WRECK OF "ORPHEUS”

Sun (Auckland), Volume I, Issue 272, 7 February 1928, Page 1

WRECK OF "ORPHEUS”

65TH ANNIVERSARY MANUKAU BAR TRAGEDY To-day is the 65th anniversary of the wreck on the Manukau Bar of Her Majesty’s ship Orpheus. Out of her complement of 256 officers and men 185 were lost. The Orpheus came from Sydney and, finding the signals against her, stood off the coast during the night. About 5 o’clock she stood into Manukau. The signalman stated at the time that he signalled her not to cross the bar, but the message must have been misunderstood. The ship struck about 1.30 in the afternoon and as the engines would not function she swung broadside on to the waves. Guns were fired and the reports were heard in Auckland, where it was thought the Maoris had commenced an attack. The heavy guns broke adrift and the ship commenced to go rapidly to pieces. The men were driven to the tops, but when the masts commenced to go the ship broke in halves. Some of the men succeeded in dropping into smooth water where they were picked up. The steamer Avon went down to the Heads, but could do nothing to help the doomed vessel, but she picked up the survivors and brought them to Onehunga where Sir George Grey, then the Governor, was among the party which received them. Bishop Patteson offered to go with the Avon to the Heads to bury any bodies washed ashore.

Twelve months’ provisions for other ships on the station were being carried on the Orpheus and after the wreck quantities of stores and clothing were washed up on Muriwai Beach, where the Maoris collected them and sent them to Auckland. The Maoris also recovered the body of Commodore Burnett and brought it to Auckland for burial. At the inquiry into the wreck it came out that the ship’s charts were not up-to-date, having been made a good many years before. About 1921 the body of one of the sailors was found in the sand quite recognisable and with the clothing intact. A man claiming to be the last survivor of the wreck of the Orpheus died in Kaitaia a few months ago.