Page:Atlantis Arisen.djvu/305

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.



fiercely tempestuous day just at nightfall, and was not seen until morning, when the guard's keen vision espied it through the mist, and for an instant only. The crew was at once put in marching order, but, the distance being too great for rapid communication, the captain secured the use of a tug in the bay to convey the life-saving apparatus to a point opposite the wreck, and distant four miles, the life-boat being towed through a tumultuous sea with the crew in their places. On disembarking, horses were hired, which dragged the beach-wagon and apparatus on a run across the sand spit to the beach where lay the "Grace Roberts," about four hundred yards from shore, broadside on, and full of water, her bulwarks and housing washed away, and the crew lashed in the rigging, while the spray from every inrolling wave was drenching and benumbing them. In two hours from the time the wreck was discovered a line had been shot on board, but so exhausted were the sailors that it was with difficulty they succeeded in hauling a hawser on board, by means of which and the life-buoy attached to it nine lives were saved. Just as the last man—the captain—was lifted, half frozen, out of the car, up came the crew from the life-saving station I have before mentioned, at Cape Disappointment, having made a run of twenty miles, hauling their beachwagon by means of horses. These incidents show great efficiency in the service at these two stations. Captain John Brown, of Toke Point, lost, in rescuing a crew, a son who had already won a medal by saving lives. It is certainly the severest service and the most humane of our public beneficent institutions, as well as one of the least rewarded.

To return to the nomenclature of this region,—it has been decided by the residents that Shoalwater Bay is a misnomer, and, the government being of the same opinion, the name has recently been changed on the government charts to Willapa Harbor, by which appellation it will hereafter appear on the map of Washington.