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  • The Nelson Gold Heist – 1852

    The Nelson Gold Robbery. The World’s News, 5 Aug 1950, p. 9.

       In the early hours of Friday, 2nd April 1852, a band of villains climbed aboard the barque Nelson while moored in Melbourne’s Hobsons Bay and made off with over 8,000 ounces of pure gold, worth tens of millions of dollars in today’s money. The heist was as simple as it was audacious and ranks among the largest robberies in Australian history. Most of the thieves never saw the inside of prison, and only a fraction of the gold was ever recovered.

       The 603-ton barque Nelson had sailed from London on 4 July 1851, around the same time that prospectors discovered a vast quantity of alluvial gold near Mount Alexander. The barque dropped anchor in Hobsons Bay on 11 October, only for its captain, Walter Wright, to learn Victoria was in the midst of a gold rush.

       The Nelson disembarked its passengers and unloaded merchandise at Williamstown, then sailed across to nearby Geelong. There, the crew deserted the ship and headed off to the gold fields to try their luck, leaving just the captain and first mate behind. Over the next couple of months, the Nelson’s hold was filled with bales of wool, casks of tallow, and, most importantly to this story, 11 boxes of gold totalling 2083 ounces, all bound for London. By March 1852, the barque was once again anchored off Melbourne in Hobsons Bay, ready to return home as soon as enough men could be found to crew her.

    Ships, deserted by their crews, lying in Hobson’s Bay, By E Thomas.

       On Thursday night, 1 April, the Nelson was still anchored a short distance off the Point Gellibrand Lighthouse, along with scores of other ships stranded for lack of crew. Captain Wright was ashore for the night, leaving his chief mate, Henry Draper, in charge. With him were the second mate Carr Dudley, an officer from a neighbouring ship, plus a handful of seamen they had managed to recruit.

       Despite a fortune in gold being on board, no watch had been posted. The crew had refused Draper’s order to stand guard through the night, saying there were too few of them to do so, and besides, they had not signed on as night watchmen. All Draper could do was lock the boxes of gold in the lazarette, (a storeroom of sorts) for safekeeping. By now, the number of boxes had grown to over twenty as the captain continued to accept new consignments.

       Henry Draper, Carr Dudley, and two officers from nearby ships spent the evening playing cards and drinking. Then, sometime around 11 p.m., the card game wrapped up, and one of the visiting officers returned to his ship. Draper and Dudley tottered off to their cabin, leaving William Davis, the Royal George’s second mate, to sleep off the evening’s entertainment on the cabin’s lounge. Meanwhile, the rest of the crew had long since retired to their berths in the forecastle.

       Around two hours later, two boats carrying 22 men rowed up to the Nelson, the sound oftheir oars muffled by blankets to mask their approach. They pulled alongside, and a dozen of them, armed with pistols and swords, climbed onto the deck.

       Some went forward and secured the crew in the forecastle while the rest poured into the main cabin aft. As they swarmed onto the deck, Carr Dudley woke Draper up to tell him he thought he could hear movement above. Draper went on deck to investigate and was confronted by several well-armed men, all dressed in black with hats pulled low over their heads and handkerchiefs covering the lower portions of their faces.   

    “We’ve come for the gold,” the ringleader told Draper, “And the gold we’ll bloody well have.” Draper had gone on deck dressed only in his nightshirt and asked if he could return to his cabin to put on a pair of trousers. While he was fumbling to get dressed, a robber, still pointing a pistol at him, warned, “We’ve not come here to be played with, so make haste. ”Draper and Dudley were forced into the main cabin to join Davis, who had been rudely awoken with a gun pointed at his head. They were eventually joined by the rest of the crew brought aft from the forecastle.

    The Sun, 30 May 1948, p. 3.

       Draper was forced to unlock the lazarette, and the thieves helped themselves to 23 cedar boxes containing over 200 kilograms of gold. During the proceedings, one of the robbers’ pistols accidentally discharged, and the bullet grazed Draper’s thigh. Once the gold was loaded onto the boats, the slightly wounded Draper and the rest of the crew were locked in the lazarette. The robbers then hopped in their boats and were rowed back to shore.

