SS Waratah

SS Waratah was a passenger and cargo steamship built in 1908 for the Blue Anchor Line to operate between Europe and Australia. In July 1909, on only her second voyage, the ship, en route from Durban to Cape Town along the coast of what is present-day South Africa, disappeared with 211 passengers and crew aboard. No trace of her has ever been found, and her fate remains unknown.

Design and construction
In September 1907 W. Lund & Sons placed an order with Barclay Curle of Glasgow for a new cargo and passenger vessel to be delivered within twelve months that was specially designed for their Blue Anchor Line trade between the United Kingdom and Australia. The owners wanted the ship to be an improved version of their existing steamship SS Geelong, and therefore most specifications were based upon those of Geelong. The ship was laid down at Barclay Curle's Clydeholm Yard in Whiteinch and launched on 12 September 1908 (yard number 472), with Mrs J. W. Taverner, wife of the Agent-General of Victoria, being the sponsor. Waratah was of the spar-deck type and had three complete decks—lower, main and spar. The first-class accommodations were built on the promenade, bridge and boat decks and could house 128 passengers. In addition, a nursery was provided on the ship for the convenience of first-class passengers. The vessel also had third-class passenger accommodations constructed on the poop deck that could house upward of 300 people but were certified for only 160. The ship, constructed for both speed and luxury, had eight state rooms and a salon, the panels of which depicted its namesake flower, as well as a luxurious music lounge complete with a minstrel's gallery. With the aim of also being an emigrant ship, her cargo holds could be converted into large dormitories, capable of holding almost 700 steerage passengers on the outward journeys while, on the return journey, she could be laden with frozen meat, dairy products, wool and metal ore from Australia. To be able to carry frozen produce, her entire front end was fitted with refrigerating machinery and cold chambers. She was also fitted with Kirkcaldy's distilling apparatus, capable of producing 5500 impgal of fresh water a day. Waratah was not equipped with a radio, which was not unusual at the time.

Sea trials were held on 23 October 1908 on the Firth of Clyde, during which Waratah was able to successfully maintain a mean speed of 15 kn over several runs on the measured mile. After successful completion of sea trials, the steamship was handed over to her owners on the same day and immediately departed for London.

As built, Waratah was 465 ft long (between perpendiculars) and 59 ft abeam, a mean draft of 30 ft. Her tonnages were, , and about. The vessel had a steel hull, and two sets of quadruple expansion engines, with cylinders of 23 in, 32+1/2 in, 46+1/2 in and 67 in diameter, with a 48 in stroke, that provided a combined 1,003 nhp and drove two screw propellers, which moved the ship at up to 13+1/2 kn. Waratah had a cellular double bottom built along her entire length, and the hull was divided into eight watertight compartments which, it was claimed, rendered her "practically immune from any danger of sinking".

Waratah was named after the emblem flower of New South Wales, which appears to have been an unlucky name: one ship of that name had been lost off the island of Ushant in the English Channel in 1848, one in 1887 on a voyage to Sydney, another south of Sydney, and one in the Gulf of Carpentaria in 1897.

Service history
Following delivery, Waratah left London for her maiden voyage on 5 November 1908, with 689 third-class and 67 first-class passengers. She was under the command of Captain Josiah Edward Ilbery, a veteran of the Blue Anchor Line, with thirty years of nautical experience and a previous master of Geelong, and had a crew of 154. She left Cape Town on 27 November and reached Adelaide on 15 December 1908. Among her passengers were Hamilton Wickes, a newly appointed British Trade Commissioner for the Commonwealth, Dr. Anderson, Bishop of Riverina, and Octavius Beale, president of the Federal Council of Chambers of Manufactures.

While on her maiden voyage, early in the morning of 6 December 1908, Waratah's second officer reported a small fire in the lower starboard bunker, extending all the way to the engine room. The fire was largely brought under control by noon on the same day but continued reigniting until 10 December. The fire was apparently caused by the heat emitted by several reducing and steam valves located on the starboard side of the engine room. While the roof of the engine room was insulated, the starboard side evidently was not. The repairs were performed at Sydney to the chief engineer's satisfaction.

