The Minneapolis journal. [volume] (Minneapolis, Minn.) 1888-1939, 1906-01-29
STORM PERIL IN
BLACK SEA TRIP
Continued From First Page.

Continued From First Page.
go to make up the pleasure tours IN 2
The France put out Of the Golden
Horn and turned her nose up the Bos-
.porus about midnight ON Dec. 16 with
the. avoWed intention Of getting to
Odessa in twenty-eights hours. The Bos-
porus IS a narrow strait about hfteen
miles long that connects the Black sea
with the Sea Of Marmora and the wider
seas beyond the Dardanelles. At places
it is less than a mile wide and lined with
beautiful summer houses and delight
full resorts of all characters. In winter
it is somewhat dismal, as the Black sea
is roaring at one end the Sea of Mar
mora at the other, while the energetic
tugboats OF the salvage sq1adrons go
footing up and down towing IN the
wrecks they have salved. s8s
On the night when we left all was
lovely until about six heuFs put, hen,
without any warming, the wind began
Ito blow and the sea to stand. on It's
head. The France, being but 120 feet
long and with her bunkers full OF coal,
tioundered about in q hopeless manner,
but as the situation at Odessa was pre-
kept driving gaily into the head seas.
These kept getting worse and worse
until finally an enormous one stole over
the ABow with a. crash and with sim
gle blow started both the. chain locker
and forecastle matches. In two min
bites both were flooded with water to the
surface Of the deck. This took the
ginger out Of the France, not to say. OF
The charterer, for with her two for
ward compartments filed with water,
rher poor little nose was so far down
Fin front that every sea that came along
simply tumbled over her bows and with
roar and swish swept her decks
clean to the stern. -
Almost swarnped. 4,
The sea kept ketting worse and the
France kept getting wetter and .wetter
as to her insides. Drip, drip, drip,
trickle, trickle, trickle came the water
into the engine room down IT, the t saloon
where that it could get and there
seemed to be many such spots. Our
dreams Of d twenty eight hour run to
Odessa began to fade and to keep the
| water from swamping her altogether
| her speed had to be dropped to five,
then three and finally. a bare one knot
an hour. In the meantime everything
that was not dashed to the deck had
long since departed far astern, includ-
I
we deeply deplored.
By noon Odessa had lost all charms
and the Bulgarian coast seemed to be
the place of all others that we had
/ pinned for years to see. By 7 O'Clock,
1 after considerable activity on the part
! of the crew with water buckets and
] pumps, the two flooded ! compartments
were reclaimed and the Bulgarian coast
reached, when everys one. took a night
| = l. 7, - inf
that is called .Kavarna head. AS the
| forecastle was soaked the sailors had
to sleep In the boiler and engine rooms
pending the drying out Of their quar-
! tiers. 's..e - y: \
The next day all hands were sui
iciently revived again to tackle tho
| Odessa propositions Having pumped
the water ballast aft and eased off the
| forward bunkers the France had a bet
ter stand-up forward and in spite ;oi
the heavy seas managed to scramble
severe drenching from the spray al
every dip.
-, In Snowstorm. !.
Everything, seemed to be calming
down until about43 O'Clock in the after
noon when from nowhere in particula,
Ia snowstorm- came down upon us like al
avalanche, with more wind and more BIZ
. seas. AS the crew all spoke at thu
same time either in Greek or some othe
unknown tongue and as each seemed t.
have a distinct and separate idea OF
his mind as,to what the exigencies o.
. the situation REQUIRED, it was Difficult
! to gatherSwhat all the excitement wa
!. about. &. The, charterer having BEEF
! frozen out Of his cabin, was trying t.
pass away the time in the engineroom
The first thing to be done was to dral
him on deck, when every body pre-
sented at one and the same ndon1en
/ a different course Of action, each o
which it would appear was the onl..
road to safety. The captain urged il
d Greek that turning about and goln
somewhere astern was the thing to dc
One engineer favored Sulina in broker
English, while the other had some idea
in Greek which have not yet come thru
/ The Turkish fireman and others of GU
, motley crew all wanted to do somethin
or ether, each i'm his own dialect. Pei
l sonally Odessa seemed as good as any
thing. %s''%
Now the cook, whose /. name
!, guages, all with equal fuency, SO h
says. Most Of these languages no on
can understand, so it is difficult t
|, check him up. In the present crisi
someone dug Stamati out of the gale
and brought him forward to use hi
influence on the situation. He ther
speaking word in each Of the seve
I languages to one Of English, starte
into detailed account of the terrors 0
the Black sea and how these snow
7 storms were fatal. Soon he got a rur
ming start and the others were dis
|. tanced. Indeed, he was making grea
impressions, when the snow was suddeI
q ly shut off and the sun appeared, t
the manifest disappointment Of all.
Bad Night at Sea. IS
4 So once more Odessa was. our goal. A
went well until the shades Of night be
j gan to fail, when the captain, who
!, a Greek, had a; sudden nervous depre!
+ sion and wanted to go into Sulina t
! Espend the night. But time was too dea
: / and his idea was overruled. II
3 The France still progressed inch b
: Inch toward that cherished goal. Abot
!. 1870 clock it began to snow some MOI
3 and blow The seasiraged and the wave
: came over the bows Hour after hot
Ill passed while at each dip of the shi
S clouds of spray and snow went drivin
81 over the bridge and Wheelhouse. II
s. water froze on the decks and riggin
E and it was almost impossible to stan
By midnight the wind had become
: Egale. For three hours things locke
( blue enough, when suddenly the win
0 dropped, the sea began toNsubside, tt
4 moon came out and all was lively, onl
q cold-so cold that ones very mario
q seemed to freeze. Three hours mo-
g and the sun came up in a cloudle