FAMOUS KETCH FOR SALE

Evening Post, Volume CXXV, Issue 48, 26 February 1938, Page 24

FAMOUS KETCH FOR SALE

The news that the ketch Defender -the fastest and best-known sailing vessel, in the Bass Strait trade—is for sale must come with a feeling of regret to lovers of little ships and to seamen of. the old tar and hemp school (state san Australian exchange). This long, rakish, and loftily sparred ketcn has been engaged on the Melbourne to Wynyard general cargo run with a back-loading.of sawn timber from the Duck Biver mills for more than a quarter of a century. In 1932, when under the command of Captain W. E. Leggett the Defender made the fastest trip across Bass Strait ever to be accomplished by a sailing vessel when she dropped anchor off Williamstown just a fraction over 23 hours after leaving the wharf at Duck River. It is thought in shipping circles that •the increasing difficulty in secunn & crews and a slight falling off in trade has to some extent called for the sale of the vessel. A well-known skipper engaged in the. Strait sailing trade said that* each year this difficulty in securing' a capable crew for a ketch was becoming increasingly acute. Not so many years ago, he said, a ketch remained at the wharf for days, when the men enjoyed a spell in port. These days, he said, a ketch, to compete with modern ways, was in pert today and out tomorrow. As hands on ketches received only about £ 12, as opposed to up to £25 with overtime on a steamer, the tendency was to forsake sail for st6__T_l_ The Defender, which is 82 feet 6 inches long, with a beam of 22 feet, was built at Kincumber, New South "nles. in 1895, of ironbark framing i-, i redgum planking. She has a loading capacity of 85 tons d.w.. or 43,000 super feet of limber (dry). Formerly owned by Captain F.W. Cook, the Defender is now owned and captained by Captain P. J. Nielsen, who at one time commanded the Holyman Line ketch Erskine, which was afterwards wrecked at Mussel Roe Bay, Tasmania.