LOSS OF THE CITY OF SAN FRANCISCO.

Globe, Volume VIII, Issue 960, 24 July 1877, Page 3

LOSS OF THE CITY OF SAN FRANCISCO.

DETAILS OF THE DISASTER. The City of San Francisco left Panama May 11th, at half-past four a.m., with 137 passengers —forty-six cabin and ninety-one steerage —and 150 officers and crew. Her cargo was valued at three-quarters of a million dollars, consisting of silks, velvets, laces, Ac. On Wednesday morning, May 16th, the day ' was bright and the atmosphere was clear. At eighteen minutes past nine o’clock a peculiar, indescribable tremor was felt, the ship having struck against an unknown danger, cutting into the hull the length of sixty feet, causing the water to rush in with fearful velocity. The ship was then six miles south-west from Tartar Shoals and thirteen miles from the shore, the captain having known by observation her position at eight o’clock". The danger upon which she struck is not on any chart, but a document, sworn to before the United States Consul at Acapulco by one Perer, and witnessed by William Lund, of the gunboat Mexico, deposes that lie is perfectly acquainted with the rocks. The ship was at once turned toward the shore, gradually sinking. She had a full head of steam on when she grounded on the sandbank at twenty minutes past ten a.m. Fortunately, three compartments were still water tight. The captain and his officers were cool and preserved discipline on board. As soon as the ship st ruck orders were given to get the boats ready and put life preservers on, as the danger of sinking was [most imminent. Soundings between the reef and sandbank showed 51, 7-V, 20, 22 fathoms, and no bottom. During the fearful interval, though the ship was evidently sinking, not a cry was heard from the passengers, and there was little confusion, although among the 1-37 passengers twenty were small children, and many were young men never before at sea. 11m

boats were tilled and started for the shore, the passengers [not being allowed to take any baggage. The boats were all overturned in the surf, and the scene was one never to be forgotten. Kind Providence preserved every life, and soon all were safe on the Mexican shore. Fortunately a stream of fresh water was found between the mountains, where, with the stars for a covering, and roots and branches of trees for mattresses, all slept. The captain at once sent one of the officers to Acapulco, eighty miles distant, but fortunately the boat fell in with the gunboat Mexico, Captain Lolor commanding, and although under orders to get provisions for a besieged city, the inhabitants of which were starving, the captain at once steamed off to the relief of the shipwrecked passengers. They were all taken off safely, crowding the deck of the gunboat, and the next day they were transferred to the Pacific mail steamer Costa. Rica, Captain Whiteberry. The commanding officers and crews of the United States ships Lackawanna and Pensacola acted most nobly, supplying the passengers with clothing from their private wardrobes. The United States ships took up subscriptions to a large amount for distribution among the women and children who were entirely destitute. Captain Waddell and his officers behaved splendidly, their conduct being brave, humane, and unselfish. Captain Waddell says seven steam pumps, of 160 barrels of water per minute capacity, were absolutely useless. The whole bottom was out of the steamer. The captain says he ran the steamer repeatedly over the same spot before, and can only conjecture that the late earthquake, which was made manifest on the coast by the tidal wave, might have upheaved a submarine rock. The ship was under way and was going at the rate of eleven knots an hour when she struck. The captain was on the bridge' an hour before the steamer struck, and timed everything by Ins watch. Twenty minutes after she struck the fires were out. In that twenty minutes she was running in shore under a full head of steam. She ran on for forty-two minutes, making a distance of nine or ten miles, and then grounded in 30ft of water on a sand bottom. Next morning about a fool, of the stern was seen out of water. The whole body of the ship was submerged and the mizenmastgone. The baggage of the passengers, furniture, &c, were constantly floating ashore during the day. The money of the passengers in the purser’s hands, the ship’s money, and all the baggage were lost. The passengers all say emphatically that the captain and officers did all that could be done. The captain declares that bis officers and men stood to their duty nobly ; that they evinced perfect coolness and courage, and that drilled men-of-wars-men could not have acted with better discipline or responded to every order with more fidelity.