WRECK OF THE STEAMER SOUTH AUSTRALIAN.

Press, Volume XI, Issue 1378, 8 April 1867, Page 2

WRECK OF THE STEAMER SOUTH AUSTRALIAN.

[From tho " Otago Daily Times," April 4.]

The splendid steamer South Australian left Port Chalmers far Melbourne on Tuesday afternoon; tlie weather had remained calm and clear her?, and it was therefore with great surprise, as well as deep regret, that the news of her having run ashore near Coal Point was received yesterday. The later news, confirmed by some of the passengers wh_o returned overland to town, that the South Australian was a hopeless wreck, caused a very general feeling of sym atliy for Captain Hugh Mackie, who has so long been known as tho commander of the Gothenburg. The South Australian had just been purchased and refitted by Messrs. Meckan, Blackwood and Co., of Melbourne, alter long lying idle at that port; and Captain Mackie having been chosen to command her, he was, we believe, heartily congratulated on his good fortune, by his I many friends here. We are told that £25,000 ! is n lnw e.»»i:ni»»» of the fair value of the South Australian, as *- Ji.* was when she left Port Chalmers on Tuesday. She has always been famed as probably the swiftest steamer in Southern waters, and her new owners having spent fully £3000 in her refit, ehe was in most excellent condition throughout- except her compares! We believe that that will be tlie substantial verdict when an enquiry comes to be made as to her loss. But that point should not be too much discussed for the present. The Grst news of the wreck was a telegram from Tokomairiro to Messrs Royse, Mudie and Co., the agents of the steamer, which was dated at noon :—

" South Australian ashore four miles nortli Coal Point. Better send down small steamer at once. Sea calm. Passengers all safe. Mr Edward Boyd, settler, has brought news " We received from our Tokomairiro correspondent a substantially similar telegram, dated 12.17.

Mr E. B. Cargill received further confirmation of the safety of the passengers in a meeeage from Mr*F. Dillon, also dated Tokomairiro, about noon, and which stated —"All safe at Molyneux. Arranging to get them home." This referred to relatives of Mr Cargill, who were passengers for Melbourne, the list being—Mrs :Kempthorne, Mrs Finlay, Mrs Taylor, Mrs and Misa Cargill, and two servants ; Messrs Kempthorne, Hay, Haines, Prince, J. R. M'Kenzie, Burton, Thomson, F. D. Bell, C. Hoyt, Liveeay, Bedgood ; and twenty-seven in the steerage. Mr Bell and Mr Hoyt intended at the Bluff for Invercargill. Mr Mudie, on receipt of the news, arranged to send the Geelong to the aid of the stranded vessel ; and as a preparative, to unload all the cargo witli which she was loaded at Port Chalmers, ready to start for the intermediate porls and Lyttelton. Mr Mudie as soon as possible started overland for Coal Point, but noar Green Island he met Mr Charles Ho;,t whose account induced him to turn back, and to go to the scene of the wreck by the Geelong. Mr Nutt, the chief engineer, with Messrs Kempthorne and M'Cracken, and two or three of the steerage passengers, arrived in town by Hoyt and Chaplin's Tokomariro coach at five o'clock, and we have thus been enabled to compile the following imperfect account of the melancholy wreck of so fine a steamer :— The South Australian left her moorings at Port Chalmers about twenty minutes after four o'clock,- and she was soon outside the Heads. The evening and early night were beautifully fine, and the sea was calm. Until about half-past seven o'clock, full speed was kept up, and tho South Ausfra lian Blipped ahead at the rate of fully twelve knots an hour. From one who w»s not a passenger, we learn that, before starting, Captain Mackie had declared that as soon as he hid got a good clear offing from Cape Saunders he meant to run his vessel " almost dead slow," as even then he should be at the Bluff by early morning. At halfpast Beven, being no doubt well off Capa Saunders, Captain Mackie seems to have commenced to carry out his intention for from half-past seven until a quarter after nine, tho engines were working half-speed. Then they were further slowed; and until the steamer struck —which was about half-paat ten o'clock—the engines were making but twelve revolutions a minute, or equal to a speed of about five knots an hour. Even at that speed, she struck so heavily that, as one of our informants states, she seemed " literally to knock her bottom in :" which, as facts proved, she must in effect have done.

Captain Mackie, who had been on deck for some time, bad entered the engine-room—he had spoken about, everything working "so nicely " —he had said that the Bluff would bo made before daylight; and he was on the companion, just leaving tho engine-room, when the crash came.

