Full-rigged ship, wooden, built Liverpool 1820, 284 tons
Owned Sir John Tobin, Liverpool
Voyage Liverpool to Demerara
Driven ashore near Trecastell [Cable Bay] Anglesey, 10/11 September 1835
Captain W Syms and crew, 14/18, rescued from the shore
On the night of 10th/11th September 1835, the Sarah, outbound from Liverpool to Demerara, ran ashore and broke up on the rocks two miles west of Aberffraw. Captain Syms and his crew of 14/18 were all safely brought ashore, using the shore-based life-saving apparatus from Holyhead. Several other vessels were wrecked off the coast of North Wales by the gales at that date. One record states that her cargo was salt, another coal and general cargo. [Information from contemporary newspapers from Liverpool and North Wales and from Lloyds Register]
The Reverend James Williams of Llanfairynghornwy, who was concerned about the loss of life from shipwrecks around Anglesey, founded the Anglesey Branch of the Royal National Institute for the Preservation of Life from Shipwreck, with his wife, Frances. He took charge of the rescue of the men aboard the Sarah, which was aground on rocks near Porth Trecastell. He was able to heave a line across to the vessel. Shortly after the last of the 14 crew had been rescued, the ship broke up. Another report quotes 18 men as rescued.
His wife, Frances, drew the scene
with a line running from the mizzen mast to the shore with a sailor on it and,
subsequently, painted a picture of it. Her paintings were lithographed
and sold to raise funds for life-saving.
Note that this couple were great-grandparents of Kyffin Williams,
the renowned Anglesey artist who died in 2006.
Painting of the rescue by Frances Williams: [from Oriel Môn]
The Rev James Williams was awarded a gold medal in 1835 by the RNIPLS (fore-runner of the RNLI) for his actions (i)in this rescue; (ii)in the rescue of the crew of the Active (when he rode into the sea to throw a grappling line aboard); (iii) for his invention of a self-inflating life-buoy.
The location of the wreck was just west of the sandy beach at Porth Trecastell
(Cable Bay) and divers have occasionally found items on the seabed here
which might have come from the Sarah.
The location of the wreck is somewhere along the coast near 53°12.19N, 4°30.14W.