LOSS OF A BOATS CREW FROM H.M.C.S. VICTORIA.

Hawke's Bay Herald, Volume XX, Issue 3908, 17 May 1877, Page 2

LOSS OF A BOATS CREW FROM H.M.C.S. VICTORIA.

By the a.s. Tamar, which has arrived at Melbourne from Launceaton, the Commissioner of Trade and Customs received a letter from Captain J. S. Stanley, R.N., dated 25th April, giving particulars of the loss of five of his men who had been sent ashore to Goose Island to bring off mails, which were expected to be left there. The particulars are as follows : — On Saturday last the Victoria was on her way from Hummock Island to an anchorage under Green Island. When about five miles from Goose Island John Norgate, who is rated as coxswain in charge of stores, was sent ashore in charge of the survey gig, having with him as a crew Wm. Bogdon, Edward Price, Thos. King, and George Leggatt. No bad weather was anticipated, and as Norgate knew well the dangers that boats had to contend with, Captain Stanley had every confidence in his judgment. Late on Saturday night the weather changed from nearly calm with rain to moderate squalls from the S.W., which continued, the wind increasing all day on Sunday. Capt. Stanley expected that Norgate would not leave the island until the weather was fair. He left, however, at 10 a.m. on Sunday, and nothing has been seen of him or his crew since. On Monday Mr Crisp fancied he saw a boat on the beach about three miles off, and on Tuesday surveying was resumed, the work taking the Victoria in the direction pointed out by Mr Crisp. It was then found that what he saw was the missing gig, bottom up. The wind would be dead aft for the boat coming off, and Captain Stanley thinks the sail must have jibed and the boat capsized. No doubt the men hung on to the boat until, numbed with cold, or from exhaustion, they sank. The accident most likely occurred near Goose Island, in which case the boat would have been about nine miles distant from the steamer. Captain Stanley says that every exertion was being made to discover the bodies, and concludes by asking for any information obtainable absut the relatives of William Cogdon and Edward Price, as no one on the steamer knows anything of their whereabouts. At 9 p.m. on Wednesday a postcript is added to the letter, stating that, although the ship's boats and boats belonging to the parties on the island had been out searching in every likely spot, no traces of the bodies had been found, and the chance of finding even the dead bodies is now looked upon as very small.