WELCOME TO THE AUTUMN EDITION of Signals
It has been an extraordinary start to the year. The museum has received the sorts of crowds that we haven’t seen for many years. Brickwrecks: Sunken ships in LEGO ® bricks has proved very popular, but it is clear from talking to many visitors that they are enjoying the whole of the museum, and that the museum experience continues to be the sum of many parts.
We were so pleased to have Brickwrecks included as part of the Sydney Festival 2023 – it is wonderful to receive such recognition for the work we do. Also part of the festival was the wonderful Shipwreck Odyssey, an interactive performance by Box of Birds/Stalker Theatre. It told the story of the ship Jenny Lind, combined with a strong environmental theme.
The third element in our Sydney Festival offering was the New Beginnings Festival, presented in collaboration with our partner Settlement Services International. This attracted more than 5,000 people to the museum in January for an afternoon and evening of world music, food and culture.
Our Fleet team has been very busy, too. In January, HMAS Vampire travelled across the harbour to Garden Island for dry docking – an essential part of the conservation management of this important vessel. Vampire has now returned refreshed and ready to serve for many years to come. I would like to acknowledge the generosity of donors who have contributed to the cost of this essential work. SY Ena has also been away for routine maintenance.
Duyfken has travelled to Hobart for the Australian Wooden Boat Festival, which we were very pleased to again support after a hiatus during the pandemic. Thousands of enthusiasts visited the Hobart waterfront over four days in February. Our team enjoyed showcasing the vessel and also had a wonderful voyage there and back.
We have launched our new online migration hub, which will become the museum’s digital home for migration storytelling. This captures the stories of some of the people whose names appear on the National Monument to Migration. To read them, use the ‘Migration Stories’ tile on the home page at www.sea.museum. We continue to bring our history to life through storytelling.
As always, there are many reasons to visit the museum. We will soon open the latest Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition from the Natural History Museum in London. The images always delight and surprise.
I am always happy to hear from the museum family about what matters to you, so please, if you have any ideas, drop me a line at thedirector@sea.museum. Different voices are both welcome and encouraged, and we’ll make every effort to respond directly.
Daryl Karp AM Director and CEO Shipwreck Odyssey, an interactive performance by Box of Birds/Stalker Theatre, was one of the museum’s offerings for the Sydney Festival. Image Cassandra HannaganThe Australian National Maritime Museum acknowledges the Gadigal people of the Eora nation as the traditional custodians of the bamal (earth) and badu (waters) on which we work.
We also acknowledge all traditional custodians of the land and waters throughout Australia and pay our respects to them and their cultures, and to elders past and present.
The words bamal and badu are spoken in the Sydney region’s Eora language.
Supplied courtesy of the Metropolitan Local Aboriginal Land Council.
Cultural warning
People of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander descent should be aware that Signals may contain names, images, video, voices, objects and works of people who are deceased. Signals may also contain links to sites that may use content of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people now deceased.
The museum advises there may be historical language and images that are considered inappropriate today and confronting to Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples.
The museum is proud to fly the Australian flag alongside the flags of our Aboriginal, Torres Strait Islander and Australian South Sea Islander communities.
2 A constellation of sunken ships
An extraordinary database pinpoints WWII wrecks
10 $10,000 maritime history prizes
Last chance to nominate – entries close 30 March
12 Fishy tails from the national collection
A treasure trove of fish specimens
20 Bat on the move
HMAS Vampire leaves home for maintenance
24 How to understand the ocean in 10 objects
Ingenious gadgets and gizmos
32 Foundation
SY Ena on the slips and an SS Orontes model in our lab
36 Ship of death
A tragic tale of disease and quarantine
40 Catching up on lost time
Further fieldwork on South Australia’s oldest European shipwreck
48 Beneath the Surface
Free online talks and tours by our curators and conservators
50 Members news and events
Your calendar of summer events for members and their guests
54 Exhibitions
Our temporary and travelling exhibitions this season
58 Learning the ropes with MMAPSS
A new training course launches at the museum
62 MMAPSS grants revealed
Financial and practical support for maritime culture
66 Genteel journeys
Three voyages of solo female migrants in the Victoria era
72 A new look at old photos
Images from the Valerie Taylor Collection aid historical ecology
78 National Monument to Migration
Launching a new platform for migrant stories
80 Settlement Services International
Creating a culture of inclusion
82 Readings
Death Ships by Doug Limbrick
Mapping lost vessels of World War II
More than 20,000 ships sank during World War II. One man is on a mission to map them all – and is uncovering untold stories along the way. By the editorial team of Esri’s StoryMaps .
The seas were the most extensive – and often the most dangerous –battlegrounds of the Second World War
A map showing the warships (red) and non-combat ships (blue) that sank between 1939 and 1945. Each symbol is scaled according to the size of the
All images courtesy Esri unless otherwise stated
ship.
The Pacific Ocean was just one theatre of a war that left virtually no corner of the global ocean untouched
The wreckage of the Japanese transport ship Kinugawa Maru, which sank off the coast of Guadalcanal in 1942, is still visible today. Photo Gilly TanaboseJUST OFF THE ISLAND OF GUADALCANAL in the South Pacific, a few rusty, jagged shapes protrude from the waters of Iron Bottom Sound. This debris, visible by satellite, is what remains of the Japanese transport ship
Kinugawa Maru, which sank on 15 November 1942 after coming under artillery fire from US forces defending the island.
Kinugawa Maru was among 50 Japanese and American ships that were destroyed during the Battle of Guadalcanal, the first prolonged engagement of the Pacific theatre of World War II. The array of ships that sank in Iron Bottom Sound testifies to the scale of the battle.
The waters off Guadalcanal were just one battleground in a years-long campaign that spanned much of the Pacific Ocean and left behind constellations of sunken ships. And the Pacific Ocean was just one theatre of a war that left almost no corner of the global ocean untouched. The seas were the most extensive – and often the most dangerous – battlegrounds of the Second World War. And Kinugawa Maru ’s story is fairly unextraordinary from a military standpoint: thousands of transport ships just like it were sunk over the course of the war. But for the people who served on that ship – and every other doomed vessel – its destruction was a cataclysmic, life-altering event.
Peering into the deep
Stories like these are easily swallowed up by the vastness of the ocean and forgotten. But thanks to enterprising mapmakers like Paul Heersink, they are being preserved.
Paul, a mild-mannered program manager at Esri Canada by day, has taken on the extracurricular task of mapping every sunken ship of the Second World War. Driven by personal interest, he has spent the past eight years combing through various primary and secondary sources, and vetting locations, dates and causes, to create the most comprehensive dataset of its kind. He says:
[Some sources] had latitude and longitude, and some had a Google map with a pin for a single ship ... so that made me think, wouldn’t it be good to put everything together on one map and see what kind of patterns there are?
With more than 14,500 mapped records, the dataset unlocks new possibilities for analysis and visualisation. And to encourage exploration and discovery, Paul has created a data-driven dashboard, which automatically updates as he adds new ships to the dataset. This dashboard illuminates patterns and stories across all scales of the naval theatre –from the fate of an individual ship like Kinugawa Maru, to the arc of a particular battle, to the progress of the entire war.
An animated map of Axis and Allied sunken ships shows how the naval theatre unfolded over the six years of the war. The Allied navies and commercial fleets suffered devastating losses in the first years of the war. But, by 1943, their luck had turned. There is a clear inflection point around March 1943: from this point onward, the Allied forces sank more ships every month than they lost.
The geography of naval combat evolved throughout the war. The western hemisphere saw a gradual expansion, and then contraction, in the distribution of naval battles. In the Pacific, meanwhile, the Allies’ island-hopping campaign gradually inched closer and closer to Japan.
By scaling the points to reflect the size of each sunken Axis and Allied ship, we can also locate the large-scale battles that shifted the balance of war. The attack on Pearl Harbor, which drew the USA into the war, is brightly illuminated at the centre of the Pacific. Brighter still is the Battle of Leyte Gulf, the last major naval engagement in the Pacific, and the largest sea battle in documented history.
Meanwhile, the North Atlantic bears witness to the ill-fated showdown between the imposing warships HMS Hood and the German vessel Bismarck, which led to their mutual destruction – and is considered one of the last head-to-head battles between large surface vessels.
By scaling the points to reflect the size of each sunken Axis and Allied ship, we can also locate the large-scale battles that shifted the tide of war
A map of sunken ships by size and affiliation, with Allied ships displayed in purple and Axis ships in green.
Unarmed vessels such as cargo ships, tankers, tugs and floating hospitals played an outsized role in the conflict –and bore the brunt of the losses
01 The American tanker SS Gulfamerica, highlighted in yellow, was one of many noncombat ships that sank within sight of the US shoreline.
02 Most of the ships that sank in the Western Pacific were noncombat vessels (blue), but the largest were warships (red).
Popular culture has immortalised the warships that engaged in these pitched battles. But in reality, most ships that sank during the war weren’t designed for combat. Image 2, opposite, distinguishes between sunken armed warships (shown in red) and sunken non-combat ships (shown in blue).
Unarmed vessels such as cargo ships, tankers, tugs and floating hospitals played a huge role in the conflict – and bore the brunt of the losses. Thousands of Allied cargo ships were destroyed while crossing the North Atlantic. Many of these ships sank within sight of land, such as the Gulfamerica oil tanker, which was torpedoed just five miles off the Florida coast. The ship was so close to shore, in fact, that its hull was illuminated by the lights from Jacksonville Beach.
Other hotspots for civilian ship losses include the waters off Venezuela, then one of the world’s largest oil exporters; the Cape of Good Hope, a key route into the Indian Ocean; and the western Pacific, where Japan lost scores of cargo vessels in the closing stages of the war.
For data historians like Paul Heersink, this dataset helps illuminate the magnitude of the war, its nuances and its impact on a human level. But it has practical purposes, too. Sunken ships are often laden with fuel and munitions, and can pose a threat to marine ecosystems and passing vessels. A comprehensive record of World War II shipwrecks could aid in ongoing containment and clean-up efforts around the world.
A recent project in Serbia, for example, led to the removal of some 23 World War II-era wrecks from the Danube River – but hundreds more litter the heavily trafficked waterway. In the US, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has located dozens of hazardous World War II shipwrecks off the Atlantic coast; this dataset could be used to document even more wrecks.
There are also economic incentives for locating these ships, as they contain valuable materials. Notably, the steel found in many World War II shipwrecks is uniquely useful, because it pre-dates (and was insulated under water from) the first atomic bomb tests. As a result, this steel has exceptionally low levels of radiation compared to newer steel, and is useful for particle-physics experiments.
These practical applications aren’t just hypothetical: the dataset is already being used to support environmental assessments for offshore wind energy projects, and additional research groups have expressed interest in applying the data to their own studies.
As the Second World War recedes into the past, and the number of surviving veterans dwindles, it is becoming increasingly difficult for people like Paul to compile a thorough account of events.
While there is an established community of shipwreck aficionados that Paul can turn to for guidance, he is sometimes forced to rely on official maps and logs, which can be incomplete or fraught with inaccuracy. He notes:
Any navy is usually pretty good about tracking where its ships are, but in times of crisis, the first thing on someone’s mind might not be ‘we need to [record] an accurate location’ when they’re being chased or bombarded.
The process of verifying ship locations can be especially frustrating, Paul admits. But he also relishes the challenges of digital forensics, like comparing archival photographs with present-day aerial imagery to pinpoint the exact location of a wreck.
While Paul’s patience and perseverance are laudable, he is quick to point out that anyone can pursue such data projects, regardless of technical or subject matter expertise.
The dataset remains a work in progress, and Paul acknowledges that it’s far from complete. He’s slowly working through a backlog of nearly 5,000 partially documented wrecks, trying to piece together these ships’ stories before they disappear for good. But he has no intention of stopping now, and continues to update the dataset each week.
After eight years of mapping, Paul is surprisingly modest about his accumulated knowledge; ‘I’m not a historian,’ he insists. But that’s a big reason why he has shared his work publicly: so that anyone can explore it and reach their own conclusions.
So what are you waiting for? Check out Paul’s dashboard at bit.ly/sunkenshipsdashboard – you never know what stories you might uncover.
This story was first published on Esri’s Storymaps site. It was originally created by Ross Donihue, Will Hackney and Cooper Thomas of Esri’s StoryMaps team, with support from Paul Heersink of Esri Canada. It was built with ArcGIS StoryMaps, a map-based storytelling tool. Read the original interactive story at bit.ly/sunkenships, or learn more about ArcGIS StoryMaps at bit.ly/storymapshome .
Writers, publishers and readers of maritime history are invited to nominate works for maritime history awards totalling $10,000, sponsored jointly by the Australian Association for Maritime History and the Australian National Maritime Museum. Nominations for the next round close on 30 March.
The 2023 Frank Broeze Memorial Maritime History Book Prize of $8,000
To be awarded for a non-fiction book treating any aspect of maritime history relating to or affecting Australia, written or co-authored by an Australian citizen or permanent resident, and published between 1 January 2021 and 31 December 2022. The book should be published in Australia, although titles written by Australian authors but published overseas may be considered at the discretion of the judges. The prize is open to Australian authors or co-authors of a booklength monograph or compilation of their own works.
EVERY TWO YEARS, the Australian National Maritime Museum and the Australian Association for Maritime History sponsor two prizes: the Frank Broeze Memorial Maritime History Book Prize and the Australian Community Maritime History Prize. Both prizes reflect the wish of the sponsoring organisations to promote a broad view of maritime history that demonstrates how the sea and maritime influences have been more central in shaping Australia, its people and its culture than has commonly been believed.
The major prize is named in honour of the late Professor Frank Broeze (1945–2001) of the University of Western Australia, who has been called the pre-eminent maritime historian of his generation. This will be the 12th joint prize for a maritime history book awarded by the two organisations, and the sixth community maritime history prize.
Fictional works, edited collections of essays by multiple contributors, second editions and translations of another writer’s work are not eligible.
The 2023 Australian Community Maritime History Prize of $2,000
To be awarded to a regional or local museum or historical society for a publication (book, booklet, educational resource kit, DVD, film or other print or digital media, including websites, databases and oral histories) relating to an aspect of maritime history of that region or community, and published between 1 January 2021 and 31 December 2022. The winner will also receive a year’s subscription to the Australian Association for Maritime History and a year’s subscription to the Australian National Maritime Museum’s quarterly magazine Signals
Publications by state-run organisations, physical exhibitions and periodicals such as journals are not eligible.
To nominate for the Frank Broeze Memorial Maritime History Book Prize, complete the form at sea.museum/ history-prizes and provide THREE photocopies or PDFs of the following:
• dust jacket or cover
• blurb
• title page
• imprint page
• contents page
• the page showing the ISBN
• one or two representative chapters of the publication (up to 10 per cent of the contents), including examples of illustrative materials.
A copy of the book may also be included, but may not substitute for these materials. Books will not be returned. Copies of any published reviews may also be included.
To nominate for the Australian Community Maritime History Prize, complete the form at sea.museum/ history-prizes and send to the address below, along with:
• For print publications or DVDs – include a physical copy.
• For digital publications such as websites, databases, online exhibitions or apps – include 250–300 words explaining the vision and objectives of the digital media, plus data indicating its success. For websites and databases, also provide the URL or download details.
• For an app or other digital media – submit it on a USB or via a file transfer system.
Copies of any published reviews may also be included.
Multiple nominations may be made, but each must be for one category only. Nominations for both prizes close on 30 March 2023. They should be posted to:
Janine Flew Publications officerAustralian National Maritime Museum Wharf 7, 58 Pirrama Road
Pyrmont NSW 2009
Or email them to publications@sea.museum
Following an initial assessment of nominations, shortlisted authors or publishers will be invited to submit three copies of their publication. These will be read by a committee of three prominent judges from the maritime history community.
