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Show U. S. GRU1SER 1LHEE IS TOTALWRECK Breakers Spraying Over the Warship's Superstructure; Crew Being Brought Ashore. DISASTER OCCURS NEAR EUREKA, CAL. No Hope of Floating $7,-000,000 $7,-000,000 Vessel; Grounds While Attempting to Salvage Submarine. EUREKA, Cal., Jan. 13. Shortly Short-ly after 8 o'clock tonight the last member of the crew of the cruiser Milwaukee, which went ashore near here early today, was landed on the beach. Not a life was lost and but on man was hurt in the difficult work of rescuing the hundreds aboard the stranded vessel. EUREKA, Cal., Jan. 13. As darkness dark-ness closed down tonight about half the crew of the United States protected cruiser Milwaukee, which went ashore on the Samoa .beach near here about 4 o'clock this morning, had been transferred trans-ferred through a roaring surf in safety to the beach by a means of a- breeches buoy and two lifeboats. On board the Milwaukee when the current carried her into the surf were eighteen officers and 421 men. , Navy officers here expressed the be-lie'ttuiiight be-lie'ttuiiight that the cruiser would be -ia. ;toJ"al ?h-s3. The Milwaukee, which draws 2$yieet,, hu"' been thrown by the breakers into water that was but twelve feet deep at low tide and the derelict was keeled over at an angle of 20 degrees. Her double bottom was filled with water and her engine room flooded. It was generally believed she had a hole in her hull. When the Milwaukee was caught by the current and carried into the breakers break-ers she was pulling on a cable attached to the stranded submarine H-3, which went ashore December 14 about half a mile from where the Milwaukee now lies. The monitor Cheyenne and the navy tug Iroquois, farther off shore, both had lines to the Milwaukee and were endeavoring to hold the cruiser from the clutches of the surf. Hawser Slips. The tidal current and the weight of the heavy steel hauser that was fast to the submarine proved stronger than the combined power of the three vessels and all were being dragged shoreward when the hawser leading to the Cheyenne Chey-enne snapped and left the little Iroquois Iro-quois to battle alone with the tide that was sweeping the Milwaukee into the breakers. Boatswain Frank Bruce, commander of the Iroquois, held on as long as he dared and then saved his vessel from the Milwaukee's fate by cutting the hawser. Lieutenant William S. Newton, New-ton, in command of the Milwaukee, tried to follow Bruce 's example and get rid of the steel hawser fast to the H-3 which was dragging him into the breakers. break-ers. But it was too late. The hawser, half a mile long and weighing twenty-four tons, could not be slipped on the moment, and before the order to let go could be carried out the Milwaukee had been gripped by the first line of breakers and was hitting the bottom. Waited Ten Hours. For nearly ten hours the crew waited on the lee "side for help from shore. When the sun broke through the fog that had enveloped the vessel since dawn it was seen that all on board were wearing life preservers. L-viug as she did at an angle of nearly near-ly 20 degrees, it was impossible to launch any of the cruiser's own boats, but soon fife savers of the coast guard service reached the scene from their station two miles distant. Later a surfboat from the Humboldt bay station was hauled across the sands to the beach near the Milwaukee. The coastguardsmen shot a line from the shore to the stranded cruiser, a cable was stretched and a breeches buoy rigged. Coxswain T. S. Decker was the first man to be trolleyerl ashore in the breeches buoy. As the Milwaukee rolled Decker was imersed in the breakers, and then, the cable tightening, he was snapped thirty feot in the air. He landed safely, however. Officer Urged Haste. Lieutenant Harvey S. Haislip, who was in charge of the cutter which capsized cap-sized in the surf on Wednesday, came next. Speaking for Lieutenant Newton, commander of the Milwaukee, he said: (; Everyone on board is safe and well, but we want haste in getting the wen ahore. ' ' The first surfboat was launched at 2:20 o'clock. It was manned by men from the Cheyenne and Iroquois which, in the meanwhile, had come into the bay. Six of the Milwaukee's men were (Continued on Page Two.) c CRUISER MILWAUKEE IS TOTAL WRECK (Continued from Page One.) brought ashore safely. The second boat brought back five. By this time two men at a time were coming ashore in the breeches buoy, and by dusk nearly 200 men were on the beach from the wrecked cruiser. Only one man suffered injury so far as known. This was G-. B. Roth, the seaman whose shoulder was fractured Wednesday when the Milwaukee's surf-boat surf-boat capsized. His shoulder was broken again as he was being brought ashore today. The work of rescue, it was announced, would continue all night until every man was off the derelict. Great fires have been built on the beach to aid the lifesavers. Work Hazardous. The surfboats were operating up to a late hour, but, owing to the strong current sweeping in the 'lee of the cruiser, this method of getting the men ashore was becoming "extremely hazardous. haz-ardous. Lieutenants Milton S. Davis and Eric F. Zemke were planning to make a preliminary pre-liminary survey of the wreck tomorrow. The Milwaukee, they said, recently left the drydock, where she received extensive exten-sive repairs. According to navy officers offi-cers here her stranding, as it now appears, ap-pears, will mean a loss of approximately $7,000,000. Lieutenant Haislip, when he slid ashore on the breeches buoy, drenched from his ride through the breakers, said: "We were caught in the surf and the fog. We tried to slip the cable we bad on the H-3, but it was too long and too heavy, and we could not get it loose in time. ' ' As Axel Lease, a seaman from Wallace. Wal-lace. Idaho, was swung ashore, he was handed a message telling of the death of his little boy. A dispatch from Bremerton navy yard said the tug Mojave had been ordered or-dered to the scene. |