ADMELLA

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ADMELLA

Post by shipstamps » Sat Sep 13, 2008 12:14 am



Built as passenger-cargo vessel under yard No 19 by Laurence Hill & Comp. , Inch Green, Glasgow for the Adelaide & Melbourne Steam Packet Co at Port Adelaide, Australia.
17 September 1857 launched under the name ADMELLA, named after the three colonial towns she sailed between, Adelaide, Melbourne and Launceston.
Tonnage 392 (old measure) 209 tons (new act). Dim. 188 x 24 x 13.6ft.
One 300 hp steam engine, one two-bladed propeller.

When completed and after trials were made in the Firth of Clyde her two-bladed propeller was disconnected and put in the hold, and she made the passage to Australia under canvas.
She had a main saloon panelled with plate glass and mirrors, with a library and crimson velvet fittings.
Steerage accommodation forward of the hold, and second class on the quarterdeck.
Cargo space for 392 tons cargo.
When she arrived in Australia she inaugurated a steamer service between the three ports she was named after.
August she made the first voyage in this service under command of Capt. Hugh MacEwan, she made also sometimes a call at Warrnambool and Portland in route.
Captain MacEwan and the ADMELLA were a popular combination with passengers. Capt. MacEwan had been at sea for thirty years, the last five in command of steamers. He was a teetotaller who had gained the reputation of being a cautious navigator

What started as an exciting trip for 113 passengers and crew bound for the Melbourne’s Champion Sweepstakes in 1859, turned into a deadly sea battle in which men, women and children languished on a reef for more than eight days, with only 24 of them surviving.

The ADMELLA left port Adelaide on Friday 5 August 1859 with a crew of 26; picking up passengers at the Semaphore jetty. One deck were six racehorses, carried in boxes. After passage through Backstairs Passage at midday, the vessel part-owner, Captain MacEwan, took his departure from the lighthouse on Cape Willoughby and set a course to pass well offshore from the reefs of Cape Jaffa, 100 miles south-eastwards. This track exposed the ship to the full force of the prevailing winter westerly’s, and the heavy swell, backed by thousands of miles of Southern Ocean, which creates unpredictable currents. The next landfall was the low sandy coastline from which a reliable position fix would not be possible until the new lighthouse on Cape Northumberland was sighted about 180 miles away. It was the captain’s practice to keep within sight of the land whenever possible during daylight and to set a course about 15 miles offshore at night. At 4 p.m., with Cape Willoughby about 32 miles astern, the swell from the south-west caused the ADMELLA to roll heavily, causing one of the horses to fall in its stall. The ship was hove to and headed into the swell for an hour to get the horse back on its feet and to make everything secure for the night. Although the weather remained fine, the swell persisted. At midnight the ADMELLA should have been off Rivoli Bay and a slight alternation in course was made to converge with the land, and to ensure that the Cape Northumberland light would be sighted at its maximum range of 18 miles.
Lighting in the south-west heralded worsening weather. At 4 a.m., Captain MacEwan, believing the ship to be at least 16 miles offshore and Cape Northumberland light just over the horizon, made an other slight alternation of course inshore. He then retired to his cabin leaving the mate, helmsman and look-out on the bridge. Less than an hour later a slight jolt caused the first mate to order the course to be altered to seaward, but the ADMELLA had grounded on the jagged pinnacles of Carpenter Rocks at Cape Banks some 16 miles inshore from her estimated position. As Captain MacEwan scrambled back to the bridge and ordered the lifeboats cleared away, the ADMELLA broke into three sections at the watertight bulkheads. Many passengers and crew drowned as the ship broke up, but a large number managed to take refuge on the forward and after sections which remained almost intact, with decks above water, listing 45 degrees.
The midship section however, collapsed and left engines and boilers exposed to the rolling surf. The two midship lifeboats had been lost, one smashed by the falling funnel. Those who had been clearing the lifeboats, including the captain, swam to the after section. While swinging the after lifeboat the forward fall was let go and the boat hung vertically on its after fall before the davit broke and the boat floated away. Then the mainmast crashed overboard, taking with it several who sought refuge in the rigging. Heavy seas broke over the wreck, leaving only four lifeboats out of ADMELLA’s extensive lifesaving equipment. Twelve of the latest swimming belts, which had been stowed below decks, were apparently lost in the darkness; nobody had any idea where the ship had been wrecked. But as daylight broke, it revealed low sand hills about a mile away with no signs of habitation. When tiers of heavily breaking surf, each successive sea threatened the wreck with complete destruction. When the main boom was swept away, the captain jumped into the sea after it, as it would have been invaluable in constructing a raft. Almost drowned he was pulled back to the doubtful safety of the after section, which had now swung round over the reef. Sixty feet away the forward section was being pounded even more mercilessly. Two men more had been washed overboard, leaving about 40 men, women and children clinging precariously to it. All the horses seemed to have managed to swim ashore, but attempts by several passengers to either swim, or paddle on wreckage, failed. With great excitement another steamship was sighted approaching from the sea. It was recognized as the ADMELLA’s sister ship HAVILAH, bound for Adelaide. But flags and urgent ringing of the bell failed to attract her attention. As darkness fell on the first day of the wreck, false hopes were again raised by a steamer’s lights seen approaching from the north-west. It was the P&O liner BOMBAY, caught in the same treacherous current that had carried the ADMELLA too close inshore. Unfortunately, those on the wreck had no means of showing lights or making signals. The BOMBAY narrowly missed the rocks and steamed on, unaware of their fate.
Sunday 7 August dawned calm and clear. A passenger marooned on the forward section, Captain Harris, another shipmaster, realized that this section would soon disintegrate. He signalled those on the after section to make contact by line. He and about 13 other managed to gain the relative safety of the after section. But of the 20 left on the forepart who were to weak or afraid to make the attempt, none of them survived. There were now about 70 people on the after section. Captain Harris dived into the flooded storerooms and recovered some supplies, which provided a bit of essential sustenance. Then with the only tool available, a meat chopper, several of the survivors managed to build a raft. Two seamen, Leach and Knapman, volunteered to man it. After three hazardous hours, the raft emerged from the breakers, and the two seamen washed up on the beach exhausted. After a brief rest they stumbled along the sand hills across creeks and swamps to Cape Northumberland lighthouse to report the wreck to the lighthouse keeper.
He immediately set off for the nearest homestead to borrow a horse. But as luck would have it, he had not ridden far before he was thrown off.