The judges’ decision will be final and no correspondence will be entered into.
The winners will be announced in the spring 2023 issue of Signals and via other channels in September 2023. For more information, see sea.museum/history-prizes
The winners of the 2021 round of prizes.‘Egg cases are important for understanding the basic biology of sharks and rays and can tell us information such as how they reproduce and how often’
Nicknamed ‘mermaids’ purses’, the egg cases of sharks, rays and skates come in diverse shapes, colours and textures. These belong to (top) Western Looseskin Skate (Insentiraja subtilispinosa); (bottom) Draughtboard Shark (Cephaloscyllium laticeps); (opposite) Crested Hornshark (Heterodontus galeatus).
All images courtesy and © CSIRO unless otherwise noted
In Hobart, 160,000 specimens in jars, drums and tanks of ethanol form the CSIRO’s Australian National Fish Collection, providing researchers with vital information into the distribution, populations and breeding habits of fish. Andrea Wild takes us inside this remarkable collection.
THE METRE has an official definition. It is the distance light travels in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second. But until the late 19th century, the metre was defined as one ten-millionth the distance from the North Pole to the Equator, through Paris. That city held the reference standard: a metre-long bar of platinum.
The Silverspot Weedfish (Heteroclinus argyrospilos) has an official definition too. Details of its features and habitat, its similarities to and differences from related species, are laid out in a scientific paper published in 2021. The holotype (the fish equivalent of that metrelong bar of platinum in Paris) is a specimen collected at 100 metres depth off the south-west coast of Western Australia in 2005. It is held in Hobart, at the CSIRO’s Australian National Fish Collection (ANFC), in a jar of ethanol, among a collection of 160,000 fish specimens.
Defining a metre enables us to do many things, from dressmaking to launching satellites. But why is it useful to define a fish?
The first fundamental step in managing and monitoring the biodiversity of our oceans is to identify the species present. To do this, we need to have a description of each species and a holotype, as a reference for identifying organisms that are observed.
Traditional biodiversity surveys use microscopes and morphology to accomplish this task, but new technologies that use environmental DNA (eDNA) are an emerging approach for detecting species at particular locations. Plants and animals shed eDNA into the environment, like we shed skin and hair. To collect it, we take a sample of water, filter the tiny pieces of DNA, sequence their unique codes and then match those codes to species. A bucket of seawater can potentially detect species present on a reef, but only if you can match the eDNA to the species it belongs to.
To match collected eDNA to species, you need a reference library of DNA sequences for every species. This is where the CSIRO’s Australian National Fish Collection steps in. Decades of collecting, naming and curating specimens make the fish collection a resource for extracting DNA from expertly identified specimens and using it to create reference sequences. Collaborations with other specimen collections enhance the DNA sequence library and strengthen the power of this technique.
Plants and animals shed environmental DNA (eDNA) into the environment, like we shed skin and hair
01
The Silverspot Weedfish (Heteroclinus argyrospilos) was unknown to science until 2021. Its holotype – the specimen upon which the official description of the species was based – is in the Australian National Fish Collection.
02
X-ray of Silverspot Weedfish (Heteroclinus argyrospilos). Fish taxonomists use X-rays to count the number of vertebrae and fin elements and examine other details.
The CSIRO is partnering with the philanthropic Minderoo Foundation to fund DNA reference sequences for marine vertebrate animals in the new DNA library. It will include fish, whales and dolphins, seals, turtles, sea snakes and sea birds. When the library is available to the public, anyone who samples eDNA from Australia’s oceans will potentially be able to match it to a known species and thus use eDNA to reveal the fish species present at any location.
Scientific naming of fish species has enabled production of field guides, such as those for divers and recreational fishers. Field guides often show fish species at their best, in perfect condition and brilliant colour. What if you need to identify fish species in open-air markets, where hundreds of species are offered for sale, piled in baskets or tipped onto tables and tarpaulins?
CSIRO research technician at ANFC, Helen O’Neill, has worked with the Ministry of Marine Affairs and Fisheries to make fish identification easier for Indonesian fishery workers. She says:
It can be very challenging for fisheries staff to identify fish at landing places, where the fishing boats unload their catch, and in markets. The fish might not be in fresh condition, heads and fins might have been removed for easier handling, or the fish might be juveniles that look very different from the adults.
01
Jars of reference specimens at the CSIRO’s Australian National Fish Collection in Hobart.
02
CSIRO researcher John Pogonoski examines samples collected on RV Investigator
Research voyages have contributed to the CSIRO’s Australian National Fish Collection today
Helen and the team created a website at www.fishIDER.org , called fishIDER. (It rhymes with ‘idea’ and is short for Fish Identificaton Database and Educational Resource.) The website is available in both English and Bahasa and shows photos and identification advice for commercially important fish species as they appear in markets. Helen notes:
Identifying fish correctly is the fundamental step in managing fisheries for sustainability. These fish support livelihoods in the region, so it’s essential they are managed properly. Fisheries managers need to know which species are being caught and how many. These numbers are then used to calculate sustainable catch levels and set catch limits.
FishIDER can also be used throughout the fish production chain to ensure accurate labelling of fish products, from markets to restaurants.
The website includes more than 350 species from diverse groups including tuna, manta rays – which are illegal to catch in Indonesia but are still sometimes landed – and the commercially valuable dolphinfish, caught by trolling and on long lines.
FishIDER is a collaborative project between the CSIRO Australian National Fish Collection and the Indonesian Government’s Ministry of Marine Affairs and Fisheries, and was originally funded by the Australian Centre for International Agricultural Research.
At ANFC’s laboratories in Hobart, smaller fish are stored downstairs in jars of ethanol, in rows of compactus shelving. Larger specimens are stored upstairs. Here you’ll find elasmobranchs – sharks, rays and skates – also submerged in tubs of ethanol.
Helen is working on egg cases from oviparous (egg-laying) elasmobranchs, matching the egg cases to the species that laid them. She explains:
Egg cases are important for understanding the basic biology of sharks and rays and can tell us information such as how they reproduce and how often. Finding egg cases can also reveal where particular species occur and shows us where their nurseries are, which tells us which areas of the ocean are used for breeding. But for many species of oviparous elasmobranchs, we don’t even know what their egg cases look like.
The egg cases in the fish collection range in size from around 4 to 25 centimetres, in creams and browns from butterscotch to deep amber and black. Some are smooth and simple, others ridged or with curling tendrils that anchor them to kelp or coral. Helen notes:
Port Jackson sharks have corkscrew-shaped egg cases that they wedge into rocks. Other species lay their eggs on the sea floor, anchored there by a sticky filamentous membrane. Each species’ egg case has a unique morphology [shape] that is really useful to us in taxonomy.
So useful are the egg cases to taxonomy that last year Helen co-authored a scientific paper based on egg cases of the Kerguelen sandpaper skate, Bathyraja irrasa, a vulnerable species that is sometimes caught as by-catch in the Southern Ocean. Embryos within egg cases revealed the size range of hatchlings and some important morphological features, and showed that the species breeds all year round.
The first fundamental step in managing and monitoring the biodiversity of our oceans is to identify the species present
01
Skipjack Tuna (Katsuwonus pelamis) being sorted at Lampulo fish market, Indonesia.
Image Craig Proctor
02 Helen O’Neill, CSIRO research technician at the Australian National Fish Collection, with specimens of Foursaddle grouper (Epinephelus spilotoceps) from Kedonganan, Indonesia.
One fish, two fish?
What’s the plural of fish?
Taxonomists say two fish if they are the same species, but two fishes if they are different species.
To help with her research, Helen borrows egg cases from other collections and museums around the world:
We’ve collected our specimens from fish markets or from surveys out at sea. We also receive them from aquarium facilities and look for them in the ovaries of the preserved shark and skate specimens in our collection.
Helen notes that the egg cases people find on beaches very rarely contain living embryos:
Incubation time varies from a few months up to three years, depending on species. Egg cases that become dislodged and wash up on beaches are unlikely to contain a living embryo. They may have already hatched, or died prematurely from being washed ashore, or been predated on by creatures like snails, which bore a hole in the egg case and suck out the contents.
Helen is partnering with the Great Eggcase Hunt, an initiative of UK-based Shark Trust, to help citizen scientists identify and record egg cases they find on beaches. The sightings will be available for research into the taxonomy and distribution of elasmobranchs.
‘Keep an eye out for the Great Eggcase Hunt app launching later this year,’ she says.
Is there such a thing as a fish?
In the evolutionary tree of life, a lungfish is more closely related to a human than to a tuna. If a lungfish is a fish and a tuna is a fish, why aren’t you a fish?
The answer is that ‘fish’ is not a taxonomic unit. (Taxonomy is the science of naming and describing species.) ‘Fish’ is simply a convenient name for a group of animals with similar looks and similar lifestyles. A fish is a vertebrate that lives in water, and that isn’t a reptile, such as a turtle, or a mammal, such as a whale.
During his career at the fish collection, CSIRO researcher John Pogonoski has helped to name 30 species new to science, subsequently growing the collection and maintaining reference specimens on behalf of the nation. Some of the species John has named include representatives of sharks, rays, chimaeras, eels, cusk eels, Eucla cods, perchlets, threadtail anthias, sea moths, silverbellies, sand-diving lizardfishes and weedfishes. Their sizes range from as small as five centimetres to over one metre. Some are found at depths of more than 1,000 metres.
Each year, dozens of new species of Australian fish are given scientific names for the first time. Some are never-before-seen creatures from the deep ocean, while others are newly recognised as being distinct from very similar-looking species. Each new species has a common name and two-part scientific name. Take the Silverspot Weedfish, for example. Its scientific name is Heteroclinus argyrospilos. It belongs to the genus Heteroclinus, a name shared by about 20 other weedfish species, and its species is designated argyrospilos Fish names are often latinised versions of place names, people’s names or features of the fish, such as a colour.
John has most recently worked as part of a science team on board the CSIRO’s Research Vessel Investigator, off the coast of Western Australia. Research voyages have contributed to the CSIRO’s Australian National Fish Collection today, including from prawn trawlers in the Gulf of Carpentaria in the 1960s and some of the early Australian National Antarctic Research Expeditions in the Southern Ocean.
Andrea Wild is a children’s author and science communicator. She works with National Research Collections Australia at the CSIRO.
HMAS Vampire takes to the harbour once more
The museum’s prized on-water exhibit, Daring class destroyer HMAS Vampire, crossed Sydney Harbour on 17 January, bound for the Captain Cook Graving Dock at Garden Island naval base. There, it underwent four weeks of essential maintenance – including hull cleaning, replating and a full repaint and antifoul. By Kate O’Connell, Communications and Media Manager.
PASSING SPECTACULARLY beneath the Sydney Harbour Bridge and drawing the eyes of enthusiasts, news media and the public, the last of Australia’s heavy gunships plied the waters from Cockle Bay to Woolloomooloo, charging a beautiful summer’s day with a rare and awe-inspiring sight.
Behind the scenes, the museum’s Fleet and Conservation teams, ably supported by dedicated volunteers, had worked tirelessly together to prepare Vampire – affectionately nicknamed ‘The Bat’ by those who once served on it – for the journey. By the time the day of its harbour passage arrived, the ship had been stripped of ancillary objects and interpretation items.
Planning and executing Vampire ’s harbour crossing was a complex operation, involving months of preparation by the museum’s proficient Fleet team, led by manager Scott Grant, in consultation with the Port Authority of New South Wales and Thales Australia – managers of dockside operations and services at the Garden Island naval base.
Without power or engines, the ship must be delicately moved from its snug spot alongside the museum by three powerful tugboats
Planning and executing Vampire’s harbour crossing was a complex operation, involving months of preparation
Image Pamela Proestos 02
Image Terry Jones
Fleet Manager Scott Grant had described the project: Vampire is a national treasure and certainly the pride of our fleet. However, its hull plates are thinning – and rust never sleeps. There is only so much in-water preservation the Fleet shipkeepers can perform. For this docking, we are spending considerable effort identifying and treating those areas of concern below the waterline.
During Vampire’s 30 years of naval service, the areas under the boilers and engines corroded at a faster rate than the rest of the ship, due to higher temperatures and humidity. These areas were also difficult for the ship’s company to access and maintain; it is those areas where the hull plates have become very thin. During this docking, we are conducting ultrasonic testing to determine the hull plate thickness. The shipyard will then apply ‘doubler plates’ to these wasted areas, to eliminate the risk of taking water. A hull thickness map will also be developed for future dockings. While in dock, the ship will also be completely repainted from stem to sternpost.
Vampire was built on nearby Cockatoo Island, where its keel was laid in 1952. The Daring class destroyers were the largest built in Australia and were the first all-welded ships to be constructed here. There remains a strong sense of pride and achievement associated with these locally made ships.
The museum’s CEO and Director, Daryl Karp, has affirmed the importance of Vampire ’s place at the museum, in part due to the hundreds of intersecting stories associated with the vessel, which help to bring maritime heritage to life:
Without power or engines, the ship had to be delicately moved from its snug spot alongside the museum’s Action Stations and heritage wharves by three powerful tugboats. It was first manoeuvred stern-first into Cockle Bay, then past Barangaroo to the more open waters of Pyrmont Bay, where it was turned, bow forward, to proudly cross the harbour.
As with all maritime activity, there is always the possibility of perfect plans unravelling, due to variables such as weather or equipment failure; indeed, this move in January had been postponed from 2022. On the day of the move, the wharf teemed with Fleet staff and shipkeepers making last-minute adjustments, with a crowd of officials, film-makers, volunteers, museum staff and passers-by, all drawn in by the frisson of unusual activity and a perfect summer’s day.
The arrival of three tugboats, as well as New South Wales Port Authority pilots, amplified the excitement and kicked the plan into gear. As the ship made its way past the museum toward Barangaroo, and with the ever-changing cityscape behind, its magnitude and bold lines struck a timeless chord – built in Sydney Harbour, Vampire was crossing it once more.
Many of our museum volunteers share history with Vampire , including several ex-servicemen who served aboard its sister ship Voyager, as well as shipbuilders, boilermakers, electricians and welders with a historic connection to the shipyard on Cockatoo Island.
Sharing their stories with our visitors provides a precious and rare experience of the vessel – one that enriches our knowledge of national, naval and maritime heritage in an incredibly valuable way.
There is also something fantastic about the sheer scale of Vampire . Visitors love that they can walk aboard this enormous, complex vessel and have access to the world of naval operational spaces. Engine rooms, messes, sleeping quarters, hospital, bridge, gun turrets and radio rooms are uncommon places for many of us – it is not every day that people can experience what it’s really like to be on board these ships.
Vampire was decommissioned in 1986, and its regular maintenance schedule and journey to the dry dock occur roughly every five years. The ship’s month of hull repair and conservation work cost around $3 million, money well spent to preserve this iconic vessel.
Scientists estimate that more than 90 per cent of the ocean’s inhabitants are still unclassified
A modern CTD (conductivity, temperature and depth) frame being brought to the surface. Its mounted series of Niskin bottles (the successor to the Nansen bottle) is designed to capture discrete water column samples from targeted depths.
Image Susan Wijffels/CSIRO Marine National FacilityTools to analyse, manage and preserve the marine environment
How humans sample the ocean and what tools they use demonstrate how the ocean works, how it is changing, and how we can innovate to manage and preserve its extensive resources. Highlighting just ten objects from the museum, Emily Jateff shows how technological innovations help us to better understand the ocean that surrounds, nurtures and completes our otherwise terrestrial world.
