SHIPS, FAMOUS

Ships and the sea have long been important factors in New Zealand life. The long coast, the break between the two islands, and the rugged bush-covered interior made the sea the cheapest, easiest, and principal highway. Indeed, until 1928 a sea voyage was the only way in or out of the country and even today cargo is carried almost entirely by sea. New Zealanders with this tradition and, in the main ports, with ships almost in their streets, are very conscious of the sea and of the ships that sail on it. Over the years certain vessels have for one reason or other caught the public fancy and their names have become part of the substance of New Zealand history.

ENDEAVOUR

The earliest historically is the Endeavour, the vessel used by Captain Cook on his first voyage to New Zealand. When the voyage was projected two naval sloops were considered and rejected. The Admiralty then suggested that a cat-built vessel of about 350 tons, with sufficient room for the large quantity of stores needed for such a voyage, could be had in the Thames. Three were surveyed and eventually the Earl of Pembroke was purchased for £2,307 5s. 6d., the hull being valued at £2,212 15s. 6d. and the mast and yards making up the total. This ship was the vessel provided for Cook and not, as has been frequently stated, selected by him. She was a typical east coast collier with a bluff broad bow and had been built by Fishburn for Thomas Milner at Whitby, Yorkshire. In March 1768 at the time of purchase she was three years nine months old. Her length was 106 ft, and 97 ft 7 in. on her lower deck, with an extreme breadth of 29 ft 3 in. Her burthen was 368 71/94 tons. She was renamed Endeavour and registered as a bark, that is, a vessel without a figurehead and a straight stem. She was not a barque. In fact, she was square-rigged on all three masts though she also had a spanker sail. She was sheathed and fitted for guns at Deptford naval dockyard during.April. Further accommodation was provided for the scientific party. In all, the fitting out and stores cost £5,394 15s. 4d., bringing the total cost to £8,235 6s. 3d. In addition, a new pinnace, long boat, and yawl were provided. The Endeavour was provided with 10 carriage and 12 swivel guns; four of the former were stowed in the hold, and eight in all went below during the rounding of Cape Horn.

She was a most satisfactory ship for the task she had to undertake, and Cook himself selected two vessels of the same type (one somewhat larger) for his second voyage. She was not fast, for her fastest speed was 8 knots running with the wind, and she was at her best sailing with the wind abaft the beam when she did between 7 and 8 knots. In a heavy gale, laid to under a main sail or mizen, no sea could hurt her. She could be careened easily, a matter of importance when she was away from dockyard hands for a long period. She could be beached easily and repairs were made in this manner when she was damaged off the eastern coast of Australia in June 1770. Her best day's run was that of 210 miles on 9 March 1771 when she was sailing in the swift Agulhas current, the next best being 168 miles on 27 April 1771 on the St. Helena run. There were also a number of runs of about 160 miles.

When the Endeavour sailed from England in August 1768, she carried 96 men, crew, and civilians. When she returned three years later, the number was 90, though replacements had been taken aboard at Batavia and the Cape. On her return to England she was again refitted and employed on four voyages to the Falkland Islands. In March 1775 she was sold out of the Navy for £645. There is nothing definite about her fate after this, but her life span in the arduous service for which she was used would not greatly exceed 20 years. By 1790 she was probably a hulk and not, as has been sometimes suggested, still in service as a French whaler.

The name Endeavour has also been used for two ships of the Royal New Zealand Navy. The first was the Antarctic supply ship, formerly HMS Pretext, and the second a tanker supply ship commissioned in 1962. Another Endeavour was wrecked on the New Zealand coast in 1795.

EARLY SHIPBUILDING

A sealing party from the trader Britannia (Captain William Raven) was left at Dusky Sound from November 1792 to September 1793, and during this time the men erected a house and a wharf and almost completed a vessel of between 60 and 70 tons. In October 1795 an old East Indiaman, the Endeavour, which, with a small ship in company, had encountered a heavy gale in the Tasman and developed leaks, took shelter in Dusky Sound. After a survey and further damage the ship was abandoned. Fortunately, the vessel partially built by Raven's sealers was still on the stocks. The crew and the convict stowaways quickly completed and launched it, rigging it out as the schooner Providence. With 90 on board she left Dusky Sound on 7 January 1796 and arrived at Norfolk Island 12 days later.

