The Sun.
London, England, 1853-07-18 00:00:00

borough-head, and it has produced serious results among
the shipping. We received information yesterday after-
noon that a valuable screw collier, the Countess of
Strathmore, the property of the eneral Iron Screw
Collier Company, which had left the Tyne heavily laden
on Wednesday afternoon for London, had foundered
during the gale. In the evening the worst fears were
confirmed by the arrival of a portion of the crew at
Shields. When she left the Tyne she had three passen-
gers and a crew of 15 cfficers and seamen on board, And
on Thursday afternoon it appears she was off the York-
shire coast, nearlyabreast of Whitby, in a heavy cross sea,
which washed her decks and poured a good deal of water
into the engine-room. The master, Mr. Nicholson, a
man of first-rate courage, and as smart a sailor as ever
crossed Shields Bar, kept her before the wind until her
foreyard blew away. He then tried to get back to Har-
tlepool, but the vessel shipped a sea which disabled the
rudder, extinguished the fires, and threw the ship into
the trough of the waves, thoroughly disabling her. A
billyboy put out to the assistance of the crew, and by a
rope, the boats having been washed away, got off ten of
the crew and two of the passengers. A Whitby vessel,
the Bounty, also came down to help them, and saved
others from the ill-fated vessel. But the mate, William
Harrison, having lashed himself to a ladder, was being
drawn towards the brig, when a sea caught the ladder,
and knocked the poor fellow off and drowned him. The
master, the last to leave his post, being a stout man,
lashed himself to a new rope, and the people on board
the brig had nearly dragged him into their boat, when
the rope broke, and he fell under the stern and was
never more seen. A poor fellow, one of the crew, a
young man belonging to Boston, had been hauled aboard
the brig in a most exhausted state, and, though every
exertion was made to restore animation, died shortly
after he was got aboard. The vessel is reported to have
foundered. The surviving crew and passengers were
landed at Hartlepool on Thursday evening, and have
been forwarded to their homes. The Countess of Strath-
more was a new vessel, having only been on the station
since May last, and with her engines was a ship of 540
tons register. The untimely death of her commander is
much lamented by the seafaring population of the Tyne,
for he was a noble specimen ofthe English sailor.
During the gale several vessels got ashore near Sea-
ham, but the crews are all saved. _

The Sunderland News gives a distressing account of
the result of the gale at Hartlepool. Its correspondent
says :

" Two vessels have been stranded on the North Sands,
about three-quarters of a mile to the north of the ileugh
Lighthouse, , _

"The first of these was a Sunderland sloop, the. Sis-
ters, William Lewis master, which was bound for
castle, having left lyhitby on the .previous night-tide.
When she was fi:-.liscovered off the coast it was seen
that she could not by any possibility 'make the harbour,
having even then got far on towards the land. It was
observable from the shore that there were only two men
and a boy on board the sloop ; and as she struck the
sea swept violently over her, carrying off the boy and
one of the men (who afterwards proved to be the boy's
father), who had attempted to rescue him. Happily
both were immediately rescued by the other man ; but
they were again swept athwart the deck by the retiring
sea. Three hours from the stranding of the sloop were
passed in a-fruitless endeavour to render assistance to
its miserable occupants, all the while subject to the most
trying exposure, and in danger of being washed over-
board by the sea ; and it was not until afternoon that
the rocket apparatus having been brought to bear on
the spot, and a connexion-line passed to the sloop by
this means, the vessel was safely boarded. This effected,
the boy, who had been supported in the arms of his
father against the mainmast of the sloop since he was
rescued from the sea by the captain ,during a period of
three hours), was discovered to be in a state of insensi-
bility, from which ho never afterwards recovered, and
the men were reduced to a condition of the utmost ex-
haustion. Both were immediately removed to the
Brunswick Hotel, where, with the most praiseworthy
attention, the usual restoratives were plentifully sup-
plied, and the seamen were rapidly recovered ; but, not-
withstanding the most persevering application of Mr-
Stamp, surgeon, by promoting artificial breathing, &c.,
the boy could not be resuscitated, and it is therefore
supposed he must have died on the way from the shore
after being landed. This was the poor little fellow's
first voyage at sea ; and the probable cause of death, in
the surgeon's opinion, is asphyxia, in his case the ner-
vous exhaustion from physical exposure and terror."
The Alexandria, of Whitby, also got ashore at Hartle-
pool during the same time. Crew saved.