The San Francisco Call. Newspaper, December 1, 1901, Page 36

[ TR RTY B e e e e e S S g Pages 35 10 48 } ; 444+ 0 Ottttttted OWIFT SAN RAFAEL BACKS A ? SAN FRANCISCO SUNDAY, DECEMBER 1, 1901. AY ERON T i L) btfl, BUT 15 TRUCK AMIDGHIPS AND SENT 10 BOTTON DISASTER CAUSES INTENSE FEELING ACROSS THE BAY Hundreds of Anxious Relatives Meet Sausalito. SurvivorsWarmly Re- | ceived by Their Friends. Captain Tribble Tells| of Rescue of the Passengers. - AUSALITO, Nov. 30.—The Sau- excitement had were ashore. austed, they were ., and those who t ding trace ito s ttle for- impaling pliot f life, it the San -y worked with- armony. Our down and f the sinking where peopie we lowered »wn_her. he believed the Ptk ed the captain re- s sake, don’t ask me.” were related d of how they then of their >wing words they e crews as f the pas- 1 at this point adway of the Treadway was 3431 -ese! and according Treadway has a wife ng here. A deckhand, a 1s also sald to be lost me §s not known. Those of the e sunken ship who arrived here did not see him on board the He started to lower the boats collision and 1o trace of him has then a cook on the Ban Ra- ed to return to the boat res n ort to secure the cash. nzie, learning of his inten- sim. Hawton persisted and on board the Sausalito. 1 to the dining-room he drowned 1 n. He swam about in the some time and succeeded in woman who fell near him. in placing the woman over small boat and finding no rd for him swam off again. , first mate of the Bausalito, the attorney a rope and got other survivors who re the Sausalito were 8. J. Ma. Market street, San Francisco. y. Pine and Devisadero streets, Fred C. Allen, 314 O'¥arrel] Francisco; E. A. McClure, 1 Francisco; W. T. Jones, Forbes, San Rafael: J. R. Rafael: E. C. Burtchall, King of W. & J. Floane, w Acisco, ense of uneasiness for thoce who were known to be passengers on the San Rufuel bad not abated here at a late hour. o arrived here on her re- | essel with ques- e San Rafael by the force | | e /%/’*/ /;7 7 77 97 NI Z5772 7575 3 i 2777 7 777 I ), i 7 ',(/////'//'V//, '}:l// 7 T R a1 #1217 W7 T 99 AN ) ) ,’//////,//// T ,%// 7 7 7 1) i L7 - STATES THAT MAN LOST HIS LIFE IN THE DINING-ROOM Jr— now stand. hold. FATED SAN RA FAEL AND CREW THAT MANNED HER HE San Rafael was built in New York and sent across the continent in picces. ponent part was carefully shipped in boxes and bundles and upon arriving on this coast in 1877 the steamer was ‘put together ovor at Steamboat Point, where the Union Iron Works Captain McKenzie has been master of the ill-fated steamer since the day she made her first trial trip. The San Rafael was 205 fect long and had a 32-foot beam and a 9-foot depth of Each com- The crew of the steamer when she went down was as follows: J. T. McKenzie, captain; Charles- Johnson, first mate; C. H. Jansen, second mate; James H. Jones, chief engineer; John | Campbell, assistant chicf engineer; John Clarke, fireman; Fred Peterson, watchman; Paul Zara, John Nelson, A. Swanson and J. Silva, deckhands; John Eller, porter. | FERRY STEAMER SAUSALITO PLOWS INTO SAN RAFAEL Continued From Page Twenty-One. dren. Women shouted franti- cally and men cursed. It was a fight for life, each one for him- self. Incidents of bravery there were, but they are locked up in the breasts of those who partici- pated in them. The darkness and the dense, murky fog made each | man’s fight his own. PANIC BEIZES CROWD. In the cabin the crowd congre- gated, or down in the warm sa- loon men played cards or drank their cocktails. - Even before the San Rafael pulled out of the slip there were few of the 250 passen- gers who were not timorous about the trip across the bay. Waitirig minute by minute many of the women had their nerves at the highest pitch before the ac- | cident occurred. Men less fear- | ful of prospective evil walked the upper deck straining their eyes for ships that pass in the night. | When the crash came the vision | of possible sudden death held all |in a vise-like grip. Action came after the recoil. When the San Rafael keeled |over to the port side from the effect of the shock the cabin pas- | sengers lost control of them- |selves. Windows were smashed, [and instead of reaching the deck by means of the ordinary - door exits they tore their hands and faces climbing through the ofién- |ings of shattered glass. Then came the confusion