officers and several others were , banging on. Mr. Dunbar warmly commends - the bravery of Mr. Dunlop, second engineer, and Mr. Kendall, eecond steward, and characterises the statement of Mr. Chamber.lain as a very fair account of what transpired. When Miss Williams was fir&t observed after being neatly 12 hours in the water it was thought she was dead, but a feeble wave of the hands reassured the watchers. The high rate of speed whioh the steamer was travelling during the fog was freely discussed on board, and a fellow-passenger, having a. presentiment of something untoward likely to happen, removed a quantity of money from a trunk to his coat pocket. Mr. Corrie is a hardy-looking young # Soot, the son of a Scottish agriculturist, and was making his first trip to the colony, on a visit to bis two brothers, who are settled at Mar ton. He was one of thoso who took refuge in the forward rigging, and was the first to attempt to carry a line from the ship to the rooks. Interviewed by an Evening Post representative this morning, Mr Corrie Baid that the rope, besides being much too weighty fora nian to swim with, proved to be too short, and it was with very great difficulty he reached the rocks in safety. Mr. Corrio says there must have originally been nearly 70 people in the forward rigging, and it was pitiful to see one after another washed off by the heavy waves, or sneoumb to the cold, until in the end only 16 romuined. One of those whom he thus saw go to their doom waß the Rev. Father M'lvor. The survivors wore afraid to climb too high into tho rigging, for fear of it giving way under the terrible strain consequent upon the great list of the vessel. Mr. Corrie speaks highly of the treatment which the anrvivora received at the hands of the natives on tho Barrier.