Remembering HMS Edgar (part 1)

The crew of HMS Edgar, circa 1895. Robert Neff Collection

By Robert Neff

On November 13, 1895, Korea's autumn, as well as the lives of 48 young English sailors and marines, suddenly ended with an icy cold wind from the north.

The young men were part of HMS Edgar's crew and had been sent in a pinnace to an island in Jemulpo harbor to conduct small arms training. The weather that morning was blustery and while the crew trained, the ferocity of the wind greatly increased but, because they were sheltered from the full blast of the wind by the island, the officer in charge was apparently unaware of how dangerous the situation had become.

The training ended at just after 11 a.m., and the men packed up their gear and began to row back to their ship. Still sheltered by the island, they were able to slowly make their way against the surging tide, but once they rounded the island's point they found themselves in a wild tempest and unable to make any progress.

At the same time, Isabella Bird Bishop, an intrepid English travel-writer, was slowly making her way to Kaesong and described the wind as so powerful that "by noon it was impossible to sit on our horses, and we fought the storm on foot." The men in the pinnace found it much more difficult.

The officer in charge of the detail, Chief Petty Officer W. Bailey (there is some question as to whether or not it was his decision), commanded the sail to be raised but, allegedly, a coxswain beseeched him not to for fear that "it might [be] the cause of the drowning of the hands."

HMS Edgar in Japan, circa 1895. Robert Neff Collection

Apparently the officer weighed the risks but deemed them acceptable under the situation, and ordered the sail raised. He did, however, as a precaution, order all the men to remove their ammunition belts and boots just prior to the sail being set. As soon as the sail went up the ship was battered by the wind and waves and immediately sank. Shore was clearly visible, only 400 to 500 yards away, but the violence of the sea and its temperature prevented anyone from swimming to it.

The plight of the crew was witnessed by sailors on nearby warships who sent help as soon as possible, but for more than half of the men help arrived too late. The Gremiastchy's steam launch was the first to arrive, nearly ten minutes after the pinnace sank. It managed to rescue 14 survivors and a steam launch from the Alger plucked nine more from the churning water. On the Yorktown there was some initial confusion and its rescue boats were slow getting into the water. In fact, the Yorktown's steam launch broke down while en route and never made it to the scene. Two "pulling boats" (row boats?) from the Yorktown eventually rescued the final two survivors.

The rescue boats with their survivors managed to return to their respective ships, except for the Gremiastchy's steam launch. Overloaded with the large number of survivors, it was sluggish and quickly filling with water. The commander of the launch made for the relative shelter of Jemulpo's inner-harbor, nearly a mile away. Upon reaching it, he was dismayed to discover that the sea was still too violent for him to safely land at the jetty and unload his freezing passengers. Spotting a Japanese steamer nearby, he made for it and was able to safely unload the 14 British sailors who were hustled by the steamer's captain into the warmth of the engine room. The Russian steam launch and its crew were forced to anchor in the bay and wait out the storm before they could safely be hauled aboard the Gremiastchy.

In the days that followed two services were held. The first, on Nov. 14, was for George Frederick Warren who had been rescued but died shortly afterwards. He was buried in Jemulpo's Foreigners' Cemetery with "full military honours" and "all the foreign residents of the ported attended the funeral."

Korea Through Western Eyes

One resident in Jemulpo described Warren as a "drummer boy, 18 years of age, [who] was to be promoted that day, his birthday. He was picked up by the Alger's cutter, and everything was done to save him, but [he] still died. His father was a marine on board the Edgar who had 32 years of service." So far I have been unable to verify his father was actually aboard the ship and seemingly contradicts a missionary in Seoul who wrote: "One drummer boy, the only marine who was lost, died afterwards from the shock...He had a mother dependent on him." Adding to the confusion, the ship's log indicates Warren was a bugler.

One other body was apparently recovered ― 19-year-old James R. Martyn of Middlesex ― and he is buried with the young drummer/bugler boy in Incheon's Foreigners' Cemetery.

The loss of the men was not forgotten by the residents of Jemulpo nor by English Admiral Henderson and his staff. Within months of the disaster a huge monument was built to remember the victims. According to The Korean Repository ― an English-language magazine published in Seoul:

"A monument has been recently erected at Chemulpo to the victims of the terrible Edgar disaster. It stands on the shoulder of the English Consulate hill just outside the wall of the compound, and is one of the most prominent objects to catch the eye on approaching or landing at the Customs Bund. The monument is of Japanese marble, very dark gray in color and is composed of three bases and an obelisk die. The lower base is seven feet square, the die is six feet high and the whole monument rises about eleven feet above the ground. It weighs, approximately, fifteen tons and much difficulty was experienced in conveying it to its present lofty and commanding situation. It bears the following inscription: 'Erected to the memory of 48 petty officers and men of H. M. S. Edgar who lost their lives in the terrible disaster, of whom the body of only one was ever given up by the sea."

In the beginning, when American warships visited Jemulpo, they would often lay a wreath as "a fresh tribute of the sorrow and lasting sympathy felt by Americans, in common with other nations, for their English brethren in their great calamity."

However, as we shall discover tomorrow, memories fade.

You can read more about this disaster in "Korea Through Western Eyes."

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