TRAGEDIES OF THE SEA.

NZ Truth, 4 January 1908, Page 7

TRAGEDIES OF THE SEA.

THE ROTTEN ROTHSAY CASTLE, And Her Devil-May-Care Captain DROWN 130 LIGHT-HEARTED PASSENGERS' ;■■ On the Wild Welsh Coast.

Ukgafn she plunges ; hark ! a second shock, Tears, her strong bottom on the .*.* marble rock ; , :• Down on the vale of death with dismal cries The victims, shuddering, roll their eyes In wild despair. *"*: . ; . ; , . —Falconer. The rugges western coast of Wales has been the scone of many a sad 'wreck, and there is scarcely a mile along the Irish Sea that is not associated with some maritime tragedy. The wild north-west wind sweeps down from the tumbling Atlantic, through the North Channel, and strikes hard against the rocky cliffs ; and woe betide a. ressrl that cannot keep an offing at such times. T.d~tTie west of Penmon, m Anglesey, is s-Llanalgb, "where, as, narrated^. .3s. "Truth" a twelvemonth ago, 1 tne Australian trader, the Royal Charter, was wrecked with: ; HALF, A MI LLIQN, STERLING j aboard. ' A miler and a-half south of it is the Dutchman's Bank, ' whereon the s Learner Rothsay Castle was wrecked, herloss' b&ing, like the majority of other . wrecks?, entirely due to stunidity and bad' management. The Rothsay Gastle, at the time oi^the disaster was 18 vcilrs old, and was a woo I tljany f T»a:dclle steamer, which had ofipmaily been built as a river boat, with . upper limbers pnly din. thick. After trying to cross th« Irish. Channel— yrhvn her crew left her foF'-tfasrowortinness— she. bad been placed to run as a pleasure steamer hfMtvc:>.n Liverpool 'and Beaumarus, a v:iiteruM r . vi:.i<'c m the Isle of Anglesey;' 'where she Wrts bound , ON HER FATAL TRIp. . Jt\ras August 17,' 1831, ancl the steamer wpa advertised to sail at 10 a.m. Ult.imrt'i'ly, ,sb? got away an boar late, and- the m,is"cellnnoous rpasfiensrrrs. numbering 150, settled down lni:o"the b<wt scats they Could firid, while? the 'inevitable band struck up iY"o. ■' well-known air, "Cheer Up."' Tjj.e r ".pre"«.''in*r ■ niglit had been rouir-h, hutto as t-fce crr-nky Rothsay Castle ]it>aij,ptl flown -t-V.e Mptspv, the weather m ih'c. opnn seemed, to be calm and favorjtMo. and the picnickers prepared, fey . A PLEASANT DAY.A licad wind metfAhe Rothsay Castle when- she rounded the Black frock, five miles from Liverpool ; the tide, too,, wj-rs. stronsr,. and there was pve-ny. . symptom N of the' wind assuming thp : -<»rt'a^nitiJtle of a pale. The steam-, er pc-finod to advance with difficulty, pnrl t.o "he sullrnlv laboring against obstacles too formidable for her ppw- , er"s. Fifteen miles out there was little gaiety lr-ft-. On the deck and liV.the.' cabins bHow many passengers.

were prostrate with seasickness. THE SKY AND THE WATER combined to make what sailors term "dirty water" a strong probability. Tarrey, a land agent of Lord. Derby, who had been scanning the horizon, and observing the behaviour of the Rothsay Castle, came half-way .down the companion-way; and, remarking that there seemed to be a good deal of danger, said he 'wished the captain would turn back. The captain looked up from his dinner-table and answered, with a snarl, "Bah ! there may be lots of fear >; there's ho danger." At five o'clock the captain left the table and showed himself on deck. The sea had now rise,ii 'high, and the steamer struggled laaily against the waves. The passengers had been discussing the .situation, now that • the vessel was hugging the shore, with the big, solid promontdryi 1 ""■ . THE- GREAT ORMES HEAD, : , before them, instead of steering, with the help of. her sails, over the uninterrupted course that would bring her to the MenM Straits: Remembering the captain's anxiety m the matter of profit, a number of passengers surrounded ; .him as " soon as be '-appeared from below,- and offered to make him a present of their fare; and remunerate Mm into the Mar-gain, if he. would return to port. His : answer ■; irritably given, was, "One would suppose you had * -committed a murder, you .are: so f rightprned.. I'm not one that turns back. If. you;knew me, you would not ask such a thing.": ' ' • ■. The entf would now seem to i have arrived. Through" the paddles and the skylights the water burst upon and half extinguished the .., engine fires, and covered the cabin floors. The ship,' rather than a thing of life, re-' sembled a dead weight/, feebly' and 'fitfully propelled forward. • Between six ajid seven o'clock^ the ebb tide, which had been expected to assist the ship, made her drag more heavily. The worn-out timbers were parting, at the seams ; 'the packet, steam as she might, was gradually being driven on they lee shore. Even the captain acknowledged he wished he cbuld pet somewhere to ride out 'the storm The Rothsav Castle ".at ei/rtit' o'clock was progressing at the 'irate of four miles :in- two hours. She -should have been at Beaumaris some hours ago, and vet/they 1 were not abreast of the Great Ormes Head. A passing vessel was allowed .to go on without signal. Wo attempt was made to run for safe, anchorage, whir*h invited • them about two miles' distant. And .the, water was bubbling into the hold ijnd the cabin's { the passengers labored; m parties at»' the, pumps'; ' the leak sained hourly. "' ■ THE FRIGHTENED EXCURSIONISTS besought' the captain to hois! a lan-

