Collision Wrecks

The San Francisco Call VOLUME LXXXIV.-XO. 37. SAX FIIANCISCO, THUBSDAY, JULY 7. 1898. PRICE FIVE CEKTS. MURDER RUNS RIOT ON THE DECK OF A SINKING SHIPand a whirlpool encircled the spot where a thirst for blood came them. Right and left their flashed and trampled bodies upon weapons the noble craft had been. Everybody marked their course. around the vortex was drawn into It. The water rushed areund, faster and The officers, who died as brave men, were powerless to control their mad passengers and faster, and the unfortunates disap- madder The Bourgogtie a peared v.Ith despairing cries. WRECKS crew. second officer of La did the work of dozen heroes. But his Mrs. La Casse had been on the edga COLLISION of maelstrom, something efforts were almost immediately set at naught by the cowardice of his frenzied crew. the but threw her outside of the whirlpool, and the One raft on which forty women were placed had been made fast to the ship's side. next she knew she was on the- life raft. A boat containing forty women was It was dragged down by the ship and all on it perished. Not one man would pause to cut the capsized and all went down in the LA BOURGOGNE lines and give them life. whirlpool. There was not t-ne man in AND boat, a*~ was left fast this it to the When the ship had gone down the few boats that floated were surrounded by the perishing. davits. Some of the women were try- ing to cut the ropes when the steamer Some women caught the lines of one cockleshell, not endangering the occupants and merely careened and capsized the boat. that a keeping their heads above water. In pure fiendishness the men of the crew cut the ropes and be- Mrs. La Casse says moment SIX PERISH after the steamer was engulfed men, HUNDRED every came murderers. women and children arose on side .of the whirlpool, ami the sight of Inother cases men who struggled to keep themselves above water by clutching the gun- the faces and the arms and the sound of shrieks was so terrible that she will wales were beaten back to death with oars and boathooks. remember them to her dying day. The British ship that had been in stood near by and for hours kept up the work of Mrs. La Casse says that when the Slay Men, collision panic first seized the crew men fought Frenzied Seamen Women and rescue. Then she was towed into Halifax. for positions in the boats like rav- ing maniacs. Women !were forced Marvelous was the endurance displayed by those who had been in the water for hours. back from the boats and trampled The officers of the Bourgogne to a man went down with the ship. One the surface on by men, who made self-preser- Children in a Fi^ht for Possession came to vation their first object. Among and was saved. them were a large number of the lower class of Italians and foreigners, who in their frenzy stopped at nothing that of the Boats. promised safety for themselves. WOMEN SLAIN LIKE The story of the fearful disaster from day, while the Cromartyshire was on . So desperate was the situation that the few officers and members of the her way over from Glasgow with a an Italian passenger drew his knife and SHEEP IN SHAMBLES crew who were saved is yet to be told, crew of twenty-one men. Although made direct at one who, like himself, was endeavoring to — but if the words of the passengers who the transatlantic steamships have a reach the boats. NEW YORK. July 6. The French line steamship La Bourgogne was sunk in collision were dragged Cromarty- Immediately his action was imitated In aboard the definite course the Bourgogne was, by every were nour- HALIFAX,N. July 6.—ln one of brought port direction. Knives with the British iron ship Cromartyshire early on the morning of July 4, sixty miles south of 8.. shire and later into this all accounts, forty miles or more to the ished and used witheffect. Women and the thick fogs which at this time of by the steamer Grecian, are to be be- north of these children were driven back to inevitable Sable on lieved, board lines. Island. Of 725 souls board 535 were drowned, including 207 first and second the year hang like a pall over the the last few minutes on The fog was very dense death at the point of -weapons, the own- the La Bourgogrne witnessed some of and the Cro- ers of which were experts in their use. class cabin All first Grand Banks and Sable Island In the martyshire was calling along re- passengers. the cabin passengers were lost, and of 300 women passengers the Rcenes of horror and with According to stories of the survivors North Atlantic, occurred, on the early most terrible duced canvas and blowing fog many on cruelty have blotted the history the horn. women were stabbed like so the ill-fated vessel only one was saved. morning of July 4. one of the most ap- that Suddenly out of fog sheep. of a civilized race. the rushed a great palling ocean disasters in the annals of steamer and in a moment The scene on the water was even That concisely tells the story of a tragedy that is stained with dishonor. Passengers and and, fact, Instead discipline which so there was a transatlantic commerce, in of heroic | fearful crash, the iron prow worse. Many of the unfortunates who crew were struggle history of sailing the often has been the one bright feature of ship of the struggling in the water attempted alike in the awful for self that turned the deck of the liner into a shambles in the steam of plunging into the port of the were moment's warning, the crew of the side to drag themselves into the boats or on and ocean a world. Without a such awful moments steamer just under bridge. pushed made the scene of deliberate murder of helpless women and men, and by the very fought demons for the few the rafts. Th- were back. almost, the great French liner La steamer like The shock was Here, too, were freely. ones to whom they had intrusted board, life rafts, battering the help- terrific and tore a knives used their lives. Bourgogne, with 725 souls on boats and | tremendous hole in the Not all of the dead met death by drown- run by sailing ship less passengers away fro: 1 their only steamer while ing. Christopher saw a was dr>wn the iron bb°W °f the Ship Brunon sailor The crash came at o'clock in the morning, when, in a dense fog. the ocean greyhound Oromartyshire and sank within a half means of salvation, with the result was demol- belonging to La Bourgogne strike a 5 is^r^The steamer Plunged on passenger hour, carrying with her to the ocean's that the strong overcame the weak, for the through over the head with a bar and struck the Cromartyshire and passed on in the gray light to plunge to the bottom, drawing down its the f'nfog her whistle crying body dropped bottom over 500 of her passengers and the list of 163 saved contains the name for help and kill him. The into the helpless victims in the whirling that hex rockets signaling her distress water. The passenger grabbed the boat surge marked the spot where she had floated. crew, while the balance, who were not of but one woman. The disaster oc- The in which the sailor was and attempted down by the fearful suction, curred at 5 o'clock in the morning on Cromartrshfre was rounded to, In the few minutes that elapsed between the shock and the disappearance the greater hor- draws and her master. Captain to get on board. struggled and fought for life until one Monday. July 4, about sixty miles was considerably Henderson, Matte O. Zurich, a Norwegian, said ror of the disaster was enacted. In an instant the quiet deck of the liner was transformed into Island, nearly ! relieved in finding appear anybody's duty an hundred and sixty-three were at length south of Sable which lies that she it did not to be Cromarty- was in no danger of sinking. launching inferno. Women who obstructed the of were rescued by the crew of the a hundred miles off this port. Off to to look after the of-the boats. way strong men to the boats struck down with the eastward on port side were not touched shir", which ship survived the colli- The Bourgogne had left New York hoarse could be heard the Those the knives. The steerage had contained many Italians, and it though call of the steamer, as by the crew. People climbed into them, seemed as in the face of death bound for Havre the previous Satur- fog began and the launched, to lift all the boats- on the waiting for the boats .to be ship in a short Uie were launched. Half an hour after but time steamer listed the collision the misty so rapidly it was impossible to do so. curtain went un Zurich declares that two of the life giving a clear view for miles, and it was that those then rafts upon which people were saved on the Cromartyshire were cut adrift by him. He was unable fearf6l to move them, they on *"*«for Iff* but tumbled over- Iboard"Vifthe Bourgogne.

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