The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, January 6, 1901, Page 13

sEsues0@ | .uo- mmmomnmw Pages 134627 00“0' SRORGR SXOXS X O wo*um‘ S6RI408 50085 000 108 HORBRPHIROR O ¥ VOLUME LXXXIX —NO. 37, SAN FRANCISCO, SUNDAY, JANUARY 6, 1901—THIRTY-TWO PAGES. PRICE FIVE CENTS. CREW AND PASSENGERS OF THE STEAMER IAQUA BATTLE TWELVE HOURS FOR THEIR LIVES AGAINST THE RAGING WINDS AND WATERS ON DUXBURY REEF Chief Engineer William Burrill, After a Desperate Struggle With the Waves, in a Lifeboat Twice Upturned, Reaches Bolinas Beach and Then Makes a Hazardous Night Journey Over the Mountain to San Rafael to Seek Aid. One of His Companions, R=ported to Be John Do Istrom, Loscs His Lile in Making the Attempted Rescue N A\l mrs s. Frank Bindsile, Wife of the Steward, a Bride and the Only Woman on Board the Wrecked Vessel, Deseribes Her Awful Night of Horror Amid Seenes in Which for Many Hours She Was Threatened With Imminent Death-—Bonfires of Distress Blaze From the Wreeked Ship and These Are Answered by the Flaming Signals From the Anxious Crowds Watching on the Shore SALVERS AT WORK THE IAQUA, . story of Friday reef had few tory of marine disas- , tragic interest the vessel struck upon @ vwned, twenty men ttled for their lves. Ar ind raged in terrifying violenoe y parts of the super- fing heavy bundles of & them through the L ers. Incessa the unded upon the rocks g tremor passed xt moment she 4 send her human her = go to plec t to Geath. Accompanying the death roar of the was the crash and smashing of table thing upon the vessel. N me the waves dashed e deck, carrying in their resistless sweep missiles which meant imminent Geat the drenched, terrified beings ed desperately to &ny support ight mean a chance against death terrifying form. was raging when the vessel, ur months in commission, left this Friday afternoon for San Pedro. felt confident of himself and p, however, and determined to go sides himself he bad on board two men and & woman, & bride wes making ber first journey with er sband, the steward. The northern assoge was taken and then darkness fell. 4 was blowing & gale and the ch as she was, tossed in the sea. without warning and without of disaster, the rs ahead.” but it was The laqua was fast upon the 100 | from st he blackness of the night, | In | lookout | raging gale had ended her rockets were fired tles sent out thelr essages of distress, but they be heard above the thunderous ds of the elements. € in the darkness, passengers and v began a night of terror. Not two away was the little town of Boli- t there came no sign from it that the signals of distress had been heard or Two sailors, John Lider and John m, volunteered to make the des- urney to the shore and seek as- A lifeboat was lowered, but so the sea and fearful the tempest it was in Instant danger of being crushed like a shell against the Eidfl of the ship. ance. high was that Chief Engineer Willlam Burrill lowered himself over the ship's side to help the struggling men. The lifeboat was cut adrift and not a hundred yards from the black hull of the Taqua it capsized. When it was again righted only two men were |in 3t John Dolstrom nad disappeared, and his body probably will never be found. | For three hours his companions battled | in the sea and when they reached shore | & remarkable scene had been In progress | for more than an hour. ! Despairing that their signals of distress | would be seen or heard, the passengers | and crew of the Jaqua sought everything which would burn on the vessel. Mat- tresses, linen, sheets, clothes, were gath- ered on the decks, saturated with coal oil and fired. The flames shot high into the alr and the anxious, eager, fearful beings on board waited in an agony of suspense. Presently there came an answering blaze | from the shore, and the wrecked crew and | passengers knew that their distress signal had been seen. But they were to pass many hours of dread before relief came. | The people of Bolinas had seen the fires from the ship and they had set a great plle of brush and lumber ablaze to tell the wrecked people that aid would be | given as soon as possible. The bonfire on the beach attracted everybody in the Duxbury Reef, not & mile snd & half | nelghborhood of the towm aud ranchers ng current and the |and farmers, | flocked to the scene. | ask assistance at San Rafael. in teams, carts and wagons, By this time the beach was strewn with the cargo of the Taqua. The vessel carried §00,00 feet of lumber, and poachers were eager to get it, scrambling even into the surf to carry it away. As soon as Chief Engineer