The sun. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1833-1916, 1912-10-24
LIFE CREWS SAVE IS
AFTER ALL DAY FIGHT
Sailors Taken From Rigging of
italian Bark on Barncoat
Shoals.
RIDE IN BREECHES BUOY
The Rescue Corps Struggle for
Hours to Reach Ship in
Heavy Storm.
RIDE IN BREECHES BUOY

A beach patrolman from the Forked
River life saving station at dawn yes
terday morning sighted rocket from
three mastod bark that had driven
across the Barnegat shoals In the south
erly gale during the night and was
going to pieces on the north side OF the
shoals two miles off Barnegat Inlet
The patrolman answered the rocket
with a Coston signal and ran to warn
his station, and from daylight until late
in the afternoon four surfboats strug-
ged and fought about the bark to take
the crew off.
The stranded vessel Is the $50 ton
italian bark Caterina, bound from
Montedlveo to New York with cargo
of bone. She carried crew OF sixteen.
During the thirty mile gale OF Tuesday
night she got in too far on the lee
shore to crawl off and was driven to
high tide over the shoals through the
breakers to her final resting place.
In the binding rain the crews Of two
heavy and two light surfboats struggled
to keep upright and to draw alongside
the bark, but were always driven back
by the tremendous seas that piled in
over the bars. All they could do was
to stand by all day. waiting for the gale
to abate or for the tide to fall that the
outer bars might serve as breakwaters
| for the seas. The position of the bark
was too far off shore to allow any use
| of the breeches buoy from the land. and
| so the half swamped surfboats bobbed
and pitched all day about the stranded
vessel
During the morning the pouring rain
stopped and the crew OF the bark was
seen in the rigging. The vessels three
masts had stood the strain and what the
| lifesavers hoped and waited for hap
pened late in the afternoon. The high
| gale moderated after a while so that the
surfboats were able to draw nearer the
| bark. At o'clock in the afternoon.
when the tide was low and the wind
mild the four captains of the surfboats
decided to make a dash in on the lee
ward side of the bark and try to put
| a line aboard
| II took a half hour to get a boat close
enough alongside to shoot line into the
rigging, but after trying again and
! again, one Of the Italians caught the
line and his comrades hauled in on 1t
until the tail block at the end Of the line
came aboard and was lashed to the
mainmast. Through the. block ran a
whip or endless line which ran to an
other block in the great surf boat
whence the line came and on this line
was rigged the breeches buoy. When
the buoy was hauled up into the rigging
one by one the sixteen drenched and
exhausted seamen swung out and
dropped into the waiting lifeboats
The captain took the final slide to the
last lifeboat before the half swamped
surfboats turned and rode in on the
seas to the shore. The crews landed
their boats through the surf and the
Italians were rushed to the Forked
River life saving station to be wrapped
in blankets and revived. They spent
the night at the station, and should
the Caterina go to pieces during the
night. as it is feared she will. they will
come to New York to-day by train.
The revenue, cutter Mohawk left New
York yesterday to stand by the bark
and pull her off the shoals II possible.