The Birmingham age-herald., 1903-08-12
CURIOUS CREWS.
The Oldest One That Ever Sailed,
 Also the oueerest.

From London Tit-Bits.
 Which is the oldest crew that ever sailed. Some seamen would say 1t must be that ghosty one which has for almost three centuries been trying to navigate the Flying Dutchman round the Cape of Good Hope, but, putting superstition aside an answer may be found in the ships company of the William Crow of Yarmouth. lost about three years ago off Hartlepool. The vessel carried four hands, of whom the youngest was 6S, the next 69-these two did duty aloft-the captain 70, and the cabln boy" had at tained to the patriarchal age of 72.
 This Is reminiscent of crews supplied to the ships of Commodore Ansons s squadron when they were fitting out for his famous voyage around the world. For this purpose 800 invalids were order ed to be collected from the out-pension- CTS of Chelsea, and in answer to Anson's approximations the admiralty authorities of the day told him that they thought them the poorest men that could be em- ployed on this occasion" But a great number of the men themselves thought
 
 were conveyed to Portsmouth, only 259 joined the squadron. for as Ansons chronicler puts it, "all those that had limbs and strength deserted, leaving be- hind only such as were literally invalids most of them being 60 years of age, and some upward of TO-
 Either from compulsion or from choice some of the vessels of our mercantile marine carry crews, who >in a different way, are almost as helpless as those sup piled to Anson. Thus, at an inquiry re- gently into the loss of a British bark it transpired that the helmsman at the wheel at the time of the wreck was a foreigner, ignorant of the English lan- guage. with whom no one on board the ship was capable of communicating in his own tongue, which was Spanish, and the man himself was unable to convey to the court the difference between port and starboard.
 But if we are surprised thus to hear of a steersman who was dumb for all prac- tical purposes, what is to be said of a whole crew of blind of men? The story as grisly a one as sea history holds-is told by Buxton, the great anti-slavery agitator, who says that in one instance the crew of a schooner making the Mid dle Passage all caught opthalmia from their living freight, and the vessel srOpeu nOpe1eSSly dDOut the Atidntlc un- til picked up quite by chance.
 A more cheerful tale of a curious kind of crew came recently from Kiel, where a Turkish corvette had been sent in con- nection with some repairs. The Turks on board. having exhausted both money and credit, and being still without money from their government, stripped the ship bare of everything pawnable in order to purchase provisions, and having done so. were actually on the point of starva- ton in port when diplomatic intervention procured them funds from Constantino- ple
 It was a crew of Turkish women also that worked the 3000-ton steamship Fora, quite recently, from Alexandretta to Philadelphia, but this is not so wonder full when 1t Is remembered that on our own coasts. not so long ago, crews of women were occasionally seen. There was. for instance. one ancient brig which traded across the Irish Sea put to the time when the earlier merchant ship ping acts put an end to her career. The vessel was the sole support of two elder l ly sisters, who. with other female help. navigated 1t from port to port, and who are reputed, according to those who have known them. to have had A kitchen gar den on the poop and a regular poultry l yard under the forecastle.