“A TERRIBLE ORDEAL”

Taranaki Daily News, 3 September 1924, Page 9

“A TERRIBLE ORDEAL”

LOSS OF THE TREVESSA. SURVIVOR TELLS STORY. ADVENTURES IN LIFEBOATS THIRSTY AND HUNGRY Among counitl&ss stories of British hero-ism on land or sea, that of the crew of the lost t Learner Trevessa will stand always in the annals of successful human endeavour against almost hopeless odds. There is at present in Wellington one of the survivors of the Treves's a, Mr. Norman V. Robson, who was chief engineer of that vessel, and who is at present filling a similar position on the steamer Tremere, discharging New York? cargo at the Taranaki Street wharf. To a Dominion reporter, Mr. Robson told of his personal experience of this never-toJbe-'forgotten 23 days’ voyage in an open boat, after the Trevessa foundered in mid-ocean. Mr. Robson, whose home was at Newcaat-le-on-Tyne, had been six months on the Treves sa when she loaded 7000 tons of zinc concentrates at Port Pirie for Antwerp. The vessel called, at Fremantle for bunker coal, and sailed on May 23 last year for Antwerp and Durban.

‘‘We started off in a howling westerly gale and high hetad-sea. For eight days the Trevessa pitched and strained heavily until we were compelled to heave to. Water was reported in No. 1 hold, ten minutes after midnight of June 3. We could hear the water rushing about, but when the tanks and wells were sounded everything was reported dry. We could not raise the hatches as heavy seas were sweeping the decks. It was soon apparent that the water entered the ship high upon her side, and as the water would not permelate the zinc concentrates it could not get to the suctions in t'he bottom of the ship. The wireless operator sent out the “SOS” and he got replies from four or five unknown shins which acknowledged receiving the latitude and longitude of the Trevessa. SETTLING BY THE HEAD. “The ship began to settle by the head so the lifeboats were ordered to be got ready at 1 a.m. At 2.15 a.m. the boats were lowered as the T-reveesa’s foredeck was 6 or 7 feet under water, and she wae commencing to stand on her head. The engines were stopped at 2.10 a.m., but the electric lighting dynamo was left ruhning. The two lifeboats on the starboard side were launched after much risk. 1 wag in Captain Foster’s boat with 10 others, and there were 24 all told in the chief officer’s boat. The officers, engineers, greasers, stewards, and sailors were Britishers, and the firemen were Arabs, Indian coolies, and Portuguese West African negroes—eleven coloured men all told. Everyone, to a man, was quite cool considering the circumstances. **A heavy gale raged, and mountain- | ous seas were running when we stood i off the ship at a distance of half a I mile. were nearly swamped several • times, and bailing was continuous. The ship soon went down, head foremost, like a giant whale slowlv ‘sounding,’ her stem standing up high in the air as she went beneath the waves.

ON SHORT RATIONS. “We remained hove-to till 5 p.m. on that day, hoping to be picked up by any vessel that might have received our '■SOS’ call. The gale which had continued with terrific force all day, now showed signs of moderating. Although no rain had fallen we had been drenched by the seas. All we had to put across us in our boat was a canvas boat rover. Each lifeboat had a mast and big sail, and any amount of oars. Captain Foster then decided to set sail for t'he French island of Rodriquez, in the Mauritius group. This island was 2100 miles away in a straight line. The skipper calculated on the time likely to be occupied on this almost hopeless voyage, so he drew -up a -scale of rationing. “We were each allotted a top of a round ‘so’ cigarette tin of condensed milk twice a day, half a ship’s biscuit twice a day, and a third of a ‘so’ cigarette tin of water once a day. There was only sufficient condensed milk to last us four days, even at that small allowance. Short as we were of rations we had an abundance of cigarettes, tobacco and maliehes, and 1 assure you these were very welcome, and helped us along quite a lot. The tiny drink of water was served out at 2 p.m. each day—'after (he heat of the midday, I when it was moat beneficial. Of course, we had no blankets or spare clothes. All we had was what we stood in.

<4 Owing to strong head winds we had to tack day after day, and our boat was leaking through a split in one of the planks caused when launching. Everyone ached, through having to bail continually for the first two days. Eventually we stopped the leak by caulking the crack with an old sweat rag. The seas, however, continued to come aboard, and once or twice we were half tTwampod. The daily log was kept by me, and it recorded our difficuHtiek. The watches were four hours on and e.ight hours off. There was no room to lie down to sleep; we had just space enough to s-iit up, and that is how we .slept twenty-three days. EXPERIENCE IN THE BOATS. “Bbth boats tacked for an hour each way, and kept close together for five days. Then Captain Foster decided that it would be better if we separated; firstly, owing to the difficulty of keeping in sight of each other; and, secondly, by separating it increased the chances of either being picked up by a vessel and reaching land and sending help to the other. Each boat’s crew cheereel the other heartily on parting. “There was only about 2ft 6i* freeboard to our boat, but -she sailed well on the wind. Sometimes the gales drove us off our course, and we simply had to run before the sea. Other times we used a sea anchor made of four oars lashed together. The seas were so severe that two of the oars in the sea anchor were smashed. We also had one spell of four days’ calm. The sun was then terrific, and at. night time we were almost frozen with cold. We huddled together to keep ourselves as warm aS possible. During the calm we rowed easily off and on for four days in halfhour turns. The men had no strength, but Captain Foster told them to take Lt easy. The idea was more to keep the men occupied and to get their thoughts off our predicament. “The skipper forbade any of us to