Not until 1826 was there another vessel built in New Zealand. This was the Herald launched on 26 January at Paihia by the Reverend Henry Williams for the Church Missionary Society. She was a schooner of about 60 tons and made three voyages to Sydney before being wrecked at Hokianga in 1828. It was at Hokianga Harbour that Raine and Ramsay and Browne of Sydney established the first commercial dockyard. At a site first called Dept-ford but later known as Horeke, three vessels were built. The first, built early in 1828, was the schooner Enterprise, and the second was the New Zealander (1828), a brigantine of 140 tons. She was the fastest vessel sailing out of Sydney at the time and on her first voyage did the Tasman trip in less than six days. The third, the Sir George Murray, was launched in 1830 and was of 394 tons burden. She was sold to be used as a whaler despite the lack of a register. The troubles of the British owners of these ships in obtaining registries and a flag to fly led to the adoption of the first New Zealand flag. The first New Zealand register was issued for the Joseph Weller, schooner 49 69/94 tons, belonging to George Weller, merchant, Sydney, and built in 1831.

TORY

In the years after Cook's visits, ships from abroad came in increasing numbers to the New Zealand coasts exploring, whaling, sealing, and trading, but the next ship of note was not engaged in any of these activities. She was the Tory, known for her part in bringing the advance party of men engaged in the organised settlement of New Zealand. When the New Zealand Company advanced its plans for promoting settlement in New Zealand, it was necessary to send men to buy land and survey it ready for the settlers. Preliminary plans dragged to such an extent that even by April 1839 no ship had been selected. In November 1838 the Company had agreed to purchase the Tory, probably for use as an emigrant ship, and for this reason she remained idle for some months. After considering another ship, the Company on 5 April 1839 selected the Tory for the preliminary expedition. It was hoped she would be able to sail on 25 April, but it was not until Sunday, 12 May, that she left Plymouth. The Tory was a three-masted barque (square rigged fore and main, fore and aft on mizen) a little bigger than Endeavour. In fact she was 381 84/94 tons burden, and 111 ft 4 in. long, with a beam of 27 ft 7 in. Her two decks were 6 ft 3 in. apart. She had a standing bowsprit, was square sterned with sham quarter galleries and, in keeping with the part she was to play in history, had a figurehead of the Duke of Wellington. Her draught was 15 ½ ft and, like many merchantmen of the time, she carried eight guns. Frederick Preston of South Town, Suffolk, built her in 1834 for Joseph Soames, the noted ship owner, who registered her on 7 May of that year. Little is known of her early voyaging, though she seems to have made a trip to the Cape in 1838. She was hurriedly fitted out and provisioned during April, and was due to sail under the command of Lieutenant Robson, RN. He, however, resigned during the last week in April and Edward Main Chaffers became Master on 4 May just before she left London. With 35 aboard including the head of the expedition, Col. Wakefield, and Edward Jerningham Wakefield, Dieffenbach, and Heaphy, she made a very fast passage of 96 days. Indeed, the time was never bettered by any of the Company's ships and it was some years before others began to make faster times. The Tory was a good sailer and her best day's run was 234 miles, or almost 10 knots for every hour of the 24. She arrived in Queen Charlotte Sound on 17 September 1839 and entered Port Nicholson three days later.

For some months the Tory sailed around New Zealand on Company business. She struck a sandbank at the entrance to Kaipara Harbour, making a hole in her hull which had to be repaired by her crew. Chaffers became harbourmaster at Port Nicholson and on 19 April 1840 she left there for Sydney with Richard Lowry as Master. She refitted there at a cost of £3,515 8s. 6d. but, failing to get a cargo, sailed for Surabaya in the hope of one. She failed again at Batavia and went on to Singapore where she took on cargo for Macao. Lowry died in Singapore and his brother Nicholas, the mate, took command. This was not to Soames's liking and on hearing of it he took immediate steps to have him removed. It was too late, for the Tory had been wrecked in the Palawan Passage on 23 January 1841. The New Zealand Company received £9,220 9s. 5d. insurance.

ACHERON

Steamships were not long in coming to New Zealand. The first Maori war brought HMS Driver, a sloop, to Auckland in January 1846, the first steamship to come to the colony. She was a paddle-wheel craft of 1,058 tons displacement brig-rigged with a 280 h.p. engine and armed with two 68–pounder and two 84–pounder guns. More important, however, was HM surveying ship Acheron which, with HM brig Pandora, charted the coasts between 1848 and 1855. This vessel was a barque rigged, five-gun paddle-wheel sloop of 722 tons which had been launched at Sheerness in 1838. The Acheron was 150 ft long and had a beam of 33 ft. She carried a crew of 100. She was the first surveying vessel in these waters to be fitted with auxiliary power – an engine developing 170 h.p. This proved of great assistance in the work of surveying the west coast of the South Island but she also charted the major portion of the coast and harbours. She gave her name to the deep (Acheron) passage between Dusky and Breaksea Sounds. Following her period in New Zealand waters, she worked on the New South Wales coast until sold in Sydney during 1855 for £2,500. During the New Zealand survey, the captain of the Acheron was John Lort Stokes.