From Adelaide, Waratah proceeded to Melbourne and Sydney, and sailed back for London on 9 January 1909 via Australian, Colony of Natal and Cape Colony ports, carrying a cargo of foodstuffs, wool, and 1,500 tons of metal concentrates. She arrived in London on 7 March 1909 to finalise her maiden voyage. After unloading her cargo she was put into drydock, where she was inspected by the Lloyd's inspector and underwent some minor repairs.

During her maiden voyage, Waratah was scrutinised by Captain Ilbery and his crew, as one of the criteria used in acceptance trials was the ship's handling and stability. Ilbery was not completely satisfied and, considering he was previously in charge of Geelong, presumably reported to the owners that the ship did not have the same stability as his old vessel. He was especially concerned about the difficulty of properly loading the steamship to maintain her stability, which resulted in a heated exchange between the owners and the builders following the vessel's return to England. The subsequent inquiry into her sinking raised some disputed reports of instability on that voyage.



On 27 April 1909, Waratah set out on her second trip to Australia, carrying 22 cabin and 193 steerage passengers, in addition to a large cargo of general merchandise, with a crew of 119. The outward trip was largely uneventful, and the ship arrived at Adelaide on 6 June after touching off at Cape Town on 18 May. Upon loading about 970 tons of lead ore at Adelaide, the ship continued to Melbourne and had to plough through a strong gale, which also complicated her berthing upon arrival on 11 June. She continued on to Sydney where she loaded her cargo for the return voyage, consisting of, among other things, flour, wool, dairy, frozen meat, and 7,800 bars of bullion, and departed on 26 June. She stopped to complete her loading at Melbourne and Adelaide, and set out from Adelaide on 7 July, bound for Durban and Cape Town and continuing to Europe. Aside from almost 100 passengers, she also had on board a convict being extradited to Transvaal Colony, accompanied by two Transvaal policemen.

Waratah reached Durban at 11:00 AM 25 July, where one passenger, Claude Gustav Sawyer, a director of public companies and an experienced sea traveller, left the ship rather than continuing on aboard her to Cape Town. Sawyer instead booked passage on the Union Castle ship Kildonan Castle which departed Durban on 28 July and arrived in Table Bay harbor on 31 July. Sawyer remained in Cape Town for almost a week before securing passage back to England aboard another Union Castler steamer Galician. Just before departing for England on 5 August, Sawyer posted a telegram to his wife in care of his business associates which read: "Booked Cape Town, Thought Waratah Top-heavy, Landed Durban. Claude." Eighteen months later Sawyer testified at the Board of Trade inquiry that he had booked passage on Waratah as far as Cape Town, but had decided to disembark at Durban because he had become nervous about the behaviour of the ship during his voyage. He also claimed that he had been disturbed by visions he saw in dreams during the voyage of a man "dressed in a very peculiar dress, which I had never seen before, with a long sword in his right hand, which he seemed to be holding between us. In the other hand he had a rag covered with blood." Sawyer claimed that he took those visions to be a warning to leave the ship at the earliest opportunity. In any event, his decision to leave Waratah at Durban saved his life. The ship left Durban at about 20:15 hrs on 26 July with 211 passengers and crew.

Disappearance
At around 04:00 on 27 July, the Clan Line steamship Clan MacIntyre spotted a ship about 8 miles astern near Port St. John's and coming up fast. Just after 6:00 AM the faster ship came abeam of Clan MacIntyre and identified herself as Waratah by signal lamp. Over the next 25 minutes the crews continued to exchange pleasantries but soon the more powerful Waratah overtook and passed Clan MacIntyre, cutting in front of the slower Scottish freighter from staboard to port. Waratah continued to pull away from Clan MacIntyre, and by 9:30 AM disappeared over the horizon near the Bashee River delta. That was the last confirmed sighting of Waratah. Later that evening, the weather began to deteriorate, as is common in that area, with increasing wind and rough seas, developing into a cyclone by early morning hours of 28 July. The captain of Clan MacIntyre, Alexander Weir, stated that it was the worst storm he had experienced in his nineteen years sailing around the Cape of Good Hope, with winds of exceptional strength causing tremendous waves.



