Early Shipping in New Zealand waters

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HMS Satellite
HMS Satellite visited the Bay of Islands in April 1823 under the command of Captain Currie, and again in 1829 under Captain J Laws. On this occasion she had come from Foveaux Strait and was destined for Tonga, Tahiti, and England.

Scotia
In 1843 Scotia, owned by John Jones, brought Edward Shortland the Protector of Aborigines to Bluff. He proclaimed Jones' station to be the best managed and most successful station on the southern coast. Another well known man also travelled on Scotia when Reverend James Watkin sailed from Waikouaiti to Stewart Island in February 1844.

Seringaptum
The English whaler Seringaptum, Captain Joy, called at New Zealand’s Bay of Islands in early 1821. At this time one of the women of the Christian mission station was suffering terribly due to the birth of her child. Francis Hall, also of the mission, frantically made his way around the Bay searching for a ship’s surgeon who could help the gravely ill woman. Eventually Hall reached Paroa Bay where Seringaptum was anchored and Mr McCurdy from the ship rushed to assist. The follwoing May Seringaptum arrived at Sydney with 240 tuns of sperm whale oil. It had been 22 months since she had sailed from England. When Captain Joy set sail again on May 23 his ship was headed for Van Deimans land where he intended to fill the hold with black oil before making the long voyage back to England.

Sisters
Captain Robert Duke anchored Sisters at the Bay of Islands for nine days in September 1823. The English three-master was back in the Bay for an extended stay the following autumn. Sisters made another visit in January 1825 and then returned to England. Robert Duke was still at the helm when Sisters arrived at the Bay of Islands on Boxing Day 1826. Duke’s first mate was a man already well known in New Zealand waters, Philip Tapsell. By the time they reached the Bay of Islands, they had been back in the south sea fisheries long enough to take on 1300 barrels of oil. It was during this visit to the Bay that the crew of Sisters used her guns to retake the ship Wellington from a group of convicts who had seized it while being transported to Norfolk Island. Captain Duke’s ship accompanied Wellington back to Sydney, delivering the convicts to a fate worse than they might have suffered at Norfolk Island. Sisters and Captain Duke continued to work the south sea fisheries for several years, calling at the Bay of Islands in February 1829, and arriving in Sydney in April 1833 with 190 tons of sperm oil.

Snapper
In November 1822 when Captain William Edwardson sailed his trading ship Snapper into Chalky Bay he was approached by a party of sealers from the General Gates. The frightened men sought refuge, and claimed they were being pursued by James Caddell who had once been a sealer himself but now lived as a Pakeha Maori among the southern tribe. When Snapper entered Bluff Harbour on December 1827, she was said to be the first European vessel to do so. Captain Edwardson then headed his ship on to Ruapuke Island, where today we find Port Snapper. In 1823 James Caddell made his first journey back to Sydney when he visited on Snapper with samples of flax prepared by Maori women from Foveaux Strait. Snapper’s next call at New Zealand was while on a trading voyage to Tahiti, when Captain Thomas Ebrill sailed her into the Bay of Islands in August 1824. In April 1829 Captain Henry was in at the helm of Snapper when she stopped at the Bay of Islands on her way to Tahiti.

Sophia
Captain James Kelly’s visit to Otago on his ship Sophia in December 1817 ended in the violent deaths of several crew and many local Maori. On December 12 the crew of Sophia were set upon and killed at Murdering Beach. When the tribe attempted to take Sophia the surviving crew fought back with their sealing knives and 16 of the local inhabitants were killed while many others drowned. Years later when Captain Kelly had taken up residence in Foveaux Strait, Joseph Weller wrote to him warning that the Otago Maori intended to take Kelly’s ship Lovat while it was anchored in Otago Harbour in 1833, most likely in revenge for what had happened in 1817.

Speculator
The trading ship Speculator was employed in procuring flax from the Kapiti region in 1831. When Captain Parker sailed her into Sydney on March 5, they had onboard 13 tons of the much sought after plant.

Speke
Speke, Captain John Hingston, was one of six ships to take part in the revenge fuelled attack on Te Pahi’s island in the Bay of Islands towards the end of March 1810. Speke had been in the fisheries before joining Atlanta, Inspector, Diana, Perseverance, and New Zealander in the mistaken and deadly attack to avenge the burning of the Boyd. Two weeks after the attack, in which 60 innocent people died, Speke set sail for England in company with Atlanta and Inspector.

