MAORILAND MEMORIES.

NZ Truth, Issue 58, 28 July 1906, Page 7

MAORILAND MEMORIES.

— . — « The Men that Go Down to the Sea in Ships. ♦ — ~

Foundering of the T. S. Mort— Hokianga to Sydney.

- (BY "OLD CHUM.")

Sfo ©W to-day would dream of charging the late Thomas Sutcliffe Mort with such a heinous crime as that of sending to sea what are known as "coffin ships." Not from their shape are they so called, but rather from the fact that unscrupulous ship-owners having heavily insured the vessels have allowed them to go to sea regardless of the fact that the living freight on board is utterly unconscious of the unseaworthiness of the vessel whose frail timbers stand BETWEEN THEM AND ETERNITY. Thomas Sutcliffe Mort was a Sydney merchant, of whom commercial Australia is justly proud. He was born in the same county in which , RICHARD JOHN SEDDON first saw the light, Lancashire, in 1816, and was a Christmas -present from his mother to his father, being born on December 23 in that year. Whan a youth he entered the warehouse of Messrs. A. and S. Henry, the eminent Manchester firm, and was by them recommended to Messrs. Aspmwall, Browne, and Co., of Charlotte-place, Sydney, general merchants, who did a large . business with New Zealand, they being the owners of the whaling ships, Francis Free- : hag, Elizabeth, and Venus, with other ventures to Maoriland. Mr. Mort arrived m Sydney in 1838, and remained with Aspinwall, Browne, and Co., and their successors, Gosling, Browne, and Co., until the year 1843, when,- the fi,rm 'collapse* J, with, many others, in the financial crisis, a severe one, of the time. Mr. Mort then started va. business on bis own account.. In this way the great wool-brokering and financial firm of Mort and Co., now Goldsbrough, Mort, and Co., was founded, Mr. T. S. Mort Jjeing the first to initiate /•' * -' ■; PUBLIC WOOL SALES IN AUSTRALIA, Mr. Mort's numerous enterprises are? wellknown, and-. the Mercantile community Sydney thought so well of him that on his death in May, 1878, a statue to his memory was raised in Macquarie : place in front of the Royal Exchange Building,- the place where merchants most' congregate. Old Sydneyites,.at home and abroad, will remember that on September 10, 186V a fine ship, the Sovereign of the Seas, 1226 tons, Captain Cruickshank, was burned at. Campbell's wharf, Circular Quay. She had arrived about eight days previous with a cargo valued at £20,000, and 104 immi'".•cwits. The fire, which was suspected to ■>•<- ;iie work of an incendiary, broke out at -. .o'clock iii the evening, and notwith--s-" l : r.f; all efforts to subdue it, the ship , tied within forty-eightr-houTs^ ;■ The ' ,-wever, was saved, and after the unit- • ..; -rs had satisfied the owners, the .<■< was sold, and by the- process- known r ; ■-. shipwrights," was converted into an -..^.amsnip, and . , , v ■ .-.' . I'tISTENED THE "T. S. MORT."* * # ■ ■ • ■ V.lie was intended for the New .Zealand timber trade. On her first voyage some l.it of her machinery went wrong when 60 miles from Sydney Heads, and the steamer had to put back for repairs. When again ready for sea, the entire crew, with one solitary exception, a young man employed in the engine' room, named Donovan, refused to go in her. Her now skipper was a Captain Royal, his orders being to take the T.,S. Mort. to Hokianga for a cargo of timber, ; and return to Sydney. On June 29, 1863, she left Hokianga with her cargo of spars and logs in good trim, and with all on board irf the best health and spirite. r v ♦ .: : * * ■ - In addition to her crew, the T. S. 