The Ajax all this time was drifting towards the island of Tenedos, with her stern and broadside alternately presented to the wind.  The humane exertions of Lieutenant Willoughby had been twice crowned with success; his boat was, for the third time, nearly filled with people, when he observed the Ajax round to, and that several men were hanging by ropes under her head.  He resolved, at all hazards, to rescue these poor fellows before she again fell off.  Dashing, therefore, towards her, he succeeded in the first part of his object, but not until the vessel was again before the wind, flames issuing from every part of both hull and rigging, and with the cutter across her hawse.

To extricate himself from this perilous situation was almost impossible, for every moment increased the speed with which the Ajax was surging through the water, and the sea thrown up from her bows threatened his small boat with instant destruction.

We will now take up the account as given by Marshall, in his Naval Biograghy:[10]

’Whilst the Ajax was propelling the cutter in the above alarming manner, the flames reached the shank, painter, and stopper, of her remaining bower anchor, and it fell from her bows, nearly effecting the destruction of the boat at its first plunge into the water.  The cable caught her outer gunwale, over which it ran, apparently one sheet of fire; orders, exertion, and presence of mind were now of no avail.  Death to all in the cutter appeared inevitable.  The sole alternative was either to be burned or drowned, for they were all too much exhausted to be able to save themselves by swimming.

’The boats at a distance saw that the cutter was enveloped in flames, and therefore considered it impossible to assist her.  All that Lieutenant Willoughby and his companions could do while the cable was running out and binding their boat more firmly to the ship, was to keep the sparks and flames as much as possible from the uncovered parts of their persons.  Providentially, however, although the inner portion of the cable had been burnt through, the anchor took the ground, and gave the ship’s head a check to windward, before the less consumed part had entirely left the tier; and thus the very event which had seemed to seal the doom of the cutter was in all respects ordained by the Almighty for her preservation.  The change in the ship’s position enabled the boat to get clear, but not before every individual in her was more or less severely scorched, and the heat was no longer endurable.’

The wreck drifted on shore on the north side of the island of Tenedos, where, at five o’clock in the morning, she blew up with an explosion which might be felt on the adjacent shores of Europe and of Asia; and all that remained of the Ajax were a few smoking spars, which rose to the surface of the sea.