Even when the sun is shining in a blue sky overhead there is an awesome splendour in the majestic ruggedness of the coast about Land’s End; but when the grey fingers of the dawn are creeping into the heavens, and the elements are waging a tumultuous war, when waves dash with tremendous force upon the rocks, to break upon them with a resounding roar, and when some unfortunate ship has been caught in the grip of the storm, then the scene is sufficient to strike terror into strong hearts.
Such was the scene on the morning of March 15, 1914, at five o’clock, when the coastguard at Sennen Cove was alarmed to see signals of a vessel in distress. Away along the coast could be seen the dark hull of a ship, stationary, except when great seas beat upon her and shook her from end to end. Ever and anon the rockets whizzed into the air, brilliant appeals for help. Instantly all was activity; the life-saving apparatus and the lifeboat were summoned, and the work of rescue had begun.
Coastguard A. Oddy, of Sennen, was in charge of the life-saving apparatus. There was no time to be wasted, for the scene of the wreck was four miles away, and every minute was precious, for it could not be long before the vessel broke in two, hurling her human freight to an awful death.
The wagon was got ready, the horses put in, and away went the wagon at top speed. Just as daylight was breaking the coastguards reached the point of the coast off which the unfortunate ship lay. What a sight met their eyes! The ship, the Swedish barque Trifolium, had been taken up by the waves and hurled ashore as though she had been but a shuttlecock. She was held fast by the rocks, with a boiling sea around her, with mountainous waves rearing angry heads, which dropped with a staggering shock and a thunderous roar upon the deck, long since deserted by the crew. To have remained there would have been to court death, for no man could keep a footing on that sloping deck, swept every minute by heavy seas.
“To the rigging they fled, scrambling up in frenzied haste”
So to the rigging they fled, scrambling up in frenzied haste, and hanging on like grim death, watching, waiting for some answer out of the darkness to their appeals for help. As they saw the life-savers pull up upon the shore they raised a faint cheer. They were numbed, wet to the skin; they had been staring death in the face for what had seemed an eternity; and now help was at hand. Men would cheer then, even if it were with their last breath!
Oddy and his companions immediately set to work to rescue those seven luckless men. The tackle was got out, the rocket apparatus fixed up, and the next instant a rocket went speeding away across the tumult of the waters, carrying a lifeline. It went right over the vessel, as also did a second one that was fired; but, though the lines were across their ship, the men in the rigging dared not leave their hold, precarious though it was, to fix the lifelines, by means of which they could have been hauled ashore. To have left the rigging for the deck would have been fatal. The avalanche of water that fell upon the ship, and swirled away every loosened thing, was too terrifying to face; certain and awful death lay that way.
So, with help so near, the sailors clung to the rigging, wide-eyed, anxious-faced, wondering what could be done, what would happen. Very soon they realised that whether they jumped or not, there was nothing but death before them, for the ship, buffeted by the waves, rolled dangerously on the rocks, and seemed as if about to heel over.