DUNEDIN

The next ship to make her name part of New Zealand history was the Dunedin, an iron ship of 1,320 tons. She was one of the six “Auckland” class ships built (at a loss) by Duncan's of Port Glasgow for Henderson's Albion Line in 1874. These ships were designed for the emigrant trade, and were capable of fast passages. The best time seems to be that of the Wellington which ran from Port Chalmers to London in 69 days. Designed to carry about 400 passengers, though often she carried more, the Dunedin was 241 ft long, had a beam of 36 ft, and a hold 21 ft deep.

In 1881 after the success of the Australian trial shipment, W. S. Davidson of the New Zealand and Australian Land Company approached Henderson's who agreed to fit out one of the Albion Company's best and fastest sailing ships to carry frozen meat. The Land Company agreed to provide a shipment of up to 7,500 sheep, to pay freight of 2 ½d. per pound, and to take all risk, though they managed to insure at £5 5s. per cent. Dunedin was fitted with insulated meat chambers, boilers, and Bell-Coleman freezing machinery at Point Glasgow. She left there in August with John Whitson as Master, and arrived at Port Chalmers in November. The sheep came from Totara, North Otago, and were frozen on board. The number was reduced to about 5,000, about 130 tons in all and, despite one breakdown in the refrigerating machinery, the ship left on 15 February 1882. After a voyage of 98 days in which the machinery was run intermittently, the Dunedin reached London. Here the meat opened up in good condition and was sold for 6 ½d. per pound.

The Albion Company's success led in November 1882 to the formation of the Shaw Savill and Albion Line which fitted out other ships for the trade. The Dunedin did nine more voyages until she was lost in 1890 homeward bound, probably running into an iceberg off Cape Horn.

ROTOMOHANA

The Union Steam Ship Co., which was established in 1876, soon had some fine vessels in its early fleet. One of these was the Rotomohana, launched in June 1879 from Denny Bros. yard at Dumbarton. With her well raked funnel and masts, shapely clipper bow with figurehead, decorative scroll work, and jib boom, she had the appearance of a steam yacht and was indeed a beautiful ship. She was the first merchant steamer to be built of mild steel and fitted with bilge keels. Her compound engines developed 2,500 h.p. from six boilers working at a pressure of 70 lb per square inch. Later she was given four new boilers and the working pressure raised to 90 lb. Her measurements were length, 298 ft, breadth, 35 ft, and depth to main deck, 23 ½ ft. Her voyage to New Zealand was the fastest to date, and she reached up to 17 knots when assisted by her sails and a following wind. On trials her maximum speed was 15.386 knots.

For nearly 20 years the Rotomohana was employed in the intercolonial trade and then, until the arrival of the Maori, was on the Wellington-Lyttelton run. In February 1904 she did this trip in 10 hours 35 minutes. From May 1908 to 1921 she ran from Melbourne to Launceston and was broken up in 1925.

CALLIOPE

The Calliope played little part in New Zealand history yet the name lives on. She was a single-screw steel and iron wood-cased corvette of 2,770 tons, 235 ft long, of 44 ½ ft beam, and carried a crew of 291 men. Launched at Portsmouth dockyard in 1884 and first commissioned in January 1887, she was detached from the China station to join the Australian squadron later in the same year. She arrived in New Zealand in December 1887 and after visiting several ports, took part in the opening of the Calliope Dock, Auckland, on 16 February 1888, being the first ship to enter it. Strangely enough, the dock takes its name from Calliope Point out of which it was excavated. This was named from an earlier warship which had visited New Zealand in 1846.

