Posted inMaritime & Naval History Ship Histories

Tanner Again in Commission

Fifty-Year-Old Brig Is to Load Cargo of Lumber at Mukilteo for This Port

HULL IS EVERLASTING

In Spite of Age and Shipwreck Her Ancient Timbers Still Hang Together

The brig Tanner is going to celebrate her jubilee by making another voyage from the north to this port. At least half a dozen times has this time-worn craft been wrecked, and as often has her obituary been written. She has been sailing the seas since 1855, when she was launched from a shipyard long passed away at Smithtown, N. Y. “Arrived, brig Tanner, in distress,” Is an entry which appears with surprlsing frequency on the records of the Merchants’ Exchange. She knows all about Davy Jones’ locker from personal observation, and more than once in the “disaster” column of the marine records she has been classed as “wreck, total loss.”

Posted inMaritime & Naval History Ship Histories Shipwrecks & Nautical Disasters

Efforts to Save Brig Tanner Fail

Newspaper illustration of the Tanner, showing her under sail.

PORT ANGELES (Wash.), October 28.—Efforts so far to haul off the brig Tanner, which went ashore last Saturday near Elwha river, six miles west of this city, have proved futile. The vessel so far is not damaged by the seas. Further effort will be made by tugs at high tide tomorrow. The tug captain believes the vessel can be hauled off if more tugs can be procured before the storm comes, otherwise she will prove a total loss.

The news that the old brig Tanner had gone ashore at Port Angeles and probably would prove a total loss was received yesterday in the local shipping world with considerable interest. The Tanner was about the oldest and one of the most picturesque vessels on the Pacific. In 1855, when she was launched at Smithtown, N. Y., she was as tight and saucy a brig as ever flew the stars and stripes. Forty-eight years of sea service, however, transformed the Tanner into a floating sieve in which no sailorman less brave than her skipper and owner, Captain Newhall, would have dared to venture beyond easy reach of a life-saving station.