TERRIBLE FATE OF SHIPWRECKED SAILORS.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9163, 11 August 1908, Page 3

TERRIBLE FATE OF SHIPWRECKED SAILORS.

The Elder-Dempster liner Albert- i ville, which arrived at Southampton ) on June Ist from the West Coast of Africa, brought details of a terrible tragedy which followed the loss of the Belgian steamer Ville de Bruges last April. The Ville de Bruges, which left Dumangi on April 15th, with six Europeans and seventy natives on board, encountered a tornado several days later, while the passengers were at their midday meal. Captain Lund3ren, the commander, was unable to keep the vessel off the shore, and she was driven on a sandbank. Four Europeans, including Captain Lundren, succeeded in swimming ashore, but the others were drowned in the surf. No sooner had Captain Lundgren and two passengers reached the beach in an exhausted condition, than they were seized by hostile natives. The latter held a prolonged council of war, after which the three captives were speared to death and eaten the following day. An engineer who had been cast up on the beach from the wreck, some distance away, witnessed the death of his comrades, but managed to escape, and after great suffering he reached the nearest Belgian post. A force, under Commandant Huter- , ea i, was sent against the cannioals, with the result that their leaders were captured and executed.