go over the side for fear of losing'anyone through exhaustion. He was determined to get us all safely to land. None of us abandoned hope, but the mental strain was severe apart from our physical misery as the days Wore on. Our .principal anxiety Was for thdfae ashore who were worrying for us. Once or twice a ten-foot shark cruised along with us for a while, but we saw no other sea- life, if you can except some pilot birds that hovered over the boot for some time. We all grew long beards and we managed to joke over our -uncouth appearance. CHASING RAIN CLOUDS. “Eating a dry ship’s biscuit is quite a feat at any time. It was a tasteless dry powder in my mouth which was parched with thirst, and I was unable to swallow the biscuit. Some of us wuold go a w-eek /without our biscuit ration as it was too dry to swallow. Water was too preieioua for soaking a piece of biscuit. With plenty of water we would have been a hundred times better off. The canvas boat cover got saturated with salt water, so it was of no use for catching rain. If the captain sighted a black cloud he would steer for it, and when rain fell we .managed to obtain extra drinking water. “We cut biscuiit tins into squares of about 16 inches by 10 infches, and bent 'them into curves like channels. We held these against our chests and when the rain fell on these tin squares- it ran down into the ‘so’ cigarette tins held at the lower edge. Sometimes we managed to get a full tin of water; other times less than half an inch. This chaising after rain clouds lengthened our voyage, but was the means of saying lives. “An'other way of assuaging thirst 'was to take turn's in stripping off our clothes during the heat of the day, and others poured buckets of water over u'3. Yet another method was to lash a cigarette tin on the end of a stick, and while one man leaned over the side of the boat another scooped the sea-water up and poured it over the nape of his neck. This was exceedingly soothing and stimulating. DEATHS ON BOARD. “'On the sixteenth day out a Lascar fireman, Jacob Ali, began to sing weird songs at night time. His constitution could not withstand the exposure and starvation. Someone was detailed to sit beside the poor chap and watch him. He was delirious but continued to take his water and biscuit. Next day he just slowly collapsed and passed quietly away. No one seemed depressed. We took it as inevitable. After four h'ours the body was lowered overboard, and it was left behind. x

“That day one of the Ara'bs took ■sick. He said he felt very ill and asked for water, but none could be spared. As the poor chap later on really showed signs of collapse, Captain iFoster gave him a drink. He also pa'ssed away quietly, on the following morning. I must say the coloured men were heroic to the end. They were splendid. “We were beginning to fear we liad missed the island, which meant another week to Madagascar. A feeling of dismay began to spread among the ■ men. We had no trailing fog to check the distance traversed. We had no | chronometer, or book of tables. The captain had his sextant and managed to cheek our position to some extent, but it was easily possible, under the circumstances, to miss the island. LAND AT LAST “After 23 days in the boat, we sighted land, which proved to be the island of Rodriguez, fifteen milee away on the port side. We all gave three hearty cheers. Some of the white men wept with joy. Captain Foster gave ail hands a full cigarette tin of water, which was relished, but no one could eat biscuit. We sailed up under the sitern of a 2000■tor steam tramp off the island. It was 7 o’clock in the evening, and when we were hailed by the people on the steamer we told them we were a shipwrecked crew 23 days adrift at sea. Their pilot camp off in a small boat and took us in through the reef to the wharf.

“It was difficult for ur to walk when we stepped ashore. Our ankles were frightfully swollen, and we had to be supported. Three or four of the worst oases had to be carried to the hospital. A rapid recovery was made under the kindly treatment of t/he local doctor and residents. The cable station there despatched the glad tidings of our escape from death to our relatives and the ship’s owners. “The other boat reached the island of Mauritius. Going up the Thames as passengers on the Union Oastle liner Joorkha, shipping on all sides greeted jus with bunting and wh-istles. Captain C. P. T. Foster, of the Trevessa, and hits chief officer, Mr. James Charles Stewart-Smith, who was in charge of the second boat, each received Lloyds’ silver medal for saving lives at sea. Captain Foster proved himself a true Britisher throughout the whole of the terrible ordeal. He was the hero of the adventure.”