South Coast NSW History Stories

The T.S.S. ‘John Penn’ sank after running onto rocks at the foot of Burrewarra Head (north of Broulee) in calm seas in the early hours of 8th November 1879. The captain later blamed the grounding on a faulty compass...

The 'Margaret' was caught in a squall, lost its sails and rudder and was washed onto rocks near Geringong where it became a total wreck...

The wind dropped when the 'Henrietta' was attempting to enter Crookhaven Heads at 11pm at night on February 4th 1880, and the sea forced the vessel broadside on to the rocks...

A mechanical failure resulted in the paddlesteamer 'My Own' being pushed by the wind onto rocks near Bass Point where it broke up. Two lives were lost...

The 73-metre, 895-ton iron steamer ‘Lady Darling’ hit a reef south of Montague Island on 10th November 1880. A large hole in the vessel’s side, described as ‘the size of a garbage can lid and about 2.5 metres under the waterline’, was the result. The steamer sank almost immediately...but the wreck was then not rediscovered until August 1996...

The barque Glimpse sank in a gale on October 21st 1881, presumably somewhere between Gabo Island and Cape Three Points (near Avoca)...

The ‘Balclutha’ was a small barque-rigged coastal steamer that was lost in heavy seas, probably somewhere off Gabo Island on 21st October 1881. It is believed her cargo of 300 tons of bluestone pavers, being shipped from Melbourne to the Homebush cattleyards in Sydney, shifted in the storm. None of her crew survived...

At around 1.30am on February 26th 1882, the 52-ton ketch ‘Esther Maria’ with 5 crew and passengers on board collided with the Illawarra Steam Navigation Company’s steamer ‘Kameruka’ about six miles north of Beecroft Head. The ‘Esther Maria’ quickly sank and one man – the vessel’s mate, Charles Greenwood, was drowned.

On June 20th 1882 the 32-ton ketch ‘Lillian’, with 3 people and a cargo of timber on board, sprung a leak. The skipper beached it on Grasshopper Island (to the east of Depot Beach) ‘to save life and property’. The vessel became a total wreck.

On December 9th 1882 (the same day the ‘Plutus’ was wrecked), the 35-ton ketch ‘Alfred Edward’ with four people on board and ‘in ballast’ ‘was lost through missing stays (i.e. it failed in an attempt to go about from one tack to another)’ as it attempted to sail out from Ulladulla.

'Plutus' was about 10 miles from her intended course when she ran aground near Currarong in December 1882. The rough sea broke the vessel's back...

On 15th January 1883, the 61-ton ketch Arthur with two tons of cargo on board tried to enter the Wagonga Inlet. Whilst crossing the bar the wind died...

The 'Nile' was one of a number of sailing ships that transported blue metal from Kiama to Wollongong and Sydney. She had left with a load of 400 tons of blue metal, turned around when she encountered unfavourable northerly winds, and struck a reef whilst re-entering Kiama harbour. 50 or 60 locals rushed to attempt to refloat her...

At 2pm on July 3rd 1883, the 'Bell' had finished loading 7,000 super feet of sawn timber from Tomakin and was about to depart for Mackay in Queensland. But the weather changed...

The 'Agnes' supposedly foundered of Jervis Bay in 1883...

The 31-ton, 58-foot schooner Cushat Doo left Batemans Bay for Sydney laden with timber on 6th May 1884. She simply disappeared...

In September 1884 the schooner Onward struck the bar at Wagonga whilst leaving, bound for Sydney...

The 52-ton ketch Belinda became unmanageable because the wind dropped as she was crossing the Wagonga bar on 22nd April 1884, and she was wrecked...

Evidently a 2-ton, 19-foot steamer that had been built in 1883, the Helena, was lost in a storm near Nowra in 1885...

The wreck of the Ly-ee-Moon is among the least explainable in Australian maritime history.

At 9.30pm, on what was a clear, calm night, she simply ran into (or was steered into) the rocks at a comparatively high speed of 11.5 knots at the very base of the Green Cape Lighthouse. 71 of those on board lost their lives..

