Northern Times.
Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1859-03-19 00:00:00

WRECKS AND CASUALTIES AT SEA.

WE took occasion, a day or two since, to make
some remarks in this place upon the subject of
Harbours of Refuge, shewing, at the same time,
what it is proposed shall be done, at the instance of
the Government, in providing such shelter for ship-
ping in different parts of our coasts. We would now
call attention, for a moment, to the kindred subject
of the Wrecks and Casualties at Sea which are
unhappily so constantly occurring; and which those
Harbours of Refuge, in fact, are designed to prevent,
by the protection they will offer to vessels that may
be dangerously exposed to the fury of the elements.
Both matters are very properly, as our readers no
doubt are aware, in Government hands, to some
extent. The first has recently been made the subject
of inquiry by a Commission. The other, of which
we have now more particularly to speak, is under the
continual notice of the Surveyor-General of the
Board of Trade, whose Report for the last year has
just been issued.

The returns in that Report, we find, show an
increase on the whole number of wrecks and strand-
ings, viz., 869 against 866 in 1857, and 837 in 1856 ;
but it is to be observed that the number of total
losses under those heads exhibit a decrease, being
354 in 1858 against 384 in 1857, and 368 in 1856.
The number of total losses by collision is 50 against
53 in 1857, and 51 in 1856, while the number of
casualties, involving damage by the same cause, is
251 against 224 in 1857, and 265 in 1856. With
respect to collisions, however, we are not, it seems,
in a situation to judge as yet of the case as it now
stands, since the new Admiralty regulations as to
lights not having taken effect until the Ist of Oct.
last, and many homeward-bound vessels being yet
unprovided with lights in accordance with them, no
conclusion can at present be arrived at as to the
effect such regulations may produce in reducing the
number of casualties by collision.
But it appears that there has been a more equal
distribution of casualties around the coast than
formerly, which is attributed to the greater preva-
lence of southerly and westerly winds throughout
the past year ; and, in consequence, a much larger
proportion than usual have occurred on the West
and Irish coasts ; the number on these coasts being
567 in 1858, against 450 in 1857. A proportionate
decrease has, from the same cause, taken place in the
casualties on the East coast, which have fallen from
600 in 1857 to 514 in 1858. These, of course, are
vicissitudes which will be continually varying, from
season to season.

The most serious affair of all, however, in connec-
tion with this subject, is the loss of life that takes
place. Yet here there is manifestly some cause for
satisfaction. The lives lost in the three last years
show a gradual and, in the last year especially, a
satisfactory decrease, compared with the whole
number of lives in peril. As, for instance, while in
1856 as many as 521, out of 2,137 of lives imperilled,
were lost ; and, in 1857, 532 out of 2,260 ; in 1858,
346 out of 1,895 were lost,—the reduction being from
24 to 18 per cent. Of the lives saved last year, as
many as 200 were rescued by life-boats, and more

than that number by the rocket and mortar service,
—the remainder, generally, having been saved by
steamers, small craft, and the coast-guard service.
And now as to the causes of so much loss of life,
even where often there is apparently the means of
escape. It is ascertained that the loss of many lives
arises from the unsuccessful lowering and clearing
of boats from ships. In the majority of cases it appears
that a boat is no sooner attempted to be lowered or
got out in a gale of wind than it is stove, or from