in the search for.life-preservers. The+San Ra- fael was a queerly built boat and few knew where these canvas- | covered located. floaters were | But they soon found out. Only ?an eye-witness can picture in his i mind the wild, chaotic fear mani- {fested by that seething, surging crowd, pushing, trampling, fizht- ling in the fullness of their terror. ORDER TO MAN BOATS. Orders t6 man boats were | given by Captain McKenzie of the San Rafael as soon as he -eal- |ized the fuli meaning of the col- lision. One crowd of twelve jumped into a lifeboat and were lowered, butsoon after swamped. They -clung to the gunwales of the small boat and were rescued There were men and women in this Jot and all were saved. One mother, in her excitement, fas- tened a life-preserver around her child, a little boy, and then threw him into the ivater. He was saved. But these means of es- cape were taken .only by those who suffered a great confusion of mind. To the more collected, after the first panic, the easiest road to safety was to jump irom one boat to another, By far the greater majority escaped this way. (. Then the Sausalito lowered her boats and began picking man, woman and child from impro- vised rafts, boats and ropes that were let down from the unin- jured ferry-boat. - Men clung to these ropes until nothing but their grit was left of them. Bodies well nigh frozen from the iciness of the water, and hands stiffened and cramped, they held on until ‘grim despair gave way to the | Tush of joy at being saved. | THE RESCUED REJOICE. Many there were last nigh | ebullient with joy at being re: icued from a watery grave, tha The piteous cry of the women | and the children still rang in their ears, and they feared that many | more were lost than was at first | supposed. |- While floating on their life- preservers W. L. Beedy, Miss Fannie Shoobert and Mrs. Olive Hamilton, of Sausalito, picked up a little boy. He was floating on a bench. All were saved. PASKING BOAT GIVES NO AID. The San Rafael sank slowly. While the cries of the affrighted were mingled with the throaty turmoil of the fog horns, a boat passed near the scene of the ac- | cident. Immediately a shout of distress went up. Men on the passing boat answered the cries of the distressed, but no help was given. Soon after the San Ra- fael disappeared with a fierce suc- tion. Then all was calm and quiet save the piercing fog whistle. Drenched ‘to" the skin, those who were rescued or saved them- selves scattered about the water front. . ‘Men, coatless, colorless and hatless, with scared looks in ‘their eyes, stood chattering on the street corners. Some still wore the life-preservers and would not give them up. Others came uptown and hurried to counteract the possibilities of { come to pass. - THRILLING AND HEROIC RESCUE THROWN INTO THE WATER BY ED OVERBOARD WHILE PANIC OF PASSENGERS WHO WERE THE COLLISION OR WHO JUMP- STRICKEN. — catching cold with warm internal draughts. The man who hd&l] ino friend aboard and who came ! {off unscathed was a happy mgn| indeed. | The news. of the disaster trav-| i eled quickly. When the Sausa~j | lito entered her slip on her return | Itrip the employes at the dock| scented the calamity. Hardly had } the boat made fast when the| men, terror-stricken women and | children, excited almost to deli- | rium, rushed over the gangplank | in great confusion. Telephones were in demand by the thought- | ful ones. Through the town the, news was disseminated and with- | in an hour the crowds around the bulletin-boards read the awful story. What San Francisco had been fearing for years had at last | | i i IS POSITIVE WOMEN WERE ON SAN RAFAEL WHEN SHE WENT DOWN Graphic Recital of J. D. Connolly, Ex- Consul General to New Zealand, a Passenger on the Sausalito. J. D. Connolly, ex-Consul General to New Zealand, was among the passengers | on the Sausalito at the time she collided with the San Rafael. He made the fol- lowing statement of the affair: “I was In the upper cabin reading a paper when T heard the crashing of tim- ber. The boat lurched to one side and came almost to a halt. There was great excitement among the passengers. The women screamed.and -a rush was made for the deck. The fog was intense, but before us loomed up a large fabric which 1 made out to be a steamer. Our bow was imbedded In the steamer's side, and 1 then realized that we were