3-052-583 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The missing training-ship Atalanta, 1880. 'At the time of going to press with our early edition no tidings of the missing ship Atalanta, for which the whole country is anxiously waiting had been received. On Nov. 7, 1879, the Atalanta, a sailing-frigate, training-ship for young seamen, sailed from Portsmouth for the West Indies...The gun-boat Avon...reports that when at the Azores she noticed immense quantities of wreckage floating about; in fact, for several miles before reaching and after leaving the islands the sea was strewn with spars, &c...When asked for their opinion as to the fate of the Atalanta, the officers of the Avon...seemed inclined to the belief that the Atalanta had suffered grievously in the gales, that she had been dismasted, and that, as a last resource, having been allowed to drift, she had gone north, where they think she now remains disabled...Quite as far back as 1844 the Atalanta has been in constant service, first doing duty as a man-of-war, next as a police hulk, and finally...as a training-ship...The ship's complement was rather more than 300, all told, and were draughted from the different ports, principally from Portsmouth and Devonport'. HMS Atalanta was later presumed to have been lost in a storm. From "Illustrated London News", 1880.