COVERING MORE THAN 70 PER CENT of the planet, the ocean is the key to our ‘Goldilocks’ climate. The ocean regulates climate and weather on land by absorbing radiation from the sun and distributing heat around the world. Ocean currents drive global weather patterns. Warming oceans cause sea level rises, changes in ocean currents, coral bleaching, redistribution of species and changes to biodiversity. Weakened and warmer currents mean more extreme weather. Melting ice also creates sea-level rises and reduces the salinity of the ocean, putting coastal communities at risk and affecting marine ecosystems. Excess carbon dioxide from the atmosphere dissolves in the ocean, creating acidification, which is deadly for sea creatures with calcium carbonate exoskeletons.
Each of the objects discussed below is chosen as a touchpoint for one aspect of a much bigger tale. Moreover, the interconnectedness of these innovations showcases how scientists work together to create a holistic picture of our past, present and future ocean. This is all part of our national maritime story.
Key to understanding the ocean is knowing the properties of water: its colour, temperature, turbidity (clarity and/or included organic and inorganic compounds), taste, odour, salinity, dissolved oxygen and pH (a measure of how acidic it is). Measuring these properties helps to determine the presence of pollution, increases in water temperature or acidification, the general health of the ocean and changes in its ecosystem.
In the late 19th century, Norwegian explorer and scientist Fridtjof Nansen (1861–1930) developed one of the first ocean-water sampling devices, known as a Nansen bottle. The bottle is lowered into the ocean and, when it reaches the desired depth, a weight is dropped down the line, tripping shut the double open-ended container to collect a sample. The bottle is also fitted with a reversing thermometer that measures water temperature and pressure for each sample.
The global Continuous Plankton Recorder Survey is the longest-running marine biological survey in the world 01
In the mid-20th century, various water sampling devices were designed and tested as potential replacements for the Nansen bottle. One of these is the Niskin bottle. Another, the ‘Jitts bottle’ – named after its creator, Harry Jitts – is an example of making do with whatever you had on hand (such as the two toilet plungers and a length of plastic sewer pipe, image 03) to create workable oceanographic equipment.
Salinometers (image 02) use electrical conductivity to measure the salinity (dissolved salt content) of seawater samples recovered by water sampling bottles. In 1958, Australian Neil Brown invented a salinometer that uses an inductive cell for temperature compensation to allow for high accuracy without temperature control.
Salinometers were eventually replaced by in-situ CTD (conductivity, temperature and depth) systems. The CTD is used to sample and record water conductivity, temperature and pressure. Other sensors may be added to the cluster that measures chemical or biological parameters. It is a crucial tool for understanding changes in water circulation and ocean conditions.
Various devices used to collect water samples to test salinity and oxygen levels at different depths. From top: Nansen bottle from the 1950s; CTD from the 1980s, showing 15 circular circuit boards; Niskin bottle from the 1960s. All ANMM Collection: 00055778 (Nansen); 00055791 (CTD); 00055779 (Niskin). All gifts from CSIRO
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In the late 1960s and early 70s, Neil Brown and Bruce Harmon created a portable lightweight (15-kilogram) salinometer better suited to short coastal research expeditions. ANMM Collection 00055916 Gift from Defence Science and Technology Group
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Another type of water sampling bottle, the Jitts bottle, from the 1970s. ANMM Collection 00055897 Gift from CSIRO
Scientists estimate that more than 90 per cent of the ocean’s inhabitants are still unclassified.1 Classifying species (taxonomy), distribution, general health and biomass (total mass of organisms in a given area) is essential if we want to know how the ocean works as an ecosystem.
Sir Alister Hardy and Sir Cyril Lucas started the global Continuous Plankton Recorder Survey in 1931. It is the longest-running marine biological survey in the world. The Continuous Plankton Recorder (CPR) measures plankton – the ocean’s most numerous residents, and one of the greatest in terms of biomass – as a guide to the health of the world’s ocean. It also showcases the potential for biological research to simultaneously collect data on species and use these data to conduct analyses of the health of their environment.
Data collected via the CPR can be related to environmental data collected during the tows (location, water temperature and salinity), which provides vital data on the presence (or absence) and density of plankton types over a long period – 100-plus years – to better understand the overall health of the ocean.
Species presence is measured to ensure that recovery of specific food species is sustainable. Currently, 254 Australian marine species are at a sustainable level, while others are recovering, depleted or depleting, or undefined.2 However, a combination of stock assessment, ecosystem impacts and efficient fisheries management helps to provide a sustainable future for our fisheries. Technological advances in how these data are recovered help to better understand the presence and absence of the fish we want to eat or need to protect.
The MUFTI-2 (Multi-Frequency Towed Instrument) was developed in the early 2000s. Like a deep-sea fish finder, it uses acoustics to accurately gauge populations of particular fish stocks at depth. Without knowing how many fish exist, it is impossible to estimate how many we should be allowed to catch and eat. Blue grenadier and orange roughy are two deep-water species, usually found at a depth of between 300 and 700 metres. The capabilities of the MUFTI-2 allowed for accurate fish species identification and better fisheries management overall, and helped to set catch limits for species based on real data.
01 This is most likely the first Continuous Plankton Recorder ever sent to Australia: CPR 13 (c 1939–1940). The museum’s CPR was donated, along with a cassette. ANMM Collection 00056040 Gift from CSIRO
02
Cross-section through an ice core. The ice and bubbles contain clues to the climate of the past. Image Australian Antarctic Division
How does the ocean shape our world?
Australia has the third largest marine territory in the world – around 10 million square kilometres, including waters off Antarctica. Australia’s marine environment is 100 per cent mapped at high resolution, compared with only 23 per cent of the global ocean. Governments, scientists, community and industry from around the world have committed to producing a complete high-resolution map of the ocean by 2030. In the last few years, they’ve already mapped more of the ocean than in the century before.
In addition to mapping, sampling the seafloor – using technologies such as the Smith Mac Grab or rock dredge – illustrates plate tectonics: where plates were in the past, why and how they moved and what is happening now. Demonstrating how much we have to yet to learn about the ocean floor, in 2020 scientists located Zealandia –a lost eighth continent and once part of Gondwana – under water between Australia and New Zealand. Such discoveries continue: the museum has on display in its exhibition Deep Time a sample of granodiorite collected from the Southern Ocean, which is evidence for old continental crust at William’s Ridge, a remote submarine plateau that was formerly above the surface and attached to Antarctica and India as part of Gondwana.
Formed through volcanic activity, vast fields of manganese nodules populate the ocean’s abyssal plains. Recent interest in commercial harvesting, or deep-sea mining, of these nodules for rare earth metals used in phones, cars and other technology puts the tiny animals that live on and near these nodules at risk – and that’s just one species we’re aware of. Because the deep ocean is so hard to reach, we still know very little about it. It is vital that best efforts are made to understand and protect these environments before they are harvested. Recent discussions to enact a treaty to protect Biodiversity Beyond National Jurisdiction made significant progress but was unsuccessful in reaching consensus to enact the treaty. 3
The ocean is the key to our ‘Goldilocks’ climate
Without knowing how many fish exist, it is impossible to estimate how many we should be allowed to catch and eat
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Fishermen haul a catch of orange roughy aboard a fishing vessel, 2012. © Mark Lewis and the Australian Fisheries Management Authority
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The MUFTI-2 (Multi-Frequency Towed Instrument) transmits fish detection data back to vessels at frequencies of 18, 38 and 120 kiloHertz.
ANMM Collection 00055792 Gift from CSIRO
Ancient water can help unlock the secrets of the earth’s past climate. Studying the contents of the ice and bubbles in an extracted ice core reveals connections between Australian and Antarctic climate, and past sea-ice and ice-sheet extent. Impurities, traces of dust, ocean salts, ash from volcanic eruptions and forest fires, and pollutants from human activity can show major environmental changes. Bubbles of trapped air can show changes in the past atmosphere such as the increase in greenhouse gases caused by human use of fossil fuels as well as natural changes that accompany climate shifts. By measuring water isotopes in water from the ice core, scientists can infer temperatures from when the snow originally fell. By drilling into this old ice and recovering an ice core, we can better understand historical climate variations.
While ice cores and other samples from deep time can tell us about past oceans and climate, we can use remote global networks to create a comprehensive profile of the world ocean in real time and understand how the ocean works today. The MRV SOLO II Array for Real-Time Geostrophic Oceanography (ARGO) float is a batteryoperated, neutrally buoyant float that records data on the surface for 10 days, sinks to record at 1 kilometre and 2 kilometres depth, and returns to the surface to transmit data to shore by satellite. Wave height and swell data, current speed and direction, and ocean temperature data are used to locate fisheries stocks, for resource management and storm forecasting and to help predict the future ocean climate.
Together with other instruments like satellites, drifting buoys, ferry boxes and underwater gliders, ARGO floats contribute to the Global Ocean Observing System (GOOS). GOOS collates information from various sources, including data on changes to the climate (ocean warming, ice melt, ocean acidification),
Australia has the third largest marine territory in the world – around 10 million square kilometres, including waters off Antarctica
operational ocean data that provide improved weather forecasts and early warning systems for oceanrelated hazards that may affect our coasts, and ocean monitoring systems that assist with conservation of biodiversity and sustainable ocean ecosystems. GOOS’ observations of the global ocean allow us to better understand how the ocean is changing now.
In this brief article, you have seen how the objects we acquire for the National Maritime Collection can be used as physical markers to link the public to the ocean and all those who are working to protect it. With just 10 objects, a vast area is covered, data collected, and information gained. This is just the tip of the iceberg – every day, innovators across the globe are working to meet the next big challenge, and as they do, the museum’s collection will continue to grow. We are deeply grateful to all who recognise the importance of securing these objects for the National Maritime Collection as we seek to record the positive impacts of scientific endeavour and connect the public to how we can ensure a sustainable future for the planet.
References
1. Camilo Mora, Derek P Tittensor, Sina Adl, Alastair GB Simpson and Boris Worm. ‘How many species are there on Earth and in the ocean?’, PLoS Biology 2011 Aug: 9(8) e1001127, published online 23 August 2011.
2. fish.gov.au.
3. www.un.og/bbnj. The main points of contention are around pre-existing arrangements for use of ocean resources, and how these resources can be accessed and shared. States parties will meet in early 2023 to again attempt consensus.
Emily Jateff is the museum’s Curator of Ocean Science and Technology.
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Museum supporters visiting the Conservation lab for a special presentation about the Orontes model by museum staff (at right). Image Merryn O’Sullivan
02 The Orontes model in the window of the Orient Line building, Spring Street, Sydney. Samuel J Hood Studio ANMM Collection 00021244
The Australian National Maritime Museum Foundation works to support the acquisition, conservation and interpretation of artefacts of our maritime experience, made possible with the financial support from you, our community. Daina Fletcher, Manager Strategy and External Relations, profiles current projects.
TWO OF THE FOUNDATION’S current programs relate to boats, big and small, that evoke our imaginings of life travelling – to and from Australia, in the case of the builder’s model of the 1929 liner SS Orontes, and in the case of the steam yacht Ena, around our leisured waterways.
The graceful 29-metre SY Ena, built in 1900 of Australian hardwoods, kauri and oak, is an operational heritage vessel at the museum wharves. The magnificent 4.2 metre Orontes presentation model, built for the Orient Steam Navigation Co by Vickers-Armstrongs Ltd in Barrow-inFurness, England, is being prepared for exhibition.
Between 1929 and 1962, SS Orontes, the last of the Orient Line’s five 20,000-ton Orama class ships built in the 1920s, made 77 voyages to ports around Australia, carrying more than 75,000 passengers. The model has been undergoing an extensive conservation program in the museum’s lab, where, in December, museum supporters visited it for a fascinating presentation by conservators Jeff Fox and Emma Hayles. Emma and Jeff explained the complexities of preserving this relatively large object, built of varied materials (of which records
have been lost or were not made), and which had itself enjoyed a storied life on display in the windows of the Orient line buildings in Sydney and later Newcastle. It had been exposed to sunlight, and the main areas of concern were the large cracks and crocodiling of the hull paint, the broken rigging and missing components.
The program involves detailed testing and analysis, removal of fragile deck fittings, fixtures and lifeboats, replacement of delicate rigging, and hundreds of hours of patient cleaning to remove nearly 100 years of built-up grime. This was done using dry and wet methods – a variety of soft brushes, air-puffers and specialised vacuums, and then aqueous solutions and cotton wool swabs.
The more complex treatments included flattening and consolidating lifted paint and cracks on the decking and hull. Future treatments might include 3D printing of parts, and the skills of model-makers may be needed to re-integrate the rigging. The program is underpinned by discussions with curators to achieve an overall result that retains the integrity and significance of the object.
The Ena Sanctum is a group of boat lovers who donate annually to support the preservation of the operational steam yacht. To find out more, email pamela.proestos@sea.museum or phone 02 9298 3777.
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SY Ena slipped in January 2023, with (from left) steam engineer Martyn Low; Warren Levin, Sydney City Marine; Frank Golotta; museum staff member Daina Fletcher; museum Ambassador Jennie Sutherland; museum Chair John Mullen, who donated the vessel to the museum in 2016 under the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts program; Ena Sanctum member David Turner; SY Ena engineer Graeme Curran; senior shipwright Jeff Hodgson; and SY Ena bosun Andrew Trenear. Image Pamela Proestos/ANMM
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SY Ena floated onto its blocks for the lift at Sydney City Marine, Rozelle Bay. Divers had carefully positioned blocks under the keel line to support the vessel evenly to maintain its in-water shape during the lift and the work. Image Sydney City Marine
In January, the museum also welcomed supporters of SY Ena to see a preservation program of a very different scale under way, when the elegant and enduring 122-year-old vessel was taken out of the water for its regular maintenance slipping. This provided a special opportunity to view Ena ’s graceful underbelly and to speak to experts working on the vessel.
To keep the engine working efficiently, cleaning the water tube boiler was a priority during the docking period. The engine was installed in the 1980s during the major restoration of the vessel undertaken by shipwright Nick Masterman and his team for the syndicate of then-owners.
Cleaning the boiler was an intricate yet grimy process. Historically, steam engineers and machinists used a steam lance to blow the soot up the stack, in a practice no longer acceptable. Today they work in very tight spaces to remove the soot by vacuuming and brushing the tubes, after removing the external insulation panels. They also service the valves, a process only possible when the ship is out of the water.
In January, the elegant and enduring 122-year-old SY Ena was taken out of the water for its regular maintenance slipping
No slipping would be complete without regular anti-fouling of the hull below the waterline. The team also dismantled the rudder post, assessing, cleaning, and improving its material condition.
All in all, the three-week program now sees Ena back at its museum home, a vital heritage presence on Sydney Harbour, where work will continue on regular deck maintenance, varnishing brightwork and polishing bronze fittings.
The financial support from our community in the ‘Ena Sanctum’ (see box opposite) and museum Ambassadors Dr David and Jennie Sutherland is more than critical to this work; it greatly helps us to maintain Ena as a working vessel to engage and excite our visitors, viewers and heritage enthusiasts around the globe.
To help support our collection, please go to sea.museum/donate
In 1850, the Emigrant sailed from Plymouth, England. Most of its 276 passengers were taking advantage of a new government scheme to bring migrants directly from the United Kingdom to Moreton Bay. All were seeking new lives, but not all would survive. Jane Smith provides an extract from her book Ship of Death, below, and examines the trip and its aftermath overleaf.
THE MORNING OF 14 APRIL 1850 began calmly, with a breath of west-south-westerly breeze and scattered puffs of white drifting across the horizon.
Eighteen-year-old Elizabeth Wade and her family gathered with the other travellers in the basement of the emigration depot, where doors opened out onto the quay. The granite waters of Plymouth Sound, dotted with sails of vessels large and small, lay before them. Some two miles out from the quay, the Emigrant was waiting.
