YACHTING ACCIDENT AT ILFEACOMBE.

Patea Mail, Volume I, Issue 1, 24 October 1887, Page 2

YACHTING ACCIDENT AT ILFEACOMBE.

SERIOUS LOSS OF LIFE. A serious yachting’ accident occurred at Ilfracombe on the afternoon of August 2Gth, and resulted in the loss of from twelve to fifteen lives. The yacht Monarch proceeds on excursions daily in the Bristol Chanunel, and on the day named started as usual with upwards of twenty passengers and two boatmen. When off Torr’s Walk the boat was struck by a squall, and 'capsizing, sank immediately. The shrieks and screams of the drowning people were heartrending, and unfortunately no aid was near. In eight or minutes, however, a number of boats arrived at the spot, and many ,of the people who were struggling in' the water were rescued and brought to shore. Those apparently dead were treated by the local medical men, and Dr, Watkins and Dr. J. Ct. Glover, of London ; but out of seven so treated in only two cases was the treatment successful. At least eight hundred persons were assembled on the pier awaiting their friends, and the distress among them as the rescuing boats arrived without their relatives’ is indescribable. The survivors state that the boathook fell overboard, and the helmsman jibbed the boat with the view of picking it up, when the vessel immediately filled and sank. The first landsman who became acquainted with the disaster was Thomas Price, junior. He and William Gregory socured a boat, and rowed quickly to the* spot. Ho picked up a lady and four gentlemen, two of whom were lifeless. —European Mail.