CHAPTER V.THE LIST OF PASSENGERS.
Wemust pause yet once more before accompanying the voyagers, that we may know as many of them as we possibly can. Many we perhaps shall never know: their very names are already forgotten; or if we turn to look at them they tell of no history, and suggest no personal remembrance. On such a day they were in theLondon, on such a day they sank with her in the Bay of Biscay. This is all perhaps we shall ever know concerning them.
A gentleman, who knew most of the passengers on board—and we give an authorized list of the names in the Appendix—when he heard of the catastrophe, remarked, that it would throw half Melbourne into mourning. Doubtless it will, and into how many other places besides will not the news of the catastrophe carry mourning? That one poor Bavarian, those two hapless Danes, had they no friends in the world to shed a tear over their watery grave? We dare not forget that each one, as he embarked, carried within him, as it were, a very world of varied interest, and that the hopes and sympathies of the unknown and poor were as precious and beautiful to those who knew and loved them, as were the plans and fortunes of the well-known and wealthy to the circle of which they formed part. Every death we see recorded should bring before us, in imagination, a bier, around which we see gathering a collection of mourners, refusing to be comforted, because their loved one is not. When we hear of a multitude of persons perishing in some dread calamity like the present, we must remember that, while all died together,each died alone, and will be mourned as if he alone had died. More than two hundred individual worlds of thought and feeling, of sympathy and design, went down beneath the ocean wave on that wild stormy afternoon. Each of these worlds was perhaps the very sun of other worlds, that will now receive a sudden and awful shock. Many men, many poor men even, so live that they are centres of operations which, although not brilliant in the world’s estimation, are of the deepest possible interest to all concerned in them, and when they die, it is as if the sun had been removed out of its place.
Nor do we forget, as we take up the list of passengers who went out in theLondon, that every one had a separate and solemn history. We do not forget that the issues of life were unspeakably important, not only to all, but, in a very solemn manner, to each—to the poor Danish sailor as well as to the Oxford scholar: we do not forget that to each one on board, this question was proposed amid circumstances most appalling, “What shall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own soul, or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?” We dare not forget the infinite value of every soul on board.
As, during the week which followed the mournful announcement that theLondonhad foundered, we looked each day into the first column of theTimes, or as country newspapers reached us, we tried more and more vividly to realize how much that list of the drowned meant, and how names that we had read confusedly amidst a mass of others, became eloquent with interest as we caught snatches here and there of the life-history belonging to them. But we have no doubt that there was not one on board whose history was completely destitute of interest and charm, to some few at least, and that tears have been shed for many who were nothing more than plain,humble people, getting an honourable living by the sweat of their brow, and who will find no biographer to tell the unassuming story of their lives. In the scores of shipwrecks that occur every year, the worthy unknown should not be without the sympathy, if they are shut out from the recognition which well-known names immediately demand. Of late years, perhaps, if we may judge from the newspapers, from letters which have reached us, and from interviews with friends of the deceased, there has not often been a wreck in which such a variety of characters had each to act a most solemn part. On board theLondonthere was life beginning and life ending in the aged and the young who were going out to the new land. There was the competence which had come after arduous and successful toil, and there was the poverty whose only capital lay hidden in its hopeful industry: there was the lawyer and the divine, the merchant and the engineer, the man of letters and the rude brawny artisan; the actor and the banker; the experienced traveller and the humble villager from Cornwall. Something of the varied life of the world at large lay mirrored in that vessel that was preparing to steam away from Plymouth. The brief notices of deaths which appeared day after day revealed dark depths of sorrow, into which one was almost afraid to look,—tragedies enacted full of horror unspeakable.
Let us glance for a moment at those of whom we know nothing beyond their names, before proceeding to notice those whose position in society and whose well-known histories speedily found biographers.
On the 11th inst., lost at sea, on board the steamshipLondon, James Thomas, Esq., late of London, formerly of Huddersfield, Yorkshire, together with his beloved wife andtwo children; also Elizabeth Hartley, for many years a most faithful servant of the above.
On the 11th inst., lost at sea, in the steamshipLondon, aged 23, John Ruskin Richardson, youngest son of the late John George Richardson, Esq., many years a resident of Sydney, New South Wales.
On the 11th instant, in the steamshipLondon, in his twenty-first year, Archibald, seventh son of Hellen Sandilands, of 56, Belsize-park, and of the late John Sandilands of Conduit-street.
On the 11th instant, lost at sea, in the steamshipLondon, on her voyage to Melbourne, Gilbert Andrew Amos, Esq., Police Magistrate and Warden, Heidelburg, Victoria, and third son of the late Andrew Amos, Esq., of St. Ibbs, Hitchin, Herts; also, at the same time and place, Isabella Dick Amos, wife of the above; also, at the same time and place, Miss Catherine McLachlan, aged 22, sister of the said Isabella Dick Amos.
