Savannah morning news. [volume] (Savannah) 1868-1887, 1885-12-03
The Rescue of the Monitors Sur
ViVOrN
Ericsso1's ccoWnt Of the Loss of the Monitor
in the Dace,Dber GsDfNra

Ertcsson's A count IF the Loss of the Monitor,
in the December Century.
After fearful and dangerous passage
over the frantic seas we reached the Rhode
Island, which still had the tOw-line caught
in her wheel, and had drifted perhaps two
miles to leeward. We came ALONGSIDE
under the lee bows, where the first boat
that had left the Monitor nearly an hour
before, had just discharged it's men; but
we found that getting on board the Rhode
Island was a harder task than get
ting from the Monitor. We were car
RED by the sea from stem to Stern,
for to have made fast would
have been fatal; the boat was bound
ing against the ships sides; sometimes 1t
was below the wheel, and then, on the
summit Of huge wave, far above the
decks; then the two boats would crash TO-
gether; and once, while Surgeon Weeks
was holding on to th6rail, he lost his fin
gers by a collision which swamped the
other boat. Lines were thrown to us from
the deck of the Rhode Island, which were
of no assistance, for not one of us could
climb small rope; and besides. the men
who threw them would Immediately let
go their holds, in their excitement, to
throw another-which | found to be the
case when kept hauling in rope instead
of climbing.
1t must be understood that two vessels
lying side BY side, when there is any mo-
tion to the sea, move alternately; or in
other words, one is constantly passing the
other up or down. At one time, when our
boat was near the bows of the steamer we
would rise upon the sea until we could
touch her rail; TIN n in an instant, by a
very rapid descent, we could touch her
keel. While we were thus rising and
falling upon the sea, caught a rope, and
rising with the boat managed
to reach within foot or two
of the rail, when man, il there
had been one, could easily have hauled
me on board. But they had all followed
after the boat, which at that instant was
washed astern, and | hung dangling In
the air over the bow of the Rhode Island,
with Ensign Norman Atwater hanging to
the cat-head, three or four feet from me,
like myself, with both hands clinching a
rope and shouting for some one TO save
him. Our hands grew painful and all the
time weaker, until l saw his strength
1--WE way. He slipped a foot, caught
again, and with his last prayer, 80, God r.
| saw him fall and sink, to rise no more.
The ship rolled and rose upon the
sea, sometimes with her keel out or
water, so that | was hanging thirty feet
above the sea, and with the fate in view
that had befalen our much-beloved COM
panion, which no one had witnessed but
myself. l still chung 10 the rope with
aching hands, calling in vain for help.
But could not be heard, for the wind
shrieked far above my voice. My heart
here, for the only time in my life, gave up
hope, and home and friends were most
tenderly thought Of. While was in this
state, within a few seconds of giving up,
the sea rolled forward, bringing with II
tue boat, and when | would have fallen
into the sea, it was there. / can only
recollect hearing an old sailor say, as |
fell into the bottom Of the boat, "Where
in - did be come frnmYp