Polly Woodside

Polly Woodside aka Rona
Iron barque, built 1885 in Belfast.
647 tons, 192 feet long, max speed 14 knots.

A trading ship, coal mostly, from the end of the era of sail, although she remained in use to the 1920s, when she was converted to a coal hulk.

Original Photos

Under sail

Under sail, from a different angle

"Three masted barque about to be broken up on the rocks."

"On Her Way To The Seclusion Of Hulkland"

Before restoration




We're going to start at the bow, walk down the starboard side, then back along the port side. Then we'll go below, have a look at the hold and then the aft accommodation.





The white thing there is the deck cabin where the crew slept, and the galley is just behind it.









Inside the deck cabin.



Galley



Main mast










Companion











This would be looking back down the length of the ship, if the boats weren't in the way.








In the hold.

The deck bit here is a modern addition for the benefit of visitors, in use it would have been all hold, accessed by ladders.



Looking forewards. Beside the big, blue information panel, there's a little window that looks into the forepeak store.





Looking the other way.




This is the layout of the aft accommodation, recreated to reflect living conditions when the ship was in use.

The doors connecting the hold to cabins, and the door from the apprentices area (shown on the plans, not in the photos though) are for the benefit of visitors. Originally, these areas would also have been accessed directly from the upper deck.




Apprentices' area.



Ladder from apprentices area to deck



Entrance part of cook & steward's cabin



Master's cabin



Master's bath



Saloon



Pilot's cabin.



Companionway, connecting officer's cabins to quarterdeck.



Second mate's cabin (this one and next). Note the two bunks.





First mate's cabin (this one and next). Only one bunk in here.

Museum at Ancanthe

This is an odd little place.

Its an art gallery, out in Lenah Valley which is right on the edge of Hobart, in under the mountain. Its a history is a little more interesting than that though.



From the Australian Dictionary of Biography, "in 1839 Lady Franklin bought 130 acres (53 ha) of land near Hobart Town for a botanical garden, to which she gave the name Ancanthe. Here a museum of natural history was built for her, on the model of a Greek temple, and to it the collections she had been forming in Government House were removed. They and the accompanying library were dispersed in 1853" and the little temple was left to become a packing shed for apples. It wasn't until a century later that it finally became an art gallery.

She's an interesting women to read about, if you follow the link. Also interesting is the PDF article about the museum from the Mercury's INK page.

Finally, before I get to my photos, two very different images of the building.
Painting by Curzona Allport
Lenah Valley postcard

I don't know what this front part is supposed to be.



I think its (the remains of) a memorial gateway. The two centre posts have stones under them (see below). 1937 was the time when the restoration of the building started too.

One And All

Looking over my web page, I realised I haven't done entries to match all my tall ship photos. Shocking, I know!

So, I am catching up now, starting with One And All, a sail training brigantine from South Australia.

These photos were taken at the 2005 Wooden Boat Festival and the reason they weren't posted before is probably because they're not particularly good photos. The lighting was bad, and the One And All was a little overshadowed by James Craig

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.