Over the dark and rushing sea came to those on shore by the flashing signals this message: “We are helpless; both anchors are down but they do not hold us and we are slowly but surely going to our destruction; unless you can send help we must surely perish.”
Telephone and telegraph messages were hurriedly sent to the authorities in Boston, and a large ship was dispatched from the Navy Yard at Charlestown, but she had not proceeded two miles beyond Boston Light, when, from the fury of the storm, she, too, broke down and had a struggle to get back to shelter, coming dangerously near to foundering herself.
All night long until midnight frequently from the distressed boat came frantic cries across the surging waters, but no earthly power could reach them.
Miss Olive Williams, manager of the Western Union Telegraph and Marine Reporting Station on the cliffs at Highland Light, remained on duty all the night long to keep in touch with the boat and the stations on shore.
At midnight the last signals from the doomed 238 flashed across the angry sea—the end had come.
With daylight next morning, out there, two hundred yards from the shore, lay a mass of broken timbers and twisted iron, all that remained of the little cruiser, and the bodies of her crew of eight officers and men were being washed about in the cruel waters that thundered to the shore.
This was the worst disaster in this immediate vicinity since the terrible storm of November 27th, 1898, when the Portland foundered, carrying to death 165 persons.
Only two bodies of the cruiser’s crew were ever recovered from the sea.
