FURTHER PARTICULARS.

Marlborough Express, Volume XLII, Issue 99, 28 April 1908, Page 4

FURTHER PARTICULARS.

THE KILLED AND INJURED.

OVER THIRTY MISSING

THE DAMAGE TO THE ST. PAUL.

I'PRESS ASSOCIATION.] (Received April 27, 11.58 p.m.) LONDON, April 27. The cruiser Gladiator was returning from Portland to Spithead in a blinding snowstorm. "When steaming past Port Victoria, well inside the first point, at a speed of ten knots, she sighted the St. Paul approaching rather faster about 200 yards away. The liner gave orders to reverse engines and go full speed astern, but a collision was unavoidable. The liner's bow crashed into the Gladiator's starboard side nearly amidships* cutting into her up to her centre lino into the engine-room. The liner went astern, and the cruiser began to list heavily. She steamed for the beach, taking groundabout 400 yards from the shore; then she turned completely on her starboard side, her stern being almost dead on to the shore.

When she heeled a number of the crew jumped into the waters; others were thrown into the water and tried to swim ashore; the rest of the crew clambered over to the port side, which was standing well out of the water, and remained until rescued by boats. An inrush of the sea into the boilerroom followed the liner's backing-out, and some say caused the boiler to explode, scalding or injuring many. The closing of the watertight doors prevented the vessel from foundering. With the fore boilers and engines working at-high pressure the cruiser got close in-shore before she became unmanageable.

_ A stoker who was below at the time states that the first warning was the crash of the liner's bow into the Gladiator's mess-room, killing a man on the spot. The crew displayed perfect discipline, quietly awaiting their turn to be taken ashore.

The liner's fine bulkhead averted very serious damage, though the St. Paul's stern was injured both over and below the water.

It is known that six of the Gladiator's crew were drowned or died of their injuries, and six more who were injured are in the hospital. Lieut. Graves and thirty hands are missing. The St. Paul had 500 passengers. The Gladiator is on a soft bottom in a sheltered position, and it is expected that salvage operations will be successful.

The crew numbered 300. It is feared that those who are missing have perished. [The Gladiator is a second-class cruiser carrying ten guns, with a displacement of 5750 tons and a horsepower of 10,000. She was launched in 1896, and belongs to the Home Fleet.]