TORBAY, on the night of Wednesday the 10th of January last, was visited by one of the most terrific gales ever remembered there, and which strewed the western coasts of England with many wrecks. The loss of life was also very great. The Bay was seldom known to be so full of ships, owing, it was said, to the squally weather, occasioning many small craft to put in there weather-bound. It was, however, so comparatively calm during the afternoon of that day, that many vessels resumed their voyages, but they had not proceeded far before the appearance of the horizon induced them to return. Other vessels that were either going up or down Channel, being similarly warned, followed their example; consequently towards the evening there were upwards of seventy vessels—a great number of them foreign—anchored in the Bay, for the most part a short distance off the Harbour of Brixham. The anchorage of Torbay is landlocked'against all but easterly winds, and there is space enough in it for whole navies to ride in safety. The great drawback to the security of the'anchorage is the difficulty of getting out of the bay if the wind suddenly, chops round to the east, as was the case during the recent gale.

Soon after dark on that occasion, the calm quickly changed to a storm, during which the wind veered rapidly about, driving before it a blinding shower of rain and sleet. The sloops in Brixham Roads made all snug for the night, and, under the partial protection of the half-finished breakwater, expected to ride out the coming gale in safety. All that could be seen of the ships outside was the gleaming of their lights here and there, but no particular anxiety was felt on their account, as the wind seemed likely to come from a westerly quarter. But towards midnight it went suddenly round to the east, and at the same time the gale increased to a hurricane, bringing with it into the Bay such a sea as none of the sailors could remember to have seen there before. At that hour but few persons were out of doors, and when they went out to the pierhead, they could see but little through the driving rain and spray, except the lights which marked the position of the trawlers as they tossed to and fro.

But presently ship after ship came driving in, making for Brixham Harbour as they best could, and dashing on their course right through the little fleet of fishing sloops which lay moored outside. Some few got safely in, but the harbour's-mouth is narrow, and on each side of it are rocks on which, if a vessel runs, it soon goes to pieces. On the righthand side, looking from the shore, are some shipbuilders' yards, and there the Coastguardmen and a few other sailors assembled with lanterns and ropes, while others went to the pier, which runs out to some distance from the foot of the cliffs to the left hand of the harbour—precipitous rocky masses rising sheer above the water a hundred feet, against whose bases the waves were thundering.

Presently the watchers on the pier and the yards could see a black mass looming indistinctly through the sleet, and with a terrible crash one vessel dashed on to the rocks on the right hand side, and then another, missing the harbour mouth, struck against the outside of the pier, and lay there at the mercy of the waves. In quick succession another and another came, all invisible until the last moment—seen for an instant suspended on a wave, and then hurled, with a crash which was heard above the roaring of the storm, against the vessels which were already grinding against the sea-wall of the pier. Gradually the news of the disaster spread through the town, and light after light gleaming in the windows of the houses round the quay, told that the families of the men on board the trawlers were preparing to rush to the pier for intelligence of the fate of husbands, and fathers, and sons. In a short time all the townspeople were on foot, and from the quays and the pier and the streets which run right up the hillside, and the cliffs over which the waves were breaking in spray, and the bleak hill on which it was scarcely possible to maintain a footing, an anxious crowd was striving to penetrate the darkness which covered the face of the waters; not idle spectators, led by curiosity or a sentimental compassion, but men and women and children, to whom all that were dear to them were in terrible danger before their eyes. Ship after ship came thundering in, till at last eight square-rigged vessels, and three of the fishing sloops, were grinding together in one indistinguishable mass, on the outside of the seawall, the great waves dashing them together, and breaking right over them, bunding with their spray the men who were striving to render assistance, and drowning their voices.

One after another the ships broke up, so that in a little time nothing was left but a tangled heap of beams and spars bound together by the ruin of the rigging. Had it been the time of spring tides, the sea would almost to a certainty have carried away the parapet of the sea-wall, and flung the wrecks bodily across the pier into the harbour. As it was, the men who thronged the pier were exposed to no small danger, as they mounted the parapet in the face of the sweeping seas, with the spars of the wrecked ships rattling about their heads. Hour after hour they did their work well, frequently contriving by the feeble light of their lanterns and the fitful blaze of tar-barrels, to get out ropes to the half-frozen mariners on board the battered vessels. Most of the sailors were rescued from the ships which struck along the pier and on the right-hand side of the harbour; but on the left several vessels went ashore under cliffs down which, even in broad daylight, scarcely a path is to be found.

All that could be seen from the top was a dark mass appearing at intervals through the broken water and the flying spray, rising at times on the top of a wave, and then WRECKS IN TORBAY, ON TUE 10TH AND 11TH JANUARY, 1866.

flung against the cliff as a man flings a sack to the ground. At length ropes were taken down to some even of these : in one case a fisherman, named CHRISTOPHER BARTLETT, was let down over the cliff with a lantern tied to his waist, thus saving the lives of a whole crew save one. Further on, however, ship after ship went ashore unassisted, for there is not a single house along the cliff for miles, and no one knew of the wrecks till morning; there they broke up where they struck, every man being drowned in the dark. When at last the long-looked for morning light came, of the 62 vessels which had been in the bay the evening before, 20 had ridden out the gale or escaped into harbour, one had beaten out to sea, the rest had foundered, or were cast ashore. More than 40 wrecks had taken place in that bay alone, and out of their crews 73 men are supposed to have been drowned. Eight of the Brixham trawlers were sunk, but all their crews escaped except 3 men and a boy.

Our engraving* shows the scene at the back of Brixham Pier, where 13 vessels were driven ashore and mostly smashed to pieces. Several dead bodies were found under this mass of wreck. The estimated loss of property in ships and cargoes was from 150,000/. to 200,000*. At half-past 9 o'clock on the morning of the llth Jan., a telegram reached Teignmouth from the harbour-master at Torquay, requesting that the life-boat of the NATIONAL LIFE-BOAT INSTITUTION mightbe sent there immediately.

After some little delay in getting the boat manned, she was taken on her transporting carriage to Torquay. Being launched about 2 o'clock, she was afterwards the means of rescuing 7 men belonging to the brig Cheshire Witch, of London, and 4 men of the ship Jessie, of London. On the following Sunday a number of the rescued men went to the parish church to return thanks, one captain hiring men to go on pumping the water from his ship in order that his own crew might not be prevented from attending. Great praise is due to all who lent their aid on the occasion, from the clergy, several of whom were on the spot and worked heartily at the wrecks, down to the sailors and fishermen. The NATIONAL LIFE-BOAT INSTITUTION has since decided on forming a life-boat establishment at Brixham,.

and the expense of the same will be defrayed from a life-boat fund collected in the city of Exeter and the county of Devon. As soon as the boat-house is finished, the life-boat will be sent to Brixham ; and the Life-boat Station will be in good working order, it is hoped, before the return of the equinoctial gales.