'Mort had two "passengers, a Mr; Brees and a son of Captain Rowritree, of the Floating Dock, Balmam. On JjUly_ 15, the GaroUne, also from ' ■■■■•■. HOKIANGA TO SYDNEY, , .canto. up with an American whaling barquethat had sprung a leak. The captain of the letter .requested the master of the Caroline to stand by him until land was sighted. While jn company with the barque— the John Wells— a three-masted vessel, was sighted, very low down by the stern. Her course was very erratic, and from the peculiarity of her rig the skipper of the Caroline judged her .to be the T. S. Mort, in distress. His conjecture proved correct. On examining the vessel it was discovered that all her boats were absent, the hatches all off, and her funnel gone. The ensign was flying, and indications showed that the crew had not long left the water-logged steamer. * * * Tiie master of the Caroline excused him6clf for not making closer inquiries, pleading bis promise to stand by the John Wells, which, however, he lost sight of before/ reaching the Sydney Heads. .Neither the two passengers or the Crew were heard of afterwards. The steamer and cargo were said to have been insured for £20,000, so that T. fc. Mort and Co. did not lose much. Of course no one at that time, and no one ,toda" believes ' that Thomas Sutcliffe Mort UNSEAWpRTHY VESSEL TO HOKIANGA. . . This melancholy wreck is interwoven with a spice of romanco. It will be generally understood that the people who go down to the sea in: ships, particularly those whose trade lay with New Zealand ports, had, when ashore, their homes at that particular part of Sydney known as "The Rocks." But in consequence of the resumptions by the JState Government and the demolition of many of the tenements', the seafaring pubi. lie, and those depending upon them, have been- scattered. But in 1883 "The Rocks" was the recognised locality wherein resided the families of seafaring people. The whaling wharves were in that locality, and everything and everybody savored of shipping- * * * When, as special commissioner for Mr'. .> John Norton I was inquiring into and practically writing the . . '„'£? ' "STORY OF THE ROCKS, 1 .',. *T was"" introduced to Mrs. jboxiqyan^. and from her I ascertained iftfe stor^of tne^ti S. Mort. • -" "'' : *•?: .-'•>•"' . v 't.ri ■ *:■■.. '.■.■'■*•:• ■■':•'* i^v Mrsi Donovan was a sister of Ambrose Kjte,' V well-known citizen of Melbourne, a roan of some wealth and of generous disposition* He it was who gave the sum of £1000, which was the nucleus of the fund which started the ill-fated exploration " ' EXPEDITION OF BURKEI AND WILLS; ',■'•■ ' * ■*• ' * Mr. Kyte arrived in Melbourne. in the year 1840, and so liked the place that he sent for his only sister, Ellen. Miss Kyte aaaie by way of Sydney, arriving in the ■hip .Susan* Captain Neatby, in Mardh, 1841. , She carried bounty immigrants, fh'e maso. ,bekig chiefly farm laborers, a sprinkling of Irish amongst them. On board tfae Susan on the passage out Mrs. Donovan met her destiny in the person of the young marine engineer, Donovan, and shortly" after landing the pair were married at bid St. Mary's Cathedral, by the Venerable Father Therry. According to the usual trend <Af love stories the couple should have lived fbappfiy for ever afterwards, but fate decreed, it otherwise. As long as providence permitted Mr. and Mrs. Donovan lived »mfprtably until he was fated to be the ?nly one of the old crew who joined the new Jne oh board the T. S. Mort. His confience in the was unbounded, and he ? %ent unquestioning to his doom. •' ■ * . ■■;. # » . • "%t§ Mrs^ Donovun'* hesiie was on The Rocks, I when in 1863 hu aur.bftsd sailed on his lust

voyage to Hokianga, and on The Rocks her home remained for nearly 40 years after. The poor lady never gave up hope that some day her early love would turn up, but when she reached her 80th year she ceased to hope. With the exception of a nine months; residence in Gloucester-etreet, Mrs. Donovan lived all her Australian life in ' Princes-street, both streets being on the Rocks, a period of over 60 years. ' Mrs.

Donovan died in November, 1901, aged 82 years, 38 pf which she mourned the husband who went down in the T. S. Mprt. Our portrait is from a photograph taken 'by order oft:.the New South Wales Government •as -a* souvenir of the Rocks resumptions.