The time for misgivings was past. The wharf bustled with activity; travellers crowded upon it, busy and buoyant, gazing hopefully out to sea. Rowing boats and dinghies with sails fluttering scuttled back and forth between the dock and the larger vessels out in the sound. Local seamen plied their trade, eager to pick up a few coins by ferrying anxious passengers to their waiting ships. Clasping their canvas bags, the Emigrant ’s passengers filed onto the lighters and sailboats that nudged the quay. When they had settled themselves among the bags and boxes, the sailors grasped the oars or eased the sails, and the vessels groaned away from the wharf. Across the sound, with its deep still waters, its labyrinth of bays and inlets and its skyline spiked with the masts of scores of boats, the crews guided the vessels.
Past the fortressed hump of Drake’s Island they glided, and the steep shoreline of Plymouth receded behind them.
The wind gathered momentum. As the hour of embarkation loomed, the sky marbled over with cloud, and showery winds beset the harbour. Ahead, the waters of Plymouth Sound lapped against the timber hull of the Emigrant. It was a grand sight: a three-masted barque, its sails furled and waiting for release, its flags snapping sharply in the briny air.
The emigrants clambered aboard, perhaps climbing a rope ladder or scrambling up a rudimentary wooden gangway that the crew had lowered for them. At last, they were on the swaying deck amid a forest of ropes, boxes and packages, the deck unsteady beneath their feet, and the timbers creaking. Drizzling rain mingled sharply with sea spray. Sailors scurried to and fro, ferrying their cargo into the hold below.
Overseeing the business was the ship’s captain, William Henry Kemp. The emigrants’ lives would be lived according to his command for the months to come. Their health and wellbeing depended upon his competence and wisdom. Though they could not have known it, the emigrants would soon have cause to be grateful for Captain Kemp’s kindness.
The passengers’ three months of quarantine was a time fraught with tragedy, frustration and fear
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Dunwich Cemetery, Stradbroke Island, QLD. The grave of the ship’s surgeon, 25-year-old Irishman Dr George Mitchell, is in the foreground, and that of his reluctant replacement, Brisbane pioneer Dr David Keith Ballow, lies behind. Both died from typhus while in quarantine.
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The graves of the 26 migrants who died in quarantine are marked by unnamed white crosses. At the end of the rows stands a plaque commemorating the dead.
Images Jane Smith
‘... so disastrous a voyage’
Elizabeth Wade and her fellow assisted passengers were taking advantage of a new government scheme to bring emigrants directly from the United Kingdom to Moreton Bay.1 They were the working poor from England and Ireland who had been selected to populate the northern reaches of the then colony of New South Wales with ‘respectable’ British citizens. They were people who were young, strong and healthy enough to work, reproduce and prosper – people who would help the district shed its reputation as an uncivilised place following the closure of the convict settlement.
They set out from Plymouth for the three-month voyage. ‘I little thought we were about to proceed on so disastrous a voyage,’ the captain’s wife, F Sarah Kemp, would write when the ordeal was over.
The disaster she referred to was a deadly disease that had broken out on board: typhus. By the time Emigrant arrived at Moreton Bay, 20 had died, mostly from the disease. The ship was diverted to the newly declared (but not equipped) quarantine station at Dunwich, Stradbroke Island, off the coast of Queensland.
Thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic, we can perhaps appreciate the fear and uncertainty these new arrivals felt – but the quarantine conditions they endured are somewhat harder to imagine. The government supplied tents and acquired timbers from the ship, which were fashioned into cabins, and the passengers set up a little community with a hospital, laundry, kitchen, butcher shop and store.
What followed was three months of waiting –a time fraught with tragedy, frustration and fear. Poor, despairing Elizabeth Wade would throw herself into the sea and drown. In all, 48 people would perish, including the ship’s surgeon Dr George Mitchell and Dr David Keith Ballow of Brisbane, who had reluctantly volunteered to replace him.
I learned of the incident while on holiday at Stradbroke Island, when in the Dunwich cemetery I stumbled across 26 white unidentified crosses. At one end stood the marked graves of the two doctors, each of which bore reference to their sacrifices. At the other was a plaque listing the names, birthplaces and death dates of those who perished on the voyage or in quarantine. The pathos of that plaque struck me; these had been real people –
The emigrants’ lives would be lived according to the command of the ship’s captain, William Henry Kemp, for the months to come
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Emigrant sailor James Hall made this model of the ship, photographed by his descendant, the late Jim Fenwick.
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James Hall was a sailor on the 1850 voyage of the Emigrant . On these voyages, single men and women were strictly forbidden from fraternising, yet at least ten couples married soon after the ordeal was over, including Hall and passenger Mary Ann Mahoney.
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Mary Ann Mahoney. She and James Hall married and settled in South Brisbane. Hall had absconded from the Emigrant as it lay at anchor in Moreton Bay, possibly to be with Mary Ann. The ship was just about to depart when he deserted.
Images reproduced courtesy Jim Fenwick
brave people with hopes and ambitions – and all that was left of them were a few statistics. I wanted to bring their stories to life: to find out who they really were, what they experienced, and what became of those who survived them – and to preserve and share those stories.
The records revealed a multitude of stories: of ongoing struggle and trauma, but also of resilience, personal achievement and success. There were stories of doctors who gave their lives, of a carpenter who made the coffins, and of a young woman who cared for six young orphans. Theirs were stories of quiet heroism, selflessness and courage in the face of tragedy.
1 Moreton Bay is now in Queensland, but in 1850, it was still part of the colony of New South Wales. In 1859, the land that forms the present-day State of Queensland was excised from the colony of New South Wales and created as the separate colony of Queensland.
Jane Smith is a Queensland-based editor, librarian and author. Ship of Death: The Tragedy of the Emigrant (ISBN 9780648650300) was shortlisted for the Frank Broeze Memorial Maritime History Book Prize 2021. For more information, see her website: janesmithauthor.com.
Ship of Death is held in the museum’s Vaughan Evans Library: call number 387.224 SMI.
COVID-19 lockdowns and border closures proved disruptive to the museum in many ways, including to archaeological field projects. One such project that can now continue is the effort to investigate, document and assess the shipwreck site of South Australian, an English barque lost near present-day Victor Harbor, South Australia, in December 1837. Dr James Hunter provides a progress report.
The imagery from the June 2022 survey was used to generate a digital 3D model of the site
SOUTH AUSTRALIAN is, appropriately, that state’s oldest known European shipwreck (see Signals 130). In the weeks following its loss in 1837, it was extensively salvaged, but in later years the hull remains broke up and eventually disappeared, and the wreck’s exact location was lost to memory. Clues existed, however, in the form of archival records and remote-sensing surveys conducted in the 1990s, allowing the site to be found and identified in April 2018. Fieldwork in early 2019 also revealed that South Australian was uncovering rapidly and in imminent peril of being damaged or destroyed by a combination of natural and anthropogenic forces.
Several tasks remained to be completed at the conclusion of site investigations in June 2019, including comprehensive documentation of the shipwreck’s exposed hull and artefacts, sampling for hull timber identification, and targeted recovery of at-risk diagnostic artefacts. The addition of Silentworld Foundation’s (SWF) maritime archaeological conservator Heather Berry to the team in late 2019 also created an opportunity for South Australian to undergo a conservation assessment to, among other things, determine the rate of decay of the wreck site’s exposed elements and offer suggestions for their stabilisation and continued preservation.
Orthomosaic of South Australian rendered from digital imagery acquired during the June 2022 survey. The bow is to the right. Image Michael Rampe/Rampe Realistic Imaging Pty Ltd and Irini Malliaros/SWF
The presence of a felt layer between two runs of exterior planking correlates exactly with information listed for South Australian in an 1836 survey report
01 Kieran Hosty (foreground) and James Hunter conduct a baseline-offset mapping survey of South Australian ’s midships hull.
02 This ceramic rim fragment found in South Australian ’s stern section originated from a blue willow pattern transfer-printed pearlware plate or bowl.
Images Irini Malliaros/SWF
After a three-year hiatus, a team of museum researchers, colleagues from SWF, and South Australianbased volunteers returned to South Australian in June and November 2022 to continue fieldwork on the site.
Armed with a research permit from South Australia’s Department for Environment and Water (DEW), the museum’s Kieran Hosty and I, along with Heather Berry and SWF’s maritime archaeologist Irini Malliaros, departed Sydney for Victor Harbor in late June 2022. We drove overland, towing SWF’s survey vessel Maggie III. We were joined in South Australia by SWF’s digital outreach specialist Kate Pentecost and two volunteers: ANMM conservator Nick Flood, and Kevin Jones, the former director of the South Australian Maritime Museum.
The first day of fieldwork was blessed with excellent weather and water clarity that enabled us to make a quick and comprehensive assessment of South Australian ’s overall condition. Our worst fears about the site’s condition thankfully proved unfounded, as much of the bow section exposed in June 2019 was reburied. Further, the mound of sand covering the surviving stern/midships area was still largely intact and stable. Recently established seagrass adhered to the exposed ends of frames and other timbers, obscuring much of the structure above the seabed and creating a ‘trap’ to capture sediment in the water column and deposit it atop the hull remains.
The notable exception to this largely preservative environment was the forwardmost section of the hull, which was found to be uncovered nearly to the bottom of the keel on the starboard side, and significantly undercut on the port side. The collapsed stem was also much more exposed than in June 2019, which prompted us to map and update its appearance on South Australian ’s site plan. Another area of significant sand scour was located immediately shoreward of the stern section and included an approximately three-metre diameter area of seabed that had been cleared of sand to the stone substrate. While not ideal from a preservation standpoint, as exposure risks further deterioration due to physical, microbial and larger marine predator activity, the uncovering of these hull elements permitted the team to obtain scantlings (timber measurements) for external planking and other architectural features that were buried in June 2019.
Hull recording focused on South Australian ’s exposed midships and stern sections, which had only been superficially mapped when the June 2019 investigations concluded. The frames in this part of the hull exhibited slightly larger scantlings than the bow, but like the bow frames were very consistent in terms of overall size, form and spacing. All were heavily worm-eaten where exposed but retained enough surface detail that accurate measurements could be collected. Investigation of the midships section also revealed the presence of a felt layer between two runs of exterior planking. This correlates exactly with information listed for South Australian in an 1836 survey report generated by Lloyd’s of London, in which a layer of ‘Patent Felt’ was sandwiched between the vessel’s hull planking and a layer of sacrificial timber sheathing, which was in turn covered with copper sheathing.
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Museum conservator Nick Flood prepares a diagram to plot the locations of ‘pin tests’ as part of South Australian ’s conservation assessment in June 2022. Pin testing allowed the team’s conservators to determine the level of hull timber degradation based on the depth to which a steel pin could be pushed by hand into the wood. The deeper and easier the pin could be depressed, the higher the level of timber degradation. Image Irini Malliaros/SWF
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Heather Berry (foreground) and Kevin Jones conduct a conservation assessment of South Australian ’s midships hull in June 2022.
Image Irini Malliaros/SWF
Fieldwork in early 2019 also revealed that South Australian was uncovering rapidly and in imminent peril of being damaged or destroyed
Several small artefacts were noted throughout South Australian, the majority in the midships/stern section. These included two gunflints, the bases of two case bottles (which frequently contained gin), two olivegreen spirit bottle bases, a blue willow pattern transferprinted pearlware ceramic fragment, and a couple of copper spikes found lying atop the interior surfaces of hull planking. Other small finds included a large lead sheet at the shipwreck’s stern end, and a scattering of large bricks that may have been intended for use with whaling tryworks. Most of these artefacts were also in the stern and not visible during the June 2019 survey.
Photogrammetric 3D recording was carried out in conjunction with site mapping, but periods of inclement weather and poor visibility prevented us from completing this task before fieldwork concluded on 30 June. Consequently, photogrammetric documentation was our primary focus when we returned to South Australian in November. Other objectives included continuation of hull recording and site mapping in the midships and stern sections, collection of additional timber identification samples, and further conservation assessment of the site’s surviving hull structure and artefacts. We also obtained permission from DEW to document and recover a small selection of at-risk artefacts. The team was the same as before, save for Kevin and Kate, who were unable to participate due to other commitments.
South Australian appeared much as it did during the June fieldwork, although more of the interior bow section was observed to have been reburied in sand. Sections of unidentified planking were partially exposed in the stern, to starboard of the hull’s centreline. While it was difficult to discern whether these timbers were hull (external) planking or ceiling (internal) planking, it was clear they had collapsed to the side of the surviving articulated hull. The team also located a section of South Australian ’s keel in the wreck site’s midships where a line of copper bolts protrudes well above the seabed. Additional investigation revealed the keel was notched to accept the vessel’s floor timbers – the lowermost frames or ‘ribs’ that crossed the centreline and formed the skeleton of the hull. Timber samples were also collected from this critical element of ship’s architecture to determine the species from which it was hewn.
Another significant outcome was the identification of two ring-shaped iron concretions lying on the seabed to port of South Australian ’s stern section. One of these objects was observed during the June 2022 survey and further inspection in November confirmed it – and the other example – to be concreted iron deadeye strops for standing rigging. Both strops are in approximately the same area and appear to be the same size. One of them also features a straight section of iron concretion, which formed part of the shroud. Their position in the wreck site’s stern suggests they were associated with South Australian ’s mizzenmast. Significantly, the first practical wire rope was developed in Germany between 1831 and 1834, which makes the presence of iron deadeye strops and shrouds on South Australian an early archaeological example of this technological innovation.
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Heather Berry performs a pin test of one of South Australian ’s midships hull timbers as part of the June 2022 conservation assessment. Image Irini Malliaros/SWF
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Heather Berry cleans marine growth from one half of the whetstone recovered from South Australian in November 2022. Image Kieran Hosty/ANMM
Artefacts recovered in November are currently undergoing conservation, after which they will be returned to South Australia
A small number of exposed artefacts were mapped in situ and recovered. These included a variety of copper ship’s fasteners (such as nails, spikes and sheathing tacks), two copper bolts, a cylindrical olive-green alcohol bottle base and a small, rectangular lead sheet known as a ‘tingle’. Tingles often came in the form of strips or patches, and were used primarily for shipboard maintenance and repair. They were also frequently used in conjunction with fabric (such as sail canvas) or oakum (loose rope fibres or fragments) to plug leaks. The fabric would be placed atop and into a leak, and the tingle installed over it and bent into shape to form a watertight seal. Small tacks were then hammered into the periphery of the tingle to affix it to a timber and hold it in place.
We also recovered a whetstone, which was found in two pieces in the forwardmost part of South Australian ’s bow section when the site was discovered in 2018. The whetstone is clearly broken, but how exactly that occurred is unclear. It may have fragmented during South Australian ’s wrecking event, but could also have been damaged prior to, or after, the vessel’s loss. Whetstones were used to sharpen a variety of edged implements, ranging from knives to harpoons. Because South Australian was being used as a whaling vessel at the time of its loss, the presence of a whetstone is not surprising, as one would have been necessary to keep harpoons, flensing knives and other whaling implements razor sharp and ready for use. However, the whetstone could also have been cargo intended for the new colony in South Australia, but which was broken in transit and instead used as ballast.
Unfortunately, November’s weather and sea state proved more daunting than in June, and poor water clarity prevailed for the duration of fieldwork. Consequently, attempts to complete the 3D photogrammetric survey of South Australian were unsuccessful. All was not lost, however, as the imagery from the June survey was shared with Michael Rampe of Rampe Realistic Imaging Pty Ltd, who used to generate a digital 3D model of the site. This model in turn forms the basis of a virtual reality experience for South Australian that is currently under development at Germany’s University of Applied Sciences, Kaiserslautern. The university’s Professor Holger Deuter, who previously collaborated with the museum to develop a virtual reality experience for the wreck site of the sidewheel paddle steamer Herald (see Signals 128), is spearheading the new initiative with a group of virtual design students. The artefacts recovered in November are currently undergoing conservation, thanks to SWF’s generous financial support and expertise. Once treatment is completed, they will be thoroughly documented and returned to South Australia. Time and weather permitting, we hope to conduct additional archaeological investigation of South Australian and finish the photogrammetric survey of the site during the first half of this year. Much work remains to be done – and given the ongoing and newly evolving threats to the site, time is a luxury that we cannot afford.
