 |
 |
|
|
"April the 6th 1901" One of the most colourful stories ever to come out of Llyn was the loss of the Iron Barque “Stuart” which came to grief on the north coast at Porth Ty Mawr (near Porth Colmon) on a foggy and drizzly morning, on the 6th of April 1901. She left Liverpool on Good Friday bound for New Zealand with a load of porcelain, Whisky, and a general cargo that included amongst other things, Pianos and Cotton bales. When she left the Mersey she had to be towed all the way to Holyhead because of a stiff westerly wind, then she had a long tack towards the Irish coast, followed by a second tack back towards Llyn. Ordinarily this would have taken the Stuart well to the south of Bardsey island and into the relative safety of Cardigan bay, but with the effects of a flood tide and a westerly wind she was still on the wrong side of the Peninsula (North) but with the poor visibility her crew couldn’t of known this, as the only usable navigational aids they had at their disposal was a compass and log line, which only gave them the ships heading and distance traveled but not their position!!! Now there are two things that I would like to clear up about this mishap. (First) Some say the reason she was wrecked was that she ran over the Sorrento, a three masted American sailing vessel that foundered in a storm at the very same spot thirty one years earlier in October of 1870, this is utter nonsense, lets face it, if she ran over the Sorrento which was only in a few feet of water, and within a stone’s throw of the beach, she was doomed anyway!!!! (Secondly) Reports at the time suggested that another reason for the mishap was the inexperience of her crew, this I don’t believe either, Insurance companies have always used this excuse, so that they can point the finger of blame at individuals rather than the shipping companies that lined their pockets. And newspapers are just as guilty, they always like to colour a story, even if it means destroying people’s careers and livelihood in the process.
No the real reason for the mishap was that seafaring in those days was
very much reliant on fair weather and a lot of good luck, which the crew of the
Stuart had neither on that day. With the navigational aids that people have now,
radar, satellite navigation (g.p.s) and accurate weather forecasting, where even
a school pupil with his atlas and a couple of well chosen toys, could quite
happily take a motor vessel of any decent size around the globe without any
problem at all.
From now on the story of the Stuart takes on a different tack so to
speak, and with the passage of time, fact and fiction appear to fuse and the two
become increasingly difficult to disentangle, but one thing is certain, when
word got around about the wreck and especially her cargo (and I don’t mean the
cotton bales or the piss pots) it changed this part of Llyn for a long time. To
wake up one morning and find an Aladdin’s cave full of goodies on your
doorstep, especially with the poverty that people had to endured back then, it
would of taken a lot of willpower and faith to stay on the right side of the
law. So hordes of local people descended on the Stuart like a swarm of
Locust, and within no time at all they were helping themselves to her
"Cargo". Now there's one thing you must remember, this was before the
1904 Religious Revival that swept through Wales and alcohol was frowned upon for
many years after that. The Customs & Excise arrived en mass from Caernarfon
with a Mr Mason Cumberland in “charge”. But the locals were already away
with a lot of the goodies. They even buried barrels, and shoved bottles down
Rabbit holes. (And rumour has it that some are still being found to this day)
because at the time they were so much under the influence they couldn't remember
where they'd hidden them, and the party went on for months. One trick that is
still talked about today is, when barrels were taken from the wreck they were
left on the cliff top, so that they could go back for more, others would come
along and take them, to stop this, the top of the barrels were taken off and
they would dip their heads in the whiskey. As the wreck disintegrated bales of cotton were carried away by the
tide. One account describes how one such bale was washed ashore on Bardsey, and
it is said that it had a rat clinging to it. The rodent had discovered an
effective way of leaving the doomed vessel, but one of the islanders spotted him
and he was promptly shot.
"Stuart's cargo of cotton bales can clearly be seen in this enlargement" ~~~~~~~ Y Stewart Aeth llestr fawreddog o Lerpwl I drwbwl os coeliwch yn awr, Yn raddol fe'i gwnaethpwyd yn 'sgyrion Ar greigiau melynion Tymawr; Barck hardd ydoedd Stewart, rhaid cyfarch Yn edrych fel Alarch ar lyn, Ond creigiau Llangwnadl er syndod A wnaethant ei difrod pryd hyn. ~~~~~~~~~~ Many poems and ballads were written about the occasion, along with
scathing sermons from chapel pulpits, condemning the behaviour of the masses for
taking advantage of their free gifts that arrived by boat that Easter. To this
day many local households have their dressers adorned with the porcelain, and
some farmhouses have kitchen tables, and the odd bottle of whiskey still
unopened. A friend of mine has a nice milk jug, and I have an original
photograph. The keel of the Stuart is still visible on a very low spring tide. I
have been to see it on a couple of occasions. But haven't found any
"Sporran Juice" yet.
Steel plate off the "Stuart" (Thanks to Cimwch.com for this Photograph)
"The Codds bottle is stamped 1901 on the bottom" (Thanks to Pete Wilkinson for these photographs) ~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~~
"Full Whiskey Bottle off the Stuart, 104 years old!!!"
|
|
Copyright © Rhiw.com |
