Worcester daily spy. [volume] (Worcester [Mass.]) 1850-1888, 1854-10-17
Captain Lncc's Narrative Photographed
from Quebec TO e. k. Collins, of New

the loss of the steamship Arctic, under my
command, with many lives and fear among
them must be included those of your own
wife, daughter. and son, of whom took last
leave the moment the ship was going down,
without ever expecting to see the light OF
another day, to give you an account OF the
| heart rending scene.
The Arctic sailed from Liverpool, Wednes-
| day, Sept. Goth, at i clock a. M, with 233
passengers and a crew of about 100.
Nothing of special note occurred during the
| passage, until Wednesday, the 9th, when, at
| noon, we were on the banks of Newfound-
| land, in latitude 46 deg. As min. morrill, and
! longitude 50 deg west, steering west by com
pass. The weather had been foggy during
! the day. Generally a distance OF half to
| three quarters of mile could be seen, but, at
intervals of few minutes, was very dense
fog. followed by being sufficiently clear to see
one or two miles.
At noon l left the deck for the purpose Of
working out the position of the ship. In
about fifteen minutes | heard cry of "hard-
a-starboard" from the officer of the deck. |
rushed on deck, and had just got out when
felt crash forward and at the same moment
saw steamer under the starboard bow, and
the next moment it struck against our guards
and passed. astern of us.
The bows of the strange vessel seemed to
be literally cut or crushed off, for full ten feet,
ana seeing that she must probably sink in
few minutes, and taking a hasty glance of
our own ship, and believing that we were
comparatively uninjured, my first impulse
was to save the lives of those on board the
sinking vessel. The boats were cleared, and
the first off Ger and six men left with one boat,
| (No. ID
When it was found our own ship was leak
60, Spt IN Wf,rk
| being instructed to put OIL the steam pumps,
and the four deck pumps were worked by
| passengers and crew, and the ship headed for
| land, which 1 Judged to be about 90 miles
| distant. 1 was compelled to leave the boat
with the first officer and It's crew to take care
of themselves.
| Several Intellectual attempts were made to
stop the leak by getting sails over the bow,
| and finding the leak gaining on us very fast
notwithstanding all our very powerful efforts
to keep her free, l resolved to get the boats
ready, and as many ladies and children placed
in them as possible. But no sooner had the
attempt been made, than the tiremen and
others rushed into them in spite of all oppo-
sition. Seeing this state of things, ordered
J the boats astern, to be kept in readiness until
order could be restored, when, to my dismay,
l saw them cut the ropes in the bow, and soon
disappear astern in the fog. Another boat
(No. 81 was broken down by persons crowd
ing into her, while hanging at the davits, and
many were precipitated into the sea and
| drowned.
This occurred while had been engaged in
getting the starboard guard boat (No. ~.
ready, in charge of which placed the ID of1-
Ger, when the same fearful scene as with the
first boat was enacted men leaping from the
top of The rail, 20 feet high, crushing and
manning those who were in the boat. then
gave orders 10 the I'd officer to let go and row
after theship, keeping under or near the stern,
to be ready to take on board women and Chi,
dren, as soon as the fires were out and the en-
gines stopped.
My attention was then directed to the other
quarter boat, CNo. 81 which 1 found broken
down, but hanging by one tackle. A rush
was made for her. also, and some dozen or
fifteen got in and cut the tackle, and were
soon out of sight.
In the meantime, l found that not q seaman
lcas left on board, noy carpenter, and loe agere
ioit]soa any tools to assist us IN building raft,
as our only hope. The only officer left was
Mr.. Dorian, the &c officer, who aided me,
with the assistance of many Of the passengers,
| who deserve great praise fer their GOODNESS and
energy, in doing all in. their power up to the
very moment before the ship sunk.
The chief engineer. (Rogers with part of
his assistants, had taken our small deck boat,
NO 81 and before the ship went down, pulled
away with about fifteen persons.
We had succeeded in getting the fore and
main yards, and two top gallant yards over
board, and such other small spars and mate
rails as we could collect. when | was fully
convinced that the ship must go down in a
very short time, and not moment was to be
lost i'll getting the spars dashed together to
form a raft, to do which it became necessary
to get the life boat, CNo. g our only remain
ing boat, into the water.
This being accomplished, 1 saw Mr.. Dorian,
Sd officer, in charge of the boat taking care to
keep the oars on board the steamer, to prevent
those in the boat from leaving the ship, hoping
still to get most OF the women and children in
to this boat at last.
They had made considerable progress in
collecting the spars' when an alarm was given
that the ship was sinking, and the boat was
showed off without oars or anything TO help
themselves with, and when the ship sunk,
the boat had got clear, probably an eighth OF
a mile to leeward.
In an instant about quarter to P. NJ,
the ship acelt dotC1e, carrying eUe1y soul on board
aoith her. l soon found myself on the surface,
after brief struggle, with my own helpless
child in my arms; when again found myself
mpelled downward to great depth, and be-
fore | reached the surface second time, had
nearly persisted, and lost the hold of my child.
AS | struggled to the surface of the water,
most awful and heart-rendng scene pre-
scented itself to my view. Over two hundred
men, women, and children, struggling togeth-
er amidst pieces of the wreck Of every kind,
calling on each other for help, and imploring
God to help them. Such an appalling scene
may God preserve me from witnessing again.
l was in the act Of trying to save my child,
when portion Of the paddle box came rush
ing up elge-ways. jpst grazing my head, and
falling with its whole weight upon the head
of my darling child. In another moment,
beheld him lying lifeless in the water
succeeded in getting on to the top of the
paddle box, in company with eleven others.
One, however, soon left us for another piece,
finding that 1T could not support so many
Others remained till they were, one by one,
relieved by death.
We stood in the water at temperature OF
40, up to our knees, and frequently the sea
broke directly over us. We soon separated
friends on other parts of the wreck, and pass
ed the night, each one of us expecting every
hour would be our last. AT length the wished
for morning came, surrounding us with a
dense iog-not a living soul to be seen but oul
own party, seven men now being left.
In the course Of the morning, we saw some
water casks and other things belonging to oul
ship, but nothing that we could get to afford
us any relief Our raft was steadily settling
as 1t absorbed water. About noon Mr.. ). NJ.
| Woodruff # M raloo L.,