Omaha daily bee. (Omaha [Neb.]) 187?-1922, 1907-04-21
DEATH IN WINTER SEAS
Appalling List of Casualties on Coast
of New EnEIand ana
Provinces.

An appalling total o. is9 lives and hfty-
four ships have been sacrificed to the
storms and reachercus coasts OF New Eng
land and the maritime provinces for the
winter Just ended according to statistics
made public. OF the ships. no account has
been taken Of the dozens that have been
driven ashore, but later 1oated and repaired
at an expense, including the charges Of the
wrecking companies but little less than
the cost Of a new craft, ard the figures do
not include the loss in Connecticut waters
The long list of dead is swollen out Of all
proportion TO those Of many previous years
by the sinking Of the steamer I.archmont
in Block Island sound the night of Febru-
airy II, with an estimated loss Of $50 lives
This was the one great disaster Of the year
In these waters, the remaining victims Of
the winter having been picked of princl-
pally In ones and twos, the largest loss Of
life in any other single wreck occurring in
the laundering this month of the Ne
foundland schooner Harry Lewis, with its
entire crew Of eight men.
While the winter has been one OF the
coolest and most clustering for years on
land, seldom has the extreme cold affected
the mortality record of the sea more than
the season just passed. In the medical re-
port on the Larchmont horror the physl-
clans found that in nearly all instances the
victims met their death by freezing. In the
provinces particularly has the cold fin
shed the work Of the waters, and sailors
reaching shore from their stricken ship
haye succumbed to the icy blasts on some
bleak and uninhabited beach.
Next to the Block Island sound with the
overwhelming balance Of the Larchmont
victims to its record, and with only two
other lives lost in it's waters, comes the
wild coast of Newfoundland. with nineteen
lives sacrificed. Cape Cod and Massachu-
sets bay have been responsible for the
loss of thirteen lives, Nova Scotia eleven
and Maine four.
proved the most disastrous to shipping
this year claiming sixteen vessels New
England was not far behind, with fourteen
craft Nine vessels have been wrecked ia
massachusetts, waters, six on the granite
lodges of Maine, eight within the vicinity
of Rhode Island and one on the limited
coast of New Hampshire
In neatly every case the loss has fallen
upon the coastwise fleet, vessels of Ameri-
can register being the heaviest losers, with
thirty-five ships and It's lives, while the
British loss was eighteen ships and twenty
four lives. The French are the only other
nationality represented in the list, the
barkentine Ebilie and Rea having been lost
on the Nova Scotia coast in December. The
schooners, being in greater numbers, have
suffered the most, thirty-six being lost, as
compared with twelve barges, five steamers
and the barkentine above mentioned Feb
ruary was the stormiest month, when 1855
lives were lost, and, even excluding the
Larchmont list, It still had sixteen to COM
pare with the thirteen lives lost in Jan
uary, the next ranking month in point of
severe weather and casualties.
That more lives have not been lost has
been due largely to the governments elab-
crate system of safeguarding shipping
through the weather bureau, with its storm
warnings and the coast guard.
From an inspiring list of individual hero
ism the deed of Greek seaman, Mitchell
| B. Bruso, a decShand on the tug Walter
A. Luckenbach. stands above all others.
Single handed in a small skiff, he rescued
two men from the sinking barge Buena
Ventura, of Montauk Point, while other
brave men shrank from venturing out in
the terrific sea and biting cold Bruso, with
the unrivalled skill of his countrymen in
handling small boats twice guided his frail
skin into the teeth Of fierce northeaster.
New York Herald.