Dr James Hunter is the museum’s Curator of Naval Heritage and Archaeology.
Go behind the scenes with museum curators and conservators to find out more about current exhibitions, research projects and collections in our monthly series Beneath the Surface. These online talks and tours touch on key content areas for the museum, including migration, maritime archaeology, Indigenous culture, ocean science, conservation and our historic fleet. Emily Jateff provides a preview.
Online talks, lasting about 40 minutes, will include:
• a survey of national coastal regeneration efforts, including an introduction to an exhibition on oyster reef regeneration currently in production with NSW Department of Primary Industries –Fisheries (Tuesday 11 April);
• a report on the search for the Dutch vessel König Willem II, wrecked in 1857 near Robe, South Australia (Thursday 18 May);
• an in-depth look at Camp X, the jumping-off point for Operation Jaywick in 1943, to mark the 80th anniversary of this mission;
RESEARCHERS FROM ACROSS THE MUSEUM have lined up to share with you some of the newest and most exciting aspects of our work in 2023. This year we are trying something different – a mix of recorded onsite tours and online talks, to better share museum activities with both national and local audiences.
The 2023 program will kick off in style on Tuesday 14 March at 4 pm, with an online presentation by noted Titanic historian and museum curator Inger Sheil. Titled ‘The White Star Line Service to Australia’, it will cover the rich and storied history of the line, including both glamorous passenger liners and (literal) cattle ships; the near mutiny of crew and passengers on the Belgic in 1911; Officer Lightoller’s notorious ‘One Gun Salute’, in which crewmen from the Medic hoisted the Boer Flag and fired at Sydney’s Fort Denison as a practical joke; famous passengers; and the service of these ships as troop transports in time of war.
This talk will feature superb ship and crew images from the Australian National Maritime Museum Collection, including the fabulous Hood Collection, as well as private collections, such as RMS Titanic Fifth Officer Harold Lowe’s private albums.
• an investigation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander sea countries, as a taste of our Sea Country exhibition opening later this year;
• and a presentation by David Payne, the museum’s former Curator of Historic Vessels, on ships’ plans and planning ships.
Onsite tours (about 40 minutes long) will be recorded and shared via the museum’s YouTube page to ensure that national and international audiences don’t miss out. They will include:
• an archaeologist’s tour of the exhibition Brickwrecks: sunken ships in LEGO ® bricks ;
• and the reinterpretation and conservation of the museum’s Cape Bowling Green lighthouse.
The Beneath the Surface program is offered once per month and is free of charge to the public.
Emily Jateff is the museum’s Curator of Ocean Science and Technology. Bookings for Beneath the Surface presentations are available via Eventbrite. Regular reminders of upcoming talks are sent to museum members and posted on social media.
White Star Line purser on board SS Medic , March 1914. Samuel J Hood Studio ANMM Collection 00021408 02
The remote Camp X at Refuge Bay, Cowan Creek, NSW, was the secret training ground for Operation Jaywick operatives in 1943. Pictured today (image Stirling Smith), juxtaposed with how it appeared in 1943 (Australian War Memorial).
AFTER A BUSY AND EXCITING SUMMER SEASON at the museum, we are looking forward to seeing you at this year’s talks and tours.
We’d like to say a big thank you to all of you who filled in our recent Members survey. The information you gave us about what you liked, didn’t like, and wanted more or less of, is helping us to tailor the Members Program to suit your needs, to make you feel more connected to the museum, and to offer you a range of events that appeal to a wide audience.
We have just confirmed our calendar of monthly Speakers Talks for the year (see pages 52–53), and we are working with a number of publishers for some fantastic author talks throughout the year. The first of these is on 26 March, when Christiaan de Beukelaer will speak about his new book, Trade Winds
Information and dates for two new series of tours will be sent to you shortly. Our Meet the Neighbours tours will offer visits to interesting places around the harbour, and with our White Glove Tours, you’ll be able to go behind the scenes at the museum. Some of you helped us to fine-tune our pilot version of these tours last year.
And stay tuned for the dates of our next events on the harbour, as we get back on the water on our own historic vessels.
We are still adding to our Members Lounge to give you a place to relax and enjoy some refreshments on your visit to the museum. I am currently looking for some more members to volunteer in the lounge as hosts, so if you have some free time each week, and would like to join the team, please get in touch.
As always, if you have any questions about the museum or your membership, do not hesitate to call the Members office on 02 9298 3777 or send us an email at members@sea.museum
Matt Lee, Manager – VIP Relations & Members
Visitors can see behind the scenes during a White Glove Tour of the Conservation lab. Image Hannah Thorley/ANMM 02
Cruises aboard Duyfken offer a taste of sailing, 16th-century style. Image Cassandra Hannagan
Author talk
Trade Winds with Christiaan De Beukelaer
2–3.30 pm Sunday 26 March
In 2020, Christiaan De Beukelaer boarded the schooner Avontuur, a 100-year-old sailing vessel that transports cargo across the Atlantic Ocean. He wanted to understand the realities of a little-known alternative to the shipping industry on which our global economy relies and that contributes more carbon emissions than aviation.
But what started as a three-week stint of fieldwork aboard the ship turned into a five-month journey covering 14,000 nautical miles. While the ship crossed the ocean, the COVID-19 pandemic forced borders to shut, preventing the crew from stepping ashore for months on end.
Trade Winds engagingly recounts De Beukelaer’s life-changing personal odyssey and the complex journey the shipping industry is on to cut its carbon emissions. Avontuur ’s mission remains crucial as ever: the shipping industry urgently needs to stop using fossil fuels, starting today. If we can’t swiftly decarbonise shipping, we can’t solve the climate crisis.
Avontuur during its first cargo sailing voyage in the Caribbean, 2017. Image courtesy Paul Bentzen/Timbercoast
Maritime archaeology
2–3.30 pm Tuesday 28 March
Archaeology gives us a fascinating look at the past. The sea can hide many mysteries: Bronze Age traders, Egyptian pharaohs, Spanish treasure galleons or colonial wrecks. And with modern technologies, many of these are being revealed.
Find out how maritime archaeology has evolved and what methods have been used to discover the intriguing stories of our past. It’s much more than just shipwrecks!
Presented by Pam Forbes and Greg Jackson from the museum’s Speakers Group.
Maritime archaeologists from the museum and Silentworld Foundation examine traces of a wreck at Boot Reef, QLD, 2018. Image Julia Sumerling/Silentworld Foundation
The adventures of Kathleen Gillett
2–3.30 pm Thursday 27 April
Nestled among the ‘big ships’ at the Australian National Maritime Museum is a small, rather plain-looking sailing ketch named Kathleen Gillett .
This talk focuses on the three men behind Kathleen: its designer, legendary Norwegian naval architect and shipbuilder Colin Archer; its owner, Jack Earl OAM, a skilled sailor and renowned marine artist; and Bruce Stannard AM, author and former journalist, who was instrumental in rescuing Kathleen from imminent decay and destruction and then bringing it into the museum’s hands.
Presented by Mark Salmon from the Museum’s Speakers Group.
Kathleen Gillett ’s former owner, Jack Earl, aboard the yacht during renovations at Bobbin Head, NSW, 1991. Image Jenni Carter/ ANMM
The Australian Hospital Ship Centaur
2–3.30 pm Wednesday 24 May
We present the story of the sinking and finding of the Centaur, an Australian hospital ship that in 1943 was illegally sunk without warning by a torpedo from a Japanese submarine off the Queensland coast.
The ship had been appropriately lit and marked to indicate that it was a hospital ship, and its sinking was regarded as an atrocity. Of the 332 people board, only 64 survived. They spent 35 hours on rafts before being rescued.
A search led by David Mearns, who had previously led the team that found the wrecks of HMAS Sydney and HSK Kormoran, discovered Centaur ’s wreck in 2009.
Presented by Noel Phelan from the Museum’s Speakers Group.
Hospital ship Centaur in Sydney Harbour, 1943. Australian War Memorial 302800
Thursday 29 June
History of pearls and pearling – Gillian Lewis
Thursday 27 July
Oil and awe: The story of Australian whaling – Justin Holmwood
Thursday 17 August
Science Week: Science on Endeavour – Pam Forbes and Greg Jackson
Tuesday 26 September
Australia II and the America’s Cup – Noel Phelan
Thursday 19 October
The story of 18-foot skiffs on Sydney Harbour – Neville Turbit
Wednesday 22 November
The Sydney to Hobart Yacht Race: A water-level perspective –Lindsay May OAM
Wednesday 6 December
Building the HMB Endeavour replica – Ron Ray OAM
All talks are free for members and one guest. Bookings essential. To book members events, email memberevents @sea.museum and tell us which event you wish to attend, and who is coming. Alternatively, you can phone us on 02 9298 3777.
For all other events, please see sea.museum/whats-on/events for further details and how to book.
For children’s and family programs, please check sea.museum or sea.museum/kids
Underwater wonderland. A school of European perch fly through clouds of pinktinged algae in a Finnish lake. © Tiina Törmänen/Wildlife Photographer of the Year
From 1 April
Wildlife Photographer of the Year is back with the best images from the 2022 edition of this wildly popular international competition.
FROM THE NATURAL HISTORY MUSEUM in London, this exhibition features more 100 exceptional images that capture fascinating animal behaviour, spectacular species and the breathtaking diversity of the natural world.
Using photography’s unique emotive power to engage and inspire audiences, the images shine a light on stories and species around the world and encourage a future of advocating for the planet.
Wildlife Photographer of the Year is the most prestigious photography event of its kind, providing a global platform that showcases the natural world’s most astonishing and challenging sights. The competition receives more than 50,000 entries from all over the world. This exhibition features the winners and a select number of the other entries from the 2022 competition.
Wildlife Photographer of the Year is developed and produced by the Natural History Museum, London. sea.museum/wildlife
Brickwrecks – sunken ships in LEGO ® bricks
Now showing
Featuring large-scale LEGO® models, real shipwreck objects, interactives and audiovisuals, Brickwrecks explores some of the world’s most famous shipwrecks, including Batavia, Titanic, Terror and Erebus
Developed and designed by the Western Australian Museum in partnership with the Australian National Maritime Museum and Ryan ‘The Brickman’ McNaught.
A LEGO® figure surveys the Pandora wreck site. Image courtesy the Brickman Team sea.museum/brickwrecks
showing
On display in the Sydney Harbour Gallery are two splendid Chinese porcelain punchbowls painted with two different views of Sydney from the time of Governor Lachlan Macquarie (1810–21). One depicts the view from Dawes Point looking east, and was donated to the museum in 2006. The other shows the view from east Sydney Cove looking west, and was donated to the State Library of NSW in 1926.
They were made in Canton as a pair in the early 1800s. The exhibit explores the mystery of who commissioned them and why, where they travelled thereafter and how they ended up in two different collections in Sydney.
Detail of the State Library of NSW punchbowl, showing the beach formerly at Sydney Cove. Image courtesy SLNSW
From June
An installation of 19 sculptures of fish by Guykuda Munuŋgurr representing species found in his Garrthalala homeland in northern Australia. Guykuda has distinguished himself as an innovative sculptor pioneering new materials and techniques. In this work he has pursued the natural representation of animal species without reference to their sacred identity.
cannon and artefacts Now showing
This small display brings together artefacts associated with Lieutenant James Cook’s famous HM Bark Endeavour In June 1770, 48 tonnes of material, including six iron cannon, were jettisoned from Endeavour in a successful attempt to save the ship after it ran aground on the Great Barrier Reef.
The Endeavour cannon is on loan to the museum courtesy of NSW Parks & Wildlife Service.
For the first time since it was donated in 1997, the entire Wharfies’ Mural is on display at the Australian National Maritime Museum in the Tasman Light Gallery.
The mural was painted by wharfies and artists from 1953 to 1965 on the walls of the lunchroom at the old Waterside Workers Federation (WWF) headquarters on the ‘Hungry Mile’, now Barangaroo. The mural expresses the history and political philosophy of the WWF and other maritime industry trade unions from the 1890s to the end of World War II.
A small temporary exhibit of related artefacts contextualising the mural is on display nearby, including a rotating display of posters that illustrate safe wharfside working practices (see overleaf).
Now showing
The Australian National Maritime Museum is responsible for the National Maritime Collection, which includes paintings, posters, maps and prints that highlight the history and diversity of maritime cultures in Australia and across the world.
Currently on display are posters promoting workplace safety on the wharves, designed by Clem Millward, one of the artists of the Wharfies’ Mural
Travelling exhibitions
James Cameron – Challenging the Deep
North Carolina Museum of Natural History, USA
Until 7 May
In an exhibition that integrates the power of the artefact and the thrill of experience, visitors will encounter the deep-ocean discoveries, technical innovations and scientific and creative achievements of underwater explorer James Cameron.
Created by the Australian National Maritime Museum’s USA Programs and supported by the USA Bicentennial Gift Fund. Produced in association with Avatar Alliance Foundation and toured internationally by Flying Fish.
flyingfishexhibits.com/exhibitions/ cameron
Closing soon
Over the past three years, Schmidt Ocean Institute has collaborated with research institutions from across Australia and the globe. Their mission: to explore the deepest and most remote parts of selected Australian and Pacific marine environments. This free outdoor exhibition reveals a selection of their stunning underwater images.
The exhibition can be viewed at the museum’s Wharf 7 forecourt.
Ocean Wonders is delivered in partnership with Schmidt Ocean Institute.
sea.museum/oceanwonders
Voyage to the Deep – underwater adventures
MOTE Marine Laboratory & Aquarium, Sarasota, Florida, USA
From February
Based on French author Jules Verne’s 1870 classic Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas , the exhibition brings to life the adventures of Captain Nemo, his fantastical Nautilus submarine and his mythical world. Kids can venture through the world below the waves, including the octopus’s garden with its giant clamshell, a giant squid to slide down and a maze of seaweed to wander through in the kelp forest. They can also explore the lost world of Atlantis.
flyingfishexhibits.com/exhibitions/voyage
Sea Monsters – Prehistoric ocean
Western Australian Maritime Museum From 1 April
Earth’s oceans were home to some of the largest, fiercest and most successful predators ever! While dinosaurs ruled the land, giant reptiles and sharks hunted the depths. What can their fossilised bones tell us about how they lived? How do they compare to today’s top ocean predators? Discover the secrets of these monsters of the deep in this exhibition for all ages.
sea.museum/sea-monsters-travelling
Stand From Under, poster designed by Clem Millward and issued by the Accident Prevention Organisation. ANMM Collection 00016551
Gift from The Association of Employers of Waterside Labour
The aim of this week-long training course is to share knowledge, develop museological skills, make connections and build a sense of community
As the group walked along the museum’s wharves, Scott Grant, Head of Fleet, delivered a tour from the heart. The group also boarded SY Ena and learnt about the museum’s approach to caring for historic and contemporary vessels. Image Megan Baehnisch/ ANMM
Late last year, a group of employees and volunteers from maritime heritage organisations around the country gathered at the museum for a museology training course as part of the Maritime Museums of Australia Project Support Scheme (MMAPSS). Lifelong Learning Officer, Anna Gregory, tells how the course came about.
