eservation; and
who even after the devices and inventions of man had utterly failed,
crowned our humble endeavors with complete success.

I have, &c.

JOHN ROSS, Captain, R. N.

To Captain the Hon. George Elliot, &c. }
Secretary Admiralty. }

LOSS OF THE CATHARINE, VENUS AND PIEDMONT TRANSPORTS; AND THREE
MERCHANT SHIPS.

The miseries of war are in themselves great and terrible, but the
consequences which arise indirectly from it, though seldom known and
little adverted to, are no less deplorable.--The destruction of the
sword sometimes bears only an inconsiderable proportion to the havoc
of disease, and, in the pestilential climates of the western colonies,
entire regiments, reared in succession, have as often fallen victims
to their baneful influence.

To prosecute the war with alacrity, it had been judged expedient to
transport a strong body of troops on foreign service, but their
departure was delayed by repeated adversities, and at length the
catastrophe which is about to be related ensued.

On the 15th of November 1795, the fleet, under convoy of Admiral
Christian's squadron, sailed from St. Helens. A more beautiful sight
than it exhibited cannot be conceived; and those who had nothing to
lament in leaving their native country, enjoyed the spectacle as the
most magnificent produced by the art of man, and as that which the
natives of this island contemplate with mingled pride and pleasure.

Next day, the wind continuing favorable, carried the fleet down
channel; and as the Catharine transport came within sight of the isle
of Purbeck, Lieutenant Jenner, an officer on board, pointed out to
another person, the rocks where the Halsewell and so many unfortunate
individuals had perished. He and Cornet Burns had been unable to reach
Southampton until the Catharine had sailed, therefore they hired a boy
to overtake her, and on embarking at St. Helens the former expressed
his satisfaction, in a letter to his mother, that he had been so
fortunate as to do so.

On Tuesday the 17th, the fleet was off Portland, standing to the
westward; but the wind shifting and blowing a strong gale at
south-south-west, the admiral, dubious whether they could clear the
channel, made a signal for putting into Torbay, which some of the
transports were then in sight of.--However, they could not make the
bay; the gale increased, and a thick fog came on; therefore