Burrill reached the beach he discovered that the | people of Bolinas could do nothing. They had no facilities with which to give aid themselves and the telephone wires were down between Bolinas and San Rafael. Exhausted, drenched and nearly dead from his struggle In the waves, Burrill insisted upon making the terribie journey over the mountain to give the alarm and A team was secured, and with John Hays, Burrill made the trip. But no relief could come from 8San Francifco until yesterday morning, when tugs were sent to rescue. In the meantime Steward Bind- sile and his bride, with three other men, got away in a small boat, Mrs. Bindsile being dragged through a window of the ship into’ the boat. The gasoline boat Jessle Matsen secured several more and the tufs completed the rescue. —_—— DUXBURY REEF A DEATH COVE How the Iaqua, Driven by the Storm, Crashed on the Treacherous Rocks. In this way Duxbury Reef has added another disaster to the many that have occurred on that treacherous point. From Tennessee Cove to where the steam schooner laqua went on the rocks last Friday night the beach is strewn with re. mains of vessels that came to an untimely end. Some of them were driven ashore like the ship Tennessee that was driven into the cove named after her, but the great majority came to their end on the reef. Rarely has a vessel got off Dux- bury. The last one to go on and get off was the steam schooner Noyo. She came in waterlogged and it cost half the value of the vessel to repair her. The steam schooner laqua was one of the | STEWARD BINDSILE AND HI1S BRIDE. . —p ‘he finest vessels of her class afloat. cost $95,000 to build and was boat.” She has been running betwéen Eureka, San Francisco and San Pedro since she went into commission and has been very popular. The laqua left Eureka or Thursday morning and passed out over the bar in company with the Eureka at 1 o'clock. The Jaqua made a quick run to San Francisco, where she landed her passengers at 3:53 p. m. Captain Bash was in a hurry to get away, in order to make a good offing be- fore dark,’so he sailed promptly at 4:30, leaving J. Loertcher, P. P. Fisher and E. M. Mattison, men who had secured pass- age or the lagua, behind him. These three are now thanking their lucky stars. Passing out through the north channel Captain Bash and the laqua met the Bu- reka and Captain Jessen passing In. As the Iaqua had given the Eureka a bad beating on'the run down the coast Cap- tain Bash waved his hat to Captain Jes- sen and gave three “toots” on his whistle, wishing the Eureka good-by. It is inter- esting that “Jaqua” is an Indian word, meaning “How do you do?" In speaking about the matter yesterday Captain Jessen said: ““We passed the Iaqua in Bonita channel about one mile west by north of Point Eonita light. It was low water and there ‘was no current. When close to buoy No. 3 the Iaqua blew one whistle and I an- swered it. We passed each other within a distance of about 100 yards. As he passed Captain Bash whistled ‘good-by.’ This was at 05:35 p. m. Ordinarily sa steamer would run along for about an- other mile and a half and would then change her course to west-southwest. ‘What Captain Bash did, of course, I don’t know. There was a very ugly sea run- ning but no fog, and I could see the shore line. Later ‘it began to get thick and a drizzling rain began to fall.” An hour later the Taqua was hard and fast Duxbury reef, and the engineers and 'men had to clamber on deck to escape the inrushing water. The boats were ordered cleared away and three men got into one of them. The boat capsized She ““A 12-knot and one of the men was drowned. The other two clung to the overturned boat and reached the shore. One of them was Chiet Engineer W. Burrill, and he told | the following story of the disaster to the | United States Inspectors of Hulls and | Boilers yesterday BURRILL TELLS ‘' TRAGIC STORY | He Describes His Night of Terror, | Battling With the Waves for Life. “We left the wharf at San Francisco about 4:30 o'clock. It was not blowing very Hard at the time. The bar was breaking badly when we went out, and | the vessel took the north channel. A Iit-| tle later it got foggy, We passed the steamer Eureka just outside, and just this side of the north head we passel the San Pedro. After going into the north channel it became foggy, a driz- zling rain setting in. “I do not know how the accident hap- pened. It was about 6:30 o'clock. We were running about six knots an hour, I should judge. I had the vessel at half speed, and then got the signal for three- quarter speed shortly before she struck. The chief officer was on the bridge, but the captain was on deck. “I was just coming from the captains room when 1 heard 1ihe mate ecry ‘Breakers ahead!” and then I jumped for the engine-room. No bell was struck to go back, but I turned the steam on the reversing engine before any one had time to give an order. Th2 boat would not move. She was hard and fast on the reef, but straight up. “The sea was heavy, but was not break- ing over the house.