On the 11th inst., in the steamshipLondon, on her voyage to Melbourne, Edward Youngman, Esq., aged 44, greatly beloved and regretted by a numerous circle of friends.
On the 11th inst., lost at sea, in the steamshipLondon, George F. P. Urquhart, Esq., of Evandale, Auckland, New Zealand, and Mary Chauncy, his wife, late of 11, Kensington-park Villas, W., daughter of the late Major James Burke, of the 77th and 99th Regiments, of Arlaman, county Limerick, Ireland.
These are only a few instances out of many that might be given; but now to look at names, well known, take first the story of the Cumberland emigrants.
It appears that no less than ten persons who went out intheLondonwere connected with Cumberland; one family, consisting of William Graham, his wife, and three children, having gone from Carlisle. It is a sad story—one which cannot be read even by strangers without the most sorrowful feelings. William Graham, tailor, aged 51 years; Ellen, his wife, 49 years; George, his son, 10 years; a daughter, 3 years; a baby, aged 4 months; Thomas Graham, aged 40 years; Mary, his wife, aged 27 years; David Graham, aged 37 years; David McVittie, aged 30 years, blacksmith, Newtown; and John Little, aged 30 years, fireman on the North British Railway. The three Grahams were brothers. Thomas had been out in Victoria twelve years, and David followed him four years afterwards, and had since been engaged in business with him. Success followed their farming operations, until they were enabled to purchase an estate. In their prosperity the brothers were not unmindful of their old home, and during the prevalence of distress at Longtown, in consequence of the cotton famine, they generously sent over a sum of 60l.for the relief of the sufferers. They also sent a large amount of relief to Manchester. In August last they came to England, with the view of seeing their friends, and of purchasing implements. Upwards of 1000l.they laid out in this way, and sent out before them a variety of implements for the farm. Thomas had another purpose to effect, also, in visiting the old country, and that was to marry, and take home with him a wife. He married Sarah Bruce, a native of Banff, and they were married only a week before they left Carlisle to take up their berths on board theLondon. Their brother, William Graham, agreed to go out with them, they paying his passage, and he took with him his family, as stated above. Little andMcVittie, friends of the Grahams, were also going out with them. Both men were in the employ of the North British Railway Company, Little as fireman, and McVittie as a blacksmith. Little was a remarkably steady and amiable young man. He was the eldest of a family of eleven children, and is survived both by his father and mother. The whole party of emigrants left for London on the 27th of December last, and a large number of friends assembled to bid them farewell, and three hearty cheers were given as the train started. Such were ten at least who had each a history inestimably precious to a wide circle of friends at home and abroad, and, simple though these people were by the side of more brilliant names, there is a quiet naturalness about their story that will appeal to many hearts.
On board theLondonalso was Mr. Henry John Dennis, a gentleman of some note in Australia and America. A few years ago Mr. Dennis narrowly escaped shipwreck in theMarco Polo, a vessel that in speed and celebrity used to compete with theSuffolkwhen Captain Martin commanded her. In the middle of the night, in the Southern Ocean, theMarco Polostruck an iceberg; but on that terrible occasion Mr. Dennis had been of some service. He had since been a very active colonial explorer, and had for many months been engaged in a hazardous hunting expedition in the wild regions and among the savage tribes which lie at the back of Port Natal. He is understood also to be the first, if not the only Englishman who has grown cotton in the Southern States of the American Union by free negro labour. Starting for America while the civil war was at its height, he took a plantation on the Mississippi, and though he had to cope with plundering bands of guerillas and with many other dangers and inconveniences, he nevertheless succeeded in raising a crop, and only retired when he found that in the then existingstate of things it was utterly impossible to grow cotton without great pecuniary loss as well as personal risk.
