The Wreck of the Jonge Louisa - a gift from the sea

A post from the Balfour Blogger #1:

On 12th February 1785, Pat Hagart, Factor to the Earldom of Orkney, sat down at his desk in Kirkwall and began a two year correspondence with Messrs Jean Texier, ship owners in Amsterdam, which ended with a fraction of the value of their beautiful brigantine and her cargo being delivered to them in January 1787.

Pat Hagart, as representative of the Crown in matters of the sea, had received news of a remarkable event off Deerness, the most easterly parish on mainland Orkney, and had gone to there to investigate.

D5-29-3 Extract of Letter written by Pat Hagart in 1785

In the previous month of 1785, on Sunday 16th January, a brigantine had been found three or four leagues east of Orkney. She was in a desperate condition...and with much difficulty brought to land but without any person aboard. Pat Hagart does not say who had first spotted her, but that seven boats from Deerness went out to the stricken vessel and established that not a single person remained aboard.

Example of an 18th century Brigantine
By John Robinson, George Francis Dow - The Sailing Ships of New England 1607-1907,
Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=31394623

The brigantine was found at least 11 miles/16.5 kilometres out. It was January, when the weather could be inclement and dangerous, yet someone in Deerness or out at sea to the east saw the vessel and then William Stove of Pickletillum, Robert Stove of Sandside, Andrew Cormack of Netherby, Oliver Craigie of Breck, Edward Ritch of Cutpool, Andrew Skea in Copinsay and Edward Pottinger (probably of Copinsay) set out, with 33 others, at the oars of seven boats to see what was afoot.

What they found was the Jonge Louisa, the wreck of a beautiful ship, minus one of her masts and no-one answering the Deerness men when they hailed her. Somehow the men boarded her and with much difficulty brought [her] to land.

A Brigantine Caught on a Lee Shore Painting by Richard Henry Nibbs

It is not clear where the Jonge Louisa was brought to; probably first to the island of Copinsay and subsequently to Sandside on the east coast of Deerness. Pat Hagart describes her in his letter on 9th April 1785 as being in an unfavourable situation. In November 1785 Thomas Balfour, on behalf of his brother John Balfour, owner of Copinsay, was claiming salvage on the Jonge Louisa. This suggests she was moored off Copinsay, or on Copinsay, at some time. Thomas also writes of bringing her into Sandside.

The excitement and speculation in Deerness must have been enormous. The men who brought her in were all from the east side of the parish. They were experienced seamen, the workforce of a peninsula that is almost an island, living by a combination of the land and the sea. Life was not easy in 1785. High numbers of young men were leaving Orkney to join the British Army, the Royal Navy or to go to the Nor Wast to work for the Hudson Bay Company in Canada. But that January Deerness fielded 40 men to rescue the Jonge Louisa. The possibilities for advantage from saving her were considerable and the news of her discovery will, no doubt, have travelled throughout the parish quickly.

Imagine the news spreading around Deerness from house to house in a place where many people were close family to one another and a community of neighbours and friends. There would have been amazement, a need to hear about how she had been brought in, and, much more importantly, what might be salvageable from her. Was there a cargo? What was it? In what condition? What about the outfitting of the ship? What about the crew's possessions? What was re-usable? Sails, ropes? Endless possibilities. And last, but not least, what had happened to her luckless crew?

Imagine too all the discussion by the men of the parish on what to do next. Inspection of the hold showed she carried iron and thousands of planks of wood (deals). Whilst the deals were manna from heaven to Deerness, the iron was a problem, to know how to process it and disappear it into the community, as was the ship herself. The decision must therefore have been made, probably reluctantly, to let the Crown's representative in Orkney, Pat Hagart, know of the Jonge Louisa's rescue and also Thomas Balfour, representative of one of the main landowners in Deerness.

The news of the ship's arrival appears to have taken some time to reach Pat Hagart. Note the Jonge Louisa's arrival on the 16th January and that Pat Hagart's letter is not written until the 12th February. In his letter to Amsterdam, Hagart advises that he found the ship to be load with Deals [and] iron, but strip'd of every thing that could be carried away. Just how bare was she when she arrived?

