Annual Report of the Operations
of the United States Life-Saving Service for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1888:
The British steamship Canonbury, of London, with a cargo
of sugar from Matanzas, Cuba, bound to Boston, Massachusetts, at half past 2
o’clock in the afternoon of this date, struck on the west end of Old Man’s
Shoal (Nantucket Island) five miles to the southeast of Surfside Station
(Second District) coast of Massachusetts. A fog had prevailed for several days,
and the captain, who had no observations after getting north of Cape Hatteras
(North Carolina) was uncertain of the ship’s position. Half an hour after the
accident the fog lifted a little, and the watch at the station descried the
vessel with a flag at half-mast. He gave the alarm at once, and the station
crew hastily manned the surf boat. The surf was very high and it was some
twenty minutes before they got out away from the beach. They then pulled for
the steamer, but when they had gone about four miles they met her crew of
twenty four men, who had abandoned her in two boars and were on their way to
the shore. The keeper turned back with them, and, when they were off the
station outside the surf, directed them to anchor. He then took a portion of
them into the surf boat and landed them. A large number of people had gathered
on the beach; with assistance from them the keeper launched the large surf
boat, and, making two trips out to the anchored boats, brought the remainder of
the crew safely to land. He had, before attempting to land through the surf,
directed the men to remain in the boat until she should strike the beach.
Nevertheless, one of them, as the boat was running in on a high sea, was thrown
into great consternation and jumped overboard. Surf man Gardner instantly
plunged into the water, seized the man with one hand, and, clinging to the boat
with the other, brought him to the beach. But for the presence of mind and
nerve of the surf man the man would probably have drowned. The heavy surf
rendered the landing of the unfortunate crew a very exciting affair, as the
people who saw it declare, while the rescued men and witnesses alike testify
that the whole exploit was marked by great coolness and skill on the part of
Keeper Veeder and efficiency and discipline on the part of the life saving crew.
The shipwrecked men were taken to the station and provided with dry garments
from the store of clothing sent by the Women’s National Relief Association.
Richard Williams, a seaman of the steamer, had been sick at the time of the
accident, and by order of a medical attendant he was removed from the station to
a neighboring cottage; but the exposure and fatigue of landing had been greater
than he could endure, and at 2 o’clock of the following morning he died. With
the exception of one man, the steamer’s people were fed and sheltered at the
station till the morning of the 30th, when the captain arranged for
other quarters for them. The vessel drove over the shoal during the night
following the casualty and drifted some five miles to the northeast, upon what
is locally known as Pochick Reef, where she sunk with the water up to her lower
yard. She was examined on the succeeding 1st day of April, with view to saving her engines, but the current
was so strong that divers could not work and the project was abandoned The
vessel subsequently broke up where she lay, and became, with her cargo, a total
loss. With the exception of the ship’s papers and the officers’ instruments,
nothing of importance was saved from the wreck.
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