Other formats

    TEI XML file   ePub eBook file  

Connect

    mail icontwitter iconBlogspot iconrss icon

White Wings Vol I. Fifty Years Of Sail In The New Zealand Trade, 1850 TO 1900

The Prince Of Wales

The Prince Of Wales.

Whaler, Freezer and Hulk—Over Seventy Years Old—Hull Still in Use.

Ships are very much like human beings; some die young and some live to a remarkable old age. Some, like the Titanic, have hardly left the launching ways before they meet with an awful fate; some, like the old Victory, Nelson's ship, seem fated to remain afloat for ever, like van der Decken's famous craft. Of the hale old vessels there is a very remarkable example swinging to her moorings in Wellington, the hulk that once bore the Royal name of Prince of Wales. This remarkable craft takes us back to
The Hulk Prince Of Wales At Wellington.

The Hulk Prince Of Wales At Wellington.

the anxious days when England was searching for news of that gallant Arctic explorer Sir John Franklin, for she was one of the vessels fitted out for the relief expedition of 1856.

The Prince of Wales was brought out to New Zealand by Nelson Bros., so well known in connection with the development of the freezing industry, and I am indebted to Mr. W. Nelson, of Tomoana, Hawke's Bay, for getting on the track of the most interesting history of this staunch old example of the British shipbuilders' thoroughness. "She was bought by Nelson Bros. in the early days of the freezing industry," he writes, "and was used as a store ship on the Thames. Early in 1889 she was at my request sent out here to New Zealand to exploit various ports, having first of all been fitted with twin propellers, which were driven by a pair of 30 h.p. engines, the steam for which was supplied from the boiler of the refrigerating plant."

The Prince of Wales started work at Gisborne in November, 1889, freezing 200 sheep a day. It must be remembered that in the infancy of this industry, which has grown to such astonishing proportions in the present day, there were no shore freezing stations. For instance, the Dunedin, the ship that took the first cargo of frozen meat Home, had to freeze the meat herself. The Prince of Wales remained at Gisborne until January, 1891, when she went to Picton and inaugurated the frozen meat trade of Marlborough. Eight years later she returned to Gisborne and again acted as storeship until July, 1901, when she went to Port Chalmers, remainingpage 338 there as storeship until 1906. From there she went to Wellington, where she was eventually sold for use as a coal hulk. She was first used as a hulk by the Blackball Coal Co., and then she passed into the hands of the Union Steamship Co., which still owns her, and this wonderful old vessel is still in commission, "and likely to last another century," as Mr. Nelson puts it.

Mr. Nelson tells me that during all the time the Nelsons had her "the bilge pump was never used." She must have been a remarkably tight example of the British shipwrights' handicraft. Mr. Nelson also recalls the incident that when the storeship was on her way to Port Chalmers she created a great scare at Lyttelton. The "Russian scare" was on at the time, and when the Lyttelton people saw this strange craft steaming somewhat clumsily down the coast they came to the conclusion that some sort of Russian filibuster was making a descent upon the colony!

Her lines must have been rather uncommon. Built in 1850 at Southampton for Money, Wigram and Co. for the Hudson's Bay trade, she was specially constructed for encountering the ice-strewn Arctic seas. She was a vessel of 536 tons gross, or 487 net, built of oak timbers and planking, over which there was a sheathing of greenheart, with zinc sheathing outside all, and all her fastenings were of metal. Mr. Nelson tells me that the "Prince's" bows for some 15ft were solid oak, with a swell of a foot or more beyond the general line of the hull. It was perhaps not surprising that such a powerfully built craft should have been selected as one of the Franklin relief expedition fleet of 1856.

Harking back to the arrival of this remarkable ship in New Zealand, I find from Napier files that Napier was her first port of call. She arrived there on October 26, 1889, 124 days out from London, in command of Captain Cumming, formerly a White Star Line officer. She is described as a barque-rigged, old-fashioned looking vessel, SO perhaps it is not surprising that she frightened the good people of Lyttelton the first time they saw her. The unconscionably long passage the "Prince" made from London is accounted for by the fact that her power was so low that she could only steam four or five knots in calm weather, and, of course, when it was a question of sailing her propellers would only hold her back.

In an account of some of the old hulks in Wellington, published in the Wellington "Post" in 1915, I find it stated that the Prince of Wales was christened by the Royal personage after whom she was named, and that on that occasion he dined on board. Edward VII., who was then Prince of Wales, was quite as popular as our present Prince, his grandson, and his name was given to all sorts of craft and places. The "Post" account goes on to say that after having been used in the Arctic for some time the ship was put on to the colonial trade, carrying immigrants, and that she witnessed the famous fight between the Kearsage and Alabama. Personally I have been unable to verify the statement that this Prince of Wales was ever in New Zealand before she was brought out by Nelson Bros. The records show that two other ships bearing the same name visited New Zealand, one in 1842 and one in 1863. The vessel of 1842 was obviously not the Prince of Wales that was built in 1850, and the ship of 1863 was a vessel of 924 tons, whereas the tonnage of the Prince of Wales, now a hulk, was 536 tons gross or 487 net.

The first of these two Princes of Wales arrived at Nelson on December 22, 1842, in command of Captain Alexander, and landed 203 immigrants, the voyage occupying 110 days— a very good passage for a vessel of 582 tons. During this year no less than nineteen ships, nearly all bringing immigrants, arrived at Nelson. The second Prince of Wales arrived at Lyttelton on June 24, 1863, under Captain McWilliam, having made the passage in 118 days from the docks.