D5-29-3 Extract of letter written by Pat Hagart to Messrs Jean Texier in Feb 1785

Hagart does not give a date for his visit to Deerness but he had to go over her with a very fine tooth comb indeed to find any clue as to her ownership. He found a paper wrote in the Dutch language but very much spoilt with salt water and that gave him enough information to conclude he should write to Messrs Texier.

D5-29-3 Extract of letter written by Pat Hagart to Messrs Jean Texier in Feb 1785

Given that he did not put quill to paper until mid-February, and that there was good money to be made from the salvage of the ship and a cut in the disposal of a valuable cargo, it is reasonable to think that Hagart did not delay in writing to Messrs Texier once he knew who owned her. So any other delay in the matter was either on the part of the landowner Dr Thomas Balfour or the Deerness men. Given too that Balfour might turn her arrival on his shores to his advantage, the conclusion that Deerness men, fully aware of the claims landowner and Crown might pursue, held back on the news of her arrival, and took best advantage of what cargo no-one could argue to have been on board her when she was taken to shore. Only Deerness men could say what was still removable at that point...

Or a Danish Captain who had reported to Messrs Texier that he had seen and clearly boarded the Jonge Louisa off the Norwegian coast near the island of Hitra (previously Hitteroe) after 9th December 1784. (see below)

Pat Hagart's letter would have left Orkney by ship in trusted hands and been passed along a pathway of further trusted hands until it finally arrived in Amsterdam. Messrs Texier received Pat's letter and responded on 18th March 1785. This letter produced a response from Pat on 9th April, a speedy turnaround for the time. 

Messrs Texier were able to give a detailed account of events leading up to the arrival of the Jonge Louisa off Orkney. The ship, under the command of Captain Nathaniel Pronk, had headed from Holland, north through the Skagerrak and then south through the Cattegat, into the Baltic Sea, and to St Petersburg where she was loaded with iron, and thence to Wybourg (now Vyborg on the Russian side of the Russian/Finnish border) where a large cargo of wood was loaded. The iron belonged to Messrs Texier and the wood to Messrs Mauritz, Dreyer and Bendix with whom Pat Hagart would liaise regarding the eventual sale of the wood.

D5-29-3 Extract of letter written by Messrs Jean Texier, Amsterdam to Pat Hagart in March 1785

The Jonge Louisa turned south again, heading back to Amsterdam, came successfully back through the Baltic Sea, the Cattegat and the Skagerrak, but on or about the 9th December, being on the Coast of Jutland, the sea being very high with a great Storm, the boats having got loose and fallen upon the Hatches, tore them to pieces and the ship got soon full of water. In such condition having nothing to live upon, the Captain and Crew took to the boat and were taken up at Sea by an English Captain who carried them to Dieppe and thence back to Amsterdam to report the abandonment of the ship. 

Basic representation of the last journey of the Jonge Louisa.
Orange is the route she should have taken back to Amsterdam;
Purple shows roughly where she was blown off course to after the crew abandoned her.

Messrs Texier had some suspicion that the vessel had been left too soon by the Crew and made enquiries in Norway, being advised by a Danish Captain, that she had been seen not far from Hiether Wie (now Hitra). The Danish Captain reported his removal of the ship's cable and the greater part of the kitchen furniture. There were no further reports of her being seen until 31 days after the storm, when she appeared off Deerness, having come across the North Sea in one piece, pushed across by the east winds. 

D5/29/3 Extract from letter written by Messrs Jean Texier re Danish Captain, 7th June 1785

Once the Crown, via the Earldom, and the Balfours were involved, the Deerness inhabitants lost control of the ship and cargo but local men were employed later in 1785 to unload the vessel and transfer her cargo to Kirkwall for sale. The ship and cargo were kept under watch until dispersal, with that watch organised by Thomas Balfour's main man in Deerness, George Louttit, schoolmaster. Is his report tongue in cheek when he describes a gale on 20 October 1785, in which some of the deals were damaged? Louttit lived in Deerness and one of his sisters was married to James Petrie at Stonehall. Might his loyalties have been divided between his employer and his family's best interests?