There was a clergyman on board, distinguished for his many and varied gifts, and who was beloved by a very wide circle of friends, both in England and Australia—the Rev. Dr. Woolley, to whose worth and talents Dean Stanley and Sir Charles Nicholson, formerly Speaker of the Legislative Assembly of New-South Wales, have paid the very warmest tribute, as, indeed, have a host of the scholarly and worthy of the land. Dr. Woolley was in the 49th year of his age, and his course in life had been one of usefulness and honour in the branches of learning to which he had specially devoted himself. His life had been that of the Professor rather than of the working clergyman. He matriculated at University College, London, but subsequently removed to Oxford, where in 1836 he took a first-class degree in classics. On leaving Oxford, he became successively Head Master of Rossal School, in Lancashire, and of King Edward’s Grammar School at Norwich. This last office he relinquished on obtaining the appointment of Professor in 1852, in the University of Sydney, which had just been incorporated under an Act of the local Legislature. His duties in this new position were most important, as upon him devolved the organization and successful working, under circumstances of great difficulty, of a great national institution. But he threw himself into the work cast upon him with enthusiasm, and laboured with untiring zeal and energy. He succeeded in a very marked degree in winning to himself and moulding the taste and character of the young men placed under his control. The gentleness—almost feminine—of his nature, the warmth and generosity of his heart, his distinguished attainments as a scholar, and the eloquence and earnestness with which he was wont to impart instruction, notonly to the Undergraduates of the University, but to the members of various popular institutions with which he was connected, have been tenderly spoken of, and will be long remembered by hundreds of persons. He came to this country a few months ago for rest, and very pleasant to himself, and to those who knew him, was his brief sojourn here. From many, as we at least read the matter, there came tempting inducements to settle down in England among associations more consonant with a refined taste than those of colonial life; but with him, too, the mainspring of life was obedience to duty, and he must return to the work waiting to be done by him. He had been exceedingly happy here. A writer inMacmillansays that one who saw him during his latest days in England writes of himthus:—
“His tastes were those of a refined and cultivated man. He told me that his stay here, mixing in the society of men of letters, had been a delight to him beyond what I, who was always in it, could conceive. Had he met Tennyson and Browning, nothing could be more to his taste than the companionship of such men, with whom his own qualities made him a most welcome guest. He had in perfection the bright, gentle, cheery manner that characterizes the best Oxford man. In stature he was small, but his face most pleasant to look at. He was very active in all sorts of societies and institutions for the benefit of working-men and men engaged in business. His age must have been about fifty, but he looked younger. He had a wife and six children waiting his return to Sydney, whither, as I perceived, he was determined to go, for he felt his work lay there, and his duty. He went back to fulfil his duty, and has fulfilled it. He is remembered by many whom he left in England as the good man—John Woolley.”
There was another passenger of celebrity on board—Mr.G. V. Brooke. He was of respectable family, and some members of it were highly distinguished in literature. In early boyhood he had been a pupil of Lovel Edgeworth, the brother of Maria Edgeworth. His father, who was an architect, had other views concerning him than those which the son lived to fulfil. He was educated with a view to the bar; but while quite young he was thrown amongst those who were devoted to private theatricals, and he was so captivated that he relinquished his law studies and applied himself to theatrical pursuits. He met with some successes, and many reverses, particularly in Australia. Of all places in the world, after his many ups and downs in life, on the morning of the 6th January he was on board theLondon, and his sister was with him.
G. V. BROOKE.
G. V. BROOKE.
We had written thus far when there came a note from a surgeon, saying that if we would call in a street near the General Post Office, information of an interesting character awaited us. It concerned the loss of those of whose death there had been no advertisement—Mr. and Mrs. Clarke, with their son, a young man of twenty-one years. The mourning garments, the pale, sunken look of woe, the open photographic album, near to which were black-bordered notes, told at once of some one lost, and of tears shed, of which few had taken notice. Mr. Clarke had gone to Melbourne more than thirty years before, accompanied by his wife and two or three children. He had prospered there as a saddler, and as the years went by, he was enabled to bring up a large family in every comfort and respectability. There was born to him a son, however, who unhappily, through a diseased bone, had a useless arm. The sight of the youth’s sufferings was always painful to his parents, and so it came to pass that last year the aged people, as they were now, determined to come toEngland to obtain the best advice. Money was no object, and they reckoned that for about £1500 the three might come and go, and perhaps the son be cured. They came, enjoyed themselves immensely, heard preachers of whom they had often heard but never seen; went about here and there; and, best of all, under an operation performed by Sir W. Ferguson, the son’s arm was cured, and made whole as the other. Mr. Clarke would have taken back with him a brave little boy, around whose neck we saw the arm of a mother fondly thrown, as if she would thus keep the child safe. He would have made the boy’s fortune his care out in Melbourne; but the mother kept her child; and Mr. and Mrs. Clarke, and their son, rejoicing in his recovered strength, went on board theLondon, to be met on the other side of the sea, as they hoped, by their children and grandchildren. Before sailing, the father wrote a letter, the last words of which were a prayer, and it was with inexpressible comfort, in the midst of grief, that the relatives of the family reflected that the three were not unprepared to die.
Week by week will reveal more and more of the preciousness of those on board to those who now mourn their loss. But the story will never be completely told. Numbers will be mourned in secret, of whom we shall know nothing until the sea gives up its dead.