§ MR. A. MILLSasked the President of the Board of Trade, Whether any report has been received respecting the wreck of a vessel called the "Fortitude," lost with all hands at Bude, in Cornwall, on the 20th of February last; and, whether it is true that this vessel had 976 been surveyed about a fortnight before the wreck, at Swansea, and that she was sixty years old?
§ SIR CHARLES ADDERLEY,in reply, said, an official investigation was held at Swansea, on the 21st of March, on the loss of the Fortitude. The vessel was 60 years old. It appeared in evidence that she underwent thorough repair two years ago, and had further repair in October last to the satisfaction of the surveyors of the Maldon Mutual Insurance Society, one of the surveyors himself having to pay his share in the loss of the vessel. The Commission decided that there was no culpability in sending her to sea. She was not surveyed a fortnight before, but she was visited three weeks before the wreck by two Board of Trade surveyors for draft of water and freeboard, and there was nothing suspicious about her. The owner's son was on board and lost with all the rest, trying to put into Bade Harbour.