- Captain Bash ordered a boat launched, but the men did not seem quick enough to obey and I jumped in with two saflors. We got the boat in the water. I had the painter, and signaled to let go the stern line. As this was done a big wave came and knocked all three of 1 us Into the water. I let go the painter, One of the men went under and never | mto the trough. came up. I crawled back into the boat and the other saflor did the same. She | was washed away from the ship, and all | but one of the oars went over. I picked one up, but it was of no use, as I had to use one to steer with. A heavy sea was running, and it was dark and misting. As | it swept us from the ship I saw the cap-| tain send up the surf signal. “When we were on top of the waves we could see the lights at the masthead and the electric lights on board. Then we would be out of sight.as the boat dropped The captain had given orders before I left to launch the life raft, but we could not see whether this was done or not. It was not many minutes— not more than twenty—after she struck that 1 was in the boat with the sailors. ““We drifted along for I don't know how | long. Both of us, Lider and myself, were | badly battered up. beach we were about a mile above Bolinas, midway between a high head and | the town. The sailor did not want to get out at first. killed. The sailor was afraid he was go ing to die, so I left him and walked in'o Bolinas for help. I walked him about 200 yards up the beach before leaving him. 1 ‘hollered’ loudly as I went along. I was nearly used up, but kept going, and fin- ally came to a house. They took me in and then went and brought my partner. People went out on the beach with lan- terns. “Bedding, pillows and a gangplank were ‘washed ashore before I left, which was z= soon as possible, as I wanted to telephone the owners. Mr. Hays drove me to San Rafael and I got In thefe a little after midnight. As we drove over the ridge we could see the vessel's lights. She was lying quartering on the reef.” RESCUE BY THE JESSIE MATSEN Captain Gibson Relates a Graphic Story of Weird Signal Fires of Distress. Burrill came over from San Rafael early yesterday morning, and about noon When we struck the | He was afrald he would be | | the gasoline schoor came in from Bolin th ten of crew of the doomed 1a. They First Assistant Engineer M. Gray Assistant Engineer John He | Joseph Simpson ana Josep ¥ Firemen Thomas Riley, John Toole and John Swanson, Cook Taylor Thorson and Seaman Jack Sohlin. Besides Logan, a passenger from Eureka, came back on the vessel. Every one of the | was soaked to the skin, and it was a | for ary clothes as soon as they | on the wharf at the foot Washington street. Captain Georgeé Gibson of the Jessis Matsen was 3n evewitness of the disas- | ter. “We were Iying at Bolinas, and | about 6 p. m. the Jaqua came along,” said | he yesterday. “I wondered what she was | doing so close to the point, and then was startled by one long whistle and then | three shott ones. Then the whistle began | to toot, toot, and I knew there was trou- | ble. Them, I afterward learned, the cap- | tain had blankets, bedding and inflam- | mable material gathered together and saturated with coal oil. This was set fira to and the blaze could be seen for miles. We made a fire on the beach to show them we were on the lookout. About 3 p. m. Chief Engineer Burrill and a man | named John Lider came ashore in omne of the ship's boats. They reported ‘all hands drowned,’ and said that John Dolstrom had been with them in the boat but had | been washed out and thrown against the side of the ship. “When day broke I stood down toward the stranded steamer and offered to take all hands off. Captaiy Bash sald ten of the men wanted to go, so I sent a boat. We had to make three trips. Four men came aboard the first trip, four on the second and two on the last. Before we left Bolinas Steward Frank Bindsile and his wife were ta%k¢n ashore. I learned that Mrs. Bindsile was formerly a Miss Floy Thomas, a Eureka girl, and has only lately been married. She was al- most crazy when the beach was reached se James set foot Gontinued on Page 14