Page:Twenty years before the mast - Charles Erskine, 1896.djvu/269

 struck, everything that skill and seamanship could devise was resorted to in order to save her, but all to no avail.

In leaving the ship some of the boats were turned end over end, but other boats, being near at hand, rescued  their crews. The ship soon went to pieces and everything was lost. But, happily, the crew was saved.

They stated that Captain Hudson was the last man to leave the ship, and that the coolness and calmness  displayed by him during the wreck had secured the  admiration of all hands.

The commodore, fearing to attempt crossing the bar in his own ship, the Vincennes, two days afterward transferred his broad pennant to the brig Porpoise, and with  the schooner, and boats of the Peacock, remained here  to survey the Columbia River and its bar, while Captain  Ringgold proceeded in the Vincennes to San Francisco  with a part of the Peacock's crew on board.

So we soon squared away and stood to sea. On the 12th we approached the shore and took a look at the land about Cape Blanco. The coast everywhere presented a dreary prospect. On the 14th we made Port San Francisco and ran in. We crossed the bar in five fathoms of water, and having a fair wind proceeded up  the bay and anchored off Yerba Buena, a small Spanish  settlement. Several vessels were lying at anchor here, among them were two American ships and a brig. We  were soon boarded by Captain Phelps of the ship Alert  of Boston, who informed us of the death of the President of the United States, Wm. H. Harrison.

On the 17th we up anchor again and stood over to Sansalito, or Whaler’s Bay, not far from Captain Suter’s