THE MARITIME MUSEUMS OF AUSTRALIA Project Support Scheme (MMAPSS) is a partnership between the museum and the federal Department of Infrastructure, Transport, Regional Development, Communications and the Arts. This annual outreach program has been providing grants and training to staff and volunteers at regional museums and organisations for over 25 years. Since 1995, the scheme has given more than $2.2 million to organisations in support of over 520 projects and funded over 70 internships.
In 2022, the training component of MMAPSS was refreshed, and developed into the Maritime Museum Administrators’ Course. The aim of this week-long training course is to share knowledge, develop museological skills, make connections and build a sense of community among the maritime museums of Australia.
In November, the museum welcomed 12 people from 10 organisations for the first iteration of the course. Participants travelled from as far as Port Adelaide, Hobart and Kempsey. Each came with their own unique story and prior experiences. One person originally hailed from France and was a specialist in Middle Eastern archaeology. Another had previously managed the Clinical Immunology and HIV/AIDS Department at the Royal Prince Alfred Hospital for over 20 years. Participants had experience in graphic design, teaching, marine science, administration, student mentoring and marketing. Some participants were tertiary-trained museum professionals, while others were volunteers learning the museum trade ‘on the job’. These vast experiences and varied backgrounds were a great asset and only enhanced the learning experience. The participants’ interests and reasons for attending this course were equally varied – ranging from digitisation to collaborating with Indigenous communities, and everything in between. Regardless of their previous experience and interests, all were eager to learn and expand their networks.
Throughout the week, the MMAPSS visitors participated in a range of seminars, workshops and on-water experiences. Each day of the program was organised thematically to help participants consolidate their knowledge on a particular area of maritime museum operations.
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In the conservation lab, the MMAPSS participants learnt about conserving objects made from a variety of materials.
Image Megan Baehnisch/ANMM
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Aboard Sydney Heritage Fleet’s ferry Harman for a trip to Rozelle Shipyard and Cockatoo Island are Andrew Walsh (Woodbridge Marine Discovery Centre, TAS), Colin Pierpoint (Macleay River Historical Society, NSW), Lynette O’Grady (Historic Ketch Falie Inc, SA), Julia Hornsby (Royal Prince Alfred Yacht Club, NSW), Pamela Vine (Camden Haven Historical Society, NSW), Camille Reynes (Maritime Museum of Tasmania), Susan Burk (Royal Prince Alfred Yacht Club, NSW), Nicole Sutherland (Jervis Bay Maritime Museum, NSW), Bronwen McLeod (Marine Rescue Port Stephens, NSW) and Justin Croft (Flagstaff Hill Maritime Museum, VIC).
Image Anna Gregory/ANMM
On the first day, Monday 21 November, the theme was ‘community and connection’. To begin building a sense of community, each participant delivered a short presentation to introduce their home organisation, their role and some priority projects. These presentations revealed amazing maritime stories, shared challenges and a mutual passion for maritime museums. They also ensured that museum staff could prepare sessions that were tailored specifically to the participants’ interests and their museum’s needs. The remainder of Monday was spent learning about how to engage meaningfully and respectfully with Indigenous communities; nurturing a network of support; and exploring the global community of maritime museums.
Tuesday was windy but sunny – just perfect for a sail on Duyfken! As the group sailed around Sydney Harbour, they learnt about reading the winds and listened to daring tales of ‘tall shippers’ climbing the rig to unfurl the sails. Back on land, they heard about the logistics of vessel management plans and participated in a practical and enjoyable grant-writing workshop. They finished the day with a visit to the Anzac Memorial in Hyde Park. This moving tour demonstrated the powerful stories a museum can tell in a small space and on a tight budget.
On day three of the course, the participants followed the journey of an object from entering the museum, through registration, conservation and ultimately display. They worked in groups to design creative exhibitions using museum objects. One group developed a thought-provoking exhibition concept targeting an elderly age group, called ‘Time is running out’. This exhibition focused on the importance of taking action on climate change, before it is too late.
On Thursday, the participants were introduced to the museum’s programs and promotions. They learnt strategies to develop engaging, educational and entertaining programs; shared programming ideas; and enjoyed a collegial dinner with special guest speaker Alan Edenborough from Sydney Heritage Fleet.
On Friday morning, Sydney Heritage Fleet generously took the group on a harbour tour on their ferry, Harman The group learnt about historic vessel repairs at the Rozelle shipyard and heard about the many layers of history at Cockatoo Island.
Throughout the week, the MMAPSS visitors participated in a range of seminars, workshops and on-water experiences
To round out the week, the participants had the opportunity to speak one-on-one with a museum staff member of their choosing. During this time, participants could ask for advice, brainstorm ideas, discuss projects and troubleshoot problems. After a busy week of learning and sharing, it was wonderful to witness the consolidation of new knowledge, the sparking of new ideas and the solidification of newly formed relationships. After the course, one participant commented, ‘I left on Friday feeling better informed, better connected but most importantly excited about the things I could take back to my museum.’
The Maritime Museum Administrators’ Course has had many benefits for the individuals who attended, their home organisations and the Australian community of maritime museums. In the post-course survey, participants were asked to identify the sessions which they found to be most beneficial. One participant nominated the sessions on object conservation and writing grant applications as the most useful. Another participant identified the sessions with the Fleet and Digital teams. One person said: ‘I loved the variety of content from the speakers and the mixture of workshops and talks.’ The diverse range of sessions during this course ensured that the participants gained a holistic understanding of maritime museum operations, while also learning strategies that were relevant to their museum’s particular circumstances and priorities.
MMAPSS is a crucial part of the museum’s annual outreach program. This refreshed course was a fantastic way for the museum to reconnect with its regional counterparts, after years of COVID-19 interruptions. The benefits of this course for the maritime museum community will only be amplified over time, as the participants apply their knowledge, share their experiences and continue to keep in contact. As one participant commented: ‘I had a wonderful time and would highly recommend the program to future participants.’
The Maritime Museum Administrators’ Course will be run annually in November. Applications for 2023 close on 31 March 2023. For more information, or to apply, go to sea.museum/about/grants-and-awards/ funding-for-maritime-heritage/how-to-apply
The latest grants under the Maritime Museums of Australia Project Support Scheme were recently announced. Aimed at projects that preserve and promote Australia’s maritime legacy, they have been awarded to 21 museums and cultural organisations across Australia. By Kate O’Connell.
THE AUSTRALIAN NATIONAL MARITIME MUSEUM administers the Maritime Museums of Australia Project Support Scheme (MMAPSS) with support from the Australian Government. Successful applicants receive a grant and/or in-kind support for a project, or funding to attend a museological training course at the museum.
Since 1995, the Australian government has provided more than $2.2 million to over 520 projects and over 70 internships under MMAPSS. In the latest round of grants, more than $155,000 has been awarded towards new and developing projects and training. Twelve projects have been awarded funding, four are receiving funding and in-kind support, four are being provided with in-kind support and one training course has been awarded. Three of the grants were awarded under this year’s special provision, which gave priority to organisations from communities that were affected by the floods of early 2022.
The MMAPSS selection committee reported that the overall quality and scope of the funded projects promises a valuable contribution to the scheme’s objectives to help preserve and display objects of national and historical maritime significance.
Projects include the physical restoration of vessels or strategic planning to enable their preservation, site enhancements that help tell stories of maritime heritage, support to develop and extend information sharing and educational materials that promote community access, digital platforms and publications that share heritage stories and resources, and special projects focused on the exhibition and conservation of specific heritage items.
The museum will also provide selected projects with in-kind support, to assist with planning, evaluation, cataloguing and design. Staff and volunteers at museums and historical societies across Australia will have access to subject-matter specialists from the museum’s Curatorial, Fleet, Design, Digital and Communications teams.
In the latest round of grants, more than $155,000 has been awarded towards new and developing projects and training
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02 Blacksmith’s workshop at Albany’s Historic Whaling Station. Image courtesy Albany’s Historic Whaling Station
MMAPSS gives grants or in-kind support of up to $15,000 for projects that fall into one or more of these categories:
• collection management – registration, documentation and storage
• conservation – preservation, vessel restoration, conservation work or treatments and professional assessments
• presentation – research, development of exhibitions, establishing interpretative displays and workshops
• development of relevant education or public programs that make collections more accessible to audiences
In addition, funding of up to $3,000 is available for paid or unpaid workers of not-for-profit organisations caring for Australia’s maritime collections to develop museological skills and knowledge. Please visit sea.museum/grants for details on the next round of funding.
Submarine Institute of Australia Inc, Australian National Submarine Museum Consultation and support to develop the existing pilot website and build an online network linking physical submarine displays in museums in Australia and around the world.
Lake Macquarie City Council Engage a local canoemaker to activate Nawayiba, an exhibition of Aboriginal maritime technologies, and liaise with local schools on an education program.
Eden Killer Whale Museum Management Committee Inc Conserve and relocate skeleton of Orcinus orca (killer whale) ‘Old Tom’, an icon of Eden’s unique commercial whaling history.
Camperdown Cemetery Trust Sydney Conserve and restore Dunbar and HMS Challenger memorials.
The Evans Head Living Museum & Community Technology Centre Incorporated Prepare a publication and museum exhibition on the George Hunt Photographic Collection, including a remote-access program.
Norah Head Lighthouse Reserve Land Manager Board Produce a print publication about the regional history of the Norah Head Lighthouse and Reserve.
Merimbula–Imlay Historical Society Inc Construct a steel cradle for the David Brown punt, load and transport the punt, and install on site.
Newcastle Museum Stabilise structural weakening and broken timbers to the bow section of the historic, locally significant lifeboat Victoria
Richmond River Historical Society Inc Digitisation and display of images and flood-proof storage for a visual compendium of ships and boats on the Richmond River.
Greater Hume Council Holbrook Professional restoration and repair of original WWII ‘Jolly Roger’ flag for framing and exhibition.
City of Canada Bay Heritage Society Museum
Conserve the late-19th-century naval reserve jacket of Lieutenant-Commander Rupert Oswald Jones OBE RNR (Rtd), JP, and source a bespoke mannequin and reproduction trousers for its display.
Newman Senior Technical College, Securing the future of historic fishing vessel XLCR – Assess the 107-yearold historic wooden fishing vessel XLCR and prepare a vessel management plan.
Volunteer Marine Rescue NSW, Port Stephens Marine Rescue One-week training course at the Australian National Maritime Museum.
Mackay Regional Council Draft a vessel management plan for preservation of historic vessel Eleanor.
Queensland Maritime Museum Association Install multilingual, QR-coded interpretative and more accessible signage for selected exhibits.
Rebuild Independence Group (RIG) Inc Memorial display in recognition of local fishing pioneers, boat-builders and marine conservationists of American River.
Mid Murray Council Create interpretive panels depicting the history of the PS Canally and river trade, and upgrade website to enhance online interpretive display.
Maritime Museum of Tasmania Provide and install a new engine and gearbox for SV Westward.
Flagstaff Hill Maritime Museum and Village New infrastructure to improve care and management of historical objects housed in the collection.
Queenscliffe Maritime Museum Remediation works identified in the Vessel Management Plan for Pilot Vessel Mavis III to continue restoration of this major exhibit.
Albany’s Historic Whaling Station Consult with the museum’s Design and Curatorial team for concept design to develop a chronological display on whaling history in Australia.
Kate O’Connell is the museum’s Communications Manager.
First-hand accounts by solo women travellers to Australia
From about 1830, increasing numbers of unmarried middle-class women began emigrating to the Australian colonies. The museum holds two diaries and a published account of three such women’s journeys to Australia in the Victorian era, writes Myfanwy Bryant .
Should a ‘gentlewoman’ find herself without financial support from family or charitable acquaintances, she faced a distressing predicament
IN VICTORIAN ENGLAND, a middle-class unmarried woman held an unenviable position in society. In an era when a woman’s worth was solely based on her marriage potential and ability to bear and raise children, these ‘spinsters’ or ‘old maids’, as they were pejoratively known, were what other women should fear to become – an affront to the social order. While under the protection of their families, such women could perform familial duties or charitable roles. If there was no income for them, however, they became a problem.
Lower-class unmarried women had surprisingly more options available to them – at the very least, they could seek employment – and unmarried upper-class women were protected by their rank and wealth. It was middle-class women, wedged tightly between social expectations and financial dependence, who suffered most from being single. Superficially educated and morally reputable, these women were bred for marriage, not employment. Theirs could be a precarious existence. Should a ‘gentlewoman’ find herself without financial support from family or charitable acquaintances, she faced a distressing predicament. Society regarded unprotected, single middle-class women as borderline useless and a potential financial and moral liability. In the mid-1800s, a solution was suggested for middle-class British women facing a bleak future: emigrate to the Australian colonies.
For the first half of the 19th century, British migration policy to Australia focused on what would solve problems – both in the colonies and at home. Lower-class families, women and men migrated by the thousands, in a process cynically referred to as ‘pauper shovelling’.1 Assisted by the government and charities, people of this class were not bound by notions of gentility and were willing to put their hand to almost anything once they landed. In the 1830s, however, concern grew that the Australian colonies now needed the civilising influence of ‘respectable’ single women. This was a particular notion of the Victorian era – that women were the purveyors of morality and virtue, able to wrangle unruly men simply by their calming feminine presence.
Back in Britain, however, emigration for single middle-class women was still considered desperate, and Australia was a destination of last resort for gentlewomen fallen on hard times. Only from the 1850s onwards did charities such as the British Ladies Emigrant Society and the Fund for Promoting Female Emigration begin changing this attitude. Growing feminist beliefs about acceptable paths and activities for women, and a more relaxed social structure in Australia, meant finding employment was less of a stigmatising deterrent to emigrating middle-class women than it had once been. The gold rush of the 1850s saw an exodus of young men of various classes from Britain, and the likelihood of a respectable marriage, still a goal for most women, was an added enticement to migrate to Australia. There were now small but determined efforts in play to clearing ‘the greatest and saddest convent the world has ever seen’. 2
Jane Roberts travelled on the Wanstead in 1829 from Plymouth, intending to settle in Hobart, Van Diemen’s Land (now Tasmania), where her two brothers were living. Jane was highly intelligent, but at 37 years of age, with no parents living, her chances to either marry or find work were bleak. Rather than viewing the voyage to Australia with resignation, however, she demonstrated remarkable foresight by recording her experiences with a view to publishing a book. Two Years at Sea was released in 1834 and became one of the first accounts of Hobart and the Swan River settlements of Western Australia to be published by a woman.
Cabin Scene. Time 9 am aboard the William Jardine, Oct 31 1844 by James Gould Medland, 1844. Travelling as middle-class women, Jane, Mary and Eliza each had their own cabin. These spaces became their private domain away from the social constraints and difficulties of shipboard life. Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales DXC 287 f.16Travel accounts written by women at this time received mixed reviews. They were often dismissed for being a female voice in a traditionally male area of authority, and while interesting, they were too constrained by the expectations of female respectability to be useful to anyone but other women. Despite experiencing the same hardships and deprivations as their male counterparts, female writers such as Jane needed to reassure their audience that they did not break acceptable codes of female conduct: 3
... that in no case has their travelling enthusiasm involved the sacrifice of obvious domestic duty; nor has it brought out any qualities inconsistent with the modesty, the grace, and the gentleness that must always be regarded as the fitting ornaments of the sex.
Reading Two Years at Sea with all this in mind, the book is an impressive achievement. While some stages of Jane’s journey are highly edited, there are moments of private observation that capture the uncertainty that must have surrounded migrating to Australia in the first half of the 19th century. Away from the propaganda of Victorian migration to Australia, Jane notes the sacrifices already made by passengers while still in home waters: 4
… tearing themselves away from their homes, connexions, and friends, feeling as the vessel recedes from their native shore, helpless and almost hopeless. The country they leave rises before them in meridian splendour, whilst the one to which they are going appears enveloped in gloom and uncertainty.