       Draper and the others would have remained imprisoned in the lazarette until well into the day had they not had a minor stroke of luck. The cook had been woken by the noise of the thieves climbing on deck, and he had hidden in a dark recess under his bunk, remaining undiscovered during the robbery. He resurfaced once he saw that the robbers had left and went aft to find his shipmates locked in the lazarette. Once released, Draper wasted no time reporting the heist to the Williamstown water police office.

       Boats were sent out to scour Hobson’s Bay, but they were too late. The robbers had got away. Shortly after daylight, the water police found one of the whaleboats pulled up on the beach at Williamstown and the other across the bay near Sandridge (present day South Melbourne). Tracks were seen leading off the beach where the boat had been abandoned.   

    The police were galvanised into action. Mounted officers and constables fanned out across Melbourne looking for the robbers and the missing gold. The robbery was a severe embarrassment to the police and the colonial government, and both were widely condemned in the newspapers when it became public. The Governor offered a £250 reward, and that was matched pound for pound by the Nelson’s shipping agents.

    The Argus 3 Apr 1852, p. 5.

       The empty gold boxes were discovered by an employee of the Argus newspaper a few days later, hidden in scrubland not far from the beach at Sandridge, but most of the gold was long gone. Only some slight traces of gold dust could be seen mixed in the sand where the boxes had been busted open. Over the next several days, police rounded up anyone who looked remotely suspicious, and the watchhouses were filled to bursting.

       The police finally got a lucky break when a band of men turned up at a hotel in Geelong late one night wanting a room. They were dressed far beyond their station in life and spent their money freely. The publican alerted the Geelong police, and they were arrested a couple of days later. These seven men were detained while the police searched for evidence of their involvement in the Nelson robbery. Two more men were captured in Portland on Victoria’s western coast. Most of the individual suspects were found to possess more than £500, five times the average yearly wage at the time.

       Of these nine men, only three were found guilty of the robbery and sentenced to long terms in prison. The most compelling evidence against them was that they had been recognised by Henry Draper, or the Royal George’s second mate, William Davis. Drape and Davis claimed they recognised the robbers because their handkerchiefs had slipped down, revealing their faces. Draper and Davis also claimed they recognised two other men who likely had nothing to do with the robbery. One had a slew of witnesses testify at his trial that he had been on the gold fields at the time, but the jury did not believe them. However, he was quietly released a couple of months later when it was clear he and his witnesses had been telling the truth. The other hapless soul spent many years at hard labour for a crime he never committed.

       For years, rumours circulated around Melbourne about who might have been involved. Ongoing interest was fuelled by the fact that most of the gold was never recovered. But it remained a baffling mystery.

       Writing in the Sydney Morning Herald 30 years later, Marcus Clarke pondered some of the many rumours associated with the heist. It was often said that a gentleman of standing in Melbourne society had masterminded the robbery and paid thugs to steal the gold on his behalf. It was also rumoured that several prominent men about town had benefited financially from the robbery. Yet another rumour had it that a notorious publican had fenced the gold and then left the colony a very wealthy man. Clarke finally concluded that after the passing of so many years, the whole story would never be known.

       But was he right? Since first writing this blog post in April 2024, I have unearthed some tantalising clues that point to the identity of the brazen thieves. But more about that some other time.

    © Copyright C.J. Ison / Tales from the Quarterdeck, 2024.

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  • The Short Life of the SS Bessemer – 1875.

    The Bessemer. The Penny Illustrated Paper, 10 Apr 1875, p. 1.

    One September afternoon in 1874, Miss Bessie Wright cracked a bottle of champagne across the bow of a new steamer and sent it gliding into the Humber River.   Thus, one of the strangest vessels ever to come off a naval architect’s drawing board was launched.

