Page:A Life of Matthew Fontaine Maury.pdf/148

134 by officers of the Navy, and Commander William Lewis Herndon had this one. He went down with his ship, leaving a glowing example of devotion to duty, Christian conduct, and true heroism.

All hopes of his having been picked up by some passing vessel have vanished. The survivors of the wreck have made their statements of the gale, the sinking of the ship, and their rescue. These have gone the rounds of the newspaper press, and we are probably possessed of all the particulars concerning that awful catastrophe that the public will ever know.

The department has already been informed officially of this wreck and disaster—how nobly Herndon stood to his post and gloriously perished—how the women and children were all saved, and how he did all that man could do, or officer should, to save his ship and crew also. But the particulars have been given to the department only in the perishable form of the newspaper records.

As a tribute to his memory, as material for history, as an heirloom in the nave, and a legacy to his country, I desire to place on record in the department this simple writing as a memorial of him.

We were intimates; I have known him from his boyhood; he was my kinsman and my wife's brother. The ties of consanguinity, as well as our professional avocations, brought us frequently and much together; we were close friends.

Under these circumstances, I ask your leave to file a report of that gale and his loss. I am to embody in it a simple narrative of incident derived from statements which the survivors from the wreck have made either publicly, through the prints of the day, or privately to his family and friends. These incidents, in the silent influence of the lessons they teach, constitute an inheritance of rare value to his country men; they are the heirlooms of which I spoke, and will, I am persuaded, be productive of much good to the service. The 'Central America,' at the time of her loss, was bound from Aspinwall, via Havana to New York. She had on board, as nearly as has been ascertained, about two millions