Moelfre's Royal Charter disaster

A painting of the Royal Charter which sank off Moelfre in 1859

On 25 October 1859 the Royal Charter, a 2,700 ton steam and sailing ship bound for Liverpool, was lost when a severe storm hit Moelfre Bay on the west coast of Anglesey.

The 452 passengers on board were returning from Australia, many of them laden with gold from their exploits in the mines.

With the seas too rough for pilots to come onboard at Point Lynas to assist in guiding the ship along the coast, the captain decided to take shelter off Moelfre.

"But the ship's anchor chain broke under the strain and drove the Royal Charter's stern onto the rocks," said local historian Mel Evans.

"The waves were so tumultuous that the ship struck the rocks 50 yards from the shore and broke into two sections."

Many of those who tried to swim ashore were weighed down by their heavy clothes, others by their pockets full of gold. One seaman died in sight of his Moelfre home.

Charles Dickens

Only 41 people survived, mostly thanks to Joseph Rogers, a Maltese seaman who swam ashore with a rope. Then 28 Moelfre men formed a human chain, risking their own lives to haul in some of the passengers and crew.

J Wynne Lewis from Moelfre, whose grandfather was one of the 28, came across Charles Dickens' account of the event in The Uncommercial Traveller.

After visiting the village, Dickens discounted the rumours that locals had been more interested in searching the dead for their gold than in helping to save lives.

St Gallgo's Church where 147 victims of the Royal Charter disaster are buried

"Dickens also paid tribute to the Reverend Stephen Roose Hughes, the village rector, who had striven tirelessly to identify and bury the dead, and inform and comfort relatives," he said.

"We salute Dickens for his sympathetic report."

It was a tradition then to bury the dead from a shipwreck in the parish where they were washed up. The graves of those who died in the wreck can therefore be found in many churches along the Anglesey coast, including Llanallgo, Llanbedrgoch, Penrhos Llugwy and Llanwen Llwyfo.

In one mass grave at Llanallgo's church there are 147 victims. Roose Hughes is also buried there.

Warden and lay preacher at Llanallgo, Peter Day - whose ancestors helped build the Royal Charter - has dived the wreck in the past.

"I first dived the wreck in 1972," said Peter. "The ship didn't really sink because the water wasn't very deep where it came to ground. All the remains are now under the sand.

"So when you dive down to the sea bed, you've got to excavate the sand with heavy equipment to get down to the wreck itself.

"There is about 200 feet of the length and six to nine feet in height left. The metalwork under the sand is well preserved."

Jewellery

Among the articles brought up from such dives were the engine room fittings, tools for loading the boilers and for raking the ashes, jewellery, ladies' brass suspenders, a few pieces of a pocket chess set and bottles of wine.

A few years after the disaster, Moelfre launched its first lifeboat which has saved over 600 lives to date. These include those rescued off the stricken Hindlea coaster, which was driven onto Moelfre's rocks in gale-force winds 100 years to the day of the storm which wrecked the Royal Charter.

"We always felt they should make a programme or film about the Royal Charter," said Peter Day. "There have been a few short programmes and a play. It was performed on Anglesey many times and was very good."