TWO SURVIVORS

Southland Times, Issue 21576, 14 December 1931, Page 7

TWO SURVIVORS

RUM RUNNER’S FATE

WRECKED ON ROCKS EFFECT OF GUNFIRE (United Tress Assn.—By Telegraph—Copyright.) (Rec 5.5 p.m.) Olso, December 12. Brought ashore near Maaloey, famishing and exhausted on a boat bearing the corpses of four shipmates, the English first officer, Savage, and the German engineer Erbault, gave news of the fate of their Polish Captain Visnagrotsky and the English and German members of the crew of the rum running steamer Venus owned in London and fljung the Panama flag, which sank after an encounter with a Customs vessel. The police had been searching for the Venus since a coastguard cutter fired 20 shots at her after she left Lerwick, Shetland Islands, with 5000 gallons of liquor aboard. The vessel subsequently, possibly as the result of the gunfire, ran on the rocks near Bergen. The crew got her oft leaking badly and pumped desperately until she again grounded and foundered in 15 fathoms. The crew sought safety in two boats and pieces of floating wreckage. Visnagrotsky broke his arm leaving the Venus and was drowned. The first boat capsized, drowning six men. The second overturned, but the men aboard drifted, clinging to the sides and bottom until two died from exposure and the bitter cold. Savage flew distress signals which fishermen observed and rescued the survivors, two of whom succumbed after being brought ashore.

Savage and Erbault are expected to recover. A motor boat has been despatched to seek possible additional survivors. The police caught Visnagrotsky rum running to northern Norway in 1930 with the schooner Emmanuel which the authorities confiscated, fining the captain whom they expelled from Norway for smuggling thither 6000 gallons of liquor.