WRECKS ON OTAKI BEACH.

Shannon News, 7 November 1922, Page 2

WRECKS ON OTAKI BEACH.

AN INTERESTING NARRATIVEFurther particulars of the “The City of Auckland/ ' which, was wrecked on the Otaki beach many years ago, are as follows: — “Mr and Mrs Simcox and family in the year 1878 used to live at the Bay of Islands. At Otaki Mr Simcox kept a diary, and it is often from this very interesting document that Mrs Simcox quotes. It is perhaps unnecessary to explain that the ship City of Auckland was in no way connected with the ship Auckland, about which Mr H. N. Burgess recently wrote so interestingly. The City was built specially for the London-Auckland trade, and towards her, early Aucklanders had a sort of proprietorial feeling of regard. It was in the year 1878 that the City of Auckland met her doom. She was bound from London to Napier with 240 emigrants on board, and a cargo of railway iron, 300 tons of which was for Napier, and the balance for Auckland, to which port she was supposed to come after having discharged her passengers and part cargo at Napier.

There was great excitement in the town of Auckland on October 23, when the “Star" came out with a message, from Wellington telling that the ship City of Auckland had gone ashore at Otaki the night before, and as communication was not so rapid then as it is now, the fate of the ship an<J her large number of passengers were not known immediately. The ship went ashore at half past nine at night, and one can imagine the consternation of the emigrants. Immediately she struck the hatches were battened down by order of Captain Balls, who was then in command, and it was decided to keep the emigrants below until measures could be adopted for their safety. The poor people, however, became so excited and were in such a state of terror that they at last burst the hatches open and rushed on deck.

Captain Ralls at once placed a guard over the boats, and took steps to restore order among the frightened people. It was eight o’clock the following morning before boat could be launched, and the Captain then sent a crew ashore to get assistance. Fortunately the weather was not very bad, or the story 'would have been very different. The Otaki settlers lost no time in going off to the help of the people on the stranded ship. THREATENED TO SHOOT.

: Wlieu the first boat went alongside the ship there was a rush among the emigrants to get aboard. Captain Ralls had to stand at the gangway with a loaded revolver in his hand, and his threat that he would shoot the first man that disobeyed orders, was not an idle one. Captain Ralls was .very well known • and popular in Auckland, and his splendid behaviour after the ship went asliore was just what one would

expect, from such a fine sailor. Fortunately the stranded vessel gave a fair amount of shelter for the landing of the passengers, and eventually every man, woman, and child aboard was safely put ashore, the women and children getting ashore without even wetting their feet. The Maoris lent very willing help and had fires going all day long on the beach. With the exception of the ship's doctor (Dr. Andrews) and his wife, who were taken in by Mr and Mrs Simcox, all the passengers were accommodated in the large Maori college that was built by Archdeacon S. Williams. Quoting from the diary which was kept by Mr Simcox, Mrs Simcox tells of the excitement the wreck caused at Otaki. Three special constables were sworn in from the Otaki residents for the purpose of looking after the unexpected accession to Otaki's small population and to supervise the providoring, plenty of good beef and potatoes being furnished by the settlers. The Maoris were very numerous in Otaki and the surrounding district for-

ty-four years ago, and they played an important part in helping the strangers, not only providing plenty of potatoes, but cooking them as well. Some of the young fellows who had been saved from the wreck did not seem anxious to help in the work that was going on; they did not offer to help when the huge piles of potatoes were being peeled, for instance, so one of the bluff, good-hearted Otaki people said, "If they won't help they can just, have thorn in their skins," and in their skins those young men got their potatoes for the future.

• When news of the wreck reached Wellington the Government steamer Hinemoa; Captain John Fairchild, was sent up to Waikanac, the most convenient spot for taking the passengers off and to that locality the shipwrecked people were conveyed in bulloek drays and anything that ran on wheels—and they were not plentiful in those days. The Hinemoa took the immigrants direct to Napier, to which port they were all bouiid. SOUVENIRS OF THE "CITY."

A few of the erow were loft to dis

mantle the wreck, and most of the gear was salvaged. Of course there were dozens of things, such, as cabin furniture, that would not pay to take away and these things were fathered by tho Otaki people as souvenirs. "When the ship was launched from the builders' yards in 1869 a finely carved teak scroll bearing Campbell's lines,'“Her path is o'er the mountain wave, her home is on the deep'' decorated the break of the Further particulars relative to rr the relic is now hanging up in the hall at Mrs Simcox's home, and she also has the ship's poop bell, which is used to announce dinner. The fo'c's'le bell i' hung in the kiosk at Otaki beach. Pari of one of the masts of the City of Auckland may be seen on the Otaki Beach when travelling from Auckland to Wellington on the express train. It is interesting to recall that some of the residents recently got a piece of timber that once formed part of the old ship, and out of it made a walkingstick for presentation to the Rt. Hon. W. F. Massey on his birthday. Mr Massey, it will be remembered, came out from Ireland to Auckland iB tho ship on her first voyage.

AN UNLUCKY SPOT. After the disaster, Captain Fairchild, of the Government steamer Hinemoa, strongly urged that a light should be placed on Kapiti Island, and in doing so said that a dozen vessels a year mis took Kapiti for Stephen's Island in the Cook Straits. “It is reckoned/' he observed, “that on the Hyderabad, the Felixstowe, and the City of Auckland, all lost in the neighbourhood within. the last three months, there has been over £IIO,OOO insurance." Other wrecks recorded by Mrs Simcox include the Pleione, which was wrecked on March 16, 1888, and afterwards refloated; and later tho ship Weathersfield, which had Tather.an unusual experience. Mrs Simcox says the Weathersfield, after many futile attempts to get her off, lay on the beaeh for six years, at the end of w T hich she was sold for very little to Messrs Daniells and Bright, who after months of hard work eventually got the vessel off, took her to Wellington, refitted her, and, as far as Mrs Simcox knows, the vessel is still afloat.

The saddest wreck of all, writes Mrs Simcox, was that of the Felixstowe, a barque from Newcastle with coal. She went ashore on October 13, 1878. The weather at the time Was stormy, and for three or four days before the captain had been unable to get any sights. Being a stranger to the coast ’ he was not aware of the strong set of the current towards the land, and when he got a glimpse of Kapiti Island he made the same mistake as several other captains —thought it was Stephens Island, in Cook Straits, made a course accordingly, and steered confidently to the west. Captain Piggot (master of the Felixstowe), the mate, and two seamen were drowned. Mrs Piggot, who was sailing with her husband, was, fortunately, saved. ONCE A RAJAH’S YACHT.

Another wreck on this unfortunate coast was that of the ship Hyderabad, 1,350 tons (Captain Holmwood), which went ashore on June 24, 1878, at Hokio, about 14 miles north of Otaki. Built about 60 years agq for the Rajah of Hyderabad, she was originally a steam yacht, very finely fitted up; but in later years she kept much humbler company, being sold and put into commission as a cargo carrier. Her engines were taken out of her when she ceased to be the plaything of a rajah, and she was a full-rigged ship when Captain Holmwood had her.

The figure-head of the Hyderabad was a heroic sized effigy in wood of the wealthy Indian potentate for whom she was built. After basking in the summer seas that wash the shores of the Rajah's native land, and braving; storms all round the world, this realistic image now adorns the garden plot in front of a cottage at Foxton. At the time she was wrecked the Hyderabad was bound from Lyttelton to Adelaide with railway material sold by the New Zealand Government to South Australia. . • ' .