WRECK OF THE SHIP JASON.

Otago Witness, Issue 2083, 25 January 1894, Page 20

WRECK OF THE SHIP JASON.

A SOLITARY SURVIVOR.

Our cable messages have already announced the wreck of the ship Jason off Cape Cod on the evening of December 5. The following graphic description of the affair is given in one of the papers to hand by the last mail : —

The wreck of the ship Jason has added 25 names to the already long list of dead which forms part of the history of the ocean shore of old Gape Cod. The storm set in with thick snow and rapidly increased in fury, turning to rain and sleet at dark. A terrible surf rolled in on the beach. When darkness set in the scene was wild in the extreme, foreboding ill to any luckless sailor caught on a lee shore.

During a lull in the storm a big ship under very short sail was discovered dangerously near shore by tho coastguard at the Nauset three lights station. She appeared to bo having a hard time, and word was passed along the line 4 to keep a good lookout for her and be ready to help her.

Surfman Hopkins, of the Pamet River station, started out on his northward patrol at the usual time in the teeth of the gale, and experienced a sorry time in the driving sleet and rain. When half a mile north of the station, at half-past 7 o'clock, he saw some big black object in the boiling surf on the bars and heard the most heartrending cries for help. He at once surmised that the ship sighted before dark was in trouble. He quickly hurried to the station and aroused all hands.

QUICK RESPONSE TO CALL FOR HELP.

The dim outline of the doomed ship could just be discerned on tb,e outer bar, with the seas breaking over and all around her, while the surf, as it rolled on the shore, was filled with wreckage of every description, making it dangerous to the lives and limta of the surfraen.

A consultation was held, and thou a cannon was rigged to shoot a line out to tho distressed vessel if possible. When a favourable chance came a shot was fired -and a line sped out to her. It caught in the rigging. Signals were made, bub there was no answer. In the meantime, soon after Captain Rich and his men arrived on the scene, a poor, half-drowned, halfclad boy was discovered in the darkness, trying to find his way somewhere. Ho piteously asked the captain, "Am I all right ? " Ho was quickly taken to the station by two surfmon and put to bed. He managed to say that the vessel was the Jason, a British ship from Calcutta, via Mauritius, 80 days out from the latter port, bound to Boston with a big cargo of baled jute, and that there were 25 more men out there in the storm and darkness.

THE SHIP A TOTAL LOSS.

When daylight broke clear and warm it disclosed a scene of death and desolation such as is seldom witnessed on these shores. The once magnificent 1600-ton ship was a total loss. The foreward part was about 100 yards further along the beach than the stern, with the foremast standing, and on this hung tho foreyard and fore-topsail yard, from which the Bails hung stripped into ribbons. The stays held the bowsprit in place. The wreck of the ship rolled back and forth, with the surf dashing over it and breaking 10 yards eff shore. Samuel J. Evans, the boy who was washed ashore, is 19 years old. He resides in Monmouthshire, England. He is the only survivor of the wreck. SURVIVOR EVANS'S STORY. Evans tells the following story of the voyage of the ship Jason : — "We sailed from Calcutta last February with a, cargo of jute butts for Boston. Two days after leaving port we were nearly dismasted in a storm, and had to pub into Mauritius for repairs. During the gale our mate was washed overboard and lost. After leaving Mauritius _we had fair weather up to the equator. " We encountered since November 15 easterly gales, with frequent snow squalls. We came in through the south channel on Monday. We shaped our course for Boston. Tuesday morning the wind pulled out to east-south-east, and at 9 a.m. it began to snow. We had no observation for two days, bub Captain M'Millan thought we were wid9 of Cape Cod, and we kept our course. Toward noon, the weather getting thicker, we took in all our upper sails and laid the ship along under three lower topsails and forestaysails. At half-past 3 in the afternoon we made breakers right under our lee, and a few moments later saw the land. We shook out our upper topsails and tried to drive by the cape, but we had no sea room, and at a quarter-past 7, findiug that we must soon strike, the ship was headed for the beach. " The captain had been below examining his charts. On reaching the deck he cried •We are lost ! ' The ship struck with fearful force, and we all sprang for the lifeboats. Before we could cut the lashings the spars began to fall and the vessel to go to pieces. This was too much for the boys, and they all rushed for the lee mizzen rigging. Only half of them succeeded iv gaining a footing. Some of them were swept overboard and were seen no more. I clung desperately to tho rigging for a few moments, when a great wave broke my grip and I went into the howling sea. I thought} it was my end, bub the water threw me here and there for a while, when suddenly I found myself on the sand. Soon men came and look me to the life-saving station. I am thankful that lam saved, but my poor shipmates are all gone. All of them had life-preservers on, and I don't see why some of them could not reach the shore as well as I."

COULD NOT SEX TIIK LIKE.

In an interview Captain Cole, of the Cahoons Hollow Life-saving Station, says : — Everything that could be done was dono to save the unfortunate men on board the ship. We put a shot line over the vessel early in the evening, but the crew on board could not reach it. In fact, in the pitchy darkness of the night they could not see the line, and, as the waves wero breaking over them every minute, they had all they could do to cling to the rigging, and then could only keep there by lashiDg themselves to the shrouds. We had our surf boat there, but no human power could launch her through the surf. It came in like a solid wall, and to shove a boat into it was only to destroy her and every man who stepped into her.

" It is very strange that no bodies have come ashore, but I think they must have been carried in the very strong tide toward the south, and some of them may be lashed to the spars which are now alongside of the ship or tangled with the rigging. Ido nob remember ever to have seen anything equal to the night in all my experience on the beach." •

Captain Worthen, of the Highland light station, said: — " It was a terrible storm and an unfortunate disaster, but no human power could help them. Ten minutes after she struck she had broken' in two and her mizzenxnast had gone over the side. We kept our patrol walking up and down the beach all night in the edge of the surf hoping to save some poor fellow who might wash in ; but not a man, with the exception of Seaman Evans, came ashore."

Tbe ship now lies a wretched semblance of the grand ship of yesterday. Tangled masses of ropes and broken spars smashed against her broken sides in the great breakers that still roll

heavily in over the bars. The wreok of the Jason will long be remembered on this coast.