FOUR HUNDRED MILES IN AN OPEN BOAT.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXV, Issue 2112, 21 June 1907, Page 3

FOUR HUNDRED MILES IN AN OPEN BOAT.

A TERRIBLE VOYAGE

Press Association. AUCKLAND, last night. The Nukualofa correspondent of the Herald sends the following graphic story of the sea, under date of Juno 15: On Sunday afternoon, May 26th, there came into tho harbor a ship’s lifeboat, low' in the water, for she was leaking badly, containing Capt. Christensen, his wife, and eight, of the crew of a Norwegian barque, tho Albania, which had been knocked about in a heavy gale, had'sprung a leak, and been abandoned by her crew about 400 miles to the southward of Tonga. The distressed voyagers were glad to get ashore and stretch their cramped linfhs after a voyage of nine days in the boat. Tho captain’s wife was so stiff from wot, cold, and exposure that she hail to be carried from the boat, and wheeled up tho wharf on a truck. On learning from the captain that the two mates, and remaining six 'members of the crew were still in the othor ship’s heat, somewhere on the ocean, the Tongan Government despatched two cutters in son roll, one going to tho eastward end of the Island of Tongataliu, and the other to the westward. Tho eastward party, under the command of Nafe. a local native pilot, came across tho boat just after dark. Tho shipwrecked mariners left for Sydney, on route to Norway, by the Atua on Juno 2nd