The Royal Charter's Black Day
The Royal Charter was a stones throw away from the land. With the sea breaking over her and threatening to demolish the ship, Issac Lewis, a boy from the village who worked on the boat, recognised his father on the shore. He was close enough to shout,
"My Father, I have come home to die."
Everything possible was done to save lives that night and my great great grandfather was an eyewitness to it all. The twenty-eight men of Moelfre showed enormous courage and bravery as they rushed across the slippery rocks to drag people from the clutch of the waves. Many of those saved were completely naked.
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by Bedwr Rees
The women in long Victorian frocks and men who were weighed down with gold went straight to the bottom of the sea. William Jones remembered how he saw the men of the village pulling people by rope from ship to shore.
The next second, the Royal Charter broke its back and threw people into the sea. Most of them didn't drown, but were smashed mercilessly against the rocks. No twelve-year-old boy should see such a massacre and it must have affected William Jones.
Over 450 people died, including Issac Lewis. After travelling half way around the world from Australia, he died on his doorstep. Thinking about that always shakes me.
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