The Birmingham age-herald. [volume] (Birmingham, Ala.) 1902-1950, 1906-09-09
Captain Tells of Collision in the
Straits of MaIacCa
NINE PLUNGED TO DEATH
World Mariner Describes How the Ben
Tong Split and Went Down IN
der Velvet Skies-Tragedy
of the Deep.

From the New York Herald
In the Straits of Malacca, where
BY night those soft laceevious stars
I,eer from those velvet skies,
the British steamship Haversham Grange
was turning up the tropie PHOSPHORUS IN
dull smears She was bound from Vladi-
vostock to Odessa. and Captain Percival
Howe had an old yarn to unreel re-
Gently when he arrived in South Brook
lyn. Large steamships are not an unusual
sight these days. even in the Malacea
Straits, for the Peninsular and Oriental
and Messagerie boats make 1t almost as
lively as In the North Atlantic ferry
route.
But a big British steamship carrying
four regiments of Russia soldiers to be
mustered out as soon as possible after
great devastating war Is a very unusual
thing indeed And then when demented
Malay steamship starts a sarabande hVe
miles ahead of the troop ship and the
dervishes aboard get her whirling IKE
dust devil on the Desert of Sind, SO that
Won can't tell the green light from the
red, it's time the nations sat up and took
notice
Had Fine Weather.
mo finer weather l ever saw in the
Straits" said Captain Howe, than we
had after we left Singaport. The SOU
west monsoon was on, but the weather
was fine. though it was very hot. We
were nearly UP with Tanjong Tuan one
night, the engines turning over maybe
eighty to the minute, giving her ten
knots an hour, when Andy Macarthur
there, the third officer, raised light out
o. the sea nearly ahead. The stranger
had high superstructure amidshlps and
she seemed to be holding a course across
the Straits, and we said she must be one
of the native passenger steamers that
trade between Penang and the Sumatra
ports.
1--WE see queer birds In the Straits
sometimes but Macarthur said that aft
err thirty years in the east he never saw
a craft like that. In twenty minutes more
we were close enough to make out her
cargo of yellow jackets screechin and
skippin about the decks. Now, this hap
pened on the night of April e. and it
is my firm belief that If we hadn't put
that ship out O. business she'd still be
dancin' around out there in the Straits.
No sooner did we come into hailing dis
lance o. the devil ship than she started
up a hornpipe a cables length on our
port bow. Around she went, with her
whistle skirin' and couple o grinning
apes at the wheel. And she kept within
till we caught the green light, and then
she whipped back again, with the sea
under her stern curling into an acre of
light as they sent her engines hard
astern.
Sent Their Ship Ahead.
"What could we do? | Just slowed the
Haversham Grange down to one bell and
stood by. Then the yellow skins sent
their ship ahead again, with the wheel
hard over until we could see both her
side lights, and then, so help us all. they
headed straight for us. Well. / sent our
ship full speed stern, thlnkin' she'd clear
u.s. but she had more way on than I
thought and she hit us amidships. Sir,
did you ever put your foot through an
old bucket with bit of crumplin' sound?