He was a Merchant Seaman. Sailing international
waters for months at a time.
Spending only short amounts of time at home with his
wife and family.
That's probably why Mums sister was eight years
older and her brother was 15 years older than she was.
He brought back souvenirs from around the world,
like the miniature Ebony elephants with ivory trunks that I think Mum’s sister still has.
Once he brought back a parrot, another time it was a
tiny black marmoset monkey with white tufts of hair sticking out from its ears.
No quarantine regulations then.
The monkey suffered terribly from the chilly English
climate, so somebody knitted a small cap and jacket for it and when the nights
were particularly cold it would sleep inside the coal range oven for warmth.
He was a stoker in the engine room of the steam ship
Port Kembla when it sailed from England on April 29 1917 bound for the Pacific
via Suez.
Some three months and many ports later it was tied
up at Breakwater Pier, in Williamstown Victoria.
There was a military guard on the pier and a small
contingent of soldiers guarded the ship around the clock.
The cargo of wool, jam, tallow, frozen rabbits,
general cargo and a little lead was loaded under the watchful eye of Mr.
Fletcher the chief officer. It was loaded by volunteer labour.
When the Port
Kembla left there on September 12 1917 the crew thought they were headed home
probably via Durban. The Captain knew otherwise though as he had orders to sail
to Wellington and then it was to continue on to England.
They sailed south for five uneventful days before
Captain Jack ordered a course that would see them pass 4 miles off Farewell
Spit. That was at 11-55pm on September 17th.The sea was calm and there was
almost no wind.
Minutes later there was terrific explosion. Fire and
dust and sulphurous fumes filled the air, and smashed the radio mast so there
was no way to call for help.
Captain Jack immediately ordered the ship hard to
port to head it towards land.
He ordered the lifeboats swung out and the crew into
them. Minutes later he jumped overboard and swam out to one of the lifeboats.
The Port Kembla filled rapidly with water and sank in just under half an hour,
miraculously with no loss of life.
If the ship had sailed a course directly for home it
would have been out in the open ocean far away from land and any help when the
explosion happened. And I wouldn't be here.
National Archives in New Zealand holds the results
of the ‘Internal Enquiry’ and newspaper clippings. Sabotage was suspected.
The family had no reason to not believe that story. That was until I happened to catch the words
Port Kembla on a TV current affairs programme.
I watched stunned as divers approached the wreck and
retrieved her bell and some crockery. The name on her bell confirmed that she
was indeed the Port Kembla. I’ve since held the Bell and some of the plates.
The dive expedition found her position via German
admiralty charts. Charts of mines laid by the Wolf that was laying mines around
the NZ coast during WWI.
http://www.petemesley.com/local%20trips%20port%20kembla.htm
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