BARQUE AND HULK

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21548, 20 July 1933, Page 10

BARQUE AND HULK

VESSEL'S LONG SERVICE VERITAS TO BE BROKEN UP After 23 years' service at sea as a barque, and 34 years as a coal hulk in Auckland Harbour, the hulk Veritas has finished her career and on Saturday slip will be towed to Tryphena, Great Barrier Island, to be broken up for firewood. The copper fastenings and timber of value in the hull will be retained. The Veritas was originally a wooden barque of 748 tons gross and she was built at Helsenborg, Sweden, in 1876. She sailed under the Swedish flag until 18S3, when she was purchased by Mr. H. R. Reid, of Melbourne. Afterwards she made many trips across the Tasman Sea in the inter-colonial trade bringing coal from Newcastle and taking timber "from New Zealand to Australia. In 1899, when still in commission, the Veritas was purchased by the Westport Coal Company, which converted her into a coal hulk. So many steamers have been replaced by motor-ships that the storage of larce quantities of bunker coal is not now required and this has resulted in the Veritas being scrapped. She has been purchased by Medland Brothers, at Tryphena, to where the hulk will bo towed by the paddle tug Lyttelton. „-\n interesting relic on the Veritas is the vessel's foremast, which is reported to have been taken out of H.M.S. Nelson, which was built in 1803.