TERRIBLE EXPLOSION OF KEROSENE AT SEA.

Grey River Argus, Volume XII, Issue 1236, 16 July 1872, Page 2

TERRIBLE EXPLOSION OF KEROSENE AT SEA.

[NORTH BRITISH MAIL ] Intelligence received in Liverpool from Bermuda utates that on the evening of the 19th March a light wan discovered about eight miles from the harbor, evidently proceeding from a burning ship, and Mr Fowler, the superintendent of pilots at Bermuda, at once proceeded to the scene of the fire in a tag. When within gunshot of the vessel, the air wit heated by the wide-spreading flames, and at one hundred feet tbe heat was insufferable,- as the ship was completely enveloped in flames. At first it was feared that aU on board had perished, hat a boat hailed the tug from off the starboard bow, and it at once went to the assistance of those in the boat There were seven men in it, two of whom were so severely burnt as to be incapable of moving, but the following statement was made by Mr Fowler :— The oarque Nimrod. Captain Bartley, left St John, New Brunswick, on the Ist of March, bound to the West India Islands with a cargo of kero* seae and naptha, barrelled salmon, &c Several days alter leaving port the Nimrod experienced very boisterous weather, and on the 13th March she lost some spars and a quantity of canvas daring a terrific gale when about 300 miles from Bermuda. On the 17th it was found that the water on board was unfit for use, several ot the men having been attacked with diarrhoea from using it, and the captain at once bore ap for Bermuda for a fresh supply. A t foar o'clock on the afternoon of the 19th Bermuda waslighted, and shortly afterwords a loud and sadden report was heard aft, and the next moment flames were, bursting through the rent timbers of the cabin deck. Boom after boom followed the first report like continued cannonading, and the fire increased rapidly, causing the greatest consternation amongst thoM who were on the forward part of the vessel, and their font effort was to cast away the jolly boat, which was lashed to the forehatch. The two men who were so severely burnt ran towards the cabin with the determination of retcuing Mrs and Miss Bartley, the captain's wife and daughter. After the boat was launched the two men were dragged from the flames into the boat, which had scarcely proceeded fifty yards when a terrific explosion occurred amidships, and high flames and dense suffocating smoke rose over the wreck on all sides. It was then found that eleven persons were missing, namely — Captain Bartley, wife and daughter; Mr Walter Canon, chief officer ; Mr Gas Bartley (son of the captain), second officer ; and six soamen named Fritz, Kent, Harrat, Toole, Hickey, and Bart The flames did not subside until midnight, when the vessel was burnt to the water's edge on one side, the other side being a mere skeleton of a hall Captain Bartley was well known in the colonial trade— his father, the late Mr Issaao C. Bartley, being one of the largest timber merchanta in North America, and Mw Bartley, who met with such a terrible fate, was accompanying her daughter, whose ill-health she thought the mild cljmate of the West Indies would restore.