In a few minutes, the officers had gathered round their captain. It needed no words to point out to them the imminence of their danger, and the necessity of their setting an example of steadiness and intrepidity to the men. They suffered no signs of dismay to appear in their demeanour, but immediately proceeded to consider what were the best steps to be taken to meet the impending danger. The calmness and courage thus displayed by the captain and his officers could not fail of having the desired effect upon the ship's company, who recovered from their panic, and seeing the necessity for instant exertion, held themselves in readiness to execute each order as it was issued.
In order to prevent the ship falling on her broadside, the masts were cut away; but she continued to beat so violently upon the rocks, that in less than half-an-hour she filled with water up to the lower deck ports, and then fell over to larboard on her beam ends. Captain Raynsford, foreseeing the inevitable loss of his vessel, had ordered the boats to be hoisted out, with the idea that they would be useful in towing a raft, which he had caused to be constructed to leeward. This raft would probably have been the means of preserving a great many lives, had not the men in charge of the two jolly-boats pushed off, and left their unhappy comrades to their fate. Unfortunately, both the cutter and the barge, in hoisting out, were stove, and immediately swamped, no less than thirty men perishing with them. Several of the crew had been killed by the falling of the masts, and others were severely injured. Two midshipmen were crushed to death between the spanker boom and the bulwarks.
Brenton has thus described the horrible scene on board:--'Nothing was to be heard but the shrieks of the drowning and the wailings of despair. The man who would courageously meet death at the cannon's mouth, or at the point of the bayonet, is frequently unnerved in such a scene as this, where there is no other enemy to contend with than the inexorable waves, and no hope of safety or relief but what may be afforded by a floating plank or mast. The tremendous shocks as the ship rose with the sea, and fell again on the rocks, deprived the people of the power of exertion; while at every crash portions of the shattered hull, loosened and disjointed, were scattered in dreadful havoc among the breakers. Imagination can scarcely picture to itself anything more appalling than the frantic screams of the women and children, the darkness of the night, the irresistible fury of the waves, which, at every moment, snatched away a victim, while the tolling of the bell, occasioned by the violent motion of the wreck, added a funereal solemnity to the horrors of the scene.'