CHAPTER II.
DANGEROUS POSITION OF THE BELL ROCK.—SIR ALEXANDER COCHRANE’s LETTER TO THE LIGHT-HOUSE BOARD.—DESIGNS FOR THE BELL ROCK LIGHT-HOUSE.—BILL BY LORD ADVOCATE HOPE IN 1803.—REPORT OF TRADERS OF LEITH.—RESOLUTION OF THE LIGHT-HOUSE BOARD TO APPLY AGAIN TO PARLIAMENT.—MEMORIAL TO THE BOARD OF TRADE.—BILL BY LORD ADVOCATE ERSKINE.—REPORT OF THE COMMITTEE OF THE HOUSE OF COMMONS.—THE BILL PASSED.
Dangerous Position of the Bell Rock.
Dangerous Position of the Bell Rock.
Whatever may have been the early state of the Inch Cape or Bell Rock, as an Island, its present character is strictly that of a sunken rock; and, as such, its relative situation on the eastern shores of Great Britain has long rendered it one of the chief impediments to the free navigation of that coast. It is almost unnecessary to remark, that there are only three great inlets or estuaries upon this coast, to which the mariner steers, when overtaken by easterly storms in the North Sea or German Ocean. These are the Humber, and the Friths of Forth and Moray; of which the Firth of Forth is the principal rendezvous. The mouth of the River Thames, excepting in certain narrow and intricate channels, has not a sufficient depth of water, and is so much encumbered with sand-banks, that no vessel can enter it under night, or approach it in bad weather. On the coast and shores in the neighbourhood of the Humber, the land is flat, and defective in those bold and characteristic features which are essential to the situation of an anchorage for ships in bad weather when they cannot keep at sea. The entrance of the Humber is also considerably obstructed with sand-banks, of which the mariner is, if possible, more afraid than of rocks, because more liable to uncertainty, by the shifting of their position, and thereby changing the direction of the accustomed channels. The great places of resort for ships, therefore, in the North Sea, are the Roads of Leith and Cromarty, lying in the Friths of Forth and Moray, as will be seen from [Plate III.], in both of which we find the natural advantages of an ample entrance, and a coast so strongly marked as to be easily recognised by the mariner. But from the dangerous position of the Bell Rock, his approach to the shores of this coast, prior to the erection of the Light-house there, was liable to the greatest peril and uncertainty.
Great storm in December 1799.
A memorable example of this occurred during a storm from the south-east, in the month of December 1799. This storm having continued with little intermission for three days; a number of vessels were driven from their moorings in the Downs and Yarmouth Roads; and these, together with all vessels navigating the German Ocean at this time, were drifted upon the coast of Scotland. Many found shelter, both in Leith and Cromarty Roads, which, from the state of the winds, lay quite open for their reception. But still, from the dread of the Bell Rock, in the one case, and the danger of mistaking the entrance to the Firth of Dornoch for that of Moray, by taking the northern instead of the southern side of Tarbetness, in the other, a great number of vessels were lost, or much hardship was sustained by the mariner in seeking safety in higher latitudes. It has even been reckoned, that seventy sail of ships were either stranded or lost upon the eastern coast of Scotland during that gale, when many of their crews perished.
At the Bullers of Buchan, near Peterhead, alone, on the first night of this storm, the wrecks of seven vessels were found in a small cove, without one survivor of the crews, to give an account of their disaster. As a remarkable instance of escape on this occasion, it may be mentioned, that a coal-ship, in ballast, returning from London to Newcastle, was carried completely round the coast of Great Britain and Ireland, the first land made by this vessel, after leaving Flamborough Head in Yorkshire, being the Land’s End of Cornwall. Having put into Falmouth to refit the ship and refresh the exhausted crew, she continued her voyage up the British Channel to the Straits of Dover, and so to Newcastle, thus making a complete circuit of the British shores. In the summer of 1800, the writer saw the wrecks of two fine vessels on the Orkney Islands; one of which, on her way to Gibraltar, had been as far as Ushant on the coast of France, when, by contrary winds, she had been driven back to the Downs, and, in the month of December 1799, she was ultimately stranded on the Island of Sanday, along with the other vessel, which in that gale had been driven from Yarmouth Roads.