Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1904-10-17
IN THE SURF.
Wreck Of the EIwood
Burton on Peaked Hill.
-Four of Vessels Crew Lost and
Three of Them Saved.
Schooners Annie M. Allen and Billow
Lost-AlI Saved.

Highland Light, Oct. 16.-In the loss
Of the schooner Elwood Burton, an
other tragedy has been added to the
long list of marine disasters which has
made Peaked Hill bars the terror of
seafaring men.
These outlying sand bars far from
the shore line, which extend for miles
eastward from Race point. make the
position of a stranded vessel always
one OF great peril. but in such storm
as ragged, Friday night, and under
such conditions the situation is terri
BILE, and the vessel whose keel mas
bottom here has sailed her last voyage
and her sailors are fortunate if they
escape with their lives.
The Burton was on a voyage from
st. John, NJ B., for New York with a
full cargo of laths both in the hold and
on deck. Capt. Williams, believing
that the safety of himself, his crew
and his vessel lay in his ability to
weather the cape and make harbor at
Provincetown, with the storm increas-
ing in fury, and with close reefed sails
he bore away for the promised shelter.
Half an hour before midnight and
when 20 minutes more would have car
ried him clear of the shoals, the
schooner suddenly took bottom. The
seas were running with mad fury and
swept the vessel with mighty force.
The only place of refuge for the help
less crew was in the rigging and there
they dashed themselves, hoping that
daylight would bring relief.
The life-savers from Peaked Hill
Bars and Race Point stations worked
like heroes to get their apparatus up
the beach through the sand and raging
Storm The night was black as ink,
and no human air could reach the
stranded vessel. The deck load of the
craft was soon washed in.
From out the swirling mass of float
ing drift stuff the body of Il man was
thrown up and down in the surf. Will
ing hands rendered quick assistance.
Into the fOaming breakers the men
rushed, and then dragged out upon the
sands Mate StackhoUse with the life
almost beaten out of him by the waves.
Soon another, and still another, did
the life savers bring to shore through
the awful rush of angry waters, and
then their work had ended. But not
their watch. for they paced up and
down the beach all the night long,
looking for more men to save. but
Capt. Williams and three of his men
had passed out of all need of earthly
aid, swallowed up in the rush of the
mad sea.
During the day the bodies Of three
.f h.. drnunal Cai1nrS 10. 4
ashore. They were removed to the I'M
dertakine rooms of Thomas Taylor al
Provincetown. They We're identified as
Steward Almon Bodge, William JOrgen-
son and NJ. Leer.
The rescued men, JudSCn StackhOuse,
Augustus Johnson and Frank Holmn
are recovering from their terrible
struggle for life by the careful nurs-
ing they are receiving at the life-sav-
ing station.
The Burton was a threemasted
schooner and had been in the coastwist
trade for 81 years. The bones of many
a staunch vessel are lying in the sands
where she went down. Right off this
point the never-to-be forgotten steam"I
Portland with her 200 souls was en-
quilted on that awful November nigh
in 1898.
Nothing remains of the Burton eXcep
mass of broken timbers and twisted
iron. Her cargo was scattered for mile:
along the beach and wreckers gatheret
it up and carted it away.
The headless body found at Race
point some hours before the wreck OF
the Burton has not been identified.