It is very likely that she was thinking of herself here, destined for a fledging colony, yet again relying on the charity of others.
The journal of 16-year-old Eliza Taylor, written aboard the City of Edinburgh in 1834, reveals a very shipboard experience, unencumbered by expectations for future employment. Eliza, migrating to Sydney with her brother and mother, demonstrates herself to be a young woman of great intelligence and humour, with a thirst for knowledge and new experiences. Free of drawing-room etiquette and the scrutiny of ballroom chaperones, Eliza sees that shipboard life offers the freedom to pursue skills that might not be available to her on shore.
During her journey, Eliza diligently learns navigation and the skills of a naturalist. On one occasion, she purposely stings herself with a mollusc specimen so she can describe the pain accurately. Eliza does not fear the challenges and hazards of a long sea journey, seeing the humour in a drenched cabin and disgruntled mother. She relishes the possibility of a duel when a ‘suspicious looking vessel’ tracks the ship, wanting to take up pistols to fight the imagined invaders herself. Eliza also recognises that this journey is a unique experience in her life. She writes: 5
I was obliged to dance this evening, having promised to figure away with the surgeon who is about to try his wings again after a bout of Rheumatism. I did not experience any pleasure, for … merriment accorded not with my gloomy reflections both for the past and the future. I am very melancholy this warm weather and often wonder whether in any future years I shall ever have a taste of the joys and scenes of happiness I had in my childhood. My evil genius whispers No.
Mary Armstrong was already 34 in 1863 when she embarked on a journey to Australia as a matron aboard the Severn. Being a ship’s matron was a respectable way in which a single, probably older, woman could earn a living. Matrons were appointed to protect the virtue of unassisted young women. They were also expected, over the duration of the journey, to occupy them with various tasks: 6 reading, writing, needlework and prayers when not enjoying drill-exercises, marching and country dancing. They should also be taught washing and ironing, to prepare them for employment in the colony.
No small task on a crowded migrant ship!
Ideal matrons were required to be ‘physically robust, active, of a decided character and firm bearing, and of a high moral and religious tone of mind… sufficiently superior to [their charges] in education and acquirements to secure their respect’.7 Mary’s diary reveals her to be all of the above. She took her duty to care for more than 100 young migrant women seriously from the start. She records being initially ‘very much put about to see so many huddled together like cattel [sic]’, but resolves immediately to embrace this ‘mixed lot’.
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The journey to Australia was a chance for a committed matron, such as Mary Armstrong, to teach girls in her charge new skills, such as stitching, reading and writing. This sampler was given by Julia Donovan, a teenaged passenger aboard the Carnatic , to the ship’s matron, Alice Wadley, in 1879. ANMM Collection 00019540
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A page from the journal of 16-year-old Eliza Taylor, showing her view of Cape Town, January 1834. ANMM Collection 00036438-044
‘Spinsters’ or ‘old maids’, as they were pejoratively known, were what other women should fear to become –an affront to the social order
Like the general of a wayward army, Mary approaches the difficult journey with determination and practicality, Bible in hand. Her diary expresses the joy she feels in providing these girls with structure, mothering and a healthy dose of religion. She fondly records joint baking efforts, singing and a sewing bee, proud that she has re-created an ideal domestic sphere at sea. Mary’s diary demonstrates her great resilience and offers glimpses of humour. Her considerable efforts paid off when, on arrival in Australia, it was noted that ‘a finer class of girls and a cleaner ship’ had not been seen in 22 years. 8
Mary, Eliza and Jane were certainly still in the minority when they decided to leave Britain – but rather than being regarded as extraordinary, they were probably normal middle-class English women who were placed in an uncommon situation. The narratives of their journeys to Australia are remarkably different in their styles and purposes, but these three women, at different stages of life, all reveal a middle-class female that Victorian Britain was ill-equipped to deal with. Mary, Eliza and Jane adapted to shipboard life with the fortitude and resilience they would always have needed as unmarried middle-class women in a patriarchal society.
What became of Eliza, Jane and Mary?
Eliza remained in Australia. She initially set up a Ladies’ School in Sydney and at 22 married a solicitor, Edward Rogers. They had three children, and their son Francis became a highly respected judge. Eliza died at the age of 54 and was buried at Camperdown cemetery in Sydney.
Jane’s plans for a new life in Hobart were dashed on arrival due to a ‘severe domestic affliction’ regarding her brothers. 9 She returned to England almost immediately on the Wanstead, under the protection of Captain Friend and his wife Mary Ann. With no known family in London, Jane may have supported herself by her writings, which included a novel and poetry. She was possibly assisted by literary acquaintances, her brothers or a charity for unmarried women. In 1835 Jane invented a relatively popular card game, ‘The Royal Historical Game of Cards’, a set of which is now in the British Museum collection.
Mary returned to England as a passenger on the Alfred in 1864. She married Scottish merchant Herbert Holley later that year, and a partial diary extract in the museum’s collection records their migration to Australia later in 1874, with their son Herbert John, aboard the Samuel Plimsoll – on which Mary again served as matron.10
Notes
1 A James Hammerton. Emigrant gentlewomen: genteel poverty and female emigration, 1830–1914. Routledge, 1979, p 98.
2 ibid, p 97.
3 WG Blaikie, ‘Lady Travellers’. Blackwoods Magazine, Volume 160, 1886, pp 49–66.
4 Jane Roberts. Two Years at Sea: Being the narrative of a voyage to the Swan River and Van Diemen’s Land, During the Years 1829, 30, 31. Richard Bently, 1884, p 3.
5 Eliza Taylor. Journal of a voyage from Gravesend to Sydney New South Wales, 1833, p 20. Transcript of unpublished manuscript, Vaughan Evans Library, call number REF MS CIT. Original ANMM Collection 000364386
6 Robin Haines. Doctors at Sea. Palgrave Macmillan, 2005, p 122.
7 ibid, p 121.
8 Mary Armstrong. Diary of a voyage as matron on the ship Severn, p 36. Transcript of unpublished manuscript, Vaughan Evans Library, call number REF MS SEV. Original ANMM Collection 00018289
9 Gillian Winter. ‘Under my own immediate observation’: Jane Robert’s visit to Hobart Town in 1830. Papers and Proceedings: Tasmanian Historical Research Association, vol 8, 2001, p 10.
10 Peter Hobbins, ‘Safely delivered: naming babes born at sea’, Traces , no 16, 2021, pp 14–16.
Two Years at Sea by Jane Roberts is in the museum’s Vaughan Evans Library: call number VEL 910.45 ROB. Myffanwy Bryant is a Registration Officer at the museum.
In the 1830s, concern grew that the Australian colonies now needed the civilising influence of ‘respectable’ single women
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As this quickly sketched portrait and commentary suggest, single middle-class women travelling to Australia did not always avoid the social judgments they might have hoped to leave behind. From ‘Sketches on board the barque Mary Harrison and ashore in Australia, 1852–54’ by Thomas Warre Harriott. Mitchell Library, State Library of New South Wales, kaxNvg2AxoVAZ
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London merchant Mrs Norton published a list of clothing for a female traveller’s use. This was comprehensive enough to provide for the most fashionable traveller to a colony and was also helpful for the growing number of unassisted female migrants. ANMM Collection 00000780
The Valerie Taylor Collection, comprising more than 10,000 transparencies, provides a way to look into the past
The museum’s Valerie Taylor Collection includes more than 10,000 underwater images taken all over the world over a period of decades.
Honours student Tiffany Tisher has used a set of photos from Seal Rocks, New South Wales, to determine how this particular marine environment has changed through time.
FROM THE LATE 1960s, avid naturalists Valerie and Ron Taylor photographed sharks and other marine life that they encountered on their travels. The duo’s underwater film and photography work proved hugely valuable – from providing footage of great white sharks for Steven Spielberg’s 1975 film Jaws to the development and testing of chain mail mesh diving suits, their lives and work told a unique story.
Fifty years later, I was given the remarkable opportunity to examine these photographs, now held at the Australian National Maritime Museum, in the hope of discovering how the marine environments they captured have changed through time. The Valerie Taylor Collection, comprising more than 10,000 transparencies, provides a way to look into the past and explore the historical ecology of our underwater seascapes.
Various unconventional data sources have been used over the years as a means to extract new ecological information to help fill gaps in our knowledge about the past. Some approaches include the use of herbarium specimens and videos for flowering events; others have used old photos of coral reefs to track historical declines.
With our environments rapidly changing, we need to understand baseline environmental conditions so we can effectively manage them. However, most visual data only began once our ecosystems started to change. This is especially true – and problematic – for marine ecosystems, which are mostly too big, too complex or too wet to survey accurately over long periods of time.
With improvements in photographic technology, new ecological data has been found through the sharing of opportunistic photos to platforms such as iNaturalist – although there can be significant bias from unstructured citizen data, and it is unclear whether looking at information that is incidentally captured in the background of a photograph can circumvent some of these issues.
For my research, I wanted to see how feasible it was to extract background habitat data not only from more recent underwater photos but also from older photos, to see if I could quantify ecological changes in marine habitats through time.
One well-represented location from the Valerie Taylor Collection is Seal Rocks in New South Wales, Australia. This is a temperate rocky reef system about three hours’ drive north of Sydney, where the Taylors owned a house and spent considerable time diving over the years. They captured many photographs of the critically endangered grey nurse shark and its surrounding marine environment up until the 1990s.
The initial difficulties for my research largely centred around determining which photographs would be useful and when they were taken. This first stage was a bit time-consuming, as I had to inspect each transparency
to try to find more specific dates and locations for the photographs. I found this information by examining the original slides, which had date stamps from when they were developed, and I also benefited from handwritten notes left by Ron and Valerie Taylor on some of the original slides.
The next step was to identify the main subject of each photograph to a species level, and determine if the background had visible habitat that I could quantify into a taxonomic group. Photos that were above water or had no background were easy to exclude, but others were harder to determine. While colour and brightness adjustments of the digital copies helped me to identify the different habitat taxonomy, some photos had no date or location information on the original slides at all. Without this information, I was unable to compile a consistent timeline. There was only one solution to my problem. I needed to go straight to the source.
After some quick back-and-forth with my university and museum contacts, I was face to face with Valerie Taylor herself. It was a surreal moment to sit and speak with the woman whose work I had closely studied for the last four months. I had seen her face countless times –but usually in a scuba mask, with a shark behind her, and from 50 years earlier.
For an afternoon, I listened in awe as Valerie related stories of her first encounters with grey nurse sharks and her time spent with husband Ron, living in their house and diving in the nearby waters. She explained how she was able to distinguish between photos from Seal Rocks and those from other dive sites in New South Wales, such as Southwest Rocks or Jervis Bay, based on the rock formations and floor sediments.
I wanted to see how feasible it was to extract background habitat data not only from more recent underwater photos but also from older photos
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Researchers Derrick Cruz (left) and Christopher Roberts from UNSW, conducting a Reef Life Survey at Seal Rocks, New South Wales, June 2022. Image Tiffany Tisher
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Tiffany Tisher, dive co-ordinator for fieldwork at Seal Rocks, New South Wales, June 2022. Image Jessica Nguyen
It was amazing how sharp and detailed Valerie’s memory was for photos that were decades old, and how she was able to pinpoint exact dive locations and dates
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Tiffany Tisher (left) with Valerie Taylor at the Australian National Maritime Museum, 24 May 2022. Image Tiffany Tisher
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Valerie Taylor photographing a grey nurse shark at Seal Rocks, NSW, 1995. ANMM Collection ANMS1458[350] Donated through the Australian Government’s Cultural Gifts Program by Valerie Taylor in memory of Ron Taylor
As part of Reef Life Survey, photos, or ‘photoquadrats’, of the reef habitat are taken at 2.5-metre intervals along the transect tape set out by the research team. Percentage cover of habitat taxa are later analysed from the photoquadrats. The author compared photoquadrats in her study to the non-scientific photographs she had gathered.
Most of the validation she provided for my data was accompanied by stories of the experiences behind the photos and of all the people involved. It was amazing how sharp and detailed her memory was for photos that were decades old, and how she was able to pinpoint exact dive locations and dates through some seemingly featureless photographs.
The data I gathered from Valerie Taylor and her collection set the foundation for the rest of my research. As I gathered more than 1,000 photographs from other recreational scuba divers, and combined them with standardised photoquadrats (see feature text) from Reef Life Survey,1 I was able to explore temporal trends of benthic habitat data to the present.
While Reef Life Survey scientific surveys only go back to 2009, and my research team replicated the surveys in 2022, by using old photographs from the Valerie Taylor Collection in combination with other citizen contributions, I was able to extend my study an additional 40 years. I found that, despite significant increases in the number of photographs collected in recent years, the number of usable photographs for habitat assessment did not change through time.
Ultimately, the temporal dataset of benthic habitat data that I obtained from my research substantially extended our understanding of potential changes from the past at Seal Rocks and demonstrates the potential of combining multiple data sources to detect and monitor environmental change.
My research shows that historical monitoring of marine habitat can greatly benefit from recreational scuba divers who may have old photos they are willing to share. Continued and future monitoring can benefit from these divers as they continue to visit many more sites and capture more photos than scientists are able to.
This method still has its challenges, however, as repetition, standardisation and accounts for bias are crucial in scientific assessments. But these unconventional approaches may provide new information in areas that have no historical or current scientific monitoring in place.
There are so many avenues for future research, and I explored only one aspect of benthic habitat monitoring gathered from data captured in the background. Additionally, my research project only used a portion of the Valerie Taylor collection. With photos from other locations and times, there is a wealth of potentially untapped data for continued exploration into how our pioneer underwater explorers can aid in new scientific discovery.
I was truly privileged to personally hear stories from Valerie Taylor about her life and work with Ron and to see the fondness she has for Seal Rocks and the home this location provides for grey nurse sharks. I hope all the other amazing parts of their life and work can continue to be shared, and that we find other ways to look at their old photos.
This wonderful year would not have been possible without the help and support of staff from the Australian National Maritime Museum: Emily Jateff, Senior Curator of Ocean Science and Technology; Cay-Leigh Bartnicke, Assistant Curator for Special Projects; and Daina Fletcher, Head of Acquisitions Development. And my very special thanks go, of course, to Valerie Taylor.
I’d also like to wholeheartedly thank my honours thesis supervisors from the University of New South Wales: Professor Adriana Vergés, Professor Alistair Poore and Christopher Roberts.
1 Reef Life Survey was established in 2007 to monitor the health of underwater reefs through time. The program trains recreational divers to complete standardised surveys and the quality of data collected is equivalent to formal scientific surveys. Trained Reef Life Survey volunteers record fish and invertebrates along 50-m transects, and take photoquadrats every 2.5 metres along the transect line to capture images of reef habitat.
To find out more about the In Bygone Dives projects, or to take part, see inbygonedives.com/projects/#seal-rocks or inaturalist.org/projects/in-bygone-dives , or email inbygonedives@gmail.com
AUSTRALIA IS ONE of the world’s great migration nations. Most of us are descended from migrants, and here at the museum we collect and exhibit stories of migrants and honour them on our National Monument to Migration.
The stories of migrants speak to universal themes such as belonging, love, adventure, family and safety. Some are stories marked by adversity, loss and sadness, some are less dramatic, but all are stories of hope.
We tell these stories across a range of activities, including developing collections, exhibitions, programs, events and our very popular educational resources, as well as, of course, research.
In December, the museum launched Migration Stories, a new digital experience dedicated to sharing complex, challenging and emotional stories about how people are shaped by migration. This website expands on the work of the National Monument to Migration, one of the museum’s most important and visible tributes to our migration heritage.
The voices and stories of migrants registered on the museum’s National Monument to Migration illuminate Australian history, demonstrating how international events have affected migration to Australia. Most importantly, they showcase the variety of backgrounds of those who have helped shape our national identity.