The men who finally unloaded the Jonge Louisa were Gilbert Wick, Thomas Miller, Robert Stove, Magnus Dick, John Laughton, John Sutherland, Hugh Peace, William Work, a second Hugh Peace and William Sinclair. Is Robert Stove a young Sergeant? (See our previous blog post here). He is probably not the same Robert Stove of Sandside who helped bring the ship under control, for that group of the original seven men were in hot dispute with Pat Hagart over salvage monies. It was the opinion, when the men ultimately went to law in the autumn of 1785, of David Balfour lawyer in Edinburgh and brother of landowner Thomas Balfour, that they had no claim on the cargo of the ship, but they did have a salvage claim for the ship itself and in the end they received £70 between them for their efforts, equivalent to approximately £6000 today. Presumably it was further sub-divided with the 33 men who helped in the initial rescue of the ship.

D2/52/12 - Extract showing the result of the court case where £70 was awarded to
Deerness men for salving the ship, 16th Jan 1786

A shipwreck was a valuable event and everyone involved in processing that wreck could make money and benefit from her arrival. In the case of the Jonge Louisa, the bounty was great, and there was none of the extra effort of feeding, clothing and generally looking after her crew. The Earldom dealt with her salvage and the ultimate sale of her cargo, and the ship itself, being paid for work done by the ship's and cargo's owners. Having the opportunity to purchase and sell the cargo, the Balfours received salvage monies, bought parts of the cargo and no doubt made money from that. Others, for example: Kenneth Sutherland of Campston bought deals from the cargo; George Louttit was paid for his endeavours in Deerness; the boatmen who rescued her were paid; their lawyer was paid; the men who unloaded the ship were paid. Who knows what other bounty also furnished the houses and farms and boats of Deerness following the arrival of the Jonge Louisa.

D2/52/2  Extract showing the final salvage amount made from the wreck.

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Sources used: 

Balfour papers: D2/23/3; D2/52/2; D2/52/9

Graemeshall papers: D5/29/3

History of Orkney by W P L Thomson

Google Maps

Wikipedia

Iolaire Tragedy

Today our thoughts are with the people of the Island of Lewis over in the Western Isles who lost so many family and friends on the night of the 31st December 1918/1st January 1919. Tragedy struck when the HM Yacht Iolaire was wrecked off the harbour of Stornoway and many servicemen on their way home for leave lost their lives.

Here is how it was reported in The Orcadian newspaper on Thursday 9th January 1919:

NAVAL DISASTER NEAR STORNOWAY - Over 200 Lives Lost

In the early hours of Wednesday morning last week just outside the harbour of Stornoway and within a few yards of their native shore, over 200 Lewismen lost their lives under most distressing circumstances. Some 500 soldiers and sailors were coming to the island on New Year leave. The numbers were beyond the capacity of the mail steamer Sheila, and some 200 naval ratings were being conveyed from Kyle of Lochalsh to Stornoway on board HM yacht Iolaire, which in addition carried a crew of 24. The ship which was in charge of Commander Mason, left Kyle about 8pm, an hour ahead of the Sheila. She had an excellent passage across the Minch with a fair wind from the south freshening as the voyage proceeded.

HM Yacht Iolaire

Between 1 and 2 o'clock am she was approaching Stornoway Harbour, the lights on Arnish Point and the beacon off the harbour entrance being quite visible. The passengers were in high spirits, eagerly anticipating their New Year holiday. For some reason quite inexplicable, the vessel, instead of turning into Stornoway Harbour, proceeded right across the harbour mouth and ran ashore at full speed near Holm head. By this time the wind had increased to the force of a moderate gale, and there was a high sea running on the leeshore, where the Iolaire had struck.

Some interesting narratives have been gleaned from survivors, who unfortunately are few.



