The daily morning journal and courier., 1898-08-19
CURIOUS NAVAL ACCIDENTS.

Ships That Have Met Singular Fates.
 Curious disappearances and accidents to our war ships characterized the ear- ly history of our navy, and in spite of all the efforts of the navy department to explain the cause of the disasters, many of them are as absolute mysteries to-day as when they happened, When the government built ten new gunbuats to prosecute the war against Trlpoli, in lSOo, they were sent out as soon as they were finished and before they were named. Each one was given a number and dispatched to the scene of the war. Number [ sailed from New York June ZO, lS05, under the command of Lieuten- ant Ogelvie, and after she eleared San dy Hook light she was never heard from again. She went down with all on board before she had even been named.
 most extraordinary accident was that which happened to the corvet Mo- nongahela at Santa Cruz in 1S6L While at anchor In the harbor tre- mendous tidal wave lifted her upon it's crest and carried her clean over the town of Frederichstadt and back again without injuring the town or the boat to any extent The receding wave landed her on the beach instead of ln the deep waters of the harbor, and 1t cost our government one hundred thou sand dollars to float her again. Fully as strange was the fate of the sloop-of- war Wateree. She was anchored in the harbor of Africa, Peru, in 1869, when a huge tidal wave swept inland and final- flooded the whole city. The wave car- ried the sloop several miles inland and finally landed her in the midst of a tropical forest. It was impossible to release her from such peculiar posi- tion and the government sold her for nominal sum- The purchasers turned the vessel into hotel, and the remains Of the once formidable war vessel loom up in the tropical forest to-day as a monument to the power of tidal waves.
 Among other cases of disaster which are attributed to the violence of the waves or weather, there is none more interesting than that of the strange fato Of the Saratoga. When she sailed from Philadelphia in October, 17S0, under the command of Captain James Young, there was no finer or handsomer war vessel afloat. That she was as formid-
 
 monstrated in practical way After cruising around short time she cap tured three British vessels in success sion, and then with her prizes she start ed to return to Philadelphia. But off the Delaware capes she encountered a British ship of line. As the Saratoga carried only eighteen guns and the In trepid was a seventy-four-gun ship, Captain Young considered it safer to run away. The enemy did not chase her far, but returned to protect and re- capture the British prizes. The Sara | toga sailed away in the very teeth of a storm, and she was never heard from again. Did she founder at sea in the gale or was she blown up by her own | magazines
 1 There are some peculiar accidents to our naval vessels in the past that are accounted for, but while the mystery of their loss Is removed and explained, the strangeness of their mishaps is no less | interesting. For instance, there is the | sinking of the United States sloop-of- | war Oneida in 1869. She was bound | home from Yokohama, but when a | short distance from port the British | steamer Bombay ran into her and cut 1 off her stern. The injury was so mor- | tai that the Oneida immediately fired | her guns of distress; but in the dark ness the Bombay crept away instead of returning to assist her In short time | the sloop went to the bottom, carrying l all of her crew with her When the news reached Yokohama the captain of l the British steamer was mobbed by the indignant populace and he was dis missed from the service in disgrace Hurricanes have been responsible fol the wreckage of several of our maya
 vessels other than those at Samoa ir | 1889. The brig-of-war Bainbridge was | turned over by hurricane off Cape
 Hatteras in 1863, and everybody or board was lost except a colored cook
 who managed to cling to pieces of the | wreck until picked up. Ninety eight | lives were lost by the wrecking of the
 sloop-of-war Huron in 1877. A smal l hurricane blew her on the shore of Norfolk, and she was pounded to pieces | by the violent surf. The Saginaw was 1 wrecked in the very middle of the Paci. l flc in 1S70-George E. Walsh in Leslie's l Weekly.