    S.S. Bessemer Saloon Steamship was the brainchild of little Bessie’s grandfather, Sir Henry Bessemer.   He had found investors who stumped up some £250,000 to make his vision a reality.   The resulting paddle steamer measuring 350 ft (106.6m) at the waterline and had four paddle wheels, two on the port side and two starboard.   The fore and aft were identical, and there were two bridges and two helms meaning she could travel as quickly in either direction at an anticipated top speed of 20 miles per hour.    But what set the Bessemer apart from any other steamer was her swinging saloon.  

    Positioned in the middle of the ship was a 70 ft (21m) cabin, which would remain stable regardless of the pitch and roll of the rest of the vessel.   The gyroscopic apparatus powered by a dedicated steam turbine had been designed and patented by Henry Bessemer himself.   This complex piece of engineering was to ensure that the steamers’ first-class passengers were spared the indignity of mal de mer or seasickness in all but the roughest of sea conditions.   Second-class passengers were not so well catered for.  They would occupy a separate, more conventional cabin mounted upon the ship’s superstructure.  

    Sir Henry Bessemer.

    The Bessemer was purpose-built to negotiate the lumpy waters of the English Channel.   She would travel between Dover and Calais, and at her top speed, it would take just one hour to cross the 20-nautical mile gap.  Henry Bessemer was convinced that the first-class passengers would disembark as hail and hearty as they had boarded his modern marvel.    Nonetheless, the designers had thought to include two “retiring rooms” for ladies and gentlemen to “withdraw from the public gaze,” should anyone still feel the ill effects of the sea.

    Not surprisingly, the novel design attracted its fair share of sceptics.   Some naval architects felt the gyroscopic apparatus would do little to stop the saloon from pitching and rolling in rough seas.   Their main concern was that the mechanism would be unable to respond fast enough to the sea to ensure the saloon maintained its equilibrium.

    After the Bessemer had been launched it was moored in the Hull Roads while her plush interior was fitted out.   A Daily News reporter would later describe the Bressemer’s saloon akin to a “superbly furnished floating clubhouse.”   The steamer was furnished with a large smoking saloon, several staterooms on the upper deck, refreshment bars, an office for small parcels, umbrella and cloakrooms, and “delightful promenades high above the reach of ocean spray.”

    Deck of the Besser Saloon steamship. The Illustrated London News, 27 Mar 1875, p. 293

    The only hiccup while the steamer was being fitted out was when she dragged her anchors during a mighty gale that battered much of the UK on 21 October.   The Bessemer was driven onto a mudflat on the northern bank of the Humber River, but she was easily floated off at high tide on that same day.  

    By late January 1875, the Bessemer had completed her first set of sea trials on the Humber.   She reportedly steered well and reached a top speed of 18 knots (33 km/h).   Her gyroscopic apparatus was said to have performed splendidly, but that assertion would soon be brought into question.   

    In March, the Bessemer made the voyage from Hull to Gravesend on the Thames in 24 hours while steaming into a strong headwind. There, she underwent more sea trials, and on 12 April, the Bessemer Saloon Steamship made her much-anticipated first crossing to Calais. As the steamer had yet to receive her passenger certification from the Board of Trade, the only people on board were the crew and a handful of men connected with the company.

    The Bessemer. The Penny Illustrated Paper, 3 Oct 1874, p. 13.

    She left Gravesend at 8.30 on Saturday morning and made her way down the Thames and out into the English Channel.   There, she was buffeted by a strong easterly wind and heavy seas.   Despite the inclement weather, the passage was reported to have been “remarkably steady”, and there had been no opportunity to test the ship’s swinging saloon.   She averaged 11 knots (20km/h) for the 75 nm (145 km) passage and arrived in that French port at 3.30 in the afternoon.   There, a great many of Calais’ residents gathered on the pier to witness the arrival of the unique ship.   Unfortunately, as she was docking, one of her paddles was damaged when it struck the pier.  

    Finally, the big day arrived on 12 April 1875.   The Bessemer steamed out of Dover with 350 invited guests onboard anticipating being the first to see the swinging saloon in action.  Several members of the press were among them, no doubt there to extol the virtues of the fine new vessel.  However, the Observer’s correspondent, for one, was clearly underwhelmed by the experience.    

