Two Derelict Vessels -- April 7, 2017

San Francisco Call, 03-April-1895

The drawing is from the 03-March-1897 San Francisco Call. William A Coulter did many maritime drawings for the newspaper. The Matson Navigation Company is still in business. 

TWO DERELICT VESSELS.

How the Archer arid Annie Johnson Were Rebuilt and Reflagged. 

The only iron sailing vessels on this coast flying the American flag are derelicts, rejuvenated after terrible ordeals of storm and disaster. One, the bark Archer, was baptized into her new national faith by water; and the other, barkentine Annie Johnson, by fire. Both were English and lost their colors and registry while floating for months lost waifs alone on the ocean.

The Archer was built in Sunderland in 1876 and was of 855 tons net burden. She was abandoned in a fierce gale off Cape Flattery about two years ago in a wrecked condition. For months she. drifted a dismantled hulk and was finally found and towed into Puget Sound. 

The Annie Johnson, as the Ida Iredale, was built in England in 1874 and was of 998 tons burden. She was abandoned on fire in the South Pacific about fifteen years ago. Her cargo of coal burned for months as she drifted, consuming everything combustible on board. When picked up ten months after she was literally an empty iron tank, lifting herself high above the surface of the water, inhabited by hundreds of sea birds, which had found the drifting hulk an excellent roosting place.  The metal plates above the water line had been warped by the fierce heat into a beautiful wavy surface, but otherwise the hull was uninjured. The vessel, was bought by an American firm, repaired and with a new flag at her masthead took a new name and number in the commerce of the great republic. She is now owned by W. Matson and Co.