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OUR ENGRAVINGS
Those Who Leave and Never Return
Twenty-eight victims, leaving 23 widows and 45 orphans behind: such is the terrible toll of the shipwrecks that have just plunged the population of Penmarch, at the tip of Finistère, into mourning and moved the whole of France. Indeed, it is hard to imagine a more rapid or complete tragedy.
On May 22nd, a violent storm suddenly raged off the Breton coast. Most of the boats, then at sea, were able to return to port. Only two fishing  boats, the Saint-Louis and the Berceau-du-Marin, one manned by a crew of seven, the other by fifteen, were caught off the coast of Penmarch and found themselves in distress. As soon as the danger they were in was realized from land, lifeboats were launched, and it is one of those poignant episodes that our large color page represents. All the more poignant because the men who set out in this way, in the middle of the storm, to save the others, were no more likely to return than they were. So, the two lifeboats set off, each manned by eight men. Despite the enormous waves and the furious wind, they were approaching their goal when waves more monstrous than the others broke on the rescuers, and, because of the shallowness of the sea, the large number of underwater rocks that did not allow the lifeboats to be self-righted, they capsized on their crew. Meanwhile, the drama was ending for the fishing boats in distress: they were going to break on the reefs of the open sea. This catastrophe, unprecedented in the annals of the sea, was not, however, to involve only deaths. Alongside all these victims, it is fitting to note the heroism bestowed by the fate of Mr. Le Gall, president of the Kéréty Fishermen's Cooperative. Having sighted the quadruple shipwreck from land, he set sail immediately and, displaying fierce energy, single-handedly managed to save six men alive and three others who were still breathing, but whom immediate medical attention could not revive. Four other men were also saved by a boat, itself caught in the rough weather, which returned to the sinister waters. As for the corpses, the sea returned them one by one, washed ashore in shrouds of seaweed.
Twenty-three widows and forty-five orphans weeping! Faced with such a spectacle, it is not enough to be moved; action must be taken. LE PETIT JOURNAL has decided to express the feelings of its readers by opening a subscription among themselves in favor of these widows and orphans. We have no doubt that the readers of the PETIT JOURNAL ILLUSTRE will think the same and will want to add their contribution, however small, to those which have already been sent to the management of this newspaper.
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