HEROISM AT SEA

Ashburton Guardian, Volume VII, Issue 2061, 12 February 1889, Page 3

HEROISM AT SEA

A very determined case of attempted snlolde took place oa Board Messrs Donald Oarrle and Oo'a steamship Garth Oattle (Oaptain J. D. Jeffries) when croising the equator on the voyage home. A German gentleman, named Hneck, a<?cd about thirty, said to be most respectably onnneoted, was pot on board the Garth Castle at Natal (n oharge of a member of the Natal polioa, namedUogar, for conveyance to Germany via London. Mr Hueok had only been m the colony four months, and having, it is said, been crossed m love and sustained some fioanolal losses, be got mentally depressed and it beo»me necessary that a vigilant natch should be kept over him. He refused to eat any food, and It wrs only with great dlfficalty that wine and soaps were administered to him through a tube. Uoger and his oharge occupied a special oabln on the deck, and all went woll up to tbe 18 h alt. Hneok, It was noticed, was m a very morose and exhausted condition, and abont two p.m., as his keeper was In the act of lighting his pipe outside the cabin door, Hneok slipped ont behind him, and made one leap over tbe port side forward of the deckhouse. An alarm was railed and the engines stopped, and then reversed fall speed astern. The ship a* the time of the occurrence, with topsails and foresails set, wan going folly fifteen knots. The port quarter boat was instantly lowarad m oharge of Mr Neary, third < fficer, and polled away m the dlreotlon of the drowning man. Io jast over ten minutes after- leaving the ship's side the boat got quite dose to Hueok who at onoe sommanoed to swim In tbe opposite direction. The fourth offioer Mr Hubert Piers, observing tbis, gallantly jumped overboard and seising Hueok by the neck, held him ap until they were hauled safely Into the boat; Haeok, strange to say, was found not to-hava son>r«d moo 1 ) from the effao's of his nudden Immersion. Oa the arrival of the ship at Plymouth be was reported to be In a very low state, consequent on his refusal to take any food Mr Piers' heroic act Is the more commendable when It fs remembered that numerous sharks were close at hand.