From the deep: revelations of the sea

The ship was wrecked on a clear starlit night, shortly after dinner when the captains of the City and the S.S. Penola mistook each other’s signals and the Penola’s bow embedded itself in the side of the City. While the Penola managed to stay afloat, the City of Launceston sank quickly to the bottom of the bay. The passengers and crew of the City were rescued by the Penola’s lifeboats and taken back to Melbourne, with only a few crewmen left behind to shine a warning light and prevent another disaster. 

From 1863, things changed for the Light of the Age. The ship was re-fitted to carry twice as many passengers and sold to the White Star Line. Many of the passengers during these later years were government subsidised immigrants travelling in steerage. Conditions were reported to be filthy, overcrowded, uncomfortable and lacking in any privacy.

On the vessel's final voyage, Captain Porter was reportedly drunk even before the Light of the Age left Liverpool. Cabin passenger, Miss Elizabeth McCandlish, suggested he was "unpleasantly associated" with the only other first class passenger, Miss Hampshire. On its final night, near the dangerous entrance to Port Phillip Heads, the Captain and members of the crew were again reported as dead drunk. The Captain was seen lying on deck while the steward served grog from a pannikin. The ship had outdated charts and no proper lifeboats.The crew sailing the ship misunderstood navigational instruments and Port Philip pilot instructions and ran the ship onto Point Lonsdale Beach. 

On New Year’s Day, the passengers were suddenly awakened at 5 am by the ship striking sand near Corner Inlet in Gippsland. It soon became apparent that the Clonmel had to be abandoned. The passengers were ferried close to shore in whale boats and each of the ladies on board had to be carried through the heavy surf by Mr Simson, a fellow passenger. Once on land, the ladies were accommodated in tents made from sails and awnings from the ship. They ate fowl mixed with saltwater from tin plates and suffered from exposure, dysentery and terrible sand flies. This was not the honeymoon Betsy Cashmore had expected -  although she ensured her wedding cake was with her when she abandoned ship. As East Gippsland was still uncharted by the colonists, the survivors of the wreck were camped there at least a week before they were rescued and taken to Melbourne.      

No lives were lost but the new immigrants lost almost everything they owned. The passengers could only save small things that they could carry onto the boats, and the clothes they were wearing. Most of the women were wearing only their night dresses. The shipwrecked passengers crept onto shore at Point Lonsdale, and while some were fed, others were scattered along the beach in the dark, “wringing their hands in despair" and trying to find family members among the crowd. All were eventually accommodated in a Melbourne immigrants home, but as the government offered only meagre support, most were left destitute. 

All the crew and passengers were lost with the exception of two 19 year olds. Tom Pearce was a crew member who managed to swim to shore. When he heard a voice from the water, he swam out and found first class passenger, Eva Carmichael clinging to a spar. He helped her to shore, gave her some brandy washed up from the wreck and then left her in a cave while he scaled the cliffs to seek help. After the wreck the coast was littered with cargo, including silverware, tiles, gas light fittings and a beautiful and fragile Minton ceramic peacock, still packed in its crate. It had been intended for Melbourne's Great Exhibition of 1880.

The forward part of the ship was battered by heavy seas and was violently wrecked against the rocks. The crew and steerage passengers were trapped on the forecastle at the front of the ship as the Cheviot broke in two. They attempted to lock themselves in the deck house, but the violence of the sea meant that gave them no protection. They had no lifebelts and none survived, meeting “… their fate dauntlessly, preserving their fortitude to the last” (The Argus, Friday 21 October 1887).

The first class passengers were winched to safety in a boatswain’s chair, dragged through the waves until they reached shore where they were cared for by Drs Browning and Griffiths at Point Nepean Quarantine Station.