Section 78

Where a seaman or apprentice is lost with the ship to which he belongs, the Superintendent may recover the wages due to him from the owner of the ship, in the same court and in the same manner in which seamen’s wages are recoverable, and shall deal with those wages in the same manner as with the wages of other deceased seamen and apprentices under this Act.

In any proceeding for the recovery of the wages, if it is shown by some official return produced out of the custody of the Director, whether in the capacity of Superintendent or as Registrar of Singapore Ships, or by other evidence, that the ship has 12 months or upwards before the institution of the proceeding left a port of departure, she shall, unless it is shown that she has been heard of within 12 months after that departure, be deemed to have been lost with all hands on board, either immediately after the time at which she was last heard of, or at such later time as the court hearing the case thinks probable.

Any duplicate agreement made out, or statement of a change of the crew delivered, under this Act, at the time of the last departure of the ship from Singapore, or a certificate purporting to be a certificate from a consular or other public officer at any port out of Singapore, stating that certain seamen and apprentices were shipped in the ship from that port, shall, if produced out of the custody of the Director, whether in the capacity of Superintendent or as Registrar of Singapore Ships, be, in the absence of proof to the contrary, sufficient proof that the seamen and apprentices therein named as belonging to the ship were on board at the time of the loss.[91