The blow, we have been told, sent a terrific shock through the ship, and it seemed to have been struck within tho line of the engineroom compartment. The instant act of tho chief engineer was to stop tho engines; but this was instantly followed by on order from She captain to "Go ahead." The doomed vessel forged ahead eomewha*, hut the crashing ripping of the bottom plates lold unmistakably that she was but tearing her way more firmly on to a bed of rocks, and tho engines were again stopped. It was speedily the opinion of those on board, who realised the full effects of what had happened, that had the South Australian been driven ahead off the rocks she must have foundered within liolf-an-hour, and then but few on board would have been saved.

All our present information is from those who would not be likely to note keenly weather or water appearances, but it is to the effect that for some time before the ship struck the weather had been getting thick, and that not until after she had struck was there anything like a " " to be seen on the water, nor was there what could be called a heavy swell. The one was seen, and tho other was felt, when the shin was f truck, and yet heaving and terribly rolling, on the rocks. In ttn minutes-from first striking the water that was rushing into tho engine-room was over tlie cvlindera ; in from twenty minutes to half-an-hour it was over the crank-shaft ; in ha!f-au-hotir the engine room was -filled. The night was now very dirk, and tlu ship wa* rolling heavily on the reef. Some of the ladies'who were passengers were nt first dreadfully alarmed, but they soon became calm, and there was nothing panic or roal disorder on board. Thero were fivo boats, and they were all safely got out, but not without the lapse of a considerable time. The first boat out wa« one of the lifeboats. No woman was assisted into it. The boat was heavily freighted with crew and passengers ; nnd Mr Nutt found himself in command of Iter. The orders were that all the boats should lie alongside, as near as was consistent with safety, and this was done. Tho women were got Into the second and third boats, we believe; the fourth was tilled with" firemen and crew ; and the fifth was kept alongside for some time, ready for Captain Mackie and the offici»rs and men who remained wish him.

All the boats were kept noir the ship until about half-past one o'clock, shortly before whicli time 3fr Mullin, the second mate, wa* put onboard the lifeboat in v hich Mr Nutt wns, aud he took command of her. Mr Mullin brought with him a compass. There were- in all twenty-five persons in this boat, with no food or water, and nothing in the way of clothes but the ordinary dress of each, i About half-past one Mr Nutt h.uied Captain Mackie, and proposed that an attempt should I be made to reach the Molyneux, in the hope

that a small steamer (the Taisroi) might be 1 found there, and assistance thus ;-eeured. Captiin Mackie absented; but ho suggested that, for safety, a landing should if possible be effected round a small point which w.s dimly visible *w3y north vr-ird, and some of the twenty-live persons be temporarily put ashore there. Captain Mackie also suggested that the boat ohould be kept about until daylight, so that this lightening of her tniglit be effected. The lifeboat then pirted company

There seems no doubt that the officers believed that the rocks on which the steamer had struck were south of the Nuggets, instead of being some fifteen miles northward of that point. Soon after daylight a point was seen ahead of the life-boat; mid "after a wearying pull the point was reached, which proved to , be tlie Taieri Heads—and that' river, not the Molyneux, was seen. On a beach there, Mr Nutt, Mr Hoyt, and, two other passengers landed ; and after a while they found a boat, and got up the river to the Ferry, thinking to be the first to send assistance to the wreck. Some others of tho passengers landed on the Taieri beach, and stated that they would make their way inland : but the crew, and a few of the passengers, resolved to stick to tlie lifeboat, and to make the voyage- on to Dunedin in her. Fortunately for them the weather remained calm. It was about twenty minutes after nine yesterday morning when the landing on the Taieri beach was effected.

It is very probable, from the telegrams published above, that at daylijht Captain Mackie at once recognised the real position of the reef on which his vessel had been wrecked, and that he directed the boats with the passengers to go southward to the Molyneux. The second and third engineers are said to have been in charge of the lifeboat, into which most of the women vrere got. One of them did not. reach the boat without an accident. .She fall into the sea, but was almost instantly helped on board the boat. One of the firemen got a similar fall, and he was for a while in danger of being drowned. The rolling of the steamer, and tho heavy breakers which frequently went over her, must have rendered it a most difficult task for all to teach the boats.

