THOMAS M. M. HEMY (1852-1937) - PAGE 25

THE BURNING OF THE "VOLTURNO" (1913?)

Thomas M. M. Hemy datapages 01, 02 & 03 are now on site. Plus all of the other image pages, accessible though the index on page 05. PRIOR PAGE / NEXT PAGE If you want to make a comment, a site guestbook is here. Test. To search for specific text on this page:- Enter your search term & 'Submit'. To repeatedly search the page, press 'ALT S' again & again as many times as may be required. But beware, once it reaches the bottom of the page, it starts all over again at the top. The Volturno data has now become most extensive, so I have placed interesting but limited data on this page & decided to index & link Volturno data separately. You can see the many pages (78 today, I think) currently available here. At left is a small image of the Hemy Volturno work, The Burning of the "Volturno", but really just a large thumbnail, provided by a friend of the site. (But now see below) The work appeared as a print in the 'Chums' magazine issue dated May 9, 1914 (No. 1,130 Vol. XXII at page 628). I wrote those words after seeing the 1914 'Chums' magazine Annual in a Toronto, Canada, children's reference library. But other sources say it appeared in the Apr. 18, 1914 issue instead. I now have confirmation that my data is correct, & the print does appear as stated. But it is quite possible that the print was placed in the 1914 Annual in a different place than it was originally published. I will await further word from anyone who could clarify that situation? The original painting? That is a very different matter! I have no idea where it might be. But I do have some words re the original. I am now advised by John R. Bird, of Brixworth, Northampton, Northamptonshire, U.K., that under the print in the 1914 'Chums' Annual are the following words. John, I thank you! Reproduced from the picture presented to Arthur Spurgeon, J.P., by the British Press. THE BURNING OF THE "VOLTURNO" by Thomas M. Hemy. On the 9th of October, 1913, the steamship "Volturno," carrying 561 passengers, of whom 539 were steerage, caught fire in mid-Atlantic. She sent out wireless calls for help, which were answered by the Cunard liner "Carmania" and ten other vessels. The sea was so rough that these vessels could do nothing but "standby". This picture represents the heroic attempt of one of the "Carmania's" boats to render aid. A feature of the disaster was the calm courage of Captain Inch, of the "Volturno". He left the burning vessel last, his dog in his arms. I am so pleased to have those words. Arthur Spurgeon, later Sir Arthur Spurgeon, was indeed, I understand, a Justice of the Peace. And here is a larger image of the work, kindly provided by John R. Bird. Now John has kindly provided me with three prints & the related negatives. It may just be possible, with those negatives, to be able to later improve upon the fine image I now can show you below. But if YOU have anything to add, I would be most happy to hear from you. Lower on this page I do have a fine contemporary artwork of the disaster. There are now many more images available, through the Volturno site index page. Here is a composite image to give you an idea of what the Volturno looked like. The large image came from here, while the small image at lower left, which seems to be of the Volturno on fire, came from this Russian site. The drawing, the work of Duncan Haws, came from Jan Daamen's extensive Volturno site, but originated, I see, at the Ellis Island On-Line site. A CONTEMPORARY ARTWORK And here I am so happy to show you an image from the back page of the Oct. 26, 1913 edition of the French newspaper "Le Petit Journal". No artist's name is visible. It is a most striking image, so I show you almost the full work & a detail from that work. The best image I have of the entire painting can be seen here, but it is very big indeed - so be warned! The masthead of "Le Petit Journal" is visually most interesting. So I show that also. All of these images came from an item that was sold on e-Bay for U.S. $9.99 in Mar. 2003. As I have commented elsewhere in these pages, one is not supposed to use e-Bay images in this way, even though e-Bay has become, for so many, a quite irreplaceable research tool. I hope that I will be forgiven & trust that 'edupgebr', the vendor, would not object to my showing images of an item that has now been sold, for this non profit & informational site. Actually I did intend to bid on the item myself but other matters intervened. The least I can do, by way of thanks, is invite you to visit the vendor's site. He had a wealth of material that interested me when I visited his pages & his items may well be of interest to you too. The original scan was not perfectly vertical, & I lost much detail when I tried to rotate & straighten the image. So I did not rotate it & what you see it not, therefore, quite all of the actual work due to some modest edge cropping. I was interested to see that a full year of these "Le Petit Journal" newspapers (1910) was available also in Mar. 2003 in a bound volume. Actually not quite the full year. 51 issues, in fact, since one was missing. It sold for U.S. $204.50. I note that the vendor of that item said that he could not see that any of the artists whose work appeared in the newspapers were identified. So the lack of an artist's name re the 'Volturno' image may not be unusual. To the Volturno page index. Thomas M. M. Hemy datapages 01, 02 & 03 are now on site. Plus all of the other image pages, accessible though the index on page 05. PRIOR PAGE / NEXT PAGE To MV Danmark Slider Puzzle page, & to the Special Pages Index. A SITE SEARCH FACILITY Search This Site for Get a Free Search Engine for Your Web Site THE GUEST BOOK - GO HERE E-MAIL THIS LINK Enter recipient's e-mail: