On Sept. 27, 1854, off Cape Race, New York, a Collins steamer, the
Artic, collided with a small French steamer, the Vesta. The Arctic went
down with a loss of 233 passengers and 135 members of the crew. Among
the victims was Edward Collins’ wife, the former Mary Ann Woodruff,
and his son and his daughter. The master of the Arctic, Capt. James C.
Luce, of Martha’s Vineyard ancestry, held his own child in his arms
through the awful scenes of panic. As he was about to launch a raft,
some debris from the paddlebox struck and killed the child.
Then came the second blow. The steamer Pacific of the Collins Line put
out from Liverpool on January 25, 1856, with 45 passengers and a crew
of 141. She was never heard from again. No clue to her fate was ever
turned up.
Meanwhile Collins had been having his troubles in Washington, and now
they were piling up. A public clamor was on; the general theme was
that the Cunard Line competition was too keen. Congress withdrew the
second subsidy. A contract was made with the rival line of Cornelius
Vanderbilt. Gradually the Collins Line sank to failure and the panic of
1857 put a period to its glorious adventuring. Fortunes were lost by
investors in the line.