WRECK OF THE NETHERBY ON KING'S ISLAND.

Southland Times, Issue 544, 20 August 1866, Page 2

WRECK OF THE NETHERBY ON KING'S ISLAND.

SAFETY OF THE PASSENGEES AND CREW. At a late hour on Saturday night (21st inst.), information was received by the Chief Secretary and Messrs. Bright Brothers, by telegram from Geelongf of the total wreck of the Black Ball ship Netherby on King's Island on her voyage ] from London to Brisbane with emigrants ; brought out under the Queensland Go- ! vernment's system of assisted immigra- < tion. The same message happily stated ' that, though the ship was a perfect , wreck, the whole of the passengers and s <rew had been landed safely on the v iaiand. The smallness of the stock of t provisions which had been got on shore, i, however, and the total absence of means of j shelter, at the time • when Mr Parry, ihe second officer, left the wreck to endeavor v to procure assistance, gave serious occa- s aion for & fear that exposure to the ele- ij

merits and want of food might have told severely upon the party,* the women and children especially. By the late train Mr Parry reached town, and with Mr M'Gowan, of the Electric Telegraph department, drove to the residence of Mv M'Culloch, where Mr Parry told his story. Steps were at once taken hy the Chief Secretary to afford relief to the sufferers ; Capturn Norman had been sent for as soon as the telegraphic message was received, and the necessary stores having been shipped, the steamer Victoria, with Mr Farry on board, to point out the precise scene of the wreck, sailed on Sunday at eleven o'clock a.m. for King's Island. In the meantime, Captain Ferguson, harbormaster, had not been idle. As soon as the news reached Williamstown on Saturday night, steam was got up on board the harboi-j feamer Pharos, and shops and private houses were ransacked for such stores of bread, tea, sugar, wine, blanketing, &c, as could be got together. About four tons of provisions, &c, were thus placed on boai'd, and at three o'clock in the morning the Pharos, under Captain Fullerton's command, steamed down channel for the scene' of the wreck. The Netherby was commanded by Captain Owens, and sailed from London early in April, and from Plymouth on the 13th of that month, with 452 passengers on board, nearly all Government immigrants. .She had also a large cargo of railway iron for the Queensland railways. On Saturday, the 14th inst., she was close to the j entrance to the straits, but the weather I for some days previously had been of such a character that no observations could be obtained. At half-past seven p.m., while j the ship was going about five knots an | hour, land was seen, but so close that in j less than three minutes from the time when the first sign of danger was observed, the Netherby struck on the rocks in Fitzmaurice Bay, on the western shore of King's Island, almost at its extreme southern end, and about thirty-five miles "from the lighthouse. During the night j the sea was comparatively calm, and at i daylight — the ship being hard and fast on i the rocks — the work of removing the pas- 1 sengers to the shore commenced. This was accomplished successfully, but while j the work was going on, the wind had increased and the sea had risen so much that all the ship's boats, excepting a small gig, were stove in, the crew escaping narrowly with their lives. About twenty barrels of flour only had been got to the beach, and this was all the provisions secured for 500 people. No canvas had had been got ashore to use for purposes of shelter for the women and children, but the scrub afforded shelter, and fires were kindled. By Monday morning all the ship's masts had gone by the board, and she was full of water. On Monday morning, Mr Parry (who is a young man of about twenty-three years of age) was despatched to the lighthouse, to endeavor to obtain help. He was accompanied by a midshipman, and three or four of the passengers. Unaccustomed to bush travelling, two of the party gave in on Tuesday or Wednesday, and set out to retrace their steps to the scene of the wreck. The others persevered, and sustaining themselves with a little flour, and a wallaby which they caught, reached the lighthouse on Thursday morning. There Mr Parry found that his only hope lay in reaching Melbourne as quickly as possible, and he obtained from the lighthouse-keeper a small but good whaleboat. only twentythree feet long. The chance of making the run to Victoria safely in her appeared so faint that one of the party refused to embark, and Mr Parry proceeded to sea with only the little middy and two others, none of them having had experience in managing boats. The wife of the lighthouse-keeper had given them a little gin in a toilet-bottle— nearly all in the shape of stores that could be spared. The wind was high, blowing half a gale, and the sea exceedingly rough. For hours together the lives of the party were in the most imminent peril, but Mr Parry reports that the behaviour of his comrades was admirable, and that but for the assistance they rendered him in a most courageous manner, he could not have reached the shore. Fortunately, they succeeded in beaching the boat late on Friday night, in a sheltered spot between Point Eoadknight and Barwon Heads, and luckily fell in with a surveying party under Mr Allan, from whom they recevie'd the immediate assistance they needed. A horse and guide having been procured, Mr Parry rode a distance of twenty-six miles to Geelong, where, meeting Mr M'Gowan, superintendent of the Electric Telegraph department, he telegraphed particulars of the wreck to the Chief Secretary and the ship's agents. Beaching Melbourne by the last train (as we have stated), accompanied by Mr M'Gowan, the Chief Secretary was immediately waited upon. The Victoria and Pharos returned to i ITobson's Bay on Tuesday morning, the • former with 230 souls, mostly women and children, and the Pharos with sixty men, 1 passengers and crew, when the following ] particulars were learned : — r j After the ship struck the rocks, finding i the water gaining in the vessel, the cap- ( tain set all hands to work to get up stores i from the hold, but before much had been done in this way the lower decks were £ flooded, and aifc last the only thing to do c was to wait for the day. The night was i passed in great suspense. The general 2 expectation was that the ship could not c live it out ; but there was no confusion r Sunday morning breaking found them still f safe, and the fog lifting, showed them the shore about a quarter of a mile distant, t Even then their look-out was awful, for f with sunken rocks, breakers, lines of r, surf, and. a rugged inhospitable shore before them, the aspect of affairs re- I mained imminently dangerous. The ship s; bad five bouts, but one broke up before tl .t could be used, and two others were [ s< smashed before all were landed, for the j ir weather became stormy. The getting on j a shore was at last achieved by fastening a i a: me to .the land and working the boats ' h

i along it, like a ferry boat running on a { wire. Even then the boats could not be taken further than the outside of the 1 lines of surf, so the passengers had either to wade waist-deep to the shore or be ■ carried thither. It was raining, too, and when, after many hours, the nearly 500 souls on board reached the land they were in. a wretched plight.