Republican news item. [volume] (Laport, Pa.) 1896-19??, 1899-03-09

road in the harbOr OF San Diego the
call Cali hands abandon ship sudden'
ly went, and the usual rush ensued
Within Just four and half minutes
from the time the call went
all hands were in the boats.
and the captains gig was
alongside waiting for the old gentle,
man to finish his rapid inspection and
shake the ship himself. After he had
seen that everything was made tight.
the skipper stepped into his gig, which
sheered off instantly, and there was
the fine white cruiser standing utterly
deserted in the swell, with every
officer and man of the crew i'll boats
two or three hundred yards of. The
drill was first-rate success, and the
skipper was getting ready to pour out
his expression of approval as he stood
in the stern sheets of his gig. when
queer thing happened. The water
right above the twin screws began 10
churn, and the ship slowly got intc
motion. The wheel, before the ship
was abandoned, had been lashed hard
aport, and the cruiser, under pretty
fair heaaway Of steam, to Judge from
the churning of the propellers, begar
to turn around rapidly in circles. You
never saw such a sensation on land oI
sea as that job created. II was utterl,
inexplicabe. The engineer officers
knocked their fcreheaas like crazy
men. There was absolutely no theory
upon which the movement of the ship
could be explained. The steam had
been shut off the main steampipe he
fore the ship was abandoned, and it IL
quite an operation to get ships
steam into her cylinders and to make
everything ready to turn the engines,
But there circled the ship, apparently
turning on q pivot, and obviously
under as much steam as there was left
in the boilers.
''She's bloomin' witch!' some of
the old-time fat-feet of the crew
shouted. and the men looked at the
crazy acting ship with bit of fear in
their eyes. She was circling about
still when the chief engineer, who was
in the steam cutter, had the cox'un
make for the cruisers starboard gang
way with all speed, and in a short
officers and men, had clambered
aboard and were rushing down the
engine room hatch.
Well, the chief engineer, the first
man to reach the engine room, found
Mr.. O'Toole, oiler, at the throttle of
the port engine. O'Toole was as drunk
as an owl, and he smoked clay pipe,
turned upside down. with all the com
placency in life. The chief engineer
had tho man by the throat in a iiffy,
and couple of minutes later, when
some of the marines got aboard
O'Toole was put in irons in solitary
confinement. When O'Tooe got
sober enough he was brought to the
mast and questioned by the skipper.
1t seems that on the night before,
O'Toole, being in crafty state of
drunkenness, and knowing he would
be thrust into the brig Immediately
he arrived aboard the ship for liberty
breaking, had hired a shore boatman
to pull him off to the ship. Instead
of taking him to the gangway the
boatman, acting under instructions
from his crafty, jagged passenger,
quietly pulled the boat alongside the
anchor chains, and O'Toole was just
Timber enough to shin up the
chains, under cover of darkness
in the middle of the night, and, after
reaching the to'gallant fo'c'sle, sneak
down below to an empty bunker. along
with couple of quart bottles OF
whisky. He had come to life just as
the ''All hands abandon ship" call
went, and, with his carcass full of
whisky. he took it into his head that
it was his part of the job to set the
ship in motion. SO he had turned
the steam into the cylinders of the
port engine, set the throttle at the
full-speed. ahead notch. and just let
her go. 1t was lucky the wheel was
lashed hard aport, or the ship would
unquestionably have been beached.
instead Of simply turning in circle.
O'Toole got a general court-martial
and was "beached" without imprison-
ment, and the bluejackets lost their
chance to call the cruiser ''bewitched
ship"