SIGNAL SERVICE. 



816 



sable to the storm - warning and weather- 



predirtion work of tlio Washington millionth--. 

 Hut, apart from the meteorological value of 

 such a Coast Signal Service, its incidental con- 

 tributions to the life-saving stations have al- 

 ready proved of tlio greatest assistance. On 

 the 22d of March, 1K77, after a severe storm 

 on tlio middle Atlantic coast, Sergeant William 

 Stein of the Signal Service, in charge of the 

 Cape Henry station, discovered before dawn a 

 large vessel stranded on a shoal on* that station, 

 and summoned the wreckers at Norfolk to 

 come to the rescue. With the earliest light 

 the Sergeant displayed the " attention-flags " 

 of the international code, with which every 

 seacoast signal station is supplied ; and, re- 

 ceiving answer that she was the Winchester of 

 Liverpool, with request for two steam-tugs to 

 be sent to the vessel, he telegraphed at once to 

 Norfolk for wrecking-steamers. Before sun- 

 down active efforts were made to save the 

 stranded vessel. She was gotten off the shoal 



after some days' lub >r ; but meantime three 

 other vessels, in a second storm (of the 25th.), 

 were stranded within a mile of her. Sergeant 

 Stein again telegraphed the wreckers at Nor- 

 folk for aid. lie ascertained the name of the 

 bark in greatest peril to be the Pautxer, a Nor- 

 wegian vessel, and the crew of the Life-Saving 

 Service a little later succeeded in tiring a life- 

 line over her deck. The Norwegians did not 

 comprehend its use ; but after some effort the 

 Signal Service officer, by means of international 

 signals, instructed her crew to " haul in on the 

 line," and by nine o'clock all the crew of the 

 Pantzer were safely landed. In the wrecks of 

 the steamships L'Amerique, Rusland, and Hu- 

 ron (of the United States Navy), the first tid- 

 ings were conveyed by the Signal Service wires, 

 and through them succor was speedily sum- 

 moned. In the case of the Huron, drifted 

 ashore near Kittyhawk, a private of the Sig- 

 nal Service, A. T. Sherwood, stationed at that 

 place, received the tirst intelligence November 



STATION AT CAPE HENRY SIGNALING TO THE STRANDED BARK 



23d, and, after telegraphing to Washington, 

 hastened to the awfnl scene, walking sixteen 

 miles through the sand, and brought full re- 

 ports of the situation to his station, which 

 were instantly telegraphed to the Chief Signal 

 Officer. The War and Navy Departments and 

 the Life-Saving Service were thus notified, and 

 by them steamers of the navy and wrecking 

 companies were started to the fatal point of 

 the shore on which the Huron had gone to 

 pieces. The Kittyhawk observer, immediate- 

 ly on receiving orders from the Chief Signal 

 Officer, opened a " wreck-station " abreast of 

 the foundered vessel before daylight of the 

 J")tli, connecting it by a temporary telegraph- 

 wire with his station, and, working this im- 

 provised station on the open beach, while the 

 gale was yet raging, drew toward the spot the 

 whole organized relief force of the Govern- 

 ment. A similar service was performed on the 



stormy night of January 31, 1878, by another 

 private soldier of the Signal Corps, William 

 Davis, when the steamship Metropolis, with 248 

 souls on board, became a total wreck twenty 

 inileafrom Kittyhawk station. At 6.55 P. M. on 

 that night intelligence of the disaster reached 

 Kittyhawk, and in less than fifteen minutes pri- 

 vate Davis, carrying telegraphic and signal ap- 

 paratus, was riding through the night &m\ storm 

 to the scene. By 4 A. M. he had reached the 

 vessel, established his telegraph station abreast 

 of her, opened communication, and forwarded 

 a report to the Chief Signal Office at Washing- 

 ton, and was putting in motion all the machin- 

 ery of relief and succor which the country could 

 command. The observers of the coast signal 

 stations, whenever it is practicable, board ves- 

 sels that have gone ashore, and open communi- 

 cation with tho land. An instance of this may 

 be cited from the action of private Harrison of 



