The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1881-01-15 00:00:00

A NOBLE RESCUE.

The ship Indian Chief, of Liverpool, 1,257 tons,
Frazer master, bound from Middlesbrough for Yokohama with a general cargo, was wrecked on Thursday,
in last week, on the Long Sand, near the entrance to
the Thames, during a fresh gale from the E. N. E.
and a heavy sea, and the master, the second mate,
and sixteen of the crew have been drowned. No
fewer than four lifeboats put off from the shore to
tin succour of the shipwrecked crew namely,
the boats at Ramsgate, Clacton, Harwich, and
Aldborough, but in the darkness of the night they
could not discover the wreck. At daylight it was
observed by the Ramsgate lifeboat, which had been
K
cruising all night round the entish Knock and Long
Sands. She at once slipped from the harbour steamer,
which had her in tow, and bad the satisfaction to
save the mate, second mate, pilot, and nine of the
seamen, who were in a most exhausted condition.
Before, however, they could be landed, the second
mate perished from the exposure he had undergone.
It appeared that the master and 16 of the crew had
been washed off the wreck dui ing the night.

The master of the Ramsgate Harbour steamer,
Vulcan and the coxswain of the lifeboat Bradford
have furnished to the Board of Trade and the National
Lifeboat Institution the following additional particu-
lars of the services rendered by the steamer and the
lifeboat, to a portion of the crew of the ship Indian
Chief:—

" At noon on Wednesday George Donne, master of the
Forgat-me-not flshinii• vessel, arrived here, and reported that
as be passed the Kentish Knock Light Vessel, at time
o'clock that morning, signal guns were being fired from her,
He steered as close to her as possible, and learned that
a large ship was ashore on the Long Sand, bearing about
W.N.W. He looked in that direction, and saw a large vessel,
and at once proceeded to Ramsgate to report the wreck. It
was then blowing a fresh gale from the EN E. The Harbour
steamer Vatican and the lifeboat Bradford were immediately
despatched in the direction el the Kentish Knock Sand,
through a very heavy sea, both tug and lifeboat shipping
much water. They arrived at the Light Ship about five p.m.,
spoke her, and were informed that a large ship was ashore
on the Long Sand. bearing north-east byriorth. They then
proceeded to the north-eastern part of the 3and, where
they cruised about for some time without seeing anything.
The steamer was then stopped and the lifeboat hauled up
as near as was prudent, and the master of the tug con-
sulted as to what was best to be done. It was ultimately
decided to remain until daylight, the sea being very
heavy and the position of the wreck not known.
Had the lifeboat slipped from the tug and got to
leeward she would have been unable to sail to wind-
ward again. They, therefore, cruised about between the
Kentish Knock and Long Sand, the tug going easy with her
engines for about fourteen hours, or until daylight on
Thursday morning, during which time the wind increased
to R strong gale and the sea was tremendous, washing away
tke sponsons and damaging the starboard fore side house
of the steamer, while the life boat and her crew were imposed
to the whole fury of the gale. At daylight they saw a large
ship sunk on the north-east part of the Long Sand, with
her foremast standing, the main and mizenmast being carried
away. The life boat was then slipped, and made sail for
the vessel. On arriving near some of the crew were
observed on the foretop. The life-boat teft go .her anchor
as near as possible, and a rope was made fast
from' the vessel to a piece of ilrwood, which floated near
and was picked up by the life-boat's crew, when she was
hauled alongside the vessel's quarter, clear of the broken
masts and spars which were hanging alongside. The crew
crawled along the rail between the seas, which were con-
tinually breaking over her, and were taken on board the
life-boat. One man, unable to help himself from exhaus-
tion and fatigue, was with great difficulty assisted on
board the boat and died shortly afterwards. The whole
mew consisted of twenty-eight men and pilot, twelve
of whom were got on board, the remainder, seventeen
in number having been previously washed off; some of
the bodies were seen in the water, lashed to the broken
spars. The life-boat's cable was then slipped and sail
made, and the boat sailed across the Long Sand
through a very heavy broken sea, the steamer having
steered round to leeward of the Kentish Knock, where she
picked up the lifeboat, and proceeded for the harbour,
arriving at 2.15 p.m. The crew were taken care of at the
Sailor's Home The ship proved to be the Indian Chief, of
Liverpool, 1,238 tons, Fraser master, from Middlesborough to
Yokohama, with general cargo, got ashore on Long Sand at
2.30 a.m. on the sth inst. This service occupied 26 hours,
from 12.15 p m. on the 6th to 2.15 p.m. on the oth. -Sikned,
ALFRED PAGE, Master of Vulcan, steam tug; CEAALEs E.
Fisu, coxswain of Bradford life boat."

