The daily star-mirror. (Moscow, Idaho) 1911-1939, 1913-01-16
ROSECRANS DISASTER
RECALLS OLD TRAGEDIES

PORTLAND, Ore, Jan. 16.-It's 6
tragic story of disaster and death and
heroism, the record of the wrecks
along the Pacific coast and the wreck
of the oil steamer Rosecrans at the
mouth of the Columbia river last
week, costing the lives of 33 men
adds another chapter to the gruesome
record. At intervals since the sturdy
master of the days of gold" made his
perilous journeys along the coast to
the present day the sea has claimed
| it's full share of treasure and human
| life Efforts of the government to pro-
| tect shipping, to provide life-saving
stations and lighthouses, have done
much to lessen the loss of life, but the
winds and the rocks and the sands are
beyond the control of man, as the large
number of wrecks strewn along the
coast fully proves.
1t was in 1882 that the British ship
Fernglen of Sunderland, England,
bound from Wellington, New Zealand,
Ito Portland, went ashore one cloudy
night on Clatsop Spit, off Cape Disap-
pointment, on the Washington coast.
In rising wind the next morning she
was discovered by the lookout in the
tower of the lifesaving station. With
some volunteers from the garrison of
Fort Candy the lifeboat started out
through the surf. The captain, conf
dent of working off the spit, refused
to have his crew transferred to shore
By the end of the second day his ship
was hopeless wreck. She had
worked in farther and was heeled over
on her starboard side, her masts in
the water and the crew clinging to the
port quarter rail.
The lifeboat was towed out again |
through the heavy seas and brought
round to windward of the wreck, when |
the towline was cast off and the life |
savers began to drop down toward the
Fernglens battered hull. When they
we're within 200 yards of her, the wind
shifted into the southeast, freshening
constantly and dead against them.
Unable to make any progress, they sig
1alled to the tug, resumed the towline,
Ind circled around, aiming to get to
he southeast and repeat their maneu-
yers from that quarter The surfmen
struggled for hours, without getting +
within casting distance of the wreck,
md finally had to abandon their eff
orts, making signal to the Fernglen
hat they would return.
At one o'clock in the afternoon,
When they reached the shattered hull {;
# the Britisher again, she was de- I
erted At first it was thought that Is
Ter men had been washed away, but I
PRESENTLY the crew was made out in a {
yhaleboat, headed for the most dan |
erous part of the beach. By signals l
he surfmen attracted their attention, t
nd SO, finally, succeeded in saving s
hem. The ship was total loss. +,
Wreck of the Atlantic. a
In December, 1886, the whaling bark t
.tlantic of New Bedford, just starting t
n a cruise, went on the sandspit off v
'oint Lobos, not far from the entrance t
D the bay of San Francisco The YES a
ell was totally destroyed, and out of L
he crew of SO men, q were lost She t
ras caught in dead calm, just out
ide the heads, and before crossing the
ar, and, despite all efforts of her cap
ain to claw her off-shore by the use II
anchors. was drifted in closer by p
1e heavy groundswell. At quarter f
asst one in the morning the Atlantic r
stern foremost in the outer i;
ne of breakers. Sea after sea swept n
|, popping her with tremendous VOL h
nee, smashing her bulwarks and W
her timbers. Her seams Il
Glow water started, her disintegra- O
on was only a question of time b
All of the boats but two had been la
mashed when the captain ordered the N