George III

The ship slipped on quietly into the night. In the hospital the surgeon could hear the monotonous droning voice of the leadsman in the chains.

Then suddenly this monotonous droning became louder, with a note of warning. The sea had swiftly shoaled, with no apparent cause.

"Heave quick!" called the captain.

"A quarter less four," came the leadsman's ill omened answer. The water was shoaling fast. Yet the land was two miles away on the nearer side.

"Hard aport! Hard aport!" was the captain's next command.

"Hard a--", the helmsman began to answer as he feverishly leapt to swing around the spokes. He never completed that answer, for before he had time to do so the ship, with a horrid, tearing sound of timbers torn into protesting pieces was on the rocks.

"My God!" shrieked Captain Moxey. But no one heard him save the sea fowl and the convicts.

There had been nothing to mark that rock--no broken water, no greasy swirling of the sea, nothing at all.

(A. J. Villiers, Vanished Fleets, 1931)


George III (ship, 393 tons) departed the Downs on 14th December headed for Hobart Town, with a cargo of 220 men and boys. Under the command of William Moxey, she carried a crew of thirty, as well as twenty-nine soldiers from the 50th regiment, two surgeons and some women, mostly soldiers' wives.

"All went well with the ship til she neared the Line. Then someone went below to draw off spirits. It is probable that he carried a naked light, for a fire started which spread rapidly. ... For hours the fate of the ship hung in the balance for among her military stores were several copper drums of gun powder. The fire had almost reached these when two convicts, Hart and Nelson, braved the suffocating smoke, entered the powder store, seized the copper containers and removed them."

"The food was scarce and bad, the medical supplies scanty with the result that by the time the George III had picked up the Tasmanian coast after one hundred days and eighteen days at sea, she had passed sixteen poor souls over the rail and sixty more were down with scurvy. Of these, fifty were regarded as hopeless."

So it was, when Moxey gathered his officers and surgeon together, they decided to take the quicker passage along D'Entrecasteaux Channel, between Bruny Island and mainland Tasmania.

"Darkness had fallen but the moon was bright and in spit of passing showers visibility was good. Sail was shortened, the leadsman placed in the chains, the Third Officer took his station on the foreyard to look out for broken water. The wind was off the land and the ship passed safely between the dreaded Actaeons and the western shore. She had cleared the reef and her Captain was unaware of the uncharted rocks still ahead which were known only to the local whalers. There were sleeping and therefore showed no break to the Third Mate on the foreyard. Six feet o water cover this part of the reef.

"The first indication of danger was given when the leadsman called, 'Five fathoms.' The ship was moving at about one and a half knots. The next call was, 'A quarter less four.'

"Captain Moxey ordered the helm, "Hard a port." But the ship struck and began to bump and pound. The quarter boat was put over to take soundings and got three and half fathoms. In a short time her masts were over the side and her rudder was up through the poop. The poor wretches locked below were screaming to be let up and were naturally trying to breakout. The military guard was placed round the main \hatch with loaded muskets to prevents the convicts from reaching the deck. In the meantime as the gig was being lowered the forward tackle jambed. She reached the water stern first and scattered her passengers. The Third Officer in the quarter boat picked them up. As this boat was now overcrowded the officer set out but could not find any landing place, so continued up the Channel to Hobart Town. By this time many of the sick below were drowned and others who were strong were trying to reach the deck. But the guard round the hatch threatened to fire on them."

"By now the main deck was almost under water and the boatswain was trying to launch the long boat. This was washed right across the deck and soldiers on guard left their stations round the hatch and boarded her. Many prisoners then reached the deck and about thirty were carried by the sea through the bulwarks and drowned. Captain Moxey was carried over the among the broken spars. Fortunately the long boat had floated after she had been swept through the broken bulwarks and some of the people who had crowded into her dragged the Captain on board."

When the overcrowded boat got free of the wreck, they found a little bay up the coast a way and unloaded. The captain takes the boat back to the wreck and picks up another load of "women, children and invalids and as many others as the boat would carry". On his second trip back, the schooner Louisa appears, and takes off the remaining survivors.

"There were 134 lives lost in this sad wreck. They were all convicts with the exception of two of the crew, a sergeant's wife and three children."

"Dr Wyse in his evidence [at the later enquiry] said that he went below to his charges when she struck. They put their hands through the gratings and seized his hands saying, "You promised to stand by us". The Doctor had answered, "I shall remain." The Doctor continued, "The rocks were tearing through her bottom and the water rising rapidly. Two of the most deserving person got through an opening they had made but Corporal Bell ordered them back. The guard was standing around the hatchway with muskets levelled. I went to the hatchway and requested Corporal Bell to allow the two prisoners, Hart and Nelson, to come up with me. ... Out of forty boys on boards twenty were lost."

There were allegations that the soldiers had fired on the prisoners. An enquiry was held but "the evidence about the shooting was conflicting. The military, with the exception of Corporal Bell, said the shots were fire to draw attention to the wreck."

Corporal Deveril: A shot was fired but not at the prisoners. One shot only was fired down the hatchway. Soon afterwards the prisoners were up to their middles in water and they then came up.

William Nelson, prisoner: Heard shots fired but saw no one wounded.

Robert Hart, prisoner: Saw soldiers level their muskets against prisoners and one shot fired. Saw prisoner Robert Lucker fall. He was nine or ten feet away. Never saw him again.

James McKay, prisoner,: Saw prisoner Yates fall after a shot had been fired.

James Elliott, prisoner: Heard two shots fired. The first killed Robert Lucker. Saw another man fall a few minutes later. Was knocked down the hatchway and fell on Lucker's body.