    He reported that the screws fastening the moveable saloon were never loosened, which would have allowed the passengers to witness for themselves the effect of Henry Bessemer’s invention.   Several reasons were put forward for why the gyroscopic apparatus was not employed, but the reporter wrote that he had been reliably informed that the equipment simply did not work.   It could shift the saloon from side to side, but it was not up to the task of “regulating the rise and fall of the saloon with sufficient precision to secure stable equilibrium.”

    S.S. Bessemer. By Henry Spernon Tozer – The Illustrated London News,

    To cap off the 90-minute non-event, the Bessemer entered Calais’s harbour far too quickly to manoeuvrer safely around the small, enclosed port.      The collision with the pier on her last visit to Calais had been attributed to the Bessemer’s poor response to her helm when travelling at low speed.   This time, the captain came in a little faster.   However, the steamer was caught in a tidal current and spun around.   The Bessemer struck the pier with considerable force but sustained little damage to itself.

    However, the same could not be said for the wharf.   “When at last the Bessemer was stopped, some 50 or 60 yards of the pier were knocked down like nine-pins in a skittle alley, and the water of the harbour was covered with broken planks and beams.”

    “The Bessemer is too long a vessel for Calais harbour,” the reporter opined, “there must always be a certain amount of risk in her entering so narrow a port with the velocity required to carry her across the bars.”   A month later, the Calais Municipality sent the Saloon Ship Company a bill for £2,800 to cover the cost of repairing the pier.

    The Bessemer saloon ship running foul of Calais Pier. The Illustrated London News, 15 May 1875, p. 20.

    That was the Bessemer’s final voyage but for her return to England.   The investors cut their losses, and the company was wound up.   The engines, the swinging saloon and other fittings were removed, and by the end of the following year, the remainder of the ship was sold off as scrap.   So ended the short but lively career of the Bessemer Saloon Steamship.

    © Copyright C.J. Ison / Tales from the Quarterdeck, 2024.

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  • The Foundering of the S.S. Alert – 1893

    Foundering of the SS Alert. Source: The Queenslander 13 Jan 1894, p. 71.

       On Friday, 29 December 1893, around 11 o’clock in the morning, two ladies were strolling along Sorrento Ocean Beach on the Mornington Peninsula when they discovered an unconscious man washed up on the sand. He would prove to be the sole survivor of the steamer Alert, which sank during foul weather.

       The SS Alert had left Bairnsdale on Victoria’s southeast coast at 4 p.m. two days earlier, bound for Port Albert and Melbourne. But a little more than 24 hours later, she would be lying at the bottom of Bass Strait off Jubilee Point.

       The Alert was a 16-year-old 243-ton iron screw steamer owned by Huddart and Parker. She had recently been refurbished and, for the past two months, had been carrying passengers and cargo between Gippsland and Melbourne. Prior to that, the Alert had been a favourite of the excursion fleet, which ferried passengers between Melbourne and Geelong.

       From the moment the little steamer cleared the Gippsland Lakes, she felt the full fury of a storm lashing the Victorian coast. Nonetheless, Captain Albert Mathieson thought the sea conditions were nothing his ship could not handle. They stopped briefly at Port Albert, 150 kilometres down the coast, to deliver some cargo and then continued on towards the entrance to Port Phillip Bay and respite from the atrocious weather.

    S.S. Alert. Source: Leader, 6 Jan 1894, p. 30.

       By 4 p.m. Thursday, they were off Cape Schanck, just 30 kilometres short of Port Phillip Bay. Owing to the trying conditions, Captain Mathieson had remained on the bridge the entire trip. Such were the conditions that it required two men at the helm to keep the steamer pointed on its course. Then disaster struck.

       About half an hour later, the Alert was struck by a massive rogue wave that swamped the deck with tons of water and pushed the steamer over onto her side. Then, they were hit by a second large wave before the water from the first had time to drain away. The saloon skylight and a porthole window were smashed, and the sea poured in. The helm was unresponsive by now, and the ship’s lee rail was pushed underwater. Another wave swept over the bridge as seawater snuffed out the struggling steamer’s engine fires.

