A TRAGEDY OF THE SEA.

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLIV, Issue 13409, 11 February 1907, Page 5

A TRAGEDY OF THE SEA.

Reference was made in our cable messages a few weeks ago to the fact that after a lapse of five years a message had been received from one of the ship's company of the Allan steamer Huronian, the disappearance of which had remained a complete mystery. The mail has brought further particulars, and it appears that the message was in the following words: —"Huronian sinking fast. Ton heavy. One side under water. Good-bye, mother and sister.Charles MeFall, greaser." This is the first tidings received of one of Britain's great ocean tragedies. It was contained in a bottle cart up at a gentleman's feet as lie was walking along the seashore at Castlerock, on the north coast of Ireland. The bottle had been securely corked, and contained an envelope on which the above brief but tragic words had been hastily written in pencil. It was on February 11, 1902, that the large cargo steamer Huronian left Glasgow with only one passenger for St. John, New Brunswick. From that day she disappeared, and nothing has been beard of her till this bottle was washed up. Inquiries showed that a fireman (or "greaser") named McFall had been on board the ill-fated vessel. When the vessel became overdue the Allan Company sought the assistance of the Admiralty, and the cr'iiser Thames was despatched to the North Atlantic in search, brt returned to Qrecnstown on May 11, 1902, with no news.