There were several further unconfirmed sightings: At around 5:30 PM on the 27th, the crew of the J. & C. Harrison freighter Harlow saw smoke on the horizon 14 to 15 miles astern. Two hours later after nightfall, Captain Albert John Bruce and his bridge crew spotted a light in the distance which they thought might be that of a steam ship coming up from behind. Smoke intermittently obsccured these lights prompting Bruce to wonder if perhaps the ship were on fire. When the mystery ship was by Bruce's estimation 5 miles away, two bright flashes appeared from the direction of the ship. The captain thought they were caused by explosions, but the mate and chief engineer of Harlow, who had also seen them, thought the flashes were brush fires on the shore; a common occurrence along the coastline at that time of year. Coming to this consensus, Bruce opted not to turn back to search for survivors, or even attempt to signal the mystery ship to see if she were in trouble. He also failed to enter the episode in the ships log. And none Harlow's crew bothered to report the incident to anyone upon arriving in Durban the next morning. It was only upon making port in the Philippines 53 days later and learning that Waratah was still missing did Bruce began to reevaluate what he had seen on the evening of the 27 July and try to rationalize the flashes as the death throes of Waratah. Reportedly, Harlow was 180 nmi from Durban.

That same evening at around 9:50 PM, the Union-Castle Line passenger steamer Guelph was eight miles off East London and steering northeast toward Durban. As Guelph came abeam of the Hood Point lighthouse, the ship's third officer, Thomas Blanchard, reported to the captain that he saw the lights of a passenger ship about five miles off their starboard rail and that he had made out a snippet of a lamp signal which read T A H. Even though the ships were within sight of one another for almost 20 minutes, no clarification of the clipped signal was attempted and no further communications were received from the mystery ship.

Another possible sighting was that of Edward Joe Conquer, a Cape Mounted Rifleman who, along with Signaller H. Adshead, was participating in military exercises in the hills overlooking the mouth of the Xhora River on 28 July. Conquer claimed that through a telescope he watched as a steamship matching Waratah's description struggle to make headway in heavy seas about 4 miles offshore. When the signalman looked again for the ship some time later, it was gone; leading Conquer to believe it had sunk. Conquer would later amend his story and claim that he actually saw the ship overwhelmed by a pair or large waves, roll over and sink. He also claimed he reported his amazing sighting to his base camp and to his Orderly Sergeant, but that neither decided to take the matter seriously. Curiously, no record of these alleged reports have ever been found. Most researchers today believe the Conquer's story was just a tall tale, particularly since he did not come forward with the story until 1929.

Waratah was expected to reach Cape Town on 29 July 1909, but never reached its destination. No trace of the ship has ever been found.

Contemporary searches
Initially, the non-appearance of the ship did not cause alarm because it was not uncommon for ships to arrive at port days, or occasionally even weeks overdue. As Waratah was considered unsinkable, it was at first thought likely that she had been delayed by a breakdown or mechanical fault, and was still adrift. Fears started to grow for her safety when ships which had left Durban after Waratah, and had travelled on a similar course, began arriving at Cape Town and reported having seen no sign of her en route. The first search effort was launched on 1 August, when the tugboat T.E. Fuller was sent out to look for any sign of the ship, but was forced to turn back after encountering dreadful weather. She later returned to search along the coast. The Royal Navy sent the cruisers HMS Pandora (1900) and HMS Forte (1893), and later HMS Hermes (1898), to search for Waratah. Hermes, near the area of the last sighting of Waratah, encountered waves so large and strong that she strained her hull and had to be placed in dry dock on her return to port. On 10 August 1909, a cable from Colony of Natal reached Australia, reading "Blue Anchor vessel sighted a considerable distance out. Slowly making for Durban. Could be the Waratah". The Chair of the House of Representatives in the Australian Parliament halted proceedings to read out the cable, saying: "Mr. Speaker has just informed me that he has news on reliable authority that the SS Waratah has been sighted making slowly towards Durban." In Adelaide, the town bells were rung. However, the ship in question was not Waratah.

Numerous other ships in the area joined the search, including Waratah's sister ship Geelong, which deviated from its course from Cape Town to Adelaide to search waters east of Colony of Natal, where Waratah was thought to be possibly drifting. The German steamship Goslar also kept special lookout for Waratah for 1262 miles of ocean while en route from Port Elizabeth to Melbourne.

