Emerging, as. it were, out of the jaws of death, the skipper of the doomed vessel Yolande, which ran aground off Shantung Promontory early on the morning of March 6, arrived here yesterday aboard the Jardine's s. Tingsang, together with his daughter, the remaining four foreign officers' of the Yolande, and 53 Chinese members of the crew. The foreign officers included the three deck officers, and the wireless opera-for, all of the engineer officers being Chinese, The Tingsang picked up the survivors at Weihaiwei, at 10.30 a.m. last Tuesday. They had been landed there by H.M.S. Capetown, after the British cruiser had carried out rescue operations, hauling survivors from the sinking vessel by means of a breeches buoy.
Altogether 56 survivors were saved from the Yolande, and it is feared that the remaining members of' the crew have been lost, They attempted to effect a landing in mountainous seas before the Capetown's rescue party had established contact with the Yolande by means of the breeches buoy, and it is feared that they Were drowned in the huge waves} which were then sending columns of water crashing right over the "Yolande.
The Yolande was named after the daughter of Captain C. E. Bertin, owner and skipper of the vessel. After the Yolande had run aground, the captain explained in an interview yesterday, those on board spent two days and two nights of terror before they were tidally rescued by the party from HMS. Capetown. The wireless room was washed away by the huge waves, and two staterooms next to the main saloon were splintered and went overboard, It would have been suicide, he said, to have gone out on to the deck, which was being swept by raging seas.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.