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

[section]

When on her maiden voyage, the ship Fifeshire, which brought out the first settlers to Nelson, was wrecked. She was trying to get out of the port after landing her passengers. Owing to the ignorance of the pilot, coupled with the failure of the wind, the vessel was carried on to the rocks by the tide, and fell broadside on to the Arrow reef, named after the brig Arrow, one of the expedition ships of the New Zealand Land Company, and the first vessel to enter the port, two months before the Fifeshire. In sailing up the channel the brig touched the reef which was afterwards given her name.

It was February 1, 1842, that the Fifeshire arrived in Nelson, and the next vessel was the ship Lloyds, which arrived on the 10th of the same month with the wives and children of the immigrants. The Lloyds was an old craft, with wretched accommodation, and she was overcrowded, as many of the early ships were. In rough weather the unfortunate immigrants had to spend hours below, cooped up in their close, dark quarters, lit by smelling oil lamps, and there was much suffering and misery. No less than 65 children died on the passage. There had also been a good deal of sickness on the Fifeshire, 17 dying of fever.