Title
Lifeboat from German liner Schiller, 1875
Subject
Lifeboat in foreground with view of St Mary's harbour in background at low tide with various sailing vessels. The German Transatlantic Steam Navigation liner Schiller.
Description
The Schiller, was a passenger steamer of 3,421 tons gross which sank on the May 7th 1875.
The Schiller had left New York for Habsburg via Plymouth on April 27th 1875, carrying 250 bags of Australian and New Zealand mail, a valuable general cargo, and £60,000 in American twenty-dollar gold piexes, 300,000 coins in all.
The Western Rocks were blanketed in dense fog that night, the worst in living memory, as this German Transatlantic Steam Navitgation liner crept towards the Isles of Scilly. By 8 o'clock that evening, Captain Thomas had reduced speed to four knots and posted double lookout. An hour later, with the Bishop Lighthouse still neither seen nor heard, volunteers from amongst the male passengers were asked as additional lookouts, witht the promise of a bottle of champagne to the first man to see her light or hear the Bishop Rock fog bell.
The prize was never collected, for just before ten o'clock the liner struck the Retarriers, having passed inside the lighthouse. Her engines pulled her clear of the rocks, but three huge waves in succession struck her beam-on, and the stricken vessle was flung broadside on to the reef. Rockets and signal-guns were fired- some of the witnesses later gave their number as at least ten- but these were mistaken by the lighthouse-keepers and islanders alike as a vessel signaly her arrival off Scilly, as was the custom.
Pandemonium broke out on deck amongst the fear-crazed passengers and the captain was obliged to fire a revolver over their heas to retain some order, but there was little hope for anyone.
The Schiller only carried eight boats, two of which were reduced to matchwod when the funnel collapsed across them. Two others jammed in their chocks due to the ship's heavy list, one capsized as soon as it touched the sea and another smashed against the hull in lowering and hung useless from its davits. Only two boats finally got clear and drifted off into the gloom of the night. For 320 men, women and children left aboard that night, it was to be one of mounting horror.
Of the Schillers original complement of fifty-nine saloon, seventy-five second class and one hundred and twenty sterage-class passengers, plus one hundred and one crew, a total of 355, only 42 men and one woman survived.
Description taken from Richard Larn, Cornish Shipwrecks:Isles of Scilly (Newton Abbot: David & Charles, 1971), p. 38-42.
The Schiller had left New York for Habsburg via Plymouth on April 27th 1875, carrying 250 bags of Australian and New Zealand mail, a valuable general cargo, and £60,000 in American twenty-dollar gold piexes, 300,000 coins in all.
The Western Rocks were blanketed in dense fog that night, the worst in living memory, as this German Transatlantic Steam Navitgation liner crept towards the Isles of Scilly. By 8 o'clock that evening, Captain Thomas had reduced speed to four knots and posted double lookout. An hour later, with the Bishop Lighthouse still neither seen nor heard, volunteers from amongst the male passengers were asked as additional lookouts, witht the promise of a bottle of champagne to the first man to see her light or hear the Bishop Rock fog bell.
The prize was never collected, for just before ten o'clock the liner struck the Retarriers, having passed inside the lighthouse. Her engines pulled her clear of the rocks, but three huge waves in succession struck her beam-on, and the stricken vessle was flung broadside on to the reef. Rockets and signal-guns were fired- some of the witnesses later gave their number as at least ten- but these were mistaken by the lighthouse-keepers and islanders alike as a vessel signaly her arrival off Scilly, as was the custom.
Pandemonium broke out on deck amongst the fear-crazed passengers and the captain was obliged to fire a revolver over their heas to retain some order, but there was little hope for anyone.
The Schiller only carried eight boats, two of which were reduced to matchwod when the funnel collapsed across them. Two others jammed in their chocks due to the ship's heavy list, one capsized as soon as it touched the sea and another smashed against the hull in lowering and hung useless from its davits. Only two boats finally got clear and drifted off into the gloom of the night. For 320 men, women and children left aboard that night, it was to be one of mounting horror.
Of the Schillers original complement of fifty-nine saloon, seventy-five second class and one hundred and twenty sterage-class passengers, plus one hundred and one crew, a total of 355, only 42 men and one woman survived.
Description taken from Richard Larn, Cornish Shipwrecks:Isles of Scilly (Newton Abbot: David & Charles, 1971), p. 38-42.
Creator
Gibson
Date
1875-05-07
Rights
Morrab library
Format
Print
Identifier
RGN.008
Coverage
St. Mary's harbour, St. Marys, Isle of Scilly
Physical Dimensions
8" x 6"