On December 6th 1886 the 'Corangamite' was travelling up the NSW South Coast with 100 passengers and 40 crew on board when, in calm seas, she encountered thick fog.

Her voyage came to an abrupt end around 8am when she ran aground on a headland in Wreck Bay. She had been travelling at full speed...

In January 1888 the 'Alice Jane' sprung a serious leak in a gale, shortly after leaving Tomakin and bound for Sydney, so was beached. Her back was then broken, leading to her becoming a total wreck...

A 26-ton ketch, built in 1853, washed ashore at Geering Bay, Gerringong on 18th March 1888. The crew was saved...

The schooner Sarah Beattie went ashore on the beach at the north head of the Wodonga River at 8 a.m. on November 16th 1888. At the time the seas were very heavy...

Hit by a 'terrific and sudden squall', the 'Growler' lost its sails and steering geer. Somehow, the crew sailed her into Gerringong Harbour where they secured the vessel to a buoy. They then set about repairing the steering gear and the sails.

They had almost completed the task when they sat down to have dinner at 1pm on Sunday 18th March 1888. However, the seas worsened and 'only five minutes elapsed till she was on the rocks'. The crew and the one passenger on board lost everything.

‘The unfortunate voyagers betook themselves to the Ocean View Hotel, Gerringong (where they) were compelled to borrow some necessary articles of wearing apparel’...

The crew abandoned the 'Mina', which was transporting timber from the Clarence River to Melbourne, when she developed a bad leaking in a gale off Cape Howe. They were picked up by a passing steamer and taken to Newcastle...

The 'Scotia' was wrecked on Blow Hole Point, Kiama, on December 26th 1899 following a complete drop in wind and her then being swept onto nearby rocks by strong prevailing currents. She was one of a fleet of vessels that was transporting blue metal from Kiama to Sydney and she was returning empty to Kiama at the time of the incident. Her crew of four reached Kiama safely...

The 'Maggie Scott', travelling from Tomakin to Sydney with a load of timber, was hit by strong westerly winds, sprung a leak and foundered. Her crew were rescued by a passing ship...

On 19th September 1889 the 'Ino', a 40-ton ketch that was travelling from Wollongong to Moruya with a load of coal, ran into rocks at the entrance to Kiama Harbour. The vessel rapidly broke up. Several days later the wreckage drifted into the entrance to the harbour, completely blocking it...

On April 10th 1890 the 'Julius Vogel' broke away from her moorings in an exposed anchorage at Tomakin and drifted ashore in a very heavy gale that was blowing at the time...

It seems the Prince Alfred foundered in a gale, somewhere near Jervis Bay in early June 1891. Four crew members lost their lives...

There’s nothing quite like a maritime mystery to excite the press and provide them with a seemingly-endless supply of stories…as the loss of the steamship ‘Taramung’ illustrates...

In July 1891 the 'William and Alexander' went ashore at Tomakin during an easterly gale. A description suggests she was jammed against a rock and the sea was flowing in and out of the vessel. However, it seems she was refloated, only to be wrecked off Terrigal a year later...

The 25-ton ketch ‘White Cloud’ was wrecked on the north point of Broulee Island on February 14th 1893...

The 112-foot, 163-ton wooden schooner ‘Samoa’ was built in Stockholm in 1866 and may have been used in the slave trade. On 5th July 1893 she was in Kiola Bay, partly loaded with a cargo of timber, when a very heavy sea set in and parted her from her moorings. She became a wreck the next morning...

The 25-metre, 56-ton schooner ‘Result’ was wrecked in stormy weather when she missed stays (failed to tack) at Abraham’s Bosom (just north-east of Currarong) on 30th September 1893...

The 65-ton schooner Mary Warner foundered off Kiola in a storm on 20th April 1894...

The steamer Trident was washed onto the Moruya breakwater during heavy weather whilst attempting to enter the river on 6th September 1894...

The headline in the 'Sydney Mail and New South Wales Advertiser’ of 1st September 1894 reads: 'A Yacht Sunk by a Whale'...

The 'Ruby' was a fishing-smack that sprung a leak and sank off Beecroft Head on December 5th 1895...