【海外の反応】5年後に届いた最後のSOS…大西洋で消えた蒸気船SS Pacificの謎が切なすぎる

The message in the bottle was published on August 7, 1861, in The London Shipping Gazette.

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Here's a follow up from the same newspaper dating from July 23, 1861

"Our readers may have observed recently, amongst our maritime extracts, the copy of the contents of a slip of paper, found in a bottle some weeks ago, on the western coast of Uls, in the Hebrides, and forwarded to us by our agent at Sternoway. The paper in question, apparently the leaf of a pocketbook, used in the hurry of the moment, was covered on both sides with pencil marks, from which the following was with difficulty deciphered: "

**« On board the Pacific from Liverpool to N.Y. – Ship going down. Confusion on board – icebergs around us on every side. I know I cannot escape. I write the cause of our loss that friends may not live in suspense. The finder will please get it published. W.M. GRAHAM. »**

" If we are right in our conjecture, the ship here named is the Pacific, one of the Collins line of steamers, which vessel left Liverpool on Jan. 23, 1856, three days before the Persia, and has not since been heard of; and this slip of paper, three inches by two, is probably the only record of the fate of that missing ship. We have not come to this conclusion hastily. On receiving the frail record from Sternoway, we at once published it, as the best and most expeditious mode of placing it before those who might possibly be interested in the fate of the vessel named. The Pacific is by no means an uncommon appellation, more especially amongst the shipping of the United States, and we did not despair that some light would be thrown upon the "message from the sea," which had so singularly been preserved and placed in our hands. After waiting for some time, we received a communication from Messrs. ZEREGA of New-York, stating that their ship Pacific, being in port at the time, of course the record had no reference thereto, but they much teared it might, notwithstanding the difference in the names, apply to their ship Baltic, which had left Liverpool in January last, and has not since been heard of; and we were requested at the same time to communicate with Messrs. ZEREGA's Agent's in Liverpool. This we have been careful to do, and at the same time we directed a search to be made amongst the list of passengers and crews both of the Baltic and of the Pacific of the Collins line. "

Edit:

I found another bit of information which I find very relevant to Pacific’s story. A few days after Pacific departed from Liverpool, Cunard’s Persia struck an iceberg on the same route. Unlike Pacific, she lived to tell the tale and went on to plow the North Atlantic for another 12 years.

Never sail a ship named "Pacific" on the Atlantic. Oceans are jealous beings.

*On board the Pacific from Liverpool to N.Y. – Ship going down. Confusion on board – icebergs around us on every side. I know I cannot escape. I write the cause of our loss that friends may not live in suspense. The finder will please get it published. W.M. GRAHAM.*

Icebergs in January crossing the North Atlantic, brutal end and the bottle drifted five years before someone found it.

So Sting was wrong?

In one of the Sherlock stories the culprit gets away so Sherlock suggests sending a cross atlantic telegram to alert the US police. But it isn't required in the end, as the ship he boarded went down during the crossing. I used to think it was a weird end, then realised that this stuff really did happen strangely often back then. Ships just went down, no tech to warn them early of threats. Hell even the Titanic with radio was only given an early alert.

Wow. Fuel consumption was 70 tons of coal per day. That's insane.