Monday morning brought bitter could and increasing seas breaking over the wreck. Some shelter was afforded in the cabins, but there was not enough space for all and several died of from exposure.

As news of the wreck finally reached the nearest post office 20 miles away at Mount Gambier, the disaster was reported by telegraph to Adelaide and Melbourne, and people from the surrounding countryside began to converge on the beach near Carpenter Rocks with food and clothing. Seas were now smooth and a quantity of wreckage had come ashore. But there were no means at hand with which to attempt a rescue. The nearest lifeboat was 100 miles away at Portland.
Twenty miles away, at the lighthouse, there was a small boat. The only thing that could be done that night was to send for the boat and to light a fire on the beach to encourage the marooned survivors. By the time the lighthouse boat arrived at 3 a.m., a badly damaged boat, which had washed ashore from the wreck, had been repaired on the beach. But rising seas precluded any launching of either craft until five o’clock in the afternoon and both of those attempts proved futile.
In the meantime the steamer CORIO arrived with a pilot boat with which to make the rescue attempt. But all she could do was heave to for the night and hope for improved weather in the morning. At this point the 40 to 50 remaining survivors had been languishing on the wreck for five days. From seawards the CORIO approached to within 200 yards of the after section. Guided from the CORIO the pilot boat rowed towards a gap in the reef, but after half an hour’s struggle, had to give up the attempt. Seeing another hope of rescue fade. Harris tried to urge the survivors to apply their weakening efforts to building another raft, this time from the mizzen gaff and two cabin doors. But during an argument over who would man the raft, it drifted away.
Captain Harris, too exhausted to do any more, died before the day was done.
Germien, the lighthouse keeper, and Thomas, the pilotboat coxswain, made another attempt to launch their boats from the beach that evening, and an another attempt in the morning, ending in boat boats being swamped in deteriorating westerly weather. With the CORIO being unable to approach to within less than a mile of the wreck and coal running short, Captain Quin decided to make a dash to Robe for replenishment.
Just as the CARIO headed north-westwards, the LADY BIRD, a 309 ton steamer owned by the Henty Brothers, came to from the east, sighting what remained of the ADMELLA. Not far away was the steamer ANT, which had also been sent from Robe to assist in the rescue. In what must have seemed like an endless succession of bad luck to be doomed survivors another attempt at rescue failed, as a rocket line was fired from a lifeboat but nobody on board the ADMILLA was able to take it. No further rescue attempts were made that day. During the night rain relieved the survivors thirst, but they had now been without adequate food or drink for a week.
Saturday 13 August, brought moderated weather. From the beach, Germein launched another rescue attempt with two boats. This time, both boats weathered the surf and approached close to the wreck. The pilot boat made another unsuccessful attempt to pass a line, and Germein’s boat was washed clean over the remains of the ADMILLA’s engines. But riding back on another roller, he rejoined the pilot boat, and this time, a line was secured by one of the survivors on the wreck. Germein managed to get three passengers, including Captain MacEwan to make the perilous transfer to one of the boats. Seeing ANT and the LADY BIRD coming in close they rowed for the beach. Germein went back for another passenger, but unfortunately he drowned when the boat capsized while landing. Then the Portland lifeboat and the whaleboat repeated the manoeuvre of the previous day, assisted by a boat from the ANT. This time the line was taken and secured to the wreck, and 18 men and one woman were rescued in the end, only 24 survived out of the 113 who had taken passage on the ADMELLA at Adelaide eight days previously

The court of Inquire decided that the ADMELLA had experienced a strong in-shore set and that the BOMBAY was fortunate in not having also ended her days on Carpenter Rocks. More efficient means of inserting watertight bulkheads into steamships was recommended, noting that the ADMELLA had broken into three sections at the rows of the bulkhead rivet holes.
Captain MacEwan was absolved from any blame for the disaster, but was criticized for not having taken regular soundings when his position was uncertain. Cen Afr Rep SG1014

Source: Australian Coastal Shipping by Barry Pemberton. Hazards of the Sea by Capt. John Noble. Some web-sites.

D. v. Nieuwenhuijzen
Posts: 871
Joined: Fri Sep 24, 2010 7:46 pm

Re: ADMELLA

Post by D. v. Nieuwenhuijzen » Fri May 19, 2017 6:45 pm

Dhufar 1977, 5 B. StG.?
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