tern or fire a signal gun. In vain was the request made ; there was no gun and no lantern on board. Just before -midnight - the Rothsay Castle was stumbling like a br-oken-dov/n steed .towards the entrance of the Menai Straits. The moon, m an interval of release from the wild clouds showed the passengers they were but half a mile from the Isle of Anglesey. They greeted Puffin Island with joy— it suggested home. The poor old Rothsay Castle was not equal to making a decisive effort ; the captain stupidly remained below at the crisis, when duty, policy, and humanity rendered his presence on the deck absolutely imperative. Consequently, nothing was done. Two of the .engine fires were now extinguished. Ashes from the furnace blocked the pumps, and prevented the passengers from keeping the leakage under. Buckets being called for, it was discovered that the one bucket belonging to the Rothsay Castle had fallen into the sea. An undaunted nassenger proposed that they should balg? out the water with their hats ; no one stirred. A critical part of the coast was near, and THE DRUNKEN SKIPPER was still below. Before one o'clock m the morning the milk-white foam of breakers appeared close at hand. The man at the wheel, . speaking never a word, touched one of the passengers on the shoulder, and pointed with his finger to the ominous vision. The Rothsay Castle was skirting the Dutchman's Bank, .a shoal wide-famed for wreck and ruin. .Too. late an attempt, was made to. return tq the safe course. The ship struck the spit stern on. A second concussion immediately followed, causing the rotten old craft to rattle from bow to taffrail, and from funnel to keel. The passengers frantically rushed from below ; they were, told BY A. LIVERPOOL PILOT, who had hitherto- been m a oabin with the steward, and who for the first time came up and surveyed the surroundings, that the^y were all lost;, for themselves 'they could see the bolts started m the timbers by the shock. ' • Such orders as the captain gave, if obeyed, would have jammed the' ship further into the sands. The helmsman took the responsibility of reversing them, but the* captain angrily told the mate to put the helm as he had originally ordered. The male : passengers were requested to go forward m a body and float the vessel ; they obeyed without any hopeful result. As -if ignorant that there was scarcely sufficient steam to turn the pa'd-dles, the captain ordered the engines to 'be reversed. The passengers asked the captain to let go the anchor to save them from driving on to the sands, their hope being : that with a flowing! tide assistance might be broueht. The senseless captain answered. "Hold your bother!, there's no dancer." Even as he spoke the unmanageable SHIP SHEERED OFF into deep water, but rebounded back with another shock upon the bank. For a mile she sta-ggered along the edge of the shallow, . rolling and alternately ; each hew assault was signalled by the crash of splintering woodwork, and each crash was signalled by fresh outbursts of terror and distress from the passengers. The ship's bell was rung until the clapper, crazy like the rest of the ship, broke, and the hammering was continued after a fashion with a stout sftiok and lumps' of coal from the engine-room. THE CAPTAIN'S EVIL SPIRIT seemed now to animate one of the sailors, who, with no object m the world but mischief, took the lamp from the binnacle and dashed it on !the deck. Then the funnel fell, carrying with it the mainmast, both crashing across the poop, and starboard quarter, and splintering the bulwarks. By this blow it was thought the captain and mate were killed and swept into the sea, as neither was afterwards sesn. . Disorder was running riot. The sailors, stupefied, looked on helpless as babes, until roused by the falling of the. funnel and mast. Three of them then lashed themselves to the mainmast. Two men seized the musician's big drum, and essayed escape by clinging to it- The stupid ■ fellows, however, quarreled as to which was the heavier, and were drowned before the dispute was finished, while the drum, burst by the waves, floated out to sea. The end was not longer delayed ■ that' the -wretched ship held together so long was a marvel. She 'began to separate, and a monster roller broke, engulfing all. Of that light-hearted company, who m the morning had been angry with the •cap-tain for bis unpunctuality, and who had listened to the band as it bade them "Cheer .up, cheer up," 130 were drowned m that deplorable wreck^ The poop portion of' the wreck, m danger of sinking from over-crowd-ing, was paddled towards the shore, and those on it were eventually rescued by a life-boat from Beauma/ris. The horrors of that ni-e-ht were mostly told by Lawrence Duckworth, one of the survivors, who, with about 50 others, had clung to the bif r< ] n est niece of the wreck still unbroken. For a time his ear became so attuned TO THE DEATH GASPS of his companions that he was able to anticipate their end. .He said, ''There was a hissing sound made by their lengthened gasps, which became more and more laborious, and ended m a short convulsion; the body became quickly rigid, and the clutch of the hands was more unyielding bhan m life." jThe castaways one by one dropped away. and Duckworth' was at last left alone, witli the three sailors clinging desperately to the mast. At last a roller, more powerful than its predecesr sors, shattered the torn hulk completely. When Duckworth came to himself, he found he and the v other three floating where the wreck Ita-d been, the cordage not bring^ severed. ULTIMATE DELIVERANCE came with the morning. A pilot, looking through his telescope from Penmaen Point, saw the drowning fellows being tossed about. He roused his fellows and launched a boat, just m the nick of time, for when \ the pilot boat had got over the two miles of intervenine water, the drifters were well-niffh spent. On the way to (Beaumaris the pilots picked ub another of the passengers, floating iwseasililr. yet holding grimly to a spar. At»«I H»at was the end of the tuh-lllc. rl.tWy Castle.