Corporal David Bell: Said two shots were fired down the hatchway. Heard a cry that a man had been shot.

The Coroner and the jury made their way down to South Port where they exhumed the bodies that had been washed up on the beach for signs of being shot. Given the state of the bodies and that only two or three out of 134 had possibly been shot that, they strangely enough didn't find anything.

There's a monument to the wreck on Southport Bluff, and another one with an anchor from the wreck in either Southport or Dover. (A quick Google tells me that I thought it was in Dover.)

Not a lot of information on the web that I can find.

There is an oil painting though, by Knut Bull, 1805.
The wreck of the 'George the Third'

Also there's the book Book: An Imperial Disaster: the wreck of George the Third by Michael Roe.

Quoted sections are from Wrecks in Tasmanian Water: 1797-1950", by Harry O'May

Neva

Another tale of a wrecked ship, also on King Island.

In 1835, the Neva, bound for Sydney from Cork, hit a reef off King Island. There were 241 people on board, including 150 female prisoners with 33 children, 9 free women with 22 children, and 26 officers and crew.

From "Wrecks in Tasmanian Water" by Harry O'May:

"At 4 pm on 14 May, when Captain Peck considered she was well clear of King Island, the dreaded cry rang out, "Breakers Ahead!". She was bowling along with a good breeze and though the helm was put hard down, it could not save her. The boats were lowered but all capsized and were swept away. The sea took charge and she quickly broke up."

Of the twenty two who survived the wreck and reached shore, seven died before they could be rescued.

That's about as much detail as most accounts of the wreck provide. Although there is often a story added of the some of the women breaking into the storeroom where the grog was kept. If you're going to die, might as well have a good time first?

Villiers, in 'Vanished Fleets' gives a longer version:

"Then the helpless ship was at the mercy of the sea; she was altogether unmanageable and was driven hard up on the rocks. She swung round and heeled heavily over, while the seas which had seemed so gentle while she ran before them, swept over her and broke all round. The mast began to go, and it was evident that the shop would go to pieces quickly. The boats were lowered, but each of them in turn capsized, and every one in them was speedily drowned. In a few moments more the ship broke into four pieces -- an indication of her sea-worthiness; or lack of it -- and, with the exception of twenty two people who clung to fragments of wreckage, every one on board was drowned. The women had been asleep in their prison in the hold when the ship struck, and so little time passed between the striking and her falling to pieces that they were still barricaded behind their bars when they went to their doom.

"The few who survived the tragedy said that they could never forget the horror of those moments, the terrible screams of the helpless women mingled with the crash, and grind of broken timbers, and pervading all, the appalling roar of the thundering breakers. Of the twenty-two who reached the shore, two went mad with sheer horror of the calamity and wandering into the bush, died there. Five others died from exposure, leaving only fifteen survivors from the whole 240. Of these six were prisoners and nine were crew; no child lived. The prisoners who survived came out of their prison when the ship fell to pieces and floated ashore on hatches, broken beans and the like."

The best account I've seen in on King Island Online site

The wreck of the Neva was just a month after the wreck of the George II, on April 10, also a convict transport. On that, there is a lot written so it might be a while before I get around to posting about it.

Cataraqui

Looking through Blue Gun Clippers and Whale Ships of Tasmania, by Will Lawson & the Shiplovers Society of Tasmania, first published 1949, I found a bit on the wreck of the Cataraqui. It's one of the sadder shipwreck tales.

On 20 April 1845, the Cataraqui left Liverpool carrying 370 emigrants, mostly families. By the 3rd August, they were just a day out of Melbourne, coming through Bass Strait, with "all on board looking eagerly forward to reaching arbour after the storm which had beset them for several days.

"In the early morning, with warning, the ship struck off Boggy Creek [west coast of King Island] when she had all sail set. A prudent shortening of the sail on the previous evening had been so scoffed at by the surgeon, who was at loggerheads with the captain, that Captain Findley decided to carry on. The ship was making at least 10 knots when she crashed on to the rocks, about 100 yards from shore.

"The Cataraqui broke up at once, scattering her human freight into the cauldron of raging waters. The position was hopeless, and of 408 person on board, only nine won to shore. Daylight presented a horrible scene to these lucky survivors. For about two miles the beach was strewn with the dead, mostly females, for the ship was carrying a large number of married women, with their families, and girls to Australia."

Wrecks in Tasmanian Waters, by Harry O'May, has a longer passage including:

"By 5 a.m. all below decks were drowned but daylight revealed about two hundred persons still clinging to the wreck. Every wave took its tool and by 4 p.m. she had parted and many went into the sea. Lines had been stretched along the vessel to supply the survivors with something to grip. Some had endeavoured to make a raft. At 5 p.m. she parted again but still seventy poor souls clung to the forecastle. All night the sea washed over them and at daybreak on the fifth only thirty survived."

The final part comes from Villiers' Vanished Fleets: Strange Tales of the Sea, when some of the survivors realised their only hope was to try to reach shore:

"Mr Guthrie, the first mate, clutching to a spar, plunged into the sea and was carried over the reef to the shore. There he found a passenger who had escaped during the night and one of the crew who had got ashore in the morning. Six other seamen swam, or with piece of planking, floated ashore. Soon afterwards, the remains of the Cataraqui disappeared beneath the sea. These nine men were all who survived; only one migrant reached Australian shores."


Parks & Wildlife Service, Shipwrecks of Tasmania

Grave of 245 bodies from the wreck of the Cataraqui on King's Island

Loss of the Cataraque/Cataraqui: From British Parliamentary Papers 1846
That last page has a list of passengers.