REGULAR FEATURES
The Story of
WRECK BAY
T
his is a story of how an addiction to alcohol set in motion a series of calamities that almost destroyed the lives of 300 people. It is the story of two men, one a belligerent alcoholic, Captain John Thomas Nutting, the other a courageous and capable young man, his Chief Officer, Edward Canney. In 1835, they were both appointed to Hive, a ship built in the UK at Deptford, Kent in 1820. She was rigged with two decks, a square stern and quarter galleries. Hive was 37 metres in length and of 440 tonnes. She had made her first voyage to NSW in 1834 with 250 male prisoners. On 24 August 1835, Hive departed for NSW after picking up prisoners in Dublin and Cork. Several times during the voyage, Canney had queried his captain’s navigational instructions after doing his own calculations. When he tried to advise Nutting that he was out
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in his reckoning, he was ordered by Nutting to, "Mind your own business”, blasting Canney with his boozy breath. “One person is sufficient to navigate the ship," he raged. Despite their differences, the voyage had so far been uneventful, aided by the perfect conditions they enjoyed throughout the trip. On Thursday 10 December, after 109 days sailing across 13,000 miles of ocean, Sydney Town was only a day's cruise away. When land was sighted earlier in the day, Canney had warned the captain that the course he was setting might bring them too close in during the night. Nutting yelled at Canney once more to, “Mind your own business!”. When third mate Thomas Morgan took over for the night watch, Canney again expressed concern, but the captain was dismissive. After posting lookouts, he ordered the ship be kept under full sail, then retired to his cabin. At about 9pm, after an ordinary night at sea, 250 convicts were locked, as usual, in their prison deck. Their guard, numbering 29 soldiers from the 28th Regiment, were mostly relaxing below, a lucky few
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with their wives and children. The commander of the guard, 25-year-old Lt Edward Lugard, was in his cabin. The surgeon Dr Anthony Donoghue was busy updating documents he must hand to officials in Sydney. He recorded that it had been an uneventful voyage, “… no extreme weather, no attempted mutinies, few people seeking medical attention and were just as likely to be soldiers as prisoners”. Nutting was in his cabin indulging in some mysterious activity that later evidence suggested was, “… linked to the contents of a bottle”. Canney too went below but he remained uneasy. Shortly before 10pm, an alarmed Morgan burst into Canney's cabin, blurting out the dire news, "There's something white on the port bow. It looks like breakers." Canney rushed on deck yelling, "Hard-a-port!" On a vessel like Hive, this would turn her to starboard, away to clear water. But it was too late to manoeuvre. Under full sail and carried forward by the swell, Hive began running through sand. She started to wedge, then stopped with a hard jolt that knocked many over. From a relaxed atmosphere, the shock of running aground
was magnified. "The confusion and terror that prevailed at this time is not to be described," wrote one of the passengers, “Women screamed and kept screaming. Children wailed in fright. On the prison deck, men, at risk of death, yelled and swore mutiny if they were not released”. Confusion below was matched by confusion and strife above. By the time Captain Nutting appeared on deck, Canney had ordered the topsail furled and the mainyards back. The captain was furious. "Who the hell ordered the foretop cluedup?" he demanded. "I did, sir. I was trying to make her turn off," Canney replied. When Nutting countermanded what he had done, Canney forced the issue by asking formally for orders. But Nutting, suddenly tired of the argument said, "Do what you think best," and retired below. Canney organized the crew to furl all sails fore and aft and to prepare the longboat for hoisting. Hive remained locked in the sand. Canney told all to remain calm in their quarters until first light. Nutting remained in his cabin. As dawn began to light the
