The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1897-11-08

''In an Instant she was as helpless as
log, and she was tossed here and there,
and taking ever wave aboard.
From port to starboard the great noun
tains of foaming water poured rolling into
the hold and adding to the quantity al
ready Weighing her down. The load was
too much and. after a moment, when we
all felt that we were lost, the ship keeled
over to starboard and went down, stern
first.
"What became of my mates I do not
know. I remember that the boats had been
lowered and that some of the men We're
ready to take to them If the vessel went
under, but no boat could have lived for a
minute in that terrible sea, and if any
of them did get into the boats ID was sim
ply TO be swamped as soon as the first
wave struck them. 1 was near the spar
and when the stern of the vessel began to
go down. went for the rigging and went
up as far as / could. Another man went
with me-the second mate-and | thank
the Lord that he was with me, or ! would
have gone mad during all the long hours
that ! was up there hanging on and trying
to keep off the frightful cold that was
slowly killing us both.
'sThere was a rolling to and fro as the
vessel struck the bottom and slowly right
ed to an even keel, and then a second later
she rolled over to one side. l thought she
was going all the way over but she did
not She settled on the bottom, and
though the waves rolled her from port to
starboard the spar remained out of the
water, with my mate and myself clinging
TO 1t.
"AI this time the hail and sleet was
coming down, and we were covered with
ice in a fewsminutes, for though the top
cf the spar on which we were hanging,
was twenty-five feet above the water, the
big waves struck us and broke over us,
and the hail cut US like shot
Il knew that it was about 3 o'clock
when we went down, and it seemed 10 me
that daylight would never come. For
what seemed to be an age, we hung onto
the rigging and we twisted our arms
about the spar and let them freeze in po-
sition, for otherwise we would have fallen
into the fearful sea
when daylight came we could not see
a sail anywhere near us, and the sea was
as bad as ever. There did not seem to
be any chance of 1t going down Hour
after hour we waited there and then we
saw the Mariposa coming. FOR a long
time we did not know whether she would
sight us, and we watched her from the
time she was little smoky haze up the
lake until we could see that she was a big
vessel.
'When she finally sighted us and we
saw her head for US, ] tried to tell my
with happy look on his face. 1t was a
terrible time to us before she came up to
us and then I knew we were not safe yet,
for the sea was running mountain high
and the big steal boat was rolling like a
| skiff. Every wave sent her up in the air
until we coSd see herI .hite bottom un-
| der her Waterline. We New at once that
her captain would notrattempt to lower a
boat for it would have been chawed up.
| when the Mariposa got within a cable
! length of us a man with strong voice
| yelled to us to hang on
| Don't give up he yelled well get
| you off Soon Then the boat circied around
us, coming Is near as she could, but when
| she was within a few rods a big roller
swept her far out and she went off to
starboard, rolling heavily when she got in
| the trough Of the sea. Then she came back
| again, and again she missed us and we
| could not have taken a line had one been
! thrown to us. Again she went around and
we watched her and watched the men on
her rail waiting TO give us a lift when
| they could. On the third trip around she
ran right alongside of our SPAR and as
| she went past a dozen men reached for
us. | don't know who got the mate but
Mr.. Smith, the engineer, got hold of me
and dragged me from the spar and over
the rail of the Mariposa. An instant later
| we had passed the little stick on which I
a day, although it seemed a week"
The second mate, Louis Lafosce tod a
| narrowing story to the crew of the Mari
posa. He said that in the rush Of men
from the hold one of them, a watchman,
was trampled to DEATH The crew was
frantic to get out of the place
Six or eight, he said must have been
drowned like rats in the hold. The first
long dip of the stern was the first lntima-
ton they had that the final danger was
at hand, and then they made a frantic
rush 10 get on deck. The hatchway was
too small to let them through together,
and the result was that one of them was
trampled to death, and several were left
to drown.
Rochester, N. Y, Nov THE unknown
fireman who went down with the Idaho
was named Richards. He lived at Ogdens-
burg, and was a son of Capt. Richards Of
the tug Thomas Wilson, which plies on
Lake Ontario.
Nelson Skinner, first assistant engineer,
lived at Auburn He had been an engin-
eer on the Rome, Watertown and Ogdens-
burg road and the Lehigh Valley road, but
laft no earvripa last Arp1lSf