On 13 August 1909, the steamship Insizwa reported sighting of several bodies off the mouth of Bashee (Mbashe) River, near the position of the last confirmed sighting of Waratah. The Captain of the steamer Tottenham also saw what he thought might be bodies in the water more than two weeks after Waratah disappeared. The tug Harry Escombe was sent out to search for bodies, but failed to find any. It did, however, find floating objects which resembled human bodies, which turned out to be whale offal and dead skate.

Many held out hope that Waratah was still afloat and drifting, basing their belief on what happened to the steamship SS Waikato in 1899. In June of that year, Waikato's propeller shaft snapped and could not be repaired at sea, leaving the ship to drift at the whims of elements for over 100 days and covering a distance of over 2500 nmi. Though she was sighted several times by other vessels, none were able to take her in tow until the steamer Asloun was finally able to secure a line to Waikato and tow her to Freemantle, Australia.

Waratah had enough provisions on board to last for a year but, because she lacked any radio equipment, she would have been unable to communicate with any ships beyond visual range. In September 1909, the Blue Anchor Line in conjunction with the Admiralty and the Australian government chartered the Union Castle cargo ship Sabine to search along the Waikato's drift course for Waratah. Sabine was fitted out with search lights and elevated crow's nests to aid in the search which operated round the clock. The search covered 14000 nmi, and zig-zagged across the southern Indian Ocean for almost 8 weeks without yielding any results. With no sighting of the ship for over four months, Waratah was officially posted as missing at Lloyd's of London on 15 December 1909. In early 1910, a group of Australian relatives of those lost aboardWaratah formed the Melbourne Search Committee and raised funds to outfit one final expedition to locate Waratah which they believed was still drifting in the frigid southern waters. The steamer Wakefield was chartered to conduct a four-month search, expanding the grid between the Sabine expedition limits and the Australian coast. Wakefield even landed crewmen on several of the uninhabited islands of the Kerguelen archipeligo to search for castaways. Like previous efforts, the Wakefield forray proved unsuccessful.

No confirmed wreckage or bodies from Waratah have ever been found, although there were a number of unconfirmed reports. In March 1910, wreckage was said to have been found at Mossel Bay. A life preserver, reportedly marked with the name "Waratah", washed up on the coast of New Zealand in February 1912. In 1925, Lt. D. J. Roos of the South African Air Force reported that he had spotted a wreck while he was flying over the Transkei coast. Though Roos professed that it was the wreck of Waratah, neither he nor anyone else ever saw the shipwreck again. Pieces of cork and timber were washed up near East London, South Africa in 1939 which some believed may have come from Waratah.

Later searches
A number of later efforts to locate a wreck have taken place, in particular undertaken by Emlyn Brown who was convinced that the sighting of Edward Joe Conquer held the key to Waratah's whereabouts. Under Brown's leadership, expeditions to locate Waratah took place in 1983, 1989, 1991, 1995 and 1997. In 1999, there were newspaper reports that Waratah had been found 10 km off the eastern coast of South Africa. A sonar scan conducted by Emlyn Brown's team had indeed located a wreck, the outline of which seemed to match that of Waratah. In 2001, however, a dive at the site revealed that the wreck was that of SS Nailsea Meadow, a cargo ship that a German U-boat had sunk in the Second World War. In 2004, Emlyn Brown, who had by then spent 22 years looking for Waratah, declared that he was giving up the search: "I've exhausted all the options. I now have no idea where to look", he said.

in 2009, Brown gave his opinion that Waratah possibly capsized in the storm; in his view, the upturned ship may have remained afloat for long enough to be carried south by currents, before finally sinking into the deep ocean beyond the continental shelf, where it cannot be easily located.

Inquiry
The Board of Trade inquiry into the disappearance was held in December 1910 at Caxton Hall in London. It quickly came to focus on the supposed instability of Waratah. Evidence was greatly hampered by the lack of any survivors from the ship's final voyage (other than the small number, including Claude Sawyer, who had disembarked in Durban). Most evidence came from passengers and crew from Waratah's maiden voyage, her builders and those who had handled her in port.

The expert witnesses all agreed that Waratah was designed and built properly and sailed in good condition. She had passed numerous inspections, including those by her builders, her owners, the Board of Trade and two by Lloyd's of London, who gave her the classification "+100 A1" – their top rating, granted only to ships Lloyds had inspected and assessed throughout the design, construction, fitting out and sea trials, on top of the two valuations and inspections Lloyds had made of the completed Waratah.

