Northfleet (ship)
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The Northfleet was a three-masted Blackwall frigate that was put into service by British ship owner Duncan Dunbar in 1853 and carried passengers and cargo from Great Britain to Australia , India and China until 1873 . On January 22, 1873, the Northfleet sank off the Dungeness headland on the coast of the English county of Kent after the collision with the Spanish steamship Murillo . Of the 379 people on board, 293 died in panic before rescuers arrived at the scene of the accident.
The ship
Consisting of wood -built sailing ship Northfleet ran in 1853 in the shipyard of Pitcher & Company Ltd. in the English city of Northfleet and was named after this city. She was 54.86 m long, 9.84 m wide and had a draft of 6.09 m. The ship was equipped with three masts . The ship was commissioned by the prominent London shipowner, wine merchant and millionaire Duncan Dunbar (1803-1862) and was also registered in London. She was a Blackwall sailing ship that flourished between the 1830s and 1870s.
The Northfleet was used like the other Dunbar ships in passenger and freight traffic from Great Britain to Australia, but also sailed to India and China. After Dunbar's death, Northfleet was bought by the London- based John Patton, Jr. & Company . In 1872 the ship was chartered to carry workers and their families, as well as 340 tons of rails for the railroad and 240 tons of other freight for railroad construction to Tasmania , where a railroad was to be built.
Downfall
On Monday, January 13, 1873, put Northfleet in Gravesend for the crossing to Hobart , capital of Tasmania, off. On board were 34 crew members, including a pilot , three first class passengers and employees of the railway company with families, including 248 men, 42 women and 52 children (a total of 379 people). The command was 33-year-old Captain Edward Knowles, whose wife made the trip.
Due to bad weather, the Northfleet was forced to interrupt the voyage and anchor on Wednesday, January 22, 1873 five kilometers from the headland of Dungeness on the Kent coast . Then she should cross the English Channel and continue the journey to Tasmania. It was a clear, calm evening, the ship was brightly lit and visible from afar and many passengers were already asleep. At around 10.30 p.m., the Northfleet , which was still at anchor, was rammed by the 300-ton Spanish steamship Murillo , which was still at anchor, and disappeared. The Northfleet was hit amidships and torn to the waterline.
The heavily loaded sailor sank within half an hour. There was panic among passengers and crew. Captain Knowles fought his way through the crowd, trying to hold the men back with a revolver to save women and children. Before other ships nearby noticed anything and could come to their aid, 293 passengers and crew drowned. Of the women, only the captain's wife and an emigrant survived. Of the 52 children, only two were saved. Captain Knowles went down with his ship. Two lifeboats got off the ship; one had no oars on board and the other was damaged.
The tug City of London , the loggers Mary and Princess and a pilot boat picked up the survivors. The clipper Corona was anchored within sight of the North Fleet , but did not notice the tragedy because the lookout was asleep. The rescue was also delayed as the captain did not order the launch of emergency rockets until 15 minutes after the collision and the cannon that was used to fire the rockets was blocked. The Murillo was not picked up off Dover until September 22, 1873, eight months after the incident . A court ordered the sale of the ship and reprimanded Captain Berrute and the officers.
For a long time after the sinking, bodies were washed up on the coast. Fishermen and seamen received a reward for every death they recovered. The dead were buried in the coastal towns of New Romney , Capel-le-Ferne , St. Margaret's-at-Cliff and Worth . Most could not be identified and ended up in a mass grave with a simple commemorative plaque.
literature
- Basil Lubbock: The Blackwall Frigates . Brown, Son & Ferguson, Glasgow 1924
- Charles Hocking: Dictionary of Disasters at Sea during the Age of Steam: Including Sailing Ships and Ships of War 1824–1962 . Lloyd's Register of Shipping, London 1969