Page:George McCall Theal, History of South Africa since September 1795, Volume 1 (1908).pdf/85

1799] beyond the northern border and quite a number of evangelists instructing the coloured people within the colonial limits.

In the afternoon of the 5th of November 1799 a heavy north-west gale set into Table Bay, an unusual event at that period of the year. Among the vessels at anchor was the English ship of the line Sceptre, carrying sixty-four guns. At noon the Sceptre fired the number of guns usual in commemoration of the discovery of the gunpowder plot, and some of her officers and sailors then went ashore, A little after dark the ship began to drag her anchors, upon which others were dropped, and when all these failed to hold, a couple of cannon were attached to cables and lowered. The Sceptre slowly drifted in, and struck on a ledge of rocks close to Fort Knokke, where she went to pieces immediately. Next morning the beach was covered with her fragments and with the bodies of her captain, nine officers, and nearly three hundred seamen and marines who perished with her. One hundred and twenty-eight officers and men, most of whom were on shore when the disaster occurred, escaped.

The Oldenburgh, a Danish ship of the line, of sixty-four guns, parted soon after the Sceptre. Instead of dropping other anchors, she set her head sails and steered for a sandy beach, upon which she was cast; and though the ship was lost, the lives of all on board were saved. The same course was followed by the English whaler Sierra Leone, the American ships Hannah and Anubis, and three small craft, all of which were lost, but their crews got safely to land.