We sailed from the Cove of Cork for St. Andrews, on the 6th of October, 1833. During a passage of sixty days, all of which time we struggled against adverse winds, nothing material occurred, save the shifting of our ballast, (limestone,) which caused some alarm; but the promptitude [pg 204] and alacrity of the crew soon set it all right. On reaching the ballast-ground, we discharged our ballast; and after we had repaired the rigging, we took in a cargo of deals. Here four of the men left us, and we had to wait for others to supply their place.
On the 23d of December we sailed on our return to Cork; mustering in all seventeen persons, including one male and one female passenger. With a fine stiff breeze down the bay, we soon lost sight of land, and nothing of note occurred till the 30th, when the wind got up from the north-west, and soon blew so heavy a gale, that we were obliged to take in every thing but a close-reefed main-topsail, under which we scudded till the 5th of January. All this time it blew a hurricane, principally from the north-west, but occasionally, after a short lull, flying round to the south-west, with a fury that nothing could resist. The sea threatened to overwhelm our little craft. It was several times proposed to lay her to; but the fatal opinion prevailed that she did better in scudding. On the night of the 6th, a tremendous sea struck her on the stern, stove in all the dead-lights, and washed them into the cabin, lifted the taffrail a foot or more out of its place, carried away the afterpart of the larboard bulwark, shattered the whole of the stern-frame, and washed one of the steersmen away from the wheel. The carpenter and crew with much labor secured the stern as well as they could for the night, and next morning the wind moderated a little, new dead-lights were put in, and the damages further repaired.
[pg 205]
Every stitch of canvas, but the main-topsail, jib, and trysail, were split into ribbons, so that we became anxious to know how we should reach port when the gale subsided. But we were soon spared further care on that head. As the day closed in, the tempest resumed its fury, and by the following morning, (the 8th,) raged with such appalling violence, that we laid her too. From her straining, the brig had now began to make so much water, as to require all hands in succession at the pumps till the following morning at two, when the larboard watch went below, the watch on deck, by constant exertion, sufficing to keep her free.
[pg 206]
At seven on the morning of the 9th, a tremendous sea broke over the starboard bow, overwhelming all, and sweeping caboose, boats, planks, casks, every thing before it, to the afterpart of the deck; even the starboard anchor was lifted on to the forecastle; and and the cook, who was in the galley, washed with all his culinary apparatus into the lee-scuppers, where he remained some time in a very perilous situation, jammed in amongst the loose spars and other portions of the wreck, until extricated by the watch on deck, who, being aft at the moment of the occurrence, escaped unhurt. Before we could recover from this shock, the watch below rushed on deck, with the appalling intelligence, that the water had found its way below, and was pouring in like a torrent We found that the coppers, forced along the deck with irresistible violence, had, by striking a stanchen fixed firmly in the deck, split the covering fore and aft, and let in the water. The captain thought it [pg 207] time to prepare for the worst. As the ship, from her buoyant cargo, could not sink, he ordered the crew to store the top with provisions. And as all exerted themselves with the energy of despair, two barrels of beef, some hams, pork, butter, cheese, and a large jar of brandy, were handed in a trice up from below, but not before the water had nearly filled the cabin, and forced those employed there to cease their operations, and with the two unfortunate passengers to fly to the deck. Fortunately for the latter, they knew not the full horror of our situation. The poor lady, whose name I have forgotten, young and delicate, already suffering from confinement below and sea sickness, pale and shivering, but patient and resigned, had but a short time taken her seat beside her fellow passenger on some planks near the taffrail, on which lay extended the unfortunate cook, unable to move from his bruises, when the vessel, a heavy lurch having shifted her cargo, was laid on her beam-ends, and the water rushing in, carried every thing off the deck—provisions, stores, planks, all went adrift—and with the latter, the poor lady, who, with the cook, floated away on them, without the possibility of our saving either of them. But such was the indescribable horror of those who were left, that had we been able to reason or reflect we might have envied our departed shipmates.
[pg 208]