An inquest has been held at Ramsgate on the body
of Howard Primrose Frazer, second mate of the
Indian Chief, who died on board the Ramsgate lifeboat
whilst being brought from the wrecked ship to shore.
The medical evidence was to the effect that the death
resulted from cold and exposure. In summing up the
Coroner said great credit was due to the lifeboat crew
for their indomitable courage, and he had no doubt
they would receive a well-deserved reward.—The
Jury found a verdict in accordance with the medical
evidence.

"A Seafarer" sends to Tuesday's Daily Telegraph a most
interesting and graphic narrative of the arrival of the
survivors of the crew of the Indian Chief at Ramsgate, and
from which weinake the following extract :

"On the afternoon of Thursday, the 7th inst., I made
one of the great crowd assembled on the Ramsgate
east pier to witness the arrival of the survivors of the
crew of a large ship which had gone ashore on the
Long Sand early on the preceding Wednesday morn-
ing. . . . The people crowded thickly about the land-
ing-steps when the lifeboat entered the harbour.
Whispers flew from mouth to mouth. Some said the
rescued men were Frenchmen, others that they were
Danes, but all were agreed that there was a dead
body among them. One by one the survivors came
along the pier, the most dismal procession it was ever
my lot to behold—eleven live but scarcely living men,
most of them clad in oilskins and walking with
bowed backs, drooping heads andnerveless arms. There
was blood on the faces of some, circled with a white
encrustation of salt, and this same salt filled the
hollows of their eyes and streaked their hair with lines
which looked like snow. The first man, who was the
chief mate, walked leaning heavily on the arm of the
kindly-hearted harbourmaster, Captain Braine. The
second man whose collar-hone was broken, moved as
one might suppose a galvanised corpse would. A
third man's wan face wore a forced smile, which only
seemed to light up the piteous, underlying expression
of the features. They were all saturated with brine ;
they were sottkei with sea water to the very marrow
of the bones. Shivering, and. with a stupified rolling
of the eyes, their teeth clenched, their chilled fingers
pressed ißto the palms of their hands they passed
out of sight. As the last man came I held my
breath; he. was alive when taken from the wreck, but
had died in the boat. Four men bore him on their
shoulders, and a flag flung over the face mercifully
concealed what was most shocking of the dreadful
sight; but they had removed his boots and socks to
chafe his feet before he died, and had slipped a pair of
mittens over the toes, which left the ankles naked.
This was the body of Howard Primrose Fraser, the
second mate of the lost ship, and her drowned captain's
brother. I had often met men newlreescued from
shipwreck, but never remember having beheld more
mental anguish and physical suffering than was ex-
pressed in the countenances and movements of these
eleven sailors."

