HEROIC CAPTAIN.

Dominion, Volume 5, Issue 1298, 29 November 1911, Page 4

HEROIC CAPTAIN.

— ? HOW AJv EXCtLISHMAN STOOD TO HIS POST. A'.dramatic accounl of an English captain's heroism when tho steamship Tucapnl, 2987 tons, was wrecked on August 12 on tho Chilean coast lias been related by a survivor who arrived recently at Sionto Video, Uruguay. "I was thrown out of my bunk at four o'clock- in tho morning, and hearing shouts and screams from all parts of tho vessel rushed on deck. There I found a scene of oonfu&ion, panic-strickcn passengers and crow rushing wildly about. "Captain Collins was tho only Knglish. officer, all the others being Chileans. 110 alone was able to keep his head, and ordered the boats to be manned. Imniodiafoly a. boat, was ready a fierce fight look place, knives and revolvers being freely mod. I was by the captain when fome sailors begged him to come into the boat which was. putting off, and I caught his reply. 'Tho captain call not save liimHo must stay by his ship/ Shortly after this a young girl implored him. to save, her from drowning. He said nothing, but pressing her hand took off his lifebelt and fastened it round her. She S was later picked up safe and sound. ; "A woman with three children attempt- j ed In enter.n boat, bill; was thrust back i by struggling men. She then implored \ the, crew to take her three children, and j succeeded in getting them nil into the * boat. Sho herself was later washed ; ashore alive, but she was a witness of tho \ swamping of the boit in which her chil- \ dren were. j "Captain Collins was tho last to leave | the ship, jumping into a small boat. When within a few yards of the shore this w/ls swamped, and the captain was not seen again. He was sixty years of age and had | been in South Amcrica for twenty years." |