SHIPWRECK MARVELS –IF ONLY THE PEACOCK COULD TALK!

Imagine if remnants of the Shipwreck Coast could talk? A rusty anchor at Wreck Beach might shout of disaster. The fabled Mahogany Ship might whisper up her secrets from beneath the dunes. The Lady Bay Lighthouse might rejoice in the ships she safely guided … and weep for those she didn’t.

For Justin Croft, Collections Creator at Warrnambool’s Flagstaff Hill Maritime Museum (below), listening to and sharing the ‘voices’ of the coast’s rich maritime history is all in a day’s work.

“It’s our job to care for and interpret the artefacts so visitors can enjoy and appreciate them, and understand their stories,” Justin said. “They’re an entry into past events and social history, telling us about not only shipwrecks but everyday life in another time.”

Justin’s favourite in the collection is the Loch Ard Peacock, also Australia’s most valuable shipwreck artefact (value: $4-plus million).

In 1878, the 144 cm tall ceramic peacock statue was being transported from England to Melbourne aboard the clipper Loch Ard, bound for the Melbourne International Exhibition of 1880 (the first official World’s Fair in the Southern Hemisphere). The ship was tragically wrecked at Loch Ard Gorge and, along with only two survivors, the peacock made it to shore.

“The peacock has an amazing tale of survival and so many different story angles,” Justin said. “It was rescued not once, but twice from the sea and dragged up the cliffs to safety. It never made it to the exhibition. Its head was broken off (maybe twice) and its beak chipped. It’s been on quite a journey. If only it could talk!” flagstaffhill.com

If so, the peacock might share details about its doublerescue or spending almost a century in private homes in Geelong and Heidelberg before being rediscovered and acquired by the museum.

For now, Justin and the museum team continue to research and share the peacock’s many stories among those of countless other shipwreck objects, listed buildings and remnants in the collection, and in the wild along the Shipwreck Coast.

Wreck Beach

At Wreck Beach in Gellibrand Lower in the Great Otway National Park, the remnant anchors of the Marie Gabrielle and the Fiji are evocative reminders of the treachery of the ocean on the Shipwreck Coast.

The legend of the Mahogany Ship

For more than 170 years, treasure hunters and historians have searched for a wrecked, dark-timbered ship they called the ‘Mahogany Ship’. The wreck was said to have been sighted in the sand dunes between Warrnambool and Port Fairy, and then never seen again. Myth or mystery – the legend lives on.

BUDJ BIM –