No doubt the South Australian struck on a reef about four miles north of Coal Point, which reef is very clearly shown on Borne of the larger maps of tho coast. The reef is, by rough measurement, about forty-four miles southerly from Cape Saunders, and fifteen or sixteen miles almost due north of the Nuggets ; the marks on land between which it lies being Cook's Head and Coal Point. Captain Tall, of the Taiaroa, says that he has, from Nuggets Point, many times seen a break on the reef at a point fully two miles from the coast line, but at high tide there is from twelve feet to sixteen feet of water over the greater portion of the reef. The opinions wo have heard as to the position of the wreck of the South Australian place ii fully three miles from the shore.

Captain Mackie was so thoroughly acquainted with the coast that ho must have been fearfully misled to have got his vessel where she now liea wrecked We have heard it suggested that a probable explanation of tlie wreck is this :—A current sets northerly along tho .joast, and is at tiine9 very strong If strong on Tuesday night, the slow rate at which the South Australian was steaming would make her extremely susceptible to the current ; and if the compasses were sufficiently wrong to lead to the course of the vessel having an unsuspected inclination shoreward, there is an explanation of how the reef north of Coal Point was struck, when Captain Mackie must have thought that he was considerably to tb.9 east, and at least a score of miles to tho southward of it.

It is satisfactory to know that, at present, there is no reason to fear that any life has been lost; and it is tc be hoped that, to-day, all the passengers and most of tao crew will reach Dunedin.

The South Australian had on board over £13 000 worth of gold—2l4o ozs. shipped by the Bank of New Zealand ; 1138 ozs. by the Union Bank of Australia. Mr Nutt believes that this had been got into one of the boats before the life boat in which he was left the neighborhood of tho wreck. About forty tons of general cargo, of no great value, represented the whole of the ship's other freight. Mr Nutt started in tlie Geelong last evening, for tho wreck ; there being also on board, the Harbor Master (with his boat and crew), Mr Mudie, and plenty of hands and material for getting as much as possible from the wreck. There can be no doubt that the wreck will bo formally abandoned and sold before the Geelong returns; but a good deal of passengers' luggage, and many things belonging to the ship, will in all probability be saved should fair weather continue during to-day. A telegram was sent to the Bluff yesterday by Mr Brodrick, agent for the Panama, New Zealand, and Australian Royal Mail Company, directing that tho Tararua, on her way from the Bluff, shall call at the wreck.

The same paper of the following day gives these additional particulars : —

There are no tidings of the return of the Geelong from the wreck of the South Australian near Coal Point. The weather yesterday was so fine and calm that those interested would be likely to keep the Geelong near the wreck until everything that could be removed on board of her had been secured.

The following telegram from Mr P. Dillon Bell, at Tokomairiro, wa3 received by his Honor the Superintendent yesterday aftornoon:—

" On arriving here with people hurt, I find that nothing whatever has been done for bringing in the women and children from tho coast. 1 arranged to cross them over tho hills in sledges to Kaitangata ; but two coaches are required to bring them on from Kaitangata here. I have telegraphed to Cobb ; but pray see to it yourself at onca, or perhaps nothing will be done. The road is quite good for a coach."

His Honor at once caused two coaches to be despatched from town, and it is expected that the passengers referred to will this afternoon be brought to Tokomairiro, from Kaitangata. We understand that seventeen of the passengers reached town by coach yesterday afternoon, ihe following names have been supplied to us : —Mrs Taylor and boy ; Messrs Lindsay, Thomson, Prince, Haines, M'Latchie, Welsh, Eulton, Auld or Hall, Handye, A. Griffiths, and Burton. All these, as we understand, were in the boat which was the last to leave the ship with passengers, and in which there were two or three of the steamer's crew. This boat remained by the wreck with the others (except the one of which the second mate waa in command) until daylight on Wednesday morning. Then this boat was pulled northward for about three miles to a small, beach, whence tho wreck was still visible, and there a landing was effected between hali'-pust eight and nine t.'clock. After a short, but hard walk inland, some set Hers were found, who gave assistance, and als> direciions as to tho course which should bo taken in order to reach KaiUngata—a to.vnsliip on ihe Mat an branch of the Molynoux. To reach Kaitangata a very difficult walk of from seven to nine miles hadto bo made, parrly over a steep bushcovcred hill. Mrs Taylor, with her boy, is stated to have held out bravely in this walk. From Kaitangata the journey to Dunedin was made by coach. As we understand, the boat in which the women and children were was pulled to the beach already referred to, and all were got ashore there ; while another boat was taken to a beach slightly to the south of the wreck, where a hauling was effected with great difficulty and danger, owing to I he surf. We are told tliat the wreck is certainly not three miles from the shore ; and one passenger says he believes it is not more than a mile from the shore.