Rock Island Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1893-1920, 1899-12-26

| The Northern Wing CEngliSh) pub
| fishes the following letter from Lord
| Frederick Blackwood TO his father.
Lord Dufferin. giving q vivid account
Of the experiences passed through dur
| ing terrific storm encountered on Oct.
| 10, off the east coast of Africa. by
Squadron c of the Ninth iancerS in
| transport:
l do not really know where TO begin
| this letter. such exciting and horrible
| things have happened since last l
| wrote to you. We got TO Durham all
| safe and as happy as larks on Oct. 9,
| expecting TO diSembark and go up to
the front Immediately. To our disgust,
however. we were told not TO land, but
to go off At once to the Cape. Accord
| ingly. at p. IN. that night, we started
| off again. Next morning the sea SEEM
| ed fairly calm. and we were all laugh
| ing and joking at the way we We're
| rolling about. You must understand
| that our troop of horses We're in wood
| en- stalls on the upper deck. This was
my troop, consisting of So troop horses,
| together with my own chargers. and 12
| mules. All the other troops and their
| horses were down below between
decks.
STABLES" was at IL p. M, when it
| had begun to get rather rough. How
ever, we still smiled. but the rolling
| got worse and worse, and my horses on
| the upper deck began to fall down, and
we smiled no more. Every man was
| told to hang on to his horse so as to
keep its chest away from the front
| board when the animal was thrown
| forward by the roll. At last the roll
| ing became terrific and the seas enOr-
| nous. All my troops were drenched
| over and over again. One man, n cor
poral, got washed off his feet and was
thrown four times with great violence
| up and down the deck. The eXtraor-
binary thing was he did not break
anything. At last the wooden frame
work of the stabling began to crack,
and l expected every minute to see the
| whole thing collapse and all my men
killed. l then went to Lund, a captain
| in the Ninth lancerS. and told him that
l thought it was getting dangerous for
my men to stay on any longer and he
gave the order for No. l troop horses
to be abandoned. Five minutes after
that one entire side of the woodwork
gave way. Two of my charges and
four others were Immediately washed
overheard.
Now came the most horrible scene
l have ever witnessed. The deck was
covered with one mass of struggling
horses and mules. mixed up with the
broken woodwork of the stables, the
whole being hurled first to one side of
the deck and then to the other. all hor-
ribly wounded, most with broken legs
and some with eyes torn out. My first
Ial,o 81,
incest horse l am ever likely to have,
was among them, but managed from
a hatchway to get a shot at her with
my revolver, and so l am glad to say
none of my three suffered the torments
of hell like the others. To make a
long story short. out of 90 horses and
mules on my deck. only three were
saved, two horses, whose stalls had re-
manned intact, and one mule, which
had a most miraculous escape, having
been washed down the hatchway into
the hold below and being absolutely
unhurt. Things were hardly better be-
tween decks below. On one deck a
huge water tank broke loose and went
hurting about, killing two horses. On
this account this deck had to be aban
doned by the men. 1t was n horrible
thing having to jump this way and
that to avoid horses that kept hurting
up and down, kicking and screaming.
The arms rack gave way, and L was
sent to try to collect the carbines.
We had managed TO stack most of
them when an enormous roll came,
and down they went. rushing from one
side to the other. Luckily, we were
all able to jump on tables, except one
man. who fell among the wreckage.
cutting his head open and laying him
out.
All the men down below remained
with the horses till p. M, when they
were ordered up, and they all huddIed
in the passages and on top of the en-
CINE room. shivering and chattering all
night with the cold. All my men had
been long since drenched to the skin, |
and not a man got a bite of food eX-
cept what we could give them in the |
way of few biscuits. wish you could |
have seen the way the men behaved. |
1t was really magnificent They never |
thought of letting go of their horses |
until they were absolutely ordered to, /
though they did not know when the /
wooden frame might give way. All /
this time, as the captain told us, the /
ship was not under control and would /
not steer. He thought at the time it /
was because they had taken out a lot /
of her cargo at Durham and so tighten
ed her, but the next morning. when the
sea went down and she still would not |
answer her helm. he had the rudder
examined aud found it was broken and
useless. 1t was not very pleasant when
the dear old skipper came down and
informed US that we were rudderless
and that If an easterly gale sprung up
we would go ashore. l did my best,
but 1 could not eat much breakfast
that morning. However. things turned
out better than we expected. and we
are now going Eve knots an hour with
a jury rudder and are getting in the