In collision. There was great excitement. It was then just 6:20 o'clock. Captain McKenzle was jssuing orders and ropes were secured. with which the two boats were fastened together. I saw people in the cabin of the San Ratael trying to get out by breaking the windows. Several passen- gers appeared on the wheel lework of the San Rafael and were a: d to the deck of the Sausalito by the passen- gers, We threw life preservers over- board to those we saw struggling in the water, I saw at least a dozen people in the water. “We were running on slow time when | told of the horror of the scene. Ecrowd surged forward. Dripping | o the crash cccurred. danger until the collision took place. I think some fifty or more people were as- sisted to the Sausalito from the San Rafael. I am not certain as to the num- ber, however. I am positive that there | were women and children in the cabin | of the San Rafael when she went down. This was about twenty minutes after the accident. There did not seem to be much discipline displayed by the officers of the San Rafacl. The work was done by the passengers rather than by the crew of that beat. After the San Rafael went down we drifted about aimlessly, and about an hour later we were told by a tugboat captain tha were near Fort Point. This gave Captain McKenzie our and we got Into the slip at 9:80 “l have no - means meny lives were lost, but the number must be considerable. I saw a number of people struggling irt the water and am certaln there were women and children In the cabin when the boat went, down. ‘The crew of the ‘Sausalitc 'did not acquit themselves very creditably. That - they were excitedywas evident. The rescue work was pefformed almost exclusively by the passengers of both bohts.™ of knowing how GRAPHIC DESCRIPTION OF DREAD DISASTER IN A WALL-LIKE FOG Benjamin F. Scouler Expresses Belisf That Few Lives Were Lost and That All Children Wers Saved. Benjamin F. Scouler of t U Marvin Co., said: - “I missed the 5:456 boat and went o on the San Rafael. It was Dl’e";“ll::,::l work from the time we left the slip. Oft Lombard-street wharf there was not a soul abcard knew where we were. It was like looking into a great big wall. We could hear bells being rung all around us and knew that we were somewhere in the vicinity of vessels at anchor. One of the bells we took to be the fog signal on Lombard-street wharf, but nobody was sure of it. Down toward the Golden Gate we heard a whistle going and some- body said it was the Lime Point signal. Somebody else remarked, ‘For God's sake what are we doing away down there® [ made the remark that we must be some- where off Alcatraz and at that moment there came a whistle through the fog. Before any of us had time to make an- other remark the Sausalito was down on top of us and everybody was making a scramble to g5 on board of her. The San Rafael was hit so hard that she heeled right over and I thought for a minute that she was going down bodily. Ig- stead of that she righted herself and the captain and officers went to work and lowered the lifeboats and got out the life preservers. ‘‘Everybody wanted a life preserver yet they dldn't. They wanted it l:ns hurry, or they didn’'t want it at all. The result of it was that nine-tenths of the life preservers on the ship were thrown overboard for anybody who might be the Continued on Page Thirty-Eight. -+ | I heard the whistle | | blow at intervals, but did not realize the | W. J. Boyd Sees Pas- senger Pinioned in Restaurant, Hartwell Either Killed by Timbers or Drowned. J. Brave Telegraph Op- | erator Makes Sev= | eral Rescues. J. BOYD, a tele- graph operator,who is a brother of Thomas P. Boyd, City Attorney of San Rafael, had one of the narrow- est escapes of gny one aboard the San Rafael, and yet there was perhaps nobody on the ili-fated steamer who after the collision performed more heroic services than he. Boyd's thrilling story bodes ill to the hope that there were no fatalities resulting from the accident. Boyd, who Is to-day laid up in bed from Injuries received trying to aid others, believes that a man named J. Hartwell was either killed in the res- taurant, where the prow of the-Sausalito rammed through the San ael, or so | badly injured that he was unable to es- cape and was carried to the bottom of the bay with the steamer when she went | down. Boyd last saw Hartwell when they | all made a mad rush out of the way of | the breaking timbers in the restaurant. Hartwell was pinned under a falling tim= ber and it looked as If he was dead. Boyd also tells a realistic story of the \rescue of oné child and the reported loss of anether. | When Boyd and his companions succeed- | ed in getting on the upper deck of the steamer they did not stop to consider their own injuries. The brave telegraph operator was. severely cut about the lips and he was limping from a bruised side, but he set about at once to lend his ald in the task of succoring the helpless wom- en and children. About the first person Boyd saw in dire distress was a Mrs. Wal- ler of Ross Station. The unfortunate woman was rushing around the upper | deck of the San Rafael with two helpless children holding tightly to her dress. Oue of the children was a boy about 4 years old, and the other a girl, slightly older. Boyd grabbed the two children and call- ing aloud to Mrs. Waller, told her to f5l- low him. The operator led the way to the side of the deck where the Sausalito’s passen- gers were casting lines to unfortunates aboard the San Rafael. On the way to safety Mrs. Waller became frantic and | hysterical and snatched the boy out of ‘\Boyd's arms. A moment later she dis- appeared from view and Boyd clambered over the side of the Sausalito with the other child safely folded away ‘In his arms. Later Mrs. Waller, In trying to | get aboard the Sausalito, fell over the side with her' boy in her arms. She was in the water quite a time, and when they finally pulled her out, she began walling and moaning over the disappearance of her ‘son. Seeing Boyd on the deck of the Sausaltto she ran up to him and cried: “My God! | My God! my boy is drowned!" | After landing Mrs. Waller's girl safely aboard the Sausalito, Boyd jumped into one of the Sausalito’s:lifeboats and with several other passengers ‘did good service in pulling people out ‘of the water. He saw alittle girl about:flve years of age floating on a bench and succeeded in res- cuing her. This child,; whose name is not known, was packed from the San Rafael by Charles F. Sciller of Sausalito. Its mother made her way along a nar- row gang plank some distance ahead. ‘When the party was halfway across the breach between.the vessels' widened and the plank dropped, plunging man, woman and baby into the water. Seciller lost sight of the woman and swam about with the child in his arms. There was no boat near nor dangling rope In sight and, becoming exhausted, the swimmer placed his little burden on a bench that was floating near by and swam back to the sinking ship. Mr. Boyd's sister was a passenger on the Sausalito on the trip to the ecity, but after the accident she turned around and went back to her home In San Rafael to rurse her brother's injuries. JAMES McCUE STRUCK BY FLYING TIMBERS AND BADLY INJURED James S. McCue, the well-known horse- man and old-time circus man, who lives at Corte Madera, was probably about the most serlously injured of the survivors. He was in the restaurant of the San Ra- fael at the time of the collision and was thrown across the room with considerable violence. He had his right arm broken, his right ear almost torn from his head and sustained internal injurfes which may prove very serfous. He is at present im the Central Emergency Hospital. _ He relates his experiences as follows: 1 was sitting at the head of the table in the ladles’ department of the restaurant. There ‘were three other passengers at the table. When the crash came 1 was sent spinning across the place. 1 found myself in a corner with my arm broken and my ear hanging down the side of my face. When I recovered from the shock 1 realized that sometbing serious had hap- and that the boat was going to sink. I managed to make my way on deck, where I found everything In confusion and everybody struggling to get inside of life-preservers. I pulled 'off my coat and threw It away. Thers Was #00 In greenbacks in the breast pocket, which I meant to transfer to my pantaloons, but forgot in the rush for a jumping-off placs. 1 found myself on the upper deck and just be- fore the steamer sank I leaped into the water. 1 to swim around until I caught hold of a line, to which I hung with my left hand for, nearly a quarter of an hour betore I was picked up. I Bave been h some pretty thing like this. At