       The captain ordered everyone to don their lifebelts as he vainly tried to head the stricken steamer into the wind, but to no avail. He ordered the lifeboats to be lowered, but one had already been swept off its davits, and the other had seas continuously sweeping over it. There was nothing anyone could do now.

    The Herald, 30 Dec 1893, p. 2.

       Robert Ponting, the ship’s cook, joined the rest of the crew on deck, and minutes later, the Alert went to the bottom. Ponting climbed onto a hatch cover, but in the turbulent seas, it kept turning over and flipping him into the water. He eventually lost hold of it altogether and began swimming. He spotted the ship’s steward nearby and kept pace with him. Ponting and the steward remained together until the poor fellow could no longer keep his head above water and drowned. Around this time, Ponting spotted Captain Mathieson swimming strongly, but lost sight of him again shortly after.   

    Ponting spent the night swimming about in the cold Bass Strait waters within view of the Cape Schanck Lighthouse. The cold water chilled him to the bone, and he eventually passed out. He continued drifting with the current, slowly pushing him towards land. Then, around daybreak, he felt himself being tumbled ashore and used the last of his strength to drag himself away from the pull of the surf. He had spent over 12 hours in the water and would spend another five or six hours passed out on the beach.

    Robert Ponting. Source. Weekly Times (Melb), 6 Jan 1894, p. 19..

       When, around 11 o’clock, he came too, he found he was surrounded by a group of ladies and a gentleman who had been walking along the beach. The first ladies to discover the unconscious man had called on the others to come to Ponting’s aid. Among his saviours was Douglas Ramsay, a doctor on holiday from his practice in Elsternwick. At first, Ramsay thought that Ponting was dead. He had tried to find a pulse but could not. and “his eyes were shut and all sanded over, his nostrils were also clogged with sand, and his body was stiff and cold,” he later recalled. The doctor didn’t give up, though. He opened Ponting’s mouth and poured some drops of brandy down his throat while vigorously working his arms “to restore animation.” After about ten minutes of this bizarre medical attention, Ponting began to show signs of life.

       Ramsay then dragged him behind a rock to shelter him from the cold wind and one of the ladies removed her jacket and wrapped it around his frozen feet. A couple of the other ladies began the long walk back to their carriage and headed to Sorrento for assistance. Meanwhile, Dr Ramsay continued with his ministrations. While they were waiting for help to arrive, another man happened on the scene while walking his giant St Bernard dog. He had his huge canine nestle up against Ponting for warmth. That, and a steady administration of medicinal brandy, brought some colour back to Ponting’s cheeks.   

    After a while, he was able to tell his rescuers his name and what had befallen him. He also asked that someone send his wife a telegram to tell her he was alive. He did not want her to think he had perished with everyone else when news of the shipwreck broke. Eventually, he was taken to the Mornington Hotel in Sorrento, where a couple of local doctors cared for him. As apparently was best practice in such cases during the late 1800s, the good doctors rubbed his entire body with mustard and poured hot brandy down his throat. In response – or perhaps despite it – Ponting made a full recovery.

    The Argus, 30 Dec 1893, p. 7.

       Over the next couple of days, several bodies and much wreckage washed up on Mornington Peninsula’s rugged ocean beaches. In all, 14 men lost their lives: 11 crew and three passengers. Robert Ponting was the only one to survive the catastrophe.

       A marine board inquiry concluded that the Alert had insufficient ballast for the prevailing sea conditions, which had made her ride higher in the water and less stable on her final voyage. The board also felt that Captain Mathieson should have found shelter in Western Port rather than continue down the coast to Port Phillip Bay. It chose not to give an opinion on the captain’s handling of the vessel in its final minutes due to insufficient evidence.

    © Copyright C.J. Ison / Tales from the Quarterdeck, 2024.

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  • The Banshee’s Terrible Loss, 1876.

    Australian Illustrated News, 15 May 1876.

