Wooden flat Myra of Runcorn, built Widnes 1865, 53 tons, ON 50000, owned Lewis Killcross, Widnes. Driven ashore on Puffin Island and wrecked, 1 November 1877. Captain Dutton and one crew saved, his son, William Dutton lost. Reported as MNL closure at that date..
Widnes Examiner - Saturday 5 November 1887
Whilst the storm was at its height the flat "Myra," belonging to Mr
Lewis Kilcross, at Widnes, went ashore at Puffin Island, near Llandudno,
and quickly became a total wreck. A young man named William Dutton, son
of the captain of the boat, was drowned, but the remainder of the crew
succeeded in scrambling upon the rocks.
Liverpool Mercury - Monday 12 December 1887
A ROMANCE OF BIOLOGY.
Many readers of the Mercury have shown - in a practical way - a kind
interest in the fate of the young couple domiciled on Puffin island, a
short sketch of whose adventures appeared in these columns same time
ago. It will be fresh in the memory of most readers that the young
keeper of this biological station recently took unto himself a wife, and
that on landing at the island, fresh from the altar rails, the young
bride's trousseau was lost over the cliffs of the island home. More
than two months have passed since that accident, and a recent visit to
the station gives an idea of how life is passing on the bleak islet
during this wintry season. The only habitable house on the island is
the four-roomed brick domicile erected by the Liverpool Dock Trustees
about forty years ago; and when we first visited the island, scarcely a
year ago, the house was a doorless, windowless wreck, The beasts of the
field, rabbits, sheep and goats, had made their home within its walls;
the birds of the air, the gulls, the puffins, the storm-tossed land
birds, and wandering songsters had found refuge within its walls, and it
seemed as though no human beings could ever dwell there again. The
biologists of Liverpool University College secured the use of the
island, however, and a few weeks of hard work saw the old place
habitable for the enthusiasts in biological research. The young keeper
who was ultimately secured to take charge of the lonely place seemed to
love his business, and he soon brought to the island his fair young
bride from Birkenhead. Puffin Island seemed a dreary place in which to
spend a honeymoon, but love brightens the gloomiest spot, and so the
girl bride faced her fate bravely. The islet of limestone is barely
five-eighths of a mile in length, being only 1057 yards, for we measured
it last week. It is 300 yards wide at its greatest width and is cut off
from the Island of Anglesea by a deep, dangerous channel nearly a mile
in width. In the summer time, under the guidance of a careful boatman,
it is a pleasant place enough, where joyous picnickers revel; but when
winter sets in, and the flowers are all dead, then, in truth, it grows
very dreary, only the gray old tower of St. Seiriol's Church stands on
the island besides the house of the biologists. All else has been swept
away by stormy winds and ruthless Time: the hermits cell and the
prince's tomb are alike lost to sight on the island. At one end, near
to the water, stands a limestone slab, set on edge; and here, report
says, a poor shipwrecked mariner was buried in three pieces, just as the
waves cast them up; but no carved line on the slab tells the story, and
the nameless mariner is remembered only in local legend. To this bleak
spot came the young bride to face the dangers of the deep "race " which
cuts off the island home from the larger world outside; to brave the
wild storms of the wintry sea which sweeps and swirls in fury round the
bare island.
One day last month, two old men had come to be the guests of the newly-married couple. These were old rabbit catchers, sent by the landlord of the island to catch the "vermin" which infest the place. On that morning a strange-looking cloud came creeping down the Welsh hills which lie across the Menai Straits from the island home. As the cloud neared the sea line it burst forth in a fierce wind, which swept across the Straits carrying before it many of the helpless craft which were lying quietly at anchor on the Welsh coast. Some hoisted sail and bore away to safety or to destruction afar off; but one unfortunate vessel, the Myra, of Runcorn, was blown helplessly across to where the sea broke in flying spume on the rocks of Puffin Island. The crew of the vessel consisted of two men and a boy of 15, the captain's son. One cable had parted at the anchorage, and the other anchor had been dragged for miles along the sandy bottom. On the edge of a sandbank, on the margin of the channel which separated the fated vessel from the rocky shore, a pause was made; the anchor held for a few minutes, and the crew tried to raise a sail so as to adventure through the deep channel which cuts off Puffin island from Anglesea. The keeper of the island and the two rabbit catchers crawled along on hands and knees, clinging to the grass and rock and thorny bush, to see if the vessel would escape; but, alas, the anchor dragged again, and the vessel was lifted up on the waves and thrown helpless on the rocks amid the boiling surf. With such force was she thrown down that a great moss-grown boulder of limestone, weighing many tons, was driven through her kelson, transfixing the helpless vessel as though she had been made of paper for a child's toy. One man got a rope cast round a jagged rock, which was only a few yards away, and secured a perilous foothold. The boy was crossing the rope to reach the same place, when a larger wave than usual broke over the vessel, and dashed against the cliffs, bringing down many tons of the overhanging rocks with a thunderous noise. The boy was lost in the seething whirl of waters, and the father's bitter cry, "Oh, my poor boy," was all that reached the keeper's ears as he lay on the cliffs above. The old rabbit catchers lowered the keeper over the cliff, and he managed to rescue the two men before the tide rose to overwhelm them, but the boy had been swept away. The sad party of cold, wet men reached the house of the young bride before noon, and she provided for the shipwrecked ones as well as possible. As the afternoon wore on, and the tide retreated, they found the battered body of the youthful sailor on the rocks below the house, and it was tenderly cared for by the bereaved father. They did not carry the little fellow to his home at Runcorn, nor did they bury him on the land, for the love of consecrated ground is strong in English hearts. They carried him across the deep "race" to Penmon churchyard, and buried him there, in one of the sleepiest old burying places ever seen. Many a poor, friendless, homeless sailor is buried in a nameless grave in that quiet spot.