" Seafarer " then proceeds to give the narrative of
the wreck, which he got direct from the chief mate,
Mr. William Meldrum Lloyd. The story, he says, is
a striking and memorable illustration of endurance
and hardship on the one hand, and of the 'finest
herocial humanity on the other, in every sense worthy
to be known to the British public.—We give the
following extraet from the narrative :
. . . . "To know, sir, what the cracking and straining of
that vessel was like, as bit by bit she slowly went to pieces,
you must have been aboard of her. . . . A little before five
o'clock in the afternoon a huge sea swept over the vessel,
clearing the decks fore and aft, and leaving little but the
uprights of the deck-houses standing. It was a dreadful
sea, but we knew worse was behind it, and that we must
climb the rigging if we wanted to prolong our lives. The
hold was already full of water, and portions of the deck had
been blown out, so that everywhere mat yawning gulfs met
the eye, with the black water washing almost flush. Some
of the men made for the fore-rigging, but the captain
shouted to all hands to take to the mizenmast, as
that one in his opinion was the securest. A num-
ber of the men who were scrambling forward re-
turned on hearing the captain sing out, but the rest held on,
and gained the foretop. Seventeen of us got over the mizen-
top, and with our knives fell to hacking away at such run-
ning gear as we could come at to serve as lashings. None of
us touched the mainmast, for we all knew, now the ship had
broken her back, that that spar was doomed, and the reason
why the captain had called to the men to come aft was
because he was afraid that when the mainmast went it
would drag the foremost, that rocked in its step with
every move, with it. I was next the captain in the
mizcntop, and near him was his brother—a stout-built,
handsome young fellow, twenty-two years old, as fine a
specimen of the buglish sailor as ever I was "shipmate with.
Ile was calling about him cheerfully, bidding us not be
down-hearted, and telling us to look sharply around for the
lifeboats. Ile helped several of the benumbed men to lash
themselves, saying encouraging things to them as he made
then fast. As the sun sank the wind grew more freezing, and
I saw the strength of some of the men lashed over me leaving
them fast. The captain shook hands with me and, on the
chance of my being saved, gave me some messages to take
home, too sacred to be written down, sir. lie likewise
handed me his watch and chain, and I put them in my
pocket. The canvas streamed ribbons from the yards,
and the noise was like a continuous' roll of thunder
overhead. It was dreadful to look down aid watch the
decks ripping up, and notice how every sea that rolled over
the wreck left less of her than it found.

" The moon went quickly away—it was a young moon, with
little power—but the white water and the starlight kept the
night fro.n being black, and the frame of the vessel stood
out like a sketch done in ink every time the dark seas ran
clear of her and left her visible upon the foam. There was no
talking, no calling to one another; the men hung in the
topmast rigging like corpses, and I noticed the second mate
to windward of his brother in the top sheltering him, as
best he could, poor fellow, with his body from the wind
that went through our skins like showers of arrows. On
a sudden I took it into my head to fancy that the mizen-
mast wasn't so secure as the foremast. It came into my
mind like a fright, and I called to the captain that I meant to ,
make for the foretop. I don't know whether he heard me or
whether he made any answer. Maybe it was a sort of craze
of mine for the moment, but I was wild with eagerness to
leave that mast as soon as ever I began to fear for it. I cast
my lashings adrift and gave a look at the deck, and saw that I
must not go that way if I did not want to be drowned. So I
climbed into the crosstrees and swung myself on to the stay, so
reaching the maintop, and then I scrambled on to the main
topmast erosstrees, and went hand over hand down the top-
mast stay into the foretop. Bad I reflected before I left
the mizeutop, I should not have believed that I had the
strength to work my way for'rards like that: my hands
felt as if they were skinned and my finger joints appeared
to have no use in them. There were nine or ten men in the
foretop, all lashed and huddled together. The mast rocked
sharply, and the throbbing of it to the blowing of the great
tatters of canvas was a horrible sensation. From time to
time they sent up rockets from the Sunk lightship—
oo.g, every hour,e sl4lO think—rebutasl-leo Iti aad
manlo since,lice itl2
time had come, and, though death seemed terrible when I
looked down upon the boiling waters below, yet the anguish
of the cold almost killcd the craving for life. It was now
about three o'clock on Thursday morning; the air was full
of the strange, dim light of the foam and the stars, and
I could very plainly see the black swarm of mon in
the top and rigging of the mizeurnast. I was looking
that way, when a great sea fell upon the hull of the ship
with a frightful crash; a moment after, the mainmast went.
It fell quickly, and, as it fell, it bore down the mizehmast.
There was a horrible noise of splintered wood and some
piercing cries, and then another great sea swept over the
after deck, and we who were in the foretop looked and
saw the stumps of the two masts sticking up from the
bottom of the hold, the mizenmast slanting over the
bulwarks into the water; and the men lashed to it
drowning. There never was a more shocking sight, and the
wonder is that some of us who saw it did not go raving mad.
The foremast still stood, complete to the royal mast and all
the yards across, but every instant I expected to find myself
hurling through the air. By this time the ship was com-
pletely gutted, the upper part of her a mere frame of ribs,
and the gale still blew furiously; indeed, I gave up hope
when the mizenmast fell and I saw my shipmates drowning
on it