GREAT PANIC ON BOARD

A young naval reservist said -

"It was very dark there being no moon, but the atmosphere was clear, and lights were distinctly visible at a great distance. As we were approaching Arnish Lighthouse we commenced getting our kits together, expecting to be safely alongside Stornoway Pier in a few minutes. It was about ten minutes to two and I was in the saloon when there came a great crash, and the vessel heeled heavily to starboard. It was so dark that we could not see the land, which, as afterwards transpired, was only thirty yards distant from the point where we struck. I don't think it was a rock we struck, but just that we ran ashore.
When the ship listed the seas came breaking over, and I should say forty or fifty men jumped overboard. I think everyone of them was drowned. There was a great panic on board. Two life-boats were launched, and both were swamped. From the first one man scrambled back on board. With this exception I think all the men who went into the boats were drowned. When the Iolaire struck she was bow on to the land, but about ten minutes afterwards she lifted and drove a little seawards, afterwards coming in stern first and falling broadside to the shore. Rockets were fired, and by their light I could see that her stern was not more than seven yards from a ledge of rocks jutting out from the shore, and amidships she was within twenty yards of the only available place for landing. The seas were breaking over the stern, but many were tempted to try to reach the rocks, which were so near.
I don't think any of them succeeded, for there was a very strong current running between the ship's stern and the ledge of rocks, and I believe there were scores of men dashed to death against the rocks. When the second or third rocket went up I observed a line hanging into the sea from one of the davits amidships, and as the vessel being broadside on, was breaking the force of the sea on the shore at this part, I let myself down by the line, got hold of a bit of the wreckage, and tried to make the shore. However I got entangled in the ropes hanging from one of the boats that had been swamped. I managed to get clear, however, and finally reached the shore.
As far as I know, I was the first man to get to land. I went out on the ledge of rocks towards the stern of the ship to see if I could get a line passed to me from those on board, but the sea was breaking over the rocks. I was twice washed off the ledge. I then saw that another man had got ashore where I had landed, and he had a life-line with him by means of which we got a hawser ashore. All the men who were saved scrambled ashore by the aid of this rope. I cannot say how many there were. Ultimately the Iolaire fell off to port and the hawser snapped.
I was very exhausted and dazed, and was wandering about for an hour or two before I found the farmhouse where all of us who got ashore were hospitably entertained."

Another young Lewisman who had joined voluntarily since the war began said this was his third experience of being shipwrecked. He was on the auxiliary cruiser Avenger, which was torpedoed and lost out from Scapa Flow, and subsequently on the auxiliary cruiser Champagne, which was torpedoed and lost in the Irish Channel. He said he was in the saloon when the Iolaire struck. He got ashore by means of the rope. As the vessel was swinging out and in, the rope was by turns slack and taut, and several of the men who tried to save themselves by means of it failed to retain their grip and were shaken off and drowned when the rope with a snap became suddenly taut.
After the hull of the Iolaire disappeared, one plucky lad, Donald Morrison, of 7 Knockard, continued to hang onto the mast. It was impossible to render assistance from the sea owing to the position of the wreck. When the storm subsided Morrison was taken off in a very exhausted condition after being eight hours in his precarious perch.

HMY Iolaire Disaster Marker

STORNOWAY, FRIDAY [3rd Jan]
It was ascertained at the local office of the Admiralty to-day that there are at least 75 survivors of the disaster which occurred on New Year's morning. The names of 67 of the men who were on leave and 5 of the crew of the Iolaire were supplied, and it was added that there were three other men who were known to have escaped, but who had not reported at the office, with the result that full particulars regarding them are lacking. There is, further, a possibility that one or two other survivors may turn up. A few men, immediately they reached safety, made for their homes on the island, and all the survivors are now scattered over the various hamlets to which they belong.
The number of the crew is now known definitely to have been 23, and the estimate of the strength of the contingent of leave men who were allotted to the yacht is today given authoritatively as 250, a total of 273 on board. The loss of life in the disaster may therefore be given as approximately 200 men.
A number of messages of sympathy were received yesterday in Stornoway including one from the King [George V]. It was as follows:-
"For the Rear-Admiral, officers and ratings, and relatives of those who lost their lives in HMY Iolaire.- His Majesty King and Queen were shocked to hear of the disaster which has overtaken the naval leave boat returning to Stornoway, and send their deepest sympathy to all the bereaved families."
The following reply was also despatched:-
"The Rear-Admiral, officers, ratings and relatives beg to thank their Majesties for their gracious message of sympathy, which will greatly assist those who are bereaved to bear their grief."
The work of recovering the bodies is still being carried out by Navy man with the assistances of some of the local fishermen. The weather has been possible to conduct dragging operations from small boats. Altogether 41 bodies were taken up to-day, bringing the total of the bodies recovered to 88. The bodies when found by the men in the small boats are taken to an Admiralty drifter, and thence conveyed to one of the harbour piers.


Commemorations are planned in the Western Isles today, see here for more information.