FISHERMEN IN WAR TIME 



second hand ; and the boy was Daniel Taylor, com' 

 monly known as Dan. 



January i was ushered in by a bitter gale in the 

 Channel. The Formidable was torpedoed by a Ger- 

 man submarine and foundered, 600 of her comple- 

 ment of 800 perishing. Seventy-one of the rescued 

 men were picked up from a swamped cutter by the 

 Provident and carried into Brixham. Seventeen of 

 the survivors were taken to the Fishermen's Insti- 

 tute, to which Brixham women took beds and bed- 

 ding for their use, recalling the incident of the great 

 storm in 1866, when the women of Brixham made 

 bonfires with their bedding, to light in the men who 

 were in peril on the sea. From these survivors 

 came some of the earliest information of the disaster 

 to the Formidable and the heroism of the trawler's 

 crew. Subsequent details completed the story. 



The first intimation of the loss of the Formidable 

 was in the following report from the Admiralty : — 

 " The battleship Formidable was sunk this morn- 

 ing in the Channel, whether by mine or submarine 

 is not yet certain. Seventy-one survivors have been 

 picked up by a British light cruiser, and it is pos- 

 sible that others may have been rescued by other 

 vessels." This hope was fulfilled by the subse- 

 quent arrival in port of the Provident. It was then 

 known that the smack, after three hours' strenuous 

 work in the bitter weather and dangerous seas, had 

 effected her rescues. 



The Provident was at sea, about fifteen miles from 

 Berry Head. Owing to the heavy weather she was 



86 



