Page 22 - Captain William Strike of Porthleven

John Strike was three years younger than Hannibal. In 1884 John became a
shipowner with total ownership of the 198 ton, Ipswich-built brigantine ‘Elizabeth
Stevens’, the purchase price (or part of it) being raised by mortgage. Hannibal was
master of this vessel when she was wrecked off Port Elizabeth on the Cape Coast of
South Africa on August 30, 1888. Hannibal, aged 51, and his wife Harriet, then aged
48, were rescued and eventually made their way back to Plymouth. Just a few
months prior to this disaster the ‘Elizabeth Stevens’ called at Falmouth en route from
London to the Rio Grande, with a general cargo. Two years prior to that the ship was
reported as having arrived in New York from Pernambuco, with a cargo of sugar, a
voyage that had taken 25 days, according to the New York Times. John Strike’s next
ship was the ‘Myvanwy’, a three-masted schooner built at Newport, South Wales in
1870, and purchased in February 1889. This vessel was in John Strike’s ownership
for eight years. That John Strike was always aware of events at home is
borne out by The Cornishman newspaper on June 29, 1893, following
the loss of the Porthleven fishing boat ‘Nile’, and its crew. It was
reported that £3. 10s. had been received from Captain Strike and t he
crew of ‘Myvanwy’ (then trading in the Rio Grande) for the dependents of
the crew of the fishing boat. Subsequently John Strike owned the Glasgow-built
iron screw steamer, the ‘Marquis of Lorne’ from 1896 to 1899, and – from 1899 - the
Suffolk- built 65 ton trading ketch, the ‘Woolwich Infant’ : an ex government
ammunition cutter. Disaster befell the ‘Woolwich Infant’ in April 1913 when, off
Sennen Cove, her anchor cable parted and she drifted towards Cowloe Rocks in a
moderate ENE gale. Sennen lifeboat stood by the stricken vessel and returned to
station when the crew of the ketch managed to re-anchor, albeit perilously close to
the rocks. Tragically the vessel drifted ashore though the crew was rescued by boat
before the lifeboat could reach the scene. Thirteen years before this John Strike died
at sea, in the ‘Woolwich Infant’, off Start Point. John Strike was 64 years of age and
his death certificate reports that he died of natural causes, to wit ‘syncope’, a
condition associated with low blood pressure resulting in a loss of consciousness.
The death occurred on March 6 1900 and after the body was landed at Plymouth, a
coroner’s inquest followed two days later. Subsequently, John Strike was buried at
Porthleven on March 10, his funeral reported briefly in The Cornishman on March 15,
1900, saying that a ‘…great number of friends followed his remains to their last
resting place’.

The loss of the ‘Victory’

The tragedy of the loss of the ‘Elizabeth Stevens’ was as nothing compared to the
fate of Samson – the fifth son - in October 1882. A year before Samson was in his
first command, the 76 ton schooner ‘Victory’, a master mariner at the age of 25. The
1881 census shows the ‘Victory’ discharging grain at Marsh Mill, Thornton on the
River Wyre upstream from Fleetwood. The ‘Victory’ had been completed at
Salcombe in Devon in 1848 and was now registered at Fowey and owned in
Mevagissey. On census day in 1881 Samson Strike was accompanied on board by a
mate and two ordinary seamen. Just over a year later the ‘Victory’ left Cardiff on
October 16, 1882 with a cargo of coal for Waterford, in Southern Ireland.

The Board of Trade returns for 1882-83 reveal the tragic loss, reporting that the
vessel had not been heard of since leaving Cardiff, but that pieces of wreckage had
been washed up at Ballyteigue Bay, County Wexford. The Marine Register of Deaths
duly records the death by drowning of the captain, Samson Strike, a 26 year old
Cornishman. The records report that the vessel was lost ‘about October 18, 1882’.
The Cornishman newspaper published on November 2, 1882 carried the following
item:

Suspense. No news has yet arrived of Captain S. Strike, of this place
[Porthleven], who sailed in the schooner Victory…but the following has been
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