       The Banshee steamed out of Townsville at 6 o’clock on the morning of Tuesday, 21 March 1876, bound for Cooktown, some 240 nautical miles (450 km) up the Queensland coast. Captain Daniel Owen had command of the 58-ton steamer and its crew of 10 men.   On this trip, the Banshee was carrying 30 paying passengers, and 12 stowaways.   Almost everyone was on their way to the Palmer River, where gold had recently been discovered.   But disaster would strike long before they reached their destination.

       A moderate breeze blew from the southeast, accompanied by some drizzling rain, as they left Townsville.   But nothing about the dismal weather hinted at the violent storm that would engulf them seven hours later.   At 1.30 p.m., when a few kilometres off the southern end of Hinchinbrook Island, they were lashed by hurricane-force winds, high seas, and torrential rain. Visibility was reduced almost to zero.

       Captain Owen did not see land again for over an hour as he steered a north-north-westerly course along Hinchinbrook’s east coast. In his 35 years at sea, he had never experienced such ferocious weather. So, he decided to exercise caution and seek shelter at Sandwich Bay. Once some normality had returned to the world, he would continue on to Cooktown. Captain Owen ordered the engines slowed to half speed and he placed a lookout forward to warn of any dangers.   

    Then, a little after 3 o’clock, the lookout sighted land dead ahead. The rocky cliffs of Cape Sandwich loomed out of the pelting rain before them. Captain Owen ordered the helmsman to steer “hard a port” and for the engines to increase to full speed. The bow started to come around, but it was too little, too late. The Banshee struck aft and was slammed broadside onto the rocks. Had they cleared that promontory, they would have made it safely into the sheltered waters beyond. But that was not to be.

    Map showing Banshee wreck site. Courtesy Google Maps.

       The ship almost immediately started breaking up. The saloon house gave way under Captain Owen’s feet. “I jumped from the saloon to the top of the steam chest, and from there to the top of the house aft,” Owen later recalled, “and stuck to the mizzen rigging.”

       Around the same time one of the passengers, Charles Price, grabbed hold of the boom as the ship ran aground, but when the funnel came crashing down, it knocked him onto the deck. From there, he climbed up on the side rail and leapt onto the rocks. Not all the passengers were so lucky. Many jumped into the sea in panic and drowned before they could scramble to safety. Price went to the aid of one female passenger clinging to the rocks as the waves crashed about her. He reached down but only got a handful of hair before she was swept away.

       The ship’s stewardess had a lucky escape. She was seen clinging to a piece of wreckage in that dangerous space between the ship and the rocks. Before anyone could get to her, she was dragged under the vessel before coming back up again. This time, she caught hold of a rope and was pulled to safety. Price tried to save another passenger who he saw struggling to get clear of the waves. But before he could reach the man, he was washed from the rocks and crushed by the ship.

       Another pair to have a lucky escape were the Banshee’s cook and a stowaway. They had remained with the ship until it was washed high on the rocks and then stepped off through a rent in the hull.

    Total Wreck of the Banshee. Mackay Mercury, 1 Apr 1876, p. 3.

       Captain Owen lost his perch in the mizzen rigging and found himself fighting for his life in the water. Twice he reached the rocks and twice he was washed back out into the cauldron. But on the third attempt, he got a firm hold and was able to clamber to safety above the pull of the waves.

       A passenger named Elliot Mullens was reading in the saloon when he heard someone call, “We are going aground.” He rushed onto the main deck just as the Banshee struck. Mullens climbed onto the bridge and, from there, launched himself across to a rock but was immediately washed off by a giant wave. Fortunately, he latched onto another rock, and despite being pummelled by successive waves, he scrambled out of the danger zone somewhat unscathed.

       “I turned, and just then the saloon … was smashed to atoms, burying beneath it four women and four children, whom we never saw again,” he later recalled. “Five minutes from the time of striking, all was over – all were saved or hopelessly gone from our sight forever.”

    In all, 17 people lost their lives, including all the children and women on board, except the stewardess. The survivors, most nursing deep cuts, bruises or broken bones, spent a cold, wet and miserable night on land. The next morning, two bodies were found washed ashore. Captain Owen held a brief service over them as they were buried where they lay.   

