WRECK OF THE SHIP MERCURIUS.-LOSS OF SIXTEEN LIVES.

Grey River Argus, Volume IX, Issue 720, 20 September 1870, Page 2

WRECK OF THE SHIP MERCURIUS.LOSS OF SIXTEEN LIVES.

SIX OF THE CREW FIFTY-O>E DAYS. ON A* REEF. (From the European Mail, July 15.) The ship Silvercraig, which arrived at Liverpool on 23rd of June, had on board six of the crew, of the iron ship Mercurius, Captain Cuthbertson, which was totally wrecked on the Roccas reef, lying in the South Atlantic, in latitude 3 degrees 52 sees. S., longitude 30 degrees 20 seonds W., on 25th March. The Captain, officers, and seaman, to the number of sixteen, "weve drowned. The Mercurius left San Francisco, for Liverpool, on 15th January, and all went well until 25th March, when she was driveu on to the Roccas reef, and became a Although all the boats managed to leave tho ship, only one succeeded in reaching the shore, and then in a very damaged state. The rocks at hi^h water are completly covered, and the only dry spot is a raised sandbank. The six survivors, on reaching terra firma, at once surveyed their position, and found the reef abounding with wreckage, amongst which they discovered four water tanks belonging to the London and Australian clipper snip Duncan Dunbar, which was lost, with eighty passengers, on the same reef, about two years ago. In one of the tanks they found some fresh water, which, with a copious fall of rain at intervals, answered all their ordinary requirements. Nothing in the shape of provisions was saved from the wreck, and for fif by-one days these six castaways supported themselves by turtle, what fish they could obtain by the aid of a bent nail and a piece of cord, bird's eggs, and young birds. For shelter against the inclemency of the weather and their exposed; position, they erected a hut from the wreck' of the Duncan Dumbar— a portion of which was still visible— and other vessels, whose names will probably be for ever a mystery. To this wooden structure they fastened a pole, and attached to it an old shirt as a signal of distress to any vessel that might happen to pass within sight of the Roccas reef. They remained on this desolate spot for fifty-one days, when the Silvercraig happened to pass ■within sight of the reef, aud saw the signal. The vessel was at once hove to, and the six poor fellows— who, though, not badly off so far as bodily condition was concerned, were sadly out of wearing apparel- put off to the Silvercraig in two small ports, which they had managed to put together from the wreckage found on the reef. Although they were fifty-one days on the rocks, no vessel was sighted but the one which picked them off on 15th May.