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Airey Force | Official Number
69270 |
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Airey Force | Official Number
69270 |
The Airey Force was an iron ship built by Williamson & Son at Harrington, launched on the 22nd March 1873. She was registered at Liverpool and her first commander was Capt.John Sprott of Harrington. She sailed twice to Sydney, and her crew consisted on 26 men on these voyages. The Airey Force left Newcastle, NSW, on the 21st December 1874 with a coal cargo, bound for San Francisco. She was under the command of Capt.William Coltier, 24 years old. On the 17th January, in fine weather, she struck a coral reef at Mangareva (in the Gambier Islands, French Polynesia). The vessel filled and was abandoned. The master and 21 crew survived this wreck, and were picked up from their boats by an island schooner and taken to Tahiti. Some of these survivors were subsequently lost when the vessel taking them San Francisco, the schooner Margaret Crockard, was itself capsized in a gale.
Ware's Whitehaven Advertiser and Cumberland Pacquet,
25th March 1873, page 2;
" HARRINGTON LAUNCH - On Saturday was launched from the shipbuilding
yard of Messrs.R.Williamson & Son, a fine iron sailing ship of 1,154
tons O.M., and 1,062 register. A larger company than usual attended to
witness the interesting event, including a number of owners of the vessel
and their friends. Mrs.John Sprott, wife of the captain, christened the
ship just before she glided from the ways to her future element., and named
her the Airey Force, after a waterfall on the banks of Ullswater.
The Airey Force is the fifth vessel built by the above firm for
Captain Sprott, of Liverpool, and she will be no insignificant addition
to that gentleman's already fine fleet of ships. Her materials and workmanship
are of the highest order. She is fitted with all the most recent improvements;
has been built under special survey, and will be classed A100 (or the highest
grade) in Lloyd's Register. The vessel, after she had been successfully
launched, was towed around into Harrington Harbour, where she will be masted,
rigged, and equipped ready for sea. She is expected to sail from that port
in about three weeks; and is to be commanded by Captain John Sprott, of
Harrington, brother to the managing owner."
The Times, Thursday, 27th May 1875, page 8;
" WRECK IN THE SOUTH PACIFIC.-The San Francisco Chronicle states
that the British bark Marama, which arrived at that port on the
30th April from Tahiti, brought news accounting for the non-arrival of
the schooner Margaret Crockard, which left Papete for San Francisco
as long ago as the 22nd of February with a complement of eight men, a light
cargo of oranges and logs, and, as passengers, the captain and crew (21
in number) of the British ship Airey Force, which was wrecked about
three months ago on Mangariva Island, in the South Sea, the crew succeeding
after many hardships in reaching Tahiti. On the second day out the Crockard
encountered a gale, and at night a heavy squall threw her on her beam ends,
and after a short struggle she turned bottom upward. The calamity came
so suddenly that those who were below had not time to escape. The crew
of the schooner, being on deck, had time to make their way to one of the
boats. Captain Godfrey escaped through a skylight. Of the four passengers
in the cabin, Captain Coltier, of the Airey Force, alone succeeded
in making his way out. Of his men, who were all below, but seven were ever
seen afterwards. Fourteen men, including the two captains, succeeded in
getting clear of the vessel. They managed to pick up a few oranges and
a kit of mackerel. With no other provisions but these, they set out for
the Island of Matahiva, 130 miles distant, this being the nearest land.
It proved to be uninhabited. To their dismay they were unable to find any
fresh water, and the only food it yielded was a few cocoanuts. Foreseeing
that they must perish if they remained there, the captain resolved upon
a desperate attempt to reach Tahiti. With six men he started on the following
day in an open boat. On the second day after leaving the island they were
picked up by the Tahitian schooner Island Belle, which immediately
started for the island and rescued the remainder of the party in an exhausted
condition. The captain of the Island Belle fed and cared for them
and transported them to the Island of Awaa, where he transferred them to
the schooner Mary, by which they were conveyed to Papete, where
they arrived twenty-six days after the loss of their vessel."
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