AUCKLAND SHIPS.

Auckland Star, Volume LXI, Issue 201, 26 August 1930, Page 16

AUCKLAND SHIPS.

EARLY RELICS.

GRAVES AT BROWN'S ISLAND.

moke reminiscences.

COASTAL TRADE RECALLED

"Mark Seven" writes :-r-"I read with pleasure the remarks of 'Old Timer' in Monday's 'Star,' and thank him for reminding me of the other burial in Freeman's Bay. "The barque Examiner was "built in Hobart, Tasmania, and when she was built had alternately a hardwood and a Tasmanian -cedar knee. This was done to test the value of the Tasmanian cedar as a shipbuilding timber. On being examined it was found that while the hardwood knees resisted gait water the Tasmanian cedar had rotted.

"My informant was the late Captain A. J. S. Gibbs, who owned the yacht Spray. Several vessels in the colonial trade and coastal .trade verified this statement, among them being'the barque Celestial which left Auckland for Sydney with general cargo and was never heard of again.

"The barque Examiner was registered in Melbourne. She arrived at Russell in a leaky condition, and had to be towed in by H,M.s. Archer* She was brought to Auckland and sold to the Devonport Steam Ferry Company, Ltd. She was moored off Calliope Dock for years. Her grave is on the south side of Brown's Island, among the remains of several old paddle steamers. The Alexandra, Victoria, Takapuna, Tainuni and many others are there with her. The Bessie's Adventures. "As far as I remember the G. M. Tueker was, at one time, owned by the late Captain Holm, of Wellington, who was master and owner. She was used for years as a hulk, but I dp not remember where elie ended her days. I have an idea that it was at Brown's Island. Another that lay there for years was the old brig Neptune, at one time registered in Wellington.

"I forgot the Rob Roy also, but I should like to ask 'Old Timer' if the Bessie was not converted into the Jane cutter, and afterwards rigged as a ketch. She traded on the coast for years. Captain Gibbs told me that the Bessfe was originally a cargo boat on the Manukau and that he went from Onehunga to Waiuku in her, the voyage occupying three or four days. This was owing to the fact that at times she ran aground on mud and sandbanks in the Manukau, and the skipper supplemented the stores with fish which he caught and cooked in a camp oven."