The Royal Mail Company's steam ship Rhone, Captain Woolley, sailed from Southampton on Wednesday 2 0ct [1867] with mail, She took out 135 passengers and a large cargo, including, gold coins £400, jewellery £2.323
A devastating hurricane struck St, Thomas in the Virgin Islands in the early hours of the morning on the 29 October 1867, five steamers and 60 vessels were lost, and the docks, coal yards, and factories at St. Thomas were destroyed. Dotted over the harbour were masts showing a few feet above water, marking the spots where the various schooners and other craft had gone down; and on the beach all round lay other vessels, hurled by the force of wind and waves far upon the land......
The "Unsinkable" Ironclad Royal Mail steamer Rhone was sunk at Peter Island, She had 145 passengers on board, of whom only 26 were saved, The Wye was lost at Buck Island, forty of the crew of were saved, also Captain Taylor who was on shore leave.
On the 30th, at various points along the beach crowds of people were collected, and from each were carried away with dreadful regularity strings of rough coffins containing the dead, which the sea gave up. By four o'clock on the 30th 292 bodies had been washed ashore and buried....
Most of the men were from the Southampton area; many of them are buried in a cemetery on Salt Island. There is a memorial in the form of an obelisk to record the loss of the Royal Mail Steam Packets “RHONE” and “WYE” in the Cemetery in Hill Lane, Southampton.
http://fosoc.net/pdfs/story RhoneWye.pdf"THE WEST INDIA HURRICAINE FUND. —The committees of this fund have decided upon granting annuities to sixty widows dependent upon it for relief in four classes Payable in fifty annual installments for fifty years. There were 102 children left orphans by the hurricaine."
The records of the fund are held at Southampton City Archives and included an indexed lisitng of the beneficiaries (ref SC/TC box 95c)
http://www.southampton.gov.uk/s-leisure/artsheritage/history/archives/Also travelling aboard the Rhone were three men invalided to England by the mail steamer from Barbados on 26 October: Benjamin Hough private Royal Marine suffering from syphilitic rheumatism; Charles Peck able seaman ulcer on the leg and heart disease; Isaac Gorman able seaman who complained continuously of frontal headache. All these men together with Dr Henry Arnot late Surgeon of HMS Doris were drowned on 29 October in the wreck of RM Steamer Rhone during a hurricane.
The Winchester Advertiser of 30 November 1867 reported: The Loss of the RHONE
The following are the Winchester people lost in the RHONE Christopher Storry steward aged 46 steward a widow and five children Mr. C. W. Malkin boatswain's mate son of Mr. Malkin stationer &.; Mr. C. Orchard butcher whose father is just dead ; and Mr. Henbury baker who leaves also we hear a widow and several children. A subscription has been started for the benefit of Mrs. Storry and we presume that Mrs. Henbory's case will not be lost sight of in the collection and distribution of the fund....
Two survivors that were not on the list, John Metcalf, who was saved from the wrecked Rhone, he was a passenger as a distressed British seaman, sent home by the Consul from the Alice Barney, he was married, and lived in London there was a report of him, surviving.
Isle of Wight Observer Saturday, October 18, 1873
Thomas Burwick a mariner was charged with stealing a pair of oilskin trousers... had his head hurt when he was wrecked in the Rhone at St.Thomas's.
Numerous reports of the above hurricane are to be found the the 19th Century British Newspaper archive available at some libraries.
The Times Saturday Nov 23 1867 list of the officers and crew of the Rhone, see attached Ann E
