The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1881-09-10 00:00:00

THE LOSS OF THE "TEUTON."

Up to a late hour on Monday evening no further
information had been received by the Union Steamship
Company in London from their representatives at
Cape Town as to the loss of the Teuton, and they do
not expect that any new light will be thrown upon the
exact cause of the disaster before the arrival of the
return mail steamer due at Plymouth about the 20th
of the present month.

In consequence of the belief that 53 passengers left
Plymouth by the Teuton, and the fact that only 44
have been accounted for by the Union Steamship
Company, it has been hoped by some that a certain
number of the 53 may have landed at Cape Town,
instead of proceeding to Knysna. There is, however,
no ground for entertaining any such hope. It ap-
pears that intending passengers frequently withdraw at
the last mcment, and that, though 53 may have pur-
posed t..) embark, only 44 actually went on board.
This has been confirmed beyond doubt in a singular
way. The company telegraphed :—" Were Knysna
passengers on board?" By a telegraphic error it was
received as "Wire Knysna passengers on board ; "
and consequently the list of 44 was transmitted to
London. On being checked it was found to exactly
correspond to the list of 44 in the company's books.

On Monday the brothers of Mr. Ferguson, whose
party consisted of nine, and are reported as among
the 44 Knysna passengers who have perished, came
from Bolton to the metropolis, and waited upon
the secretaay of the Union Steamship Company.
They had received private intelligence that Mr.
Ferguson and his family had landed at Cape Town
to transact business, and they trusted that he had
not proceeded to Knysna. They were afforded every
information, but the officials could not give them any
encouraging assurance, as the Teutc,n, must have
stayed at Cape Town for 24 hours, giving Mr.
Ferguson plenty of time to accomp, ish what he
wanted and return on board. There is the chance
that he did not, and the company have undertaken to
telegraph to their agents for precise information on
the subject.

The Union Steamship Company have come to the
conclusion that the worst is now known with regard
to the loss of their intermediate steamer, the Teuton.
The loss of life, unfortunately, is greater than was
originally expected, some 25 coolies having joined the
steamer at Cape Town, en route for East London. The
passengers from England on board after the vessel
landed those for Cape Town numbered 162; the crew
was 85 strong, and, adding the 25 coolies, the total
human freight for places east of Cape Town was 272.
Of these, 36 persons, including only 11 passengers,
were saved ; therefore, the total loss of life so far as
can be ascertained up to the preoent is 236.

No estimate can yet be formed of the numbers of the
widows and orphans, but the officials of the Union
Company and others sze prosecuting the necessary
inquiries in order to prepare statistics for the public
rnepting, which will be held as early as possible, to
raise a fund for their support. The fund which was
raised for a similar purpose, and invested in Corpora-
tion trustees, when the Royal Mail Company's steam-
ship Amazon, was destroyed by fire in the Bay of
Biscay, in the year 1852, accompanied with a fearful
loss of life, is not yet quite extinct, and a few old
widow pensioners are still receiving grants. Similar
funds, but not on so extensive a scale, have been raised
on other occasions in Southampton, such as the loss of
the Rhone and TVye steamers in the West India hurri-
cane of November, 1867. and the wreck of the Nor-
mandy. These have severally worked themselves out.

Although the Union Cempany have sustained the
loss of some eight or nine steamers since their original
establishment in the year 1854, this last involves by
far the heaviest sacrifice of human life. The Brion,
a small vessel of 401 tons, was lost in the Bay of
Biscay in January, 1857. The Athens, of 739 tons,
was wrecked in Table Bay in May, 1865, many lives
being lost, during a tremendous hurricane, in which
most of the vessels in port were driven on shore. The
Dane, of 530 tom, was lost in December, 1865, at
Point Recife, Algoa, Bay, but without any loss of life.
The subsequent losses, previous to the.' Teuton, have
been the Celt, of 2,112 tons, on her passage from Cape
Town to Algoa Bay, in February, 1875; the Kafir, a
small coasting steamer of 981 tons; the European, of
2,212 tons, off Ushant, on the 6th of December, 1877;
and the American, of 2,126 tons, which foundered on
the 23rd of April, 1880, off the Cape Verd islands, an
event memorab' e for the discipline which was shown."

It is stated that forty of the passengers- by the
Teuton were from Glasgow. They comprised masons,
joiners, and painters, with their wives, children, and
other relatives. Eight are known in Glasgow, five
being young men who were proceeding as painters to
Port Elizabeth under an engagement from a Glasgow
firm.

LOST IN THE PRAIRIE. - The young Count Geza
Andrassy, who is visiting America with some com-
patriots, has had a rather unpleasant adventure in
the prairies. A large party of them had sallied out to
lasso wild horses, and the young count, in the ardour
of the chase, left his companions far behind and lost
them. Two days he wandered about the prairie with-
out food or drink, on the third he succeeded in shoot-
ing a hare with his last cartridge, and the report of
his gun attracted hii companions to the spot. They
had been scouring the plains for him with 150 redskins,
and were fortunately within hearing when he dis.
charged his rifle.