Anyone care to hazard a guess which ship this was? ……………….. From ‘The Illustrated London News’, September 29th, 1849 We copy the following singular narrative from the Dublin Evening Mail: The colliers, which frequent the southern ports of Ireland, frequently take passengers to England or Wales at a very low rate―such as half-a-crown a head. In April, one of those vessels took in sixty passengers in a small southern port and, fortunately for them, also took in a large number of sheep. Shortly after the vessel had sailed, she encountered heavy adverse gales, which drove her down the Channel and into the Atlantic, where she was tossed about for several days, steering at random, the worthy skipper being in utter ignorance of his position. The sheep were slaughtered to save the crew and passengers from starvation. At length the wanderers fell in with a ship, and, like the celebrated navigator who sought Fingal, they discovered where they were. They were informed that a perseverance for two days, not in a nor-east but in a nor-west course, would bring them to New York, and there they arrived with all the passengers, save the sheep, safe. The half-crown men were delighted to find that their voyage terminated under the Star-Spangled Banner. The families of those who thus unexpectedly crossed the Atlantic had given them up for lost, but have lately received letters informing them of their safe arrival in America, and that they would shortly send money to enable their friends to join them in a country as yet―happily for themselves―unskilled in the science of political economy, and so selfish as to deem it better to support their own citizens than encourage and reward the industry of foreigners. Awaiting the expected remittances, the several families retired into lodgings in a union workhouse. ………………… Good job the passengers weren’t Welshmen. The sheep wouldn't have been fit to eat. ……………….. Regards,Tony (Wales)