NEW ZEALAND DISASTERS AND TRAGEDIES
THE LOSS OF THE TUG TOANUI
OFF SEVEN STONES, CORNWALL, ENGLAND
WEDNESDAY 11 JUNE 1913

THE TUG TOANUI. NO FURTHER TIDINGS. HOPES THAT VESSEL MAY TURN UP AT GIBRALTAR
It is long since an item of news created more interest locally than, the announcement which appeared in yesterday morning’s “Times” to the effect that wreckage had been found on the Cornwall coast bearing the words “Toanui, Glasgow.” It was known that the Gisborne Sheepfarmers’ Frozen Meat Company’s fine new tug, Toanui, had left Gourock, near Glasgow, for Gisborne, on the night of June 4, under Captain Sewell, of Gisborne, the company’s marine superintendent. Under ordinary weather conditions, the Toanui should have reached Gibraltar about Monday last. The news of the finding of wreckage on the English coast bearing the tug’s name occasioned a sensation in Gisborne, and the “Times” office was yesterday, and until a late hour last night, besieged with inquiries as to whether further information had been received.
St. Just, off which the wreckage was picked up, is a Cornish market town of a population of 6000, almost on the extreme south-western point of Cornwall, being only some 12 miles from Land’s End. The Longship Lighthouse is just off Land’s End. and this is the light which vessels pick up before setting a course for Gibraltar. The fact that so little wreckage has been discovered favors the theory propounded by a master mariner in yesterday morning’s issue to the effect that heavy seas had possibly struck the Toanui and washed a quantity of the top Hamper overboard.
It is held by shipping authorities that had the vessel met with serious disaster more wreckage would have been discovered, and consequently in her case “no news is good news.” It is considered probable that the tug has been delayed by bad weather, and is fighting her way to Gibraltar. Had she been disabled, it is highly probable that she would have been picked up ere this, as the waters thereabouts are in the track-of shipping.
Captain Sewell is regarded as a thoroughly capable master, and a man whom nothing short of a dire disaster could prevent bringing his boat through while she could float, and optimistic hopes are still held that the vessel will yet be reported from Gibraltar.
The crew on board the tug was a picked one, which was being brought out with a view to them being given permanent employment by the company on arrival at Gisborne. Mr. C. A. de Lautour, chairman of directors of the Sheepfarmers’ Company, last evening informed a “Times” reporter that no further news had been received concerning the tug.Gisborne Times, Volume XXXV, Issue 3962, 19 June 1913, Page 5

ALL HOPE ABANDONED. MOURNING FOR MASTER AND CREW OF THE TUG TOANUI. SHEEPFARMERS’ OFFICES AND FACTORY TO BE CLOSED TO-DAY
After hoping against hope that favorable tidings of the salvage tog Toanui and her crew would come to hand, the Gisborne Sheepfarmers’ Frozen Meat Company have resigned themselves to the fact that the vessel and her crew of have joined the vast majority which the sea has claimed.
By advertisement in this issue, Mr W. F. CEDERWALL, general manager of the company, notifies that the offices, factory, and so far as possible all other services of the company will be closed throughout to-day, in memory of Captain Sewell, the officers, and crew of the S.S. Toanui, “who,” the advertisement reads, “it has been feared, have been lost at sea while in the company’s employment.”
The new salvage tug, which left Glasgow on June 4, carried the following crew.

It has been truly said that ‘hope springs eternal in the human breast,’ but there comes a time when the most optimistic must resign themselves to the inevitable, and it would appear as if the fate of the Toanui and her crew is now settled, practically beyond dispute. There will be widespread and genuine regret at the loss of so able and popular a master as Captain Sewell, who was held in the highest esteem by nil who knew him, and the sympathy of the whole community will go out to Mrs Sewell in her hour of sorrow.
The crew had been specially selected, and was composed of picked men, who were being brought out to enter the company’s service in Gisborne. There will be sad hearts on the banks of the Clyde for the gaps which have been caused by the loss of the ten gallant seamen who set out for New Zealand on June 4 with hopes high burning and promises to return to dear ones in Bonnie Scotland.
In a letter to Mr. C. A. de Lautour, chairman of directors of the Sheepfarmers’ Frozen Meat Company, dated May 29, Captain Sewell, writing from Glasgow, stated that he hoped to be able to sail on May 30, at noon, and that he was engaged adjusting compasses at Greenock, and hoped to reach Gisborne in 65 days. The captain advised that his longest steaming distance was about 11 days at nine knots, and he was arranging his coal supplies on that basis. Sympathy will be expressed for the company in the loss of so valued a servant as Captain Sewell, as well as on the loss of such a fine vessel. Gisborne Times, Volume XXXVI, Issue 3977, 7 July 1913, Page 5