In 1889 the Calliope was dispatched hurriedly to Samoa to relieve HMS Rainbow. She coaled at Wellington and reached Apia on 2 February. Samoa was a trouble centre and on 15 March there were three United States, three German, and one British warship in the small harbour. A storm which had blown up from the south on the previous day turned to the north-east and increased to a hurricane which blew directly into the open harbour. Throughout the night it battered the vessels causing them to drift shorewards. At dawn Calliope was within 50 yards of the reef, and despite the use of the steam in all boilers it was not possible to steady her. There was additional danger from the other vessels dragging and swinging on their anchor cables and being driven on to her. She was struck by two ships, and her jib boom was carried away. Eventually the danger from the remaining ships ahead and the reef just astern left only one solution. At 9.30 a.m., choosing the right moment to avoid a German vessel and with his own stern about 20 ft from the reef, Captain Kane slipped his anchor and with the engines full ahead, which in calm water would give 14 ½ knots, Calliope proceeded out to sea. At a speed of less than a knot she passed the USS Trenton, whose ship's company cheered her on. Visibility was almost zero and it was not possible to fix the ship's position. As long as the engines held out, however, things were reasonably good and, despite the fact that they were working at full power for almost 12 hours, they did. At 8 p.m. the sea had dropped somewhat and by noon of the 17th the wind was down to a mere gale. On the 19th Calliope was able to return to Apia to find the harbour clear of shipping. Of the seven warships she was the only one afloat, though two others were later refloated. The deaths totalled 130 men.

The staff engineer in his report attributed much of the success in maintaining and generating steam to the Westport coal which was being used. In his opinion it was the “very best colonial coal”. The Captain gave credit to the engines, to the crew, and to the ship's builders. The Calliope was withdrawn from active service in 1907 and became the headquarters and drill ship of the Tyne Division of the RNVR at Newcastle.

AMOKURA

In the training of New Zealand seamen the name Amokura has a distinguished place. It was borne by a three-masted composite barquentine (square-rigged on foremast, fore and after on after masts) which had been built for the Royal Navy and named HMS Sparrow. She was built at Greenock and was 165 ft long, 31 ft in beam, with a displacement of 805 tons. Her engine of 720 i.h.p. gave her 13 knots. In 1906 the New Zealand Government purchased her for £800 as a training ship for seamen boys. Lads of 12 to 14 were recruited and instructed in navigation, seamanship, marine engines, and gun drill. F. A. Worsley, later of Antarctic fame, was her first captain but after a brief period he was succeeded by Captain G. E. Hooper. The ship wintered at Port Nicholson, then did two cruises in the summer chiefly under sail to the sub-Antarctic islands and to the Kermadecs. It was hoped that the boys so trained would provide a nucleus for the New Zealand Division of the Royal Navy as well as being a source of recruitment for our mercantile marine. Many of the boys eventually became deck officers, and at one time a very high proportion of the New Zealand merchant marine was commanded by Amokura boys. By 1919 the seagoing life of the Amokura was over and she remained anchored in Wellington harbour. The ship was laid up in 1922 and, after being used as a coal hulk, was beached at the head of Kenepuru Sound, Marlborough.

NEW ZEALAND

When the British Government was concerned with the growing menace of the German Navy and proposed to construct four dreadnoughts, New Zealand, through its Prime Minister, Sir J. G. Ward, offered on 22 March 1909 to pay for “a first-class battleship of the latest type”. This gift was accepted and in June 1910 the battle cruiser New Zealand was laid down at the Govan Yard of the Fairfield Shipping Co., on the Clyde. There had been an earlier warship of this name built in 1904 but in 1909 it was renamed Zealandia. Launched in July 1911 and commissioned in November 1912, the New Zealand was 580 ft overall with a beam of 80 ft, a draught of 26 ½ ft, and a displacement of 19,000 tons. Her turbines developed 44,000 h.p. and four screws drove her through the water at 26 knots. She had 31 coal-fired boilers, but these were later converted to oil. The armament included eight 12 in. and sixteen 4 in. guns and two submerged 21 in. torpedo tubes. In peacetime she carried 800 men. Three officers in the first commission were New Zealanders.

After a brief work up she left Portsmouth on 8 February 1913 to visit New Zealand, arriving at Wellington on 12 April. During the next 10 weeks she visited most New Zealand ports and was inspected by half a million people; indeed, the New Zealand made New Zealand people navy minded. She returned to England late in 1913 and as part of the battle cruiser force of the Grand Fleet took part in every action in the North Sea during the First World War. The first was at Heligoland Bight on 28 August 1914 when New Zealand torpedoed the German light cruiser Köln. On 24 January 1915 at the Dogger Bank she assisted in sinking the armoured cruiser Blücher. She was also in the Battle of Jutland on 31 May 1916, where she engaged the German battle cruisers, firing 430 rounds and received only one hit.

New Zealand returned to New Zealand waters in August 1919, flying the flag of Admiral of the Fleet Viscount Jellicoe, who in a world tour was to investigate and report on the problems of naval defence, both of the Empire and of New Zealand. But New Zealand was to play little part in it for, as a result of the Washington Naval Treaty, she was scrapped in 1921.