However, many witnesses who had travelled on the ship testified that Waratah felt unstable, frequently listed to one side even in calm conditions, rolled excessively, and was very slow to come upright after leaning into a swell, and had a tendency for her bow to dip into oncoming waves rather than ride over them. One passenger on her maiden voyage said that when in the Southern Ocean she developed a list to starboard to such an extent that water would not run out of the baths, and she held this list for several hours before rolling upright and then settling down to a similar list on the other side. This passenger, physicist Professor William Bragg, concluded that the ship's metacentre was just below her centre of gravity. When slowly rolled over towards one side, she reached a point of equilibrium and would stay leaning over until a shift in the sea or wind pushed her upright.

Other passengers and crew members commented on her lack of stability, and those responsible for handling the ship in port said she was so unstable when unladen that she could not be moved without ballast. But for every witness of this opinion, another could be found who said the opposite. Both former passengers and crew members (ranking from stokers to a deck officer) said Waratah was perfectly stable, with a comfortable, easy roll. Many said they felt she was especially stable. The ship's builders produced calculations to prove that even with a load of coal on her deck (that several witnesses claim she was carrying when she left Durban) she was not top heavy.



The inquiry was unable to make any conclusions from this mixed and contradictory evidence. It did not blame the Blue Anchor Line, but did make several negative comments in regard to the company's practices in determining the performance and seaworthiness of its new ships. Correspondence between Captain Ilbery and the line's managers show he commented on numerous details about the ship's fixtures, fittings, cabins, public rooms, ventilation and other areas, but failed to make any mention at the basic level of Waratah's seaworthiness and handling. Equally, the company never asked Captain Ilbery about these areas. This led some to speculate that Ilbery had concerns about Waratah and its stability, but deliberately kept such doubts quiet. However, it is also possible that neither he nor the Blue Anchor Line felt it necessary to cover such areas, because Waratah was heavily based on a previous (and highly successful) Blue Anchor ship, Geelong, and so Waratah's handling was assumed to be the same.

It is certainly true that many passenger ships of the period were made slightly top-heavy. This produced a long, comfortable but unstable roll, which many passengers preferred to a short, jarring but stable roll. Many trans-Atlantic liners were designed this way, and after a few voyages those operating them learnt how to load, ballast and handle them correctly and the ships completed decades of trouble-free service. It may have been Waratah's misfortune to encounter an unusually heavy storm or freak wave on only her second voyage, before she could be trimmed correctly. This slightly top-heavy design could also account for the strongly opposed opinions of witnesses about whether or not the ship felt stable. An inexperienced or uninformed person on the ship might conclude that the long, slow, soft roll of the ship felt comfortable and safe, whilst someone with more seagoing experience or a knowledge of ship design would have felt that the same motion was unstable. In regards to the witnesses claiming Waratah's instability in port when unladen, this may have been true. However, virtually all ocean-going ships (which are, after all, designed to carry a large weight of cargo) need to be ballasted to some extent when moved unladen, so Waratah was certainly not unique in this respect. The witnesses would have been well aware of this – that they still came forward to attest that they regarded Waratah as dangerously unstable in these conditions does suggest that the ship was exceptional in some respect.

Waratah was also a mixed-use ship. Passenger liners, with a small cargo volume relative to their gross register tonnage had fairly constant and predictable ballasting requirements. A ship like Waratah would carry a wide range of cargoes, including on the same voyage, making the matter of ballasting both more complex and more crucial. When she disappeared, Waratah was carrying a cargo of 1,000 tons of lead concentrate, which may have suddenly shifted, causing the ship to capsize.

The inquiry concluded that the three ships reporting potential sightings of Waratah on the evening of 26 July could not all have seen her given the distance between them and the time of the sightings, unless Waratah had reached Mbashe River and exchanged signals with Clan MacIntyre but then turned around and headed back to Durban, to be sighted by Harlow.

