CAPTAIN LEFT LAST

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31653, 13 April 1968, Page 1

CAPTAIN LEFT LAST

(N.Z. Press Association) WELLINGTON, April 12. The wife of the captain of the sunken ferry Wahine today paid tribute to her husband as “a wonderful man who did a magnificent Job.” Mrs Anne Robertson, a Canadian, said that her husband got everyone safelv off the ship. “He watched everyone leave and when he was satisfied that ail had gone he dived into the sea himself,” she said. She said that the deputy harbourmaster and her husband (Captain H. G. Robertson) were the last two men on the ship. The deputy harbourmaster dived into the sea when the last passengers and crew had left, then her busband followed.

She said that her husband (shown in the photograph coming ashore) was picked up by a fishing boat “He arrived home drenched His clothes weighed a ton. I don’t know how he swam in them,” she said. She said her husband had been advised to see a doctor but he had refused. “Once he warmed up he was all right. But everyone knows how a captain feels when he loses his ship,” she said. “The phone has been ringing since Wednesday with messages from kind people. I’ve even had a call from Canada and there was a cable from a friend in California,” she said. “Thank God so many people were saved. The loss is tragic, but my husband did his best.”