    By now, the storm had blown itself out, leaving a dead calm in its place. Six men volunteered to cross Hinchinbrook’s thickly forested and mountainous interior so they could signal the small settlement of Cardwell for help. Meanwhile, Captain Owen and everyone else remained where they were, but they did not have long to wait to be rescued.

    Hinchinbrook Passage circa 1880s. Source: Picturesque atlas of Australasia 1886.

       Around 6 p.m., someone cried out, “Sail Ho.” And, sure enough, there was a sailing vessel out to sea heading south. A large red flannel blanket was hastily hoisted on a makeshift mast, and everyone waited, praying that they would be seen.

       Five minutes later, the schooner The Spunkie turned towards land to investigate. But it was only by chance that the survivors had been spotted. The Spunkie’s mate had recently purchased a new telescope and was want to look through it at any opportunity. Luckily, when he brought it to his eye this day, he spotted the red flag and the bedraggled survivors lining the shore. By 10 o’clock that night, everyone had been transferred to the schooner, and they continued on their way to Townsville. The six men who crossed the island were picked up by the steamer Leichhardt as it was passing through the Hinchinbrook Passage.   

    A Marine Board Inquiry concluded the Banshee was lost due to the stress of the weather. Although they believed that Captain Owen had erred in not heading further offshore than he did, they found that “he acted as he believed for the best under very trying circumstances.”

    © Copyright C.J. Ison / Tales from the Quarterdeck, 2024.

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  • COSPATRICK: A tale of fire, cannibalism and a desperate fight for survival

    The burning of the Cospatrick at sea. Penny Illustrated Paper, 09 January 1875, p. 1. (Detail)

    On 27 November 1874, a lookout on the British ship Spectre spotted something floating in the water deep in the Indian Ocean.   As they drew near, they realised it was a small boat holding six men.     When they came alongside, they found one man was already dead. The other five were barely clinging to life and two of those would soon die.   They were the only survivors from the emigrant ship Cospatrick, which had caught fire and sank with the loss of nearly 470 people.

    The 1200-ton  Cospatrick had sailed from London bound for Auckland with 433 passengers, most of whom were assisted migrants looking forward to starting life afresh in New Zealand.   But, just after midnight on 17/18 November, when they were about 750 km southwest of the Cape of Good Hope, smoke was seen coming from the forehatch.  

    The alarm was immediately raised, and Captain Elmslie rushed on deck.   The whole crew were turned out to tackle the blaze thought to have started in the Boatswain’s Locker, where many flammables were stored.     Pumps poured water down the forescuttle, hoping to extinguish the fire before it spread.    Meanwhile, the captain was trying to turn the ship before the wind in a vain attempt to keep the fire contained to the fore part of the vessel.

    Cospatrick, source: London Illustrated News, 9 Jan 1875.

    As the crew battled the fire, almost all the passengers rushed on deck, fearing for their lives, and screaming for help.    Then the Cospatrick swung head to the wind, “which drove the flames and a thick body of smoke aft, setting fire to the forward boats,”* 2nd mate Henry McDonald recalled.  He and the sailors fighting the fire with pumps and buckets were forced to retreat aft with the flames licking at their heels.    With half the ships’ lifeboats lost Macdonald asked Captain Elmslie if he should lower the remaining two.   Elmslie told him “no” but instead to continue fighting the fire.

    But, by then, terrified passengers had taken matters into their own hands.   As many as 80 people, many of them women, climbed into the starboard boat meant only to carry 30 while it was still suspended in its davits.   They buckled under the weight, and when the boat dipped into the sea, it capsized, spilling everyone out.   Under the circumstances, no crew could go to their assistance, and they all drowned.

    A guard was placed on the port lifeboat, but it was also swarmed by panicked passengers.   Flames burnt through the ship’s rigging, and the foremast collapsed and fell over the side.   By now, the captain realised his ship was lost.   Standing by the helm with his wife and son beside him, he told the few men assembled around him to do what they could to save their own lives.  

    The Rush to the Boats. The Australasian Sketcher, 20 Mar 1875, p. 9.

