MYSTERY OF THE SEA.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXII, Issue 9544, 16 July 1909, Page 7

MYSTERY OF THE SEA.

LOST WARSHIP CONDOR. NATURALIST DISCOVERS A CLUE. The loss of the sloop of war Condor, which was attached to the Pacific squadron, js still fresh in ths minds of New Zealanders as one of the saddest naval tragedies of modern times. The Condor was one of an unfortunate class. She was a new ship of 980 tons, of a type which is not now, happily, built for the navy. The Condor was practically a police boat, being of light draught, to enable her to go into shallow rivers. Such vessels are practically useless for war, having poor speed, only a few guns.and no armour protection. They were built because they were cheap in construction, and could steam at a small outlay; but they were really most costly, owing to the large numbers of officers and men who were tied to vessels of absolutely no war value. The Condor was commissioned at Chatham on November Ist, 1900, by Commander Clifton Sclater, and ordered to the Pacific.

She left Esquimalt on December 3rd, 1901, in company with H.M.S. Warspite. She was bound for Honolulu and Tahiti, heavily laden with coal. Her mission was to make a cruise amons the Pacific Islands, carrying mails to the lonely inhabitants of Pitcairn Island, touching at various remote reef and islands, on the chance of relieving castaway seamen. She first proceeded to gun practice, which continued until the afternoon, and then started on her course to Honolulu. Investigations showed that she had at least 13 hours of calm weather, during which she was lessening her distance from the land, and then she encountered the storm, in which, apparently, she went down. The vessels parted company, and the Condor was last seen labouring heavily and flying signals of distress by Captin Baody, of the Bank Line steamer Aymeric, who was then in command of the south-bound lumbership Springbank. He had all he could du to save his own vessel. The Condor never reached Honolulu, and her fate has heretofore remained one of the mysteries of the deep. On the same night the collier bound from Nanaimo to San Francisco, was lost. Some people believe that the two vessels olllded and sank. The Admiralty sent the warships Phaeton and Egeria in search of the Condor, while the United States Government contributed the revenue cutters Grant and McCulloch.

At the beginning of June an English naturalist, Bonycastle Dale, who has returned to Victoria, British Columbia, reported the discovery, near Barclay Sound, Vancouver Island, of the submerged hulk of what he asserts is the sloop-of-war Condor, which has been missing since 1901. He says he has communicated with the Briiish Admiralty, and hi declares that the evidence of idertity seems incontrovertible. The wreckage Yr.z. iti comparatively shallow water, his than two miles off the coast. A few weeks ago a spar, stamped with the Admiralty mark, was visible floating on the surface, apparently attached to a wreck beneath. It was washed ashore almost in the same spot where a jib-boom spar, marked Condor, together with a lifebuoy similarly stamped, were thrown up on the beach some months ago. At extreme low tide, according to half a-dozen Wett Coast residents, the hulk is barely submerged. Sir Charles Cameron, the father-in-law of Commander Sclater, attributed the vessel's toss to her build. "She had between her forecastle and poop-both of which stood well above the water—a well at the waist. In a merchant vessel this would have been a safe enough build, jas the bulwarks round the waist would either have been iow and

slight, or their place would have been taken by rails. In a man 01 war, however, to give shelter in fighting, the bulwarks are breast high and very strong, and if a velssel of the Condor's build shipped a heavy saa a huge weight of water would be landed in this well, without any means of escape, and the swish of this might aggravate her roll to such an extent as to upset her altogether, or, if not sufficient for that her furnaces might become extinguished. Now, the Condor rulled tremendously. In letters to. his wife and myself, Commander, Sclater constantly referred to her rolling as an 1 excuse for his inability to write more frequently, or as a reason for the substitution of pencil for pen and ink." On one occasion, Sir Charles I Cameron added. Commander Sclater reported the "lateral level" of the vessel was altering every few seconds some 35 degrees.

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