Faces of Migration is the first stage of this new digital platform, which will be continually updated with new stories to create a centre of migration storytelling. Faces of Migration currently features more than 25 stories of how people have been shaped by migration.
Faces of Migration features visually rich and raw moments shared by migrants who have been asked:
‘How has being a migrant (or the family of a migrant) changed or shaped you?’
Virginia Langeberg
‘Being a migrant has shaped me tremendously. Arriving in Australia with my family at the age of five, I barely knew a word of English. Starting school that way was no easy feat. I was a shy kid with a competitive streak, my brother was the outgoing one.’
Emmanuel Alfieris
‘We stand on the shoulders of the immigrants that came to Australia and brought and created their families to this amazing country. Many left unimaginable circumstances of war, persecution and poverty in their homelands. And all made extraordinary sacrifices to come to Australia.’
Read more at lab.sea.museum/migration
Do you want to share your migration story? Contact our team at migration@sea.museum
The stories of migrants speak to universal themes such as belonging, love, adventure, family and safety
01 Virginia Langeberg, presenter for SBS World News, migrated with her family from Stockholm, Sweden.
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Emmanuel Alfieris (right) and his father George, who migrated from Kythera, Greece.
Images Cara O’Dowd
Museum staff recently had the opportunity to enhance their understanding of our rich and diverse community through training designed to create a more inclusive Australia. By Hannah Gartrell of Settlement Services International.
IN NOVEMBER 2022, the museum took part in a workshop run by Settlement Services International (SSI) Diversity Training that facilitated conversations where team members shared experiences, reflected, asked questions and connected with one another.
The training was an opportunity for staff to step outside their day-to-day routine and enter a safe space to discuss what diversity and inclusion are, why they matter and what staff could do differently to better serve the people from all backgrounds who come through the museum’s doors.
SSI Diversity Training Manager Janet Irvine said this training was designed to help build a world where everyone is seen and valued for who they are:
‘We believe that through training, we can create that change one conversation at a time.’
She noted that diversity meant recognising that everyone has a different perspective to offer:
‘If we approach people with that open curiosity, there’s so much for all of us to gain’.
By participating in activities such as diversity training, organisations like Australian National Maritime Museum are demonstrating that diversity and inclusion are an ongoing conversation, not a one-off box-ticking exercise, said Ms Irvine:
Now, almost one in three Australians was born overseas. Our country has never been so diverse, and we have so much to gain by embracing that diversity and creating an environment where everyone feels included.
SSI Diversity Training provides learning experiences that transform how people respond to diversity in ways that are thought-provoking, inspire curiosity and build confidence to engage more authentically with cultural diversity. It is an initiative of the community-based social business SSI and is grounded in the organisation’s 20-plus years’ experience as a leading provider of services to multicultural communities.
Sixteen per cent of Australians have experienced discrimination based on their skin colour, ethnic origin or religion, according to the 2022 Mapping Social Cohesion survey from the Scanlon Foundation. This has increased significantly since 2007, when just seven per cent of Australians reported having experienced discrimination.
This shows that while appreciation of multiculturalism is improving, there is still a long way to go towards creating a truly inclusive Australia. Through open and honest discussions with those around us, however, we can progress towards that goal – one conversation at a time.
The training was designed to help build a world where everyone is seen and valued for who they are
This expedient experiment created a perfect storm for contagion to prevail
When Marco Polo arrived in the colonies it attracted widespread praise – notwithstanding the high death rate on its inaugural voyage south. Image Marco Polo, Thomas Robertson, 1859. State Library of Victoria PCLT 987
EVEN BEFORE OUR CURRENT PANDEMIC, maritime authors were feverishly researching the insalubrious history of disease at sea. Jane Smith’s very fine Ship of Death (2019) details the tragedy of the Emigrant, headed for Moreton Bay in 1850,1 while Michael Veitch’s book and play, Hell Ship (2020), portray the catastrophic loss of life aboard the Melbourne-bound Ticonderoga in 1852.
In Death Ships, Doug Limbrick delivers a much-needed survey of one particularly fatal choice driven by the discovery of gold in the Australian colonies. Faced with unprecedented demand for passages to the diggings –and for fresh labour to replace workers lost to gold fever – Britain’s Colonial Land and Emigration Commission made a bold decision. In place of the single-decked square-riggers usually chosen for assisted emigration, they sought out double-decked ships that normally completed Atlantic crossings. ‘With these large two-deck vessels’, Limbrick writes, ‘key rules were broken, ignored or modified to suit the circumstances’ (p 196). The results were disastrous.
Death Ships charts the notorious voyages of the six such vessels despatched from Liverpool to Australia in 1852: Bourneuf, Wanata, Marco Polo, Ticonderoga, Beejapore and Shackamaxon. All newly built in North America, they were robust and well fitted for their primary task of hauling freight and lumber.
Designed for the stormy North Atlantic, all proved seaworthy for the much longer route down Africa’s west coast and across the southern Indian Ocean to Australia. The recent adoption of the great circle route, passing through the blustery southern latitudes, made for a speedy voyage. Unfortunately, the rough seas and cold also kept the passengers below and wore down their constitutions.
While these journeys were rapid, they regularly proved highly fatal. With vessel capacities leaping from 300–400 to 800–1,000 passengers per voyage, the Emigration Commissioners had solved one problem but created another. Under Britain’s Passenger Vessels Act, these ships were still required to carry a surgeonsuperintendent, matron and adequate provisions. But as Limbrick notes, the cramped and damp accommodation, poor ’tween-decks ventilation and sheer numbers aboard provided ripe conditions for disease.
In total, these six ships conveyed 4,782 passengers. More than 10 per cent of them died at sea or in colonial quarantine, primarily from typhus fever, measles, scarlet fever, and diarrhoeal and respiratory diseases. The highest mortality – 26 per cent – was recorded on the Ticonderoga voyage to Melbourne. The overwhelming majority of deaths were among children aged seven years
or younger, but certain groups of emigrants – particularly Irish and Scottish highlanders – also suffered unduly. Limbrick attributes this higher risk level to the journeys that non-English emigrants undertook to reach Liverpool, with attendant changes in diet, climate and exposure to infectious diseases. On board the vessels, many suffered due to their unfamiliarity with English rituals of daily hygiene, formal medicine and communal cooking. This tragic toll ensured that future voyages returned to single passenger decks only.
This book offers an excellent entry point for understanding the process and problems of mid-19th-century emigration to the antipodes. Limbrick draws upon manuscripts, shipping records, government reports, newspapers and published literature to produce a highly readable account (although curiously he does not cite Veitch’s tale of the Ticonderoga). His conclusions are well thought through and convincing, acknowledging how this expedient experiment created a perfect storm for contagion to prevail.
1 See page 36 for an article by Jane Smith about Ship of Death.
Reviewer Dr Peter Hobbins is the Museum’s Head of Knowledge.
Death Ships: The story of life and death on six big emigrant ships
By Doug Limbrick, published by Shawline Publishing Group, Melbourne, 2021. Softcover, 216 pages, bibliography, index, illustrations.
ISBN 9781922594006
RRP $18.95. Vaughan Evans Library 387.50994 LIM
Are you exploring your family history, chasing oceanic adventures or seeking a deep understanding of our Indigenous maritime cultures? Then start your voyage of discovery in the museum’s Vaughan Evans Library.
EACH MONTH WE ADD NEW WORKS across a wide range of topics, including naval history, immigration, diverse local cultures, ocean science, river stories, Australian history, school textbooks and titles for kids. We also offer a variety of maritime, genealogical and general research databases. Check our library catalogue, schedule a visit and enjoy our wonderful new books.
Lillian Anderson
History of the Anderson family: From Scotland to Mauritius to Australia
Call number
929.209944 AND
Maie Barrow
Estonians in Australia
Call number 305.89454 BAR
Alex Calder, Jonathan Lamb and Bridget Orr
Voyages and beaches: Pacific encounters, 1769–1840 Call number 995 VOY
Wally Caruana
Aboriginal art Call number 709.94 CAR
Chris Chen and Marie-Louise McDermott Ocean pools
Call number 797.20994 CHE
Robert Cleworth
The fabulous Catalina: A collection of Catalina and flying boat anecdotes from veterans and relatives of those who flew these machines
Call number 940.544994 CLE
Fiona Crosbie and Richard Spurio
Allens: The first 200 years Call number
340.092294 MAX
John Dikkenberg
In whom we trust: Crisis and leadership at sea Call number 910.452 DIK
Arnie Duffield and Lee Duffield
Arnie: Pearls and luggers in the Torres Strait
Call number
639.412099438 DUF
Graham Edgar, Rick StuartSmith and Antonia Cooper
Living offshore reefs of Australian marine parks
Call number
333.9164160994 LIV
Lara Einzig with Jessica Hundley
Women making waves: Trailblazing surfers in and out of the water
Call number 797.32 EIN
Find AE1 Ltd and Australian National Maritime Museum Research Vessel Petrel baseline survey of HMAS AE1 Call number 359.930994 RES
James W Fletcher
‘Trustworthiness personified’: A history of the Newcastle Pilot Service 1801–1884
Call number
387.16609944 FLE
Coral Gaunt and Robert Cleworth
Cats at war: The story of RAAF Catalinas in the Asia-Pacific theatre of war Call number 940.544994 GAU
Peter Grose
The battle of Sydney Harbour 1942 Call number 940.5451099441 GRO
Michael Timothy Hickie
The Mike Hickie story: Family history, the navy, and Australian life Call number 920.71 HIC
Thomas Ingram
HCS Cabalva from England towards China [manuscript] Call number REF MS CAB (Bound)
Bob Kearney
Fishing in the good old days: Was it really better? Call number 799.10994 KEA
Sarah Laverick
Through ice and fire: The adventures, science and people behind Australia’s famous icebreaker Aurora Australis Call number 919.89 LAV
Bernard McCall
Svitzer tugs (worldwide) Call number 623.8232 MCC
Andrew McMillan
Catalina dreaming Call number 940.544994 MCM
A E (Bill) Minty
Black Cats: The real story of Australia’s long range Catalina strike force in the Pacific War: Solomons to Singapore, Cairns to the coast of China
Call number 940.54499 MIN
Ros Moriarty
Listening to country: A journey to the heart of what it means to belong Call number 994.0049915 MOR
Adrian Newstead with Ruth Hessey
The dealer is the devil: Adventures in the Aboriginal art trade Call number 709.994 NEW
John Ogden
Whitewash: The lost story of an African Australian Call number 305.388 OGD
Arvi Parbo
On Estonia and Estonians Call number 947.98 PAR
Jack Riddell
Catalina squadrons, first and furthest: recounting the operations of RAAF
Catalinas, May 1941 to March 1943 Call number 940.544994 RID
Glynis Ridley
The discovery of Jeanne Baret: A story of science, the high seas, and the first woman to circumnavigate the globe
Call number 910.41092 RID
Charles Sheppard
Coral reefs: A natural history Call number 577.789 SHE
Jane Smith Ship of Death: The tragedy of the Emigrant Call number 387.224 SMI
Richard Udy
Catalina crews memorial book: records of the Catalina squadron’s contribution during World War 2 in the Pacific, with a selection of Catalina poems Call number 940.544994 UDY
Kaye Webb and Ronald Searle
Refugees 1960: A report in words and drawings Call number RARE 325.21 WEB
Edith Widder
Below the edge of darkness: A memoir of exploring light and life in the deep sea
Call number 551.46 WID
Acknowledgments
The Australian National Maritime Museum acknowledges the support provided to the museum by all our volunteers, members, sponsors, donors and friends.
The museum particularly acknowledges the following people who have made a significant contribution to the museum in an enduring way or who have made or facilitated significant benefaction to it.
Honorary Fellows
John Mullen AM
Peter Dexter AM
Valerie Taylor AM
Ambassadors
Norman Banham
Christine Sadler
Dr David and Jennie Sutherland
Major Donors
The Sid Faithfull and Christine Sadler
Acquisition Program
David & Jennie Sutherland Foundation
Honorary Research Associates
Rear Admiral Peter Briggs AO
John Dikkenberg
Dr Nigel Erskine
Paul Hundley
Dr Ian MacLeod
Jeffrey Mellefont
David Payne
Lindsey Shaw
Major Benefactors
Margaret Cusack
Basil Jenkins
Dr Keith Jones
RADM Andrew Robertson AO DSC RN
Geoff and Beryl Winter
Honorary Life Members
Yvonne Abadee
Dr Kathy Abbass
Robert Albert AO RFD RD
Bob Allan
Vivian Balmer
Vice Admiral Tim Barrett AO CSC
Lyndyl Beard
Maria Bentley
Mark Bethwaite AM
Paul Binsted
Marcus Blackmore AM
David Blackley
John Blanchfield
Alexander Books
Ian Bowie
Colin Boyd
Ron Brown OAM
Paul Bruce
Anthony Buckley AM
Richard Bunting
Capt Richard Burgess AM
Kevin Byrne
Sue Calwell
RADM David Campbell AM
Marion Carter
Victor Chiang
Robert Clifford AO
Helen Clift
Hon Peter Collins AM QC
Kay Cottee AO
Vice Admiral Russell Crane AO CSM
Stephen Crane
John Cunneen
Laurie Dilks
Dr Nigel Erskine
John Farrell
Dr Kevin Fewster CBE AM FRSA
Bernard Flack
Daina Fletcher
Sally Fletcher
Teresia Fors
CDR Geoff Geraghty AM
John Gibbins
Anthony Gibbs
RADM Stephen Gilmore AM CSC RAN
Paul Gorrick
Lee Graham
Macklan Gridley
VADM Mark Hammond AM
Sir James Hardy OBE AASA
RADM Simon Harrington AM
Jane Harris
Christopher Harry
Gaye Hart AM
Janita Hercus
Robyn Holt
William Hopkins OAM
Julia Horne
Kieran Hosty
RADM Tony Hunt AO
Marilyn Jenner
John Jeremy AM
Vice Admiral Peter Jones AO DSC
Hon Dr Tricia Kavanagh
John Keelty
Richard Keyes
Kris Klugman OAM
Judy Lee
Matt Lee
David Leigh
Keith Leleu OAM
Andrew Lishmund
James Litten
Hugo Llorens
Tim Lloyd
Ian Mackinder
Stephen Martin
Will Mather
Stuart Mayer
Bruce McDonald AM
Lyn McHale
VADM Jonathan Mead AO
Rob Mundle OAM
Alwyn Murray
Martin Nakata
David O’Connor
Gary Paquet
David Payne
Prof John Penrose AM
Neville Perry
Hon Justice Anthe Philippides
Peter Pigott AM
Len Price
Eda Ritchie AM
John Rothwell AO
Peter Rout
Kay Saunders AM
Kevin Scarce AC CSC RAN
David Scott-Smith
Sergio Sergi
Ann Sherry AO
Ken Sherwell
Shane Simpson AM
Peter John Sinclair AM CSC
Peter R Sinclair AC KStJ (RADM)
John Singleton AM
Brian Skingsley
Eva Skira AM
Bruce Stannard AM
J J Stephens OAM
Michael Stevens
Neville Stevens AO
Frank Talbot AM
Mitchell Turner
Adam Watson
Ian Watt AC
Jeanette Wheildon
Hon Margaret White AO
Mary-Louise Williams AM
Nerolie Withnall
Cecilia Woolford (née Caffrey)
Signals
ISSN 1033-4688
Editor Janine Flew
Staff Photographer Jasmine Poole
Design & production Austen Kaupe
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The Australian National Maritime Museum is a statutory authority of the Australian Government
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Mr Daniel Janes, Chairman
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Mr Tom O’Donnell
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