"It was half an hour after thii that a man, who was jammed
close against me, pointed out into the darkness and cried

in a wild hoarse voice, Isn't that a steamer's light ? ' I
looked, but what with grief and suffering and cold I was
nearly blind and could see nothing. But presently another '
man called out that he could see a light, and this
was echoed by yet another: so I told them to keep
their eyes upon it and watch if it moved. They said
by and by that it was stationary: and though we
could not guess that it meant anything 'good for us
yet this light heaving iii. sight and our talking of it
gave us some comfort. When the dawn broke we saw the
smoke of a steamer, and agreed that it was her light we
had seen; but I made nothing of that, smoke, and was look-
ing heart-brokenly at the mizenmast and the cluster of
drowned men washing about it, when a loud cry made me
turn my head, and then I saw a lifeboat under a reefed
foresail heading direct for its. It was a sight, sir, to
make one crazy with Joy, and it put the strength of ten
men into every one of us. A man named Gillniore—
I think' it was Gillmore—stood up and waved a long
strip of canvas. But I believe they had seen there
were living men aboard us before that signal was made. The
beat had to cross the broken water to fetch us, and in my
agony of mind I cried out, 'She'll never face it! She'll
leave us when she sees that water !' for the sea was frightful
all to wind Ward of the sand and over it, a tremendous play
of broken waters, raging one with another, and making the
whole surface resemble a boiling cauldron. Yet they
never swerved a hair's breadth. Oh, sir, she was a noble
boat ! We could see her crew—twelve of them—sitting on
the thwarts, all looking our way, motionless as carved
figures, and there was not a stir among them as, in an
instant, the boat leapt from the crest of a towering sea
right into the monstrous broken tumble. The peril of
these men who were risking their lives for ours made
tie forget our own situation. Over and over again the
boat was buried, but as regularly did she emerge with
her crew fixedly looking our way, and their oilskins
and the light-coloured side of the boat sparkling
In the sunshine, while the coxswain leaning for-
ward from the helm, watehed our ship with a face
of iron. By this time we knew that this boat was here to
save us, and that she would save us, anil, with wildly beating
hearts, we unlashed ourselves, and dropped over the top into
the rigglng. We were all sailors, you see, sir, and -knew
what the lifehoat men wanted, and what was to be done.
Swift as thought we had bent a number of ropes' ends
together, and securing a piece of wood to this line, threw it
overboard, and let it drift to the boat. It was seized,a hawser
made fast, and we dragged the great rope on hoard. By means
of this hawser the lifeboat men hauled their craft under our
quarter, clear of the raffle. But there was no such rush
made for her as might be thought. No ! I owe it to my
shipmates to say this. Two of them shinned out upon the
mizenmast to the body of the second mate that was lashed
eight or nine feet over the side, and got him into the boat
before they entered it themselves. I heard the coxswain of
the boat—Charles Fish by name, the fittest man in the
world for that berth and this work—cry eut, Take that
poor fellow in there ! ' and he pointed to the body of the
captain, who was lashed in the top, with his arms over
the mast, and his head erect and his eyes wide open. But
one of our crew called out, . -He's been dead four hours, sir,'
and then the rest of us scrambled into the boat, looking away
from the dreadful group of drowned men thatlay Ma cluster
round the prostrate mast. The second mate was still alive,
but a meniac. It was heartbreaking to hear his broken, feeble
cries for his brother, but he lay quiet after a bit, and died
in half-an-hour, though we chafed his feet and poured
rum into his mouth, and did what men in our miserable
plight could for a fellow-sufferer. Nor were we out
of danger yet, • for the broken water was enough to
turn a man's hair grey to look at. It was a fearful sea for
us men to find ourselves in the midst of, after having looked
at it from a great height, and I felt at the beginning almost
as though I should have been safer on the wreck than in
that boat. Never could I have believed that so small a
, vessel could meet such a sea and live. Yet she rose like a
! duck to the great roaring waves which followed her, draining
every drop of water from her bottom as she was hove up,
and falling with terrible suddenness into a hollow only
to bound like a living thing to the summit of the next
gigantic crest.
"When I looked at the lifeboat's crew and thought of our
situation a short while since, and our safety now, and
how to rescue us these great-hearted men had im-
perilled their own lives, I was unmanned, I could not
thank them, I could • not trust myself to speak. They
told us they had left Ramsgate Harbour early on the
preceding afternoon, and had fetched the Knock at dusk,
and not seeing our wreck had lain to in that raging sea,
suffering almost as severely as ourselves, all through the
piercing, tempestuous night. What do you think of such a
service, sir? How can suck devoted heroism be written of,
so that every man who can read shall know how great and
beautiful it is? Our own sufferings came to us as a part of our
calling as seamen. But theirs was bravely courted and en
dared for the sake of their fellow-creatures. Believe me, sir,
It was a splendid piece of service ; nothing grander in its way
was ever done before, even by Englishmen. lam a plain
seaman, and can say no more about it all than this. But
when I think of what must have come to us eleven men
before another hour had passed, if the lifeboat crew had not
run down to us, I feel like a little child, sir, and my heart
grows too full for my eyes."

