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LE AOL A LEE RICE I Ge A a A A

 

 

528 Chronicles of the Cape Fear Rwer

1,019, value $30,000, which was a total loss, with ten per-
sons on board, was rendered assistance by the Life-Saving Sta-
tion at Cape Fear.

The total value of property involved in the above disasters
was $218,200; the total value of property lost was $74,000,
and the total number of persons on board was sixty. No lives

were lost.
The rescue of the crew of the schooner Savannah, which was

stranded on the western edge of Frying Pan Shoals, is illustra-
tive of the value of this work. It is indicative of the service of

these stations.
On December 27, 1912, the 584-ton, four-masted schooner

Savannah, bound from Jacksonville, Florida, to Portland,
Maine, with a cargo of pine lumber, and carrying a crew of 9
men, all told, stranded about noon on the western edge of Fry-
ing Pan Shoals, in a westerly gale and thick weather. The
vessel and cargo, valued together at more than $40,000, were
totally lost. The ship’s crew, however, were saved by the crews

of the Cape Fear and Oak Island Stations.

As the schooner lay on the shoals, with the mountainous seas
dashing against her and over her, she was discovered by Keeper
Brinkman of the Cape Fear Station. To make sure that she
was aground the keeper climbed the tower of the Cape Fear
Light to get a look at her through a spyglass. On leaving the
tower he asked the lightkeeper to set a signal, which, according
to a previous understanding, would convey to the station crew
at Oak Island and to the revenue-cutter Seminole the informa-
tion that a vessel was in trouble offshore.

The Cape Fear crew put off the beach in their surfboat with-
out loss of time, and covered the eight miles to the schooner in
two and a half hours. The Oak Island crew also appeared
about the same time in their power lifeboat. It was agreed
that Keeper Brinkman should undertake the work of rescue,
a boat under oars being more readily and safely handled than
a power boat, in broken water about a wreck. This arrange-
ment was duly carried out, the Oak Island crew standing by,
ready to assist their comrades should the surfboat meet with
misfortune while alongside. “After a hard battle with wind
and sea,” says Keeper Brinkman in his report, ‘we took the
captain and eight men off.”

The rescue accomplished, the sailors were transferred to the
power boat, which thereupon proceeded ashore with the surf-

boat in tow.

Peace Restored 529

The ship’s crew were cared for at the Oak Island Station
until the following morning, when they were placed aboard the
Seminole, which had appeared off the station during the night.
The cutter and two tugs attempted to float the schooner ‘but
without success. ! |
err y see cost of maintaining the Cape Fear and
acne se : rece and for salaries during the fiscal year

: ed June 30, 1913, was $17,430, the expense being
about evenly divided between the two stations. The amounts
expended for salaries were $7,089.10 and $6,940.80 for the
Cape Fear and Oak Island Stations, respectively. The expense
for maintaining the stations averaged about $1,700 each dur-

ing the year. The cost of rebuilding the Cape Fear Station,
now under way, will amount to between four and five thousand

dollars.

USE OF OIL TO PREVENT BREAKING SEAS.
About the year 1870 the late Alexander Sprunt, founder

of the firm of Alexander Sprunt & Son, demonstrated in a
magazine article published abroad the efficacy of the use of
oil at sea in stormy weather. He subsequently endeavored to
induce the British Admiralty to provide every ship with his
simple device for protection against breaking seas while lying
to, and received some recognition. Z
At that time, in the winter, he loaded a small brig of about
two hundred tons register with a heavy cargo of maval stores
for Europe. The captain was induced to provide a barrel of
crude oil, two canvas bags perforated with a large needle, and
a twenty-foot spar with block and tackle, to be used in one of
need. On his return to Wilmington some months later, he
ee acknowledged that his ship and crew had been Bee
soared ; saved from destruction by this simple and effective
at was obliged to lay to for several days in a hurricane.
f e heavy waves smashed the boats and threatened to destroy —
1e vessel. He thought of the oil and at once applied it. Run-
ae te spar out on the weather side, he filled the bags with
ae = hauled them out to the end of the spar. Immediately
esi ene of oil spread over the advancing waves and,
ugh the brig rose and fell upon the mountainous seas, the

water di
Oy 1d not break, and the little vessel rode out the gale in

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