    Macdonald and a couple of the seamen tried launching the pinnace which was stored upside down on the deck.   But before they could get it over the side, its bow caught fire, and they abandoned it.   Macdonald then ordered the port-side lifeboat to be lowered, and as it descended, he jumped on board.    Moments later, he was joined by the Chief Mate, who leapt from the Cospatrick as it was fully ablaze.  Captain Elmslie was last seen jumping into the sea with his wife.  The ship’s doctor followed, carrying Elmslie’s young son.  

    The boat, carrying 34 people, remained by the Cospatrick throughout the night as it continued to blaze.   The main and mizzen masts fell, and then an explosion deep in the hold blew out the stern under the poop deck.   This was probably caused by the large quantities of alcoholic spirits, and other volatile liquids stored in the hold.

    The next morning, Macdonald found that some of his shipmates had managed to right the starboard boat, and it, too, was full of survivors.   They found a few other people clinging to wreckage and hauled them onto the two boats.    They remained with the Cospatrick until it finally burned to the waterline and sank on the evening of 19 November.   Then, Macdonald took command of the starboard boat while the Chief Mate remained in the portside boat.  

    They divided the surviving people between the two boats and shared out the available oars.   The Chief Mat’s boat carried around 35 people while Macdonald’s carried 30.   Neither boat had a mast or sail, but Macdonald got a petticoat from a female passenger, which he used as a makeshift sail fastened to an upright plank.    Neither boat had any freshwater or any other provisions.   Nor does it seem they had so much as a compass to steer by.  

    Sail Oh! Rescue of the Survivors. The Australasian Sketcher, 20 Mar 1875, p. 9.

    They set a course for where they thought the southern tip of Africa lay some 750 kilometres away.    The boats remained together for the next two days, but on Sunday night, 22 November, a gale blew up, and they became separated.    The Chief Mate’s boat was never heard of again.

    Henry Macdonald kept a daily log of their voyage as any good office would.   “Sunday 22, … thirst began to tell severely on us all. … three men died, having first become made in consequence of drinking salt water.”*   Four more men died the following day, but before their bodies were dispatched over the side, Macdonald wrote that “we were that hungry and thirsty that we drank the blood and ate the liver of two of them.”*  Over the next several days, they would continue to live off the dead.

    The weather raged around them, and deaths were a daily occurrence.   Early in the morning of Thursday, 26 November, a barque sailed past but failed to spot them among the white caps.    They continued drinking the blood of the dead, but they were getting weaker by the day.  

    On Friday, 27, two more men died, but they had only the strength to throw one of them overboard.   “We are all fearfully bad, and had drunk sea water,” Macdonald entered in his log.*

    There were now just five men still alive, but only barely.   They were all dozing when Macdonald was woken by a passenger, who had gone made with delirium, biting his feet.   When Macdonald looked up, he saw that an end to their suffering was at hand.    The Spectre, returning home to Scotland from Calcutta, was bearing down on them.   The five men were taken aboard, but two of them died soon after being rescued.   The three survivors, including Henry Macdonald, were put ashore at St Helena when the barque stopped there for supplies.

    The Survivors, L-R Cotter, Macdonald, Lewis. The Illustrated London News, 16 January 1875, p. 61.

    An inquiry held in London into the loss was not convinced the fire had started in the boatswain’s locker.   It concluded that the blaze was likely caused by a careless match or candle carried by someone breaking into the hold in search of liquor the ship was known to be carrying in large quantities.    It recommended that a more robust bulkhead be installed in ships but did not consider whether highly flammable cargo should be carried on the same vessel as so many passengers.

    Nor did the inquiry make any firm recommendations regarding the number of lifeboats carried by passenger ships.    Even had the crew been able to launch all the Cospatrick’s boats, fewer than half the people on board could have been saved.   It simply advised that ship owners should consider some increase in lifeboat carrying capacity.   It would take another 40 years and the loss of the Titanic before laws mandated that all ships have enough lifeboats to evacuate everyone in an emergency.

    (*) Henry Macdonald’s log was published in the Sydney Morning Herald on 26 Feb 1875, p. 3.

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