Theories


Theories which have been put forward to explain the disappearance include:

Freak wave
A theory advanced to explain the disappearance of Waratah is an encounter with a freak wave, also known as a rogue wave, in the ocean off the South African coast. Such waves are known to be common in that area of the ocean. It is most likely that Waratah, with what seems to be marginal stability and already ploughing through a severe storm, was hit by a giant wave. This either rolled the ship over outright or stove in her cargo hatches, filling the holds with water and pulling the ship down almost instantly. If the ship capsized or rolled over completely, any buoyant debris would be trapped under the wreck, explaining the lack of any bodies or wreckage in the area. This theory was given credibility through a paper by Professor Mallory of the University of Cape Town (1973) which suggested that waves of up to 20 metres (66 feet) in height did occur between Richards Bay and Cape Agulhas. This theory also stands up if Waratah is assumed to have been stable and seaworthy – several ships around the Cape of Good Hope have been severely damaged and nearly sunk by freak waves flooding their holds. Throughout the world ships such as Melanie Schulte (a German ship lost in the Atlantic Ocean) and MV Derbyshire (a British bulk carrier sunk in the Pacific Ocean) have suddenly broken up and sunk within minutes in extreme weather.

Some have also suggested that instead of sinking, the ship was incapacitated by a freak wave and, having lost her rudder and without any means of contacting land, was swept southwards towards Antarctica to either be lost in the open ocean or founder on Antarctica itself. No evidence except the absence of the wreck supports this theory.

Cargo shift
Waratah was carrying in her cargo holds around 1,000 tons of lead and 300 tons of lead ore concentrate, which is known under certain circumstances to liquefy due to the motion of the ship. This can affect the stability of the ship due to the free surface effect, potentially causing it to capsize. Today, ore concentrate is treated as hazardous cargo, with special measures required for its transport in ships; however, in 1909 there was little awareness about the dangers of carrying this material.

Whirlpool
Both at the time of the disappearance and since, several people have suggested that Waratah was caught in a whirlpool created by a combination of winds, currents and a deep ocean trench, several of which are known to be off the southeast coast of Africa. This would explain the lack of wreckage, but there is no firm evidence that a whirlpool of sufficient strength to almost instantly suck down a 450 ft ocean liner could be created as suggested.

Explosion
Given the evidence from the officers of Harlow (see above), it has been speculated that Waratah was destroyed by a sudden explosion in one of her coal bunkers. Coal dust can certainly self-combust and in the right proportions of air be explosive. However, no single bunker explosion would cause a ship the size of Waratah to sink instantly, without anyone being able to launch a lifeboat or raft, and without leaving any wreckage.

Aftermath
Waratah's disappearance, the inquiry and the criticism of the Blue Anchor Line generated much negative publicity. The line's ticket sales dropped drastically and, coupled with the huge financial loss taken in the building of Waratah which, like many ships of the time, was under-insured, forced the company to sell its other ships to its main competitor P&O, and declare voluntary liquidation in 1910.

In 1913, a Brisbane newspaper, The Daily Mail, suspected its competitor The Daily Standard was copying its news stories. So The Daily Mail published a hoax article claiming that Waratah had been discovered in Antarctica. The Daily Standard also published the story and added a statement from the harbourmaster.

Memorials


A plaque in the Parish Church at Buckland Filleigh, Devon, England, commemorates Col. Percival John Browne. He was returning to England on Waratah, from his sheep farm in Mount Gambier, South Australia. His family home was Buckland House.

A plaque to the memory of Howard Cecil Fulford, the ship's surgeon, was erected in the chapel by his fellow students at Trinity College (University of Melbourne).

In the Parish Church of St Wilfrid, Bognor Regis, England, is a plaque: "The church gates were given in memory of Harris Archibald Gibbs who was drowned at sea in the SS Waratah".

In the main church in Aberystwyth, Wales, is a plate "in happy memory of John Purton Morgan, 3rd Officer SS Waratah lost at sea 1909".

A memorial in Higher Cemetery, Exeter, Devon, commemorates Thomas Newman "drowned in SS Waratah 27th July 1909".

A centenary plaque was unveiled at the Queenscliffe Maritime Museum, Victoria, Australia, on 27 July 2009.

Cultural impact
The story of Waratah, with the loss of 211 people, has often been compared with that of RMS Titanic which sank three years later, with the loss of over 1,500 people. Consequently, Waratah has been referred to variously as the "Titanic of the southern seas", the "Titanic of the south" or, alternatively, "Australia's Titanic".

Geoffrey Jenkins 1971 novel Scend of the Sea includes a fictional account of the Waratah mystery.