WRECK OF THE GRASMERE.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 434, 17 February 1909, Page 9

WRECK OF THE GRASMERE.

, ON TOM'S ROCK. - , HO,W THE CREW WERE SAVED, In speaking of ;tho Ponguin disaster yes-, terday, Mr, J. K. Logan, superintendent of electric lilies, recalled tho wreck of tho Grasmoro, which .oamo to-grief on Tom's Rock on Christmas Day, 1596. Mr. Logan states that, at 3 a.m. on that date, he loft for. Cook. .Strait iiutho Terranora. to repair tho Otur-angi-Wiiite'ij. Bay • cable,. and,.-when steaming aiong tlio coast, they pftssed'tho barque Grasmoro inward bound from Newcastle bowl'ing along beforo a stiff north-westerly breeze.' When tlio Terrttrtora.reaohed Terawhiti it was found that no \vork could he done for, though, it was fine .overhead, there was n considerable sea running, so Captain "Gray, resolved, to stand over towards Capo Canipbell to get out of the "rip" until such time as tlio sea moderated. ..On' the way across a; small i.water cask was sighted,'and' then another.- Other ominous bits of flotsam presently appeared. Captain Gray, divining that something serious had occurred, decided to follow tho lino .of the wreckage',.And, steaming straight'lack, first picked up a boat containing .five: meiij and then tlio captain's gig containing eight hands—in all the full complemont of tho orew. Had it not been for the prompt action of Captain; Gray, tho boats: would, in all probability, have been swept "through the strait before the northerly galo in the direction of the Chathams.- -Tho Grasmore. had managed tb get into a position too near the. coast, and had, iu broad daylight, with a,<slcar sky over head, struok Tom's Rock. Among, previous disastrous, wrecks oft . the New Zoaland coast, montiou should btj' mado of-'. H.M.S.' Orpheus, "which-: wentdofn "on the Miinukiiu bar on February 7, 1803, causing the loss of ISI lives. Years apo, the City of Dunediri left Wolliugtoil .with :a large number; of .diggers ■bound for the West Coast. , She ..was seen from Mr. i\KMeiianien's' station/ and was assumed'to have struck on Tom's Rock, for she. went'.down, off-the rocky' Coast, and none of the bodies were recovered. An old resident of Makara stated yesterday' to a Dominion' reporter, that the first wreck on the Terawhiti coas'u was that of the Maria in tho early fifties.: The Maria was 1 proceeding from- tiowry Ray with, a cargo of stock for Clifford's station in the South Island, when a south-eastorly galo drovo her on the rocks'at the/ moath of the ICarori Stream. Tho only man saved was a nc-gro, who swam ashore and : mado for M'Monameii's. station. Among thoso lost in tho wreck was. Mr. Geor'go Wallace, brother of Mr, James Wallace, of tho Wellington and Manawatu Railway Company.