The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1898-10-03
ONCE s,cssge SAVED the MAINE.
swung Toward . Bridge. but m. Quick
ness Saved the Vessel.

swung Toward . Bridge. hut His Quick
ness Saved the Vessel.
Newspaper men who were at Havana
In the days when the Maine horror was
so fresh as to be an ever-present re-
membrance. with Spaniard as well as
Yankee, will recall the great nervous
tension under which Captain Sigsbee la
bored. Is IL to be marveled at? He had
hundreds OF pressing routine duties de-
handing daily attention. Each of these
duties had to do with his lost ship. In
those early days he could not know
how fully his government and fellow
citizens e~xonerated him from all blame.
His heart. IL not his duty. called him
often to the hospital where his manned
seamen fought for their lives. He had
hourly kilograms from Washington 10
answer and attend to and many con-
f~erences with the Spanish officials were
required. In these conferences he must
he courteous to suavity. firm to obsti-
nacy-must never by speech, look or
gesture give indication of the storm of
wrath within him when he remembered
the Maine" Sigsbee knew his battle
ship had been blown up from the out
side, that the good craft whose engines,
as Chief Engineer Howell told me.
never once stopped when she left a
port until she reached her succeeding
harbor," was sunk. by treacherous. das-
tardly hands. DISSEMINATION was gall
TO the frank sailor.
A man was tending bed
ward in the Hotel Inglaterra when Cap
tain Sigsbee came in. After a word or
two of greeting he said:
Let's go into the cafe and get some
cold milk or something 1.-THE mercury
was in the S0's)."
Then the reporter b%ethought of a very
gallant thing Sigsbee did in 1897 and
recalled IL to his memory. One morning
Sigsbee had brought the Maine through
He'll Gate and was steering down the
East river to a berth in the Brooklyn
navy yard, when an excursion boat,
loaded with women and children, got di-
rectly in front of him and the master.
losing his grip, rang confusing bells
until a panic was imminent. The Maine
could not turn to port. for n couple OF
big barges loaded with freight cars were
in the way
Il simply could not run down that
steamer" said Sigsbee, as he recounted
the circumstances Il knew II was dan
gerous to run a battleship into a dock,
but i had no other choice. When the
big ship crashed into the pier near
Thirty-fourth street i said to myself.
SlSobtt tfitl ~ gC.a
and when. instead Of blaming, the news
papers praised my action in unmeasured
terms and the navy department wrote
me i'm laudation, l felt pleased, i can
tell you"
Funny though" continued the cap
tain. with a smile. II never was praised
for what / did a few minutes later. and
il was a fairly good job. too. When the
Maine backed clear of the pier and we
discovered the ships hurts were super
fetal and slight we Strengthened out
for the navy yard. But IL Is no joke
TO handle a 6.000-ton man-of-war draw
ing 25 feet or so in a crowed river, with
the tide running strong and all sorts
of eddles to contend with. In spite or
all precautions we swung under the
Brooklyn bridge before we got turned
for the yard. Then a vicious eddy struck
us and carried the ship closer and clos
err to the Brooklyn pier. To hit that
means destruction. ] was on the bridge
and none too easy in my mind. you may
wager. Presently the officer OF the
deck reported:
1--WE are only a few feet from the
pier. captain
~ know 1t, sir I replied, and then
I signaled the engine room to go fun
speed ahead with the starboard engine
and half speed astern with the port.
II worked and we swung ahead ana
clear and in a few moments were safe"
ly at dock in the yard. Blu 1t was a
close thing and I had to decide a num-
Der of questions i'm a seconds timc-
while | had no certain knowledge as 10
the force or direction Of the currents
that were placing the ship in jeop-
ardy."
After musing a moment and finishing
his cold milk. Sigsbee added: Honest
ly, that was about as creditable a thing
as I ever did. in its way. But | didn't
brag about II. for the query would
have been natural What did you let
your ship get into that fix for| l
couldn't help IL, of course, but would
have had to do a lot of explaining