Divine Deliverance of Passengers on the Burning S.S. Abyssinia

The steamship Abyssinia caught fire in mid-ocean on December 18, 1891, while carrying missionaries Joseph H. Richards, Ira Williams, and Joseph M. Kerr. The ship was doomed, but the S.S. Spree arrived at the exact hour needed to rescue all fifty-nine passengers, including the missionaries, before the Abyssinia was destroyed. The article identifies this as a special interposition of Providence.

Fuller account of this event (as retold in Latter-day Saints' Millennial Star, Vol. 54, No. 1 (4 January 1892)):

The incident to which special reference is now made is connected with the loss of the Guion steamship Abyssinia, which burned in mid-ocean on December 18. The vessel was to have left New York on Saturday, December 12, but was delayed one day in taking her cargo. Her passengers numbered fifty-nine—nineteen cabin and forty steerage. Among the former were three missionaries for Great Britain: Elders Joseph H. Richards, Ira Williams, and Joseph M. Kerr. The fire was discovered in the steerage at 4:30 a.m. on the 18th, and though every effort was made to extinguish it, the flames spread with such rapidity that the captain ordered the boats to be lowered. The passengers were all safely transferred to the boats, and remained in them for some time, expecting every moment that the ship would go down. While in this condition, and while the fire was raging in the doomed vessel, the steamship Spree, of the North German Lloyd line, appeared in sight. She had been driven out of her course by the heavy weather, and was not on the regular track of the Atlantic steamers. The Divine Hand had guided her in the winds and storms of a three and a half days’ voyage from New York, so that she arrived on the scene in the very hour when her presence was most needed. The passengers were taken on board the Spree, and were treated with the greatest kindness by the officers and crew. The Elders are exceedingly grateful, and the Saints will unite with them in praise and thanksgiving to the Almighty, who provided the means of escape from danger, thus answering the prayers which are offered up by His people for the protection of those who are called to carry the Gospel to the nations of the earth.