SS Eider was a 4,179 ton German ocean liner

Ocean liner

An ocean liner is a ship designed to transport people from one seaport to another along regular long-distance maritime routes according to a schedule. Liners may also carry cargo or mail, and may sometimes be used for other purposes .Cargo vessels running to a schedule are sometimes referred to as...

 built for Norddeutscher Lloyd

Norddeutscher Lloyd

Norddeutsche Lloyd was a German shipping company. It was founded by Hermann Henrich Meier and Eduard Crüsemann in Bremen on February 20, 1857. It developed into one of the most important German shipping companies of the late 19th and early 20th centuries, and was instrumental in the economic...

 in 1884 by John Elder & Co.

Fairfield Shipbuilding and Engineering Company

The Fairfield Shipbuilding and Engineering Company, Limited was a British shipbuilding company in the Govan area on the Clyde in Glasgow. Fairfields, as it is often known, was a major warship builder, turning out many vessels for the Royal Navy and other navies through the First World War and the...

 of Glasgow

Glasgow

Glasgow is the largest city in Scotland and third most populous in the United Kingdom. The city is situated on the River Clyde in the country's west central lowlands...

 as the fourth ship in the Rivers class

Rivers class ocean liner

The Rivers class was a class of eleven ocean liners of the Norddeutscher Lloyd , the first class of German express liners. The ships were built between 1881 and 1890, the first nine in Glasgow by John Elder & Co. or the renamed Fairfield Shipbuilding and Engineering Company, the last two in Stettin...

. She had four masts and was a two-funnelled steamer over 430 ft long, with a crew of 167, and capable of carrying 1,204 passengers. However, she had a short service history, being lost soon after her launch in what is remembered as one of the most impressive and memorable shipwrecks on the coast of the Back of the Wight

Back of the Wight

Back of the Wight is an area on the Isle of Wight, England that has a unique history and social background. Part of this stems from the fact that the area was and still is very cut off from the rest of the island and is made up of small villages strung out along the coast, such as Brighstone,...

, a region on the Isle of Wight

Isle of Wight

The Isle of Wight is a county and the largest island of England, located in the English Channel, on average about 2–4 miles off the south coast of the county of Hampshire, separated from the mainland by a strait called the Solent...

, England

England

England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...

.

Wreck

On 31 January 1892, the Eider was heading up the English Channel

English Channel

The English Channel , often referred to simply as the Channel, is an arm of the Atlantic Ocean that separates southern England from northern France, and joins the North Sea to the Atlantic. It is about long and varies in width from at its widest to in the Strait of Dover...

 to Bremen through thick fog. Around 10 pm the ship ran hard aground on the Atherfield Ledge

Atherfield Ledge

Atherfeild Ledge is a rocky outcrop extending from the coast of the Back of the Wight, Isle of Wight. This is a famous shipwreck location. Along with Brook Ledge and Brighstone Ledge it is one of the area's main shipping hazards.-Geography:...

, a hard outcrop of rock projecting from the large bay of the Back of the Wight. Captain Heinecke jettisoned cargo and called for tugs. The new Atherfield lifeboat approached from a recently established station on the cliffs, but the captain refused her offer of help.

The tugs did reach the Eider, but a gale had arisen that made it impossible for them to get close enough in case they struck the rocks as well. At 10 am the captain decided to evacuate the passengers; however, it was now too rough for the small Atherfield lifeboat, the Catherine Swift, to be launched. The bigger lifeboats located at Brook

Brook, Isle of Wight

-Background:It is situated on the south west coast of the Island between Brighstone and Freshwater, and borders a section of rugged coastline , the Back of the Wight, facing into the English Channel and towards the famous Needles and west Wight cliffs....

 and Brighstone

Brighstone

Brighstone is a village and civil parish on the Isle of Wight, 6 miles southwest of Newport on the B3399 road. Brighstone was previously known as "Brixton"...

 were launched, but they had much farther to travel. The Brighstone lifeboat, the Worcester Cadet, arrived first and carried a dozen women and children to Atherfield beach. The Brook lifeboat, the William Slaney Lewis, reached the Eider five hours after being launched and rescued another load of women and children.

By 2 pm the sea had worsened to the point where rollers were reaching over the stern, but by 3 pm the water had calmed and the lifeboats were relaunched. All the passengers were saved, but the crew stayed onboard.

On Tuesday the gale reached storm force and the lifeboats evacuated the crew and bullion from the now badly holed and sinking vessel.

Result

The rescue brought praise for those involved from all around the world. The RNLI awarded medals to some crew members, and Kaiser Wilhelm II gave each coxswain an engraved gold watch and donated £200 to the RNLI. The ship was later salvaged and declared a total loss.

External links

• Eider, Norddeutscher Lloyd at Norway Heritage