In connection with the above the Staiulard his
published the following letter :
Sir,—l have just come from our Sailors' Home, where the
eleven men saved from the ill-fated Indian Chief are being
carefully attended to. From the accounts of these sailors it
appears that the vessel struck on the Long Sand about three
o clock on Wednesday morning. During the day which suc-
ceeded the crew remained on board, although the sea was
breaking over them with tremendous violence. Towards the
evening the hull had sunk considerably in the sand, and as
the tide rose the crew had to take to the rigging. Sixteen,
including the captain, settled themselves in the mizeu-top ;
the rest found refuge on the foremast.

During the night the wind increased, and the cold was
intense. About two o'clock in the morning the mainmast
was unshipped, and carried with it the mizen and the six-
teen unfortunate men who were clinging to it. During the
seven or eight hours which succeeded these poor fellows
were driven about amongst the floating spars, and most of
them met death by concussion with pieces of broken timber.
The only one amongst them who survives, and who had his
collar-bone broken by a stroke from a drifting spar, gives a.
harrowing account of the way in which he saw his com-
panions, one after another, perish around him. At length,
as morning broke, he managed to crawl to the vessel, widen,
owing to the -falling tide, was again emerging from the
water, and, with great difficulty, he eventually got into the
forerigging.
At about nine o'clock our Life Boat, which had been out
during the whole night, in tow by the steam tug, approached
the wreck, and in about an hour's time, between the break-
ing of successive seas, the eleven survivors, after a weary
watch of twenty-five hours, were taken on board. One
poor fellow—the captain's brother —was so exhausted that
he was obliged to be dragged into the Life Beat, and shortly
after he expired.

The mate tells me that he shall never forget two things--
first, the groans of his dying shipmates during that terrible
night, and then the thrill of inexpressible joy he experienced
when he saw the lifeboat approaching. The rescue was
skilfully planned and nobly executed ; it reflects the greatest
credit upon all concerned, and adds another to the long list
'of heroic deeds performed by English sailors.—l am, Sir,
your obedient servant,
J. EIISTACE BRENAN, Vicar of Christ Church, and
Chaplain of the Ramsgate Sailors' Home.
Christ Church Vicarge, Ramsgate, January 7.

Captain Brains, the Harbour Master at Ramsgate, has
forwarded to the National Lifeboat Institution tilts following
account of the admirable behaviour of the lifeboat in the
rescue of a portion of the crew of the Indian Chief :7
" Harbour Office, Ramsgate, Jan. 8, 1881.—Of all the meri-
torious services performed by the .Ramsgate tug and life-
boat, I consider this one of the best. The decision the
coxswain and crew arrived at to remain till daylight, which
was in effect to continue for fourteen hours cruising about,
with the sea continually breaking over them, in a heavy gale
end tremendous sea, proves, I consider, their gallantry and
determination to do their duty. The coxswain and crew of
the lifeboat speak in the highest terms of her good qualities.
They state that when sailing across the Long Sand, after
leaving the wreck, the seas were tremendous, and the boat
behaved most admirably. Some of the shipwrecked crew
have since stated that they were fearful, on seeing the
frightful-looking seas they were passing through, that they
were in more danger in the lifeboat than when ladled to the
mast of their sunken ship, as they tkought it impossible for
any boat to live through such a sea."