Frisco Mail News

Hastings Standard, Volume VIII, Issue 4150, 9 February 1904, Page 2

Frisco Mail News

TERRIBLE WRECK AND LOSS OF

life:

(By Telegrapn.;

(Per s.s. Sonoma). Auckland, February, 9. Seattle (Washington), J anuarv 9th. —The steamer Clallam of the Seattle Victoria fleet, went down early this morning i n the straits of Juan de Fuca. Out oi eighty souls aboard, fifty-two were drowned within three miles of the shore. When it appeared certain the Clallam ci/uld not be saved a desperate effort was made to take off the women and children in life boats. The first boat which Captain Lawrence, the Yukon pilot, volunteered to command was manned by deck hands, went dowh within_ sight of the Clallam. The s e e, ond lifeboat, filled with male passengers,—in command, —second officer Currin, was probablv lost a few mint uies later. From aboard the Clallam. the watchers .saw the waves sweep passengers from their bold on the seats, and hurl them into the seething waves. Though the lifeboat was right-M later ,bn, diligent search, extending over twenty hours, has failed to reveal -any trace of it, or of the passengers and members of the crew who were lost when the third lifeboat was swamped in the attempt to launch it.

Passengers who ii a d fastened on life preservers were picked up by the st c a mer Rahata. They had died from exposure within si,ght of their destination.

Huge seas overwhelmed the Clallam, placing her at the mercy of the gale. Bravely the officers and crew stuck to the helpless hulk and worked to save the boat and eighty souls aboard her, but in vain, the Clallam could not stand the terrific onalsught of seas. At 12.3(1 she rose on her beam ends and began to settle down, and rapidly sank at 1.07, A few min utes later she lurched and disappear, ed beneath the waves, onlv her top works and floating wreckage, remain-, ed to show where she went down.