Spring
The trading ship Spring, Captain Brooks, called at the Bay of Islands in early 1814 before departing again for Sydney.

Spring Grove
Reported as having visited the Bay of Islands in the early part of April 1810, Spring Grove was a whaler under the command of Captain W Mattinson.

Star
Captain Wilkinson’s ship Star, was the first European ship recorded as visiting Whangaroa Harbour. Three years later the whaling ship arrived at the Bay of Islands from the sealing grounds and Mercury Bay. After about two weeks in the Bay, Star sailed for Sydney still under the captaincy of Wilkinson. Another ship called Star arrived in New Zealand on 6 November 1856. This Star is remembered for delivering 30 settlers to New River estuary en route to Invercargill.

Success
In 1839 Johnny Jones purchased Success, and enlisted Edward Catlin as her master. The schooner was to become the first locally owned whaler working out of Bluff under Captain Sterling. In 1842 she delivered the first two white women to settle in Southland, Elizabeth Stevens and Mrs Paulin, both relations of Captain Howell of Jacob’s River. Among the new arrivals was also the first white child to reside in the south, much to the fascination of the local Maori. Sadly Success ran out just a few years later, when she was totally wrecked at Bluff after her crew had spent the night in James Spencer’s pub.

HMS Success
23 September 1829, the Royal Navy ship HMS Success, Captain Jervois, arrived at the Bay from Sydney, cruising.

Sushannah
The barque Sushannah was sent to Otago to collect the remainder of the season’s cargo from the Weller Brothers station. However on her return to Sydney on 6 September 1835 she also had the preserved body of Joseph Weller. Sushannah's captain reported that measles were taking a toll on the Maori people.

Sydney Cove
The sealer Sydney Cove delivered one of early New Zealand’s most legendary figures to its shores in 1810. James Caddell was 16 years old when he and his fellow crewmates were attacked by Maori while sealing on Stewart Island. Five sealers were killed and eaten. Caddell survived, married a chief’s daughter, and spent many years living with the southern tribe as a Pakeha Maori.

Sydney Packet
In 1830 Sydney Packet was in New Zealand waters trading for flax under the command of Captain Williamson. In 1833 she was purchased by George Bunn to deliver cargo to Sydney from Bunn’s Preservation Station. Her new captain was Joss, and together they made three voyages across the Tasman in the second half of the year, delivering quantities of seal skins, flax, black oil, and on one occasion shipwreck items recovered from the wreck of Mosman at Auckland Islands. The items has been originally recovered by Captain Anglin of Caroline, another ship of Bunn’s that was now employed in the sealing grounds.

In 1834 Sydney Packet joined Caroline at the Auckland Islands and Joss sailed her back to Sydney in March with another haul of seal skins, oil, and flax. Joss made one more return voyage in August before captaincy was handed over to Williams of Preservation Station. On arrival in Sydney in November 1824, Williams reported that the local Maori were ‘extremely tranquil’. In 1835 Johnny Jones, a waterman of Sydney Cove, bought Sydney Packet for 800 pounds, appointed Captain Bruce, fitted her out for bay whaling and she sailed for Preservation. Bay whaling was the new industry in New Zealand waters having taken over from deep sea whaling and sealing. When Captain Bruce returned in July he had on board Johnny Jones’ first cargo of oil, and Jones promptly set sail on Sydney Packet that same month to oversee his new whaling station at Preservation Inlet. When he returned to Sydney in October it was with the news that Measles had taken a terrible toll on the southern Maori.

There was more bad news when Sydney Packet next arrived in Sydney in February 1836. Captain Bruce reported that the ship Active had been seized by Maori in Port Nicholson, and that native New Zealanders were on the move south. He warned that shipmasters would need to be vigilant during their voyages. Over the next few months Captain Bruce reported encountering several American whaling ships, including Martha, Gratitude, Columbus, and Ionic, as well as the Sydney whaler Denmark Hill, while making his rounds of Johnny Jones’ whaling stations.

By October Sydney Packet’s crew had become badly affected by influenza and to make matters worse the steward’s life was threatened by local Maori for introducing the deadly disease to them. The illness took a horrendous toll on the Maori people and great numbers were said to be lying about barely alive. The spread of the disease halted their preparations for war against Te Rauparaha’s men who were believed to be about to invade from the North, so it was a double threat to their very existence. Sydney Packet made two more voyages across the Tasman, then in 1837 while she was anchored at Jones’ Moeraki station she was totally wrecked in a gale.