Hell Ship

by Michael Veitch

  Christopher had been able to bear the grief of the beach no longer. Besides, he sensed his turn too would surely come if he stayed there amid the death of the quarantine station. With another young man whose name has now been forgotten, one evening he simply decided to take a walk along the beach away from the station and not return. They had told his father, who was in no position to object. He was too busy looking after his wife, Christopher’s mother Helen, but gave them the address of her cousins in Melbourne and told them to find them and tell them what had happened. Christopher and the unknown young man set out on their trek along the beach, neither knowing nor caring where it was leading, nor how they were going to get there. All they knew was that the settlement of Port Phillip was somewhere to the north, at the end of this beach. Exactly how far that was, they had no idea.

  For two weeks they had walked, hugging the shore where they could, or scrambling over cliffs. They drank from puddles in the rocks, and their only sustenance came courtesy of the Aboriginal people who ate the shellfish on the shore, and a couple of surprised but kindly squatters or leaseholders who took pity on the lads and their story, furnishing them with an occasional meal.

  They crossed rivers and creeks, sleeping where they could and travelling when they were able. Eventually, they came across a few outlying dwellings, which then became more frequent before passing, without them realising, the former quarantine station at Little Red Bluff, now abandoned. It was hard going and exhausting, but eventually they arrived in Melbourne, worn out after an overland journey of nearly 60 miles. At no time, despite the hardship, had they for an instant been tempted to return to the camp at the beach. Exactly how Christopher McRae managed to find his way to the address in Coburg has endured in the family as a minor miracle.

  The tragedy of the McRae family was not yet finished. Three days into the new year, 1853, having lost four of her seven children, Helen McRae became one of the Ticonderoga’s final victims and also died, to be buried alongside her children: Janet, Farquhar, John and Malcolm. Having travelled so far from Scotland, she never did manage to again meet with her cousin Granny McRae in Coburg.

  27

  A visit from the Governor

  The Australian summer began, and the people of the quarantine station were jolted into the realities of a climate that was entirely alien to them. Fair Celtic complexions that had never known harsh sunlight were now seared, first red then, eventually, a deep nut brown. Even the light had been a revelation, with the glare of the Australian sky forcing eyes to squint constantly in ways they had never had to do except at the very height of northern hemisphere summer—and even then only on a handful of days. Then there were the flies, which seemed to balloon exponentially in great black crawling clouds as the quarantine camp became established, feeding and breeding in the waste and remains of butchered animals, poorly disposed of in shallow pits. Little more than waving branches and smoke from fires could keep them at bay.

  Cooking facilities remained basic, as did the water supply, which came exclusively from wells sunk into the sand and, thankfully, did not run dry and the food was plentiful and nutritious, being regularly supplied from the nearby cattle estates of Mr Barker and others. Some of the lime-burners whose leases remained intact—there were six issued on that part of the peninsula in all—were also able to make money selling eggs, milk and a range of other supplies from their smallholdings outside the boundaries of the camp.

  Slowly, as the weeks went by, the health of most of the 300–400 patients (the precise figure is difficult to pin down) began to improve. Time passed slowly for both the healthy and the healing passengers, spent in long walks along the beach and the surrounding dunes, and among the twisted and alien trunks of the ti-trees, unlike any vegetation the passengers had ever seen in the glens or on the western isles of their old home of Scotland.

  The sea, now that they were not actually on it, seemed beautiful and ever-changing, with the calmness of the bay in front of them contrasting with the drama of the open ocean just the other side of their little peninsula, in places only a few hundred yards to their rear. The infestation of typhus-carrying lice, so compounded in the sardine-like confines of the ship, here began to lessen as people were at last able to spread out. While there is no anecdotal evidence of sea bathing having taken place, it would be safe to assume at least some did occur, in which case the cleansing effect of washing away lice from the body would have been profound.

  For many, simply the rest, walking along the shore and observing the changing moods and colours of the ocean and rocks were enough to begin the process of emotionally healing from the terrors of the voyage and its aftermath. The most serious cases remained on board the Lysander, and many of those would make up the 70 or so people who would die at the station between the arrival of the Ticonderoga in early November and the first days of 1853. Drs Veitch and Sanger were as busy as they had ever been during this period; however, with fresh food and medical supplies now available, their tasks became easier, as they saw by the numbers of deaths gradually declining and the recovery rate among patients gradually increasing.

  Annie Morrison remained steadfast to the task she had undertaken since the early days of the epidemic, continuing to assist in the care, and now recovery, of the sick. In the many weeks since Dr Veitch’s desperate call for volunteers, Annie had long since exceeded all expectations. As she grew from the role of assistant to something far more important, he had come increasingly to appreciate her knowledge of each patient and their continually changing condition. Steadily, he came to rely not only on her tireless dedication but on her quietly soothing presence.

  The recovering passengers were not quite as alone as they had first supposed. From the beach, excellent views were to be had of the many ships that daily passed back and forth, heading either out of the Rip or entering the bay and travelling up to Melbourne, a city still being inundated with people in search of gold. The passengers watched the busy pilots—the same ones who had guided them over to the cove—going about their daily business of leading bigger ships, full of cargo and hopeful passengers, through the difficult Heads and into the lanes. As the weeks of incarceration went by, many wished they too could be on board one of those ships and escape the monotony of their closed beach settlement, but close as they were in yards, they may as well have been a thousand miles distant.

  Nor was the newly opened—albeit still rudimentary—quarantine station the exclusive preserve of those from the Ticonderoga. Although it would not be officially gazetted until the following year, nor fully completed with permanent buildings until 1855, Point Nepean was now very much in use, and other ships flying the yellow flag also began to drop anchor in the cove. None, however, presented a case as serious as the Ticonderoga, and most lingered only a few days or a week, their passengers strictly confined to their ship, before once again departing.

  In the second week of December, Thomas Hunt returned to take up residence on the Lysander. From here, he could direct the progress of the construction of the station proper, which was slowly getting under way, as well as inspect the state of the Ticonderoga’s passengers. It is presumed, too, that he had quietly lost faith in his appointee, Dr Taylor, and wished to keep a closer eye on him before his replacement could be organised.

  A few days later, on 12 December, the camp became abuzz with the news that Governor La Trobe himself would be making a personal visit, and staying overnight in one of the staterooms of the Lysander—presumably situated a safe distance from the suffering and dying typhus patients in the ship’s hospital ward. Late that afternoon, the government schooner, HM Boomerang, glided into view and tied up alongside the great hulk of the Lysander. At a time when such persons were the true celebrities of the day, from the beach the passengers strained to secure as best a view as they could of His Excellency, some catching a glimpse of his slim blue uniformed figure as it made its way from the smaller vessel to the larger one.

  It was at dinner on board the Lysander that evening that La
Trobe, perhaps a little too carried away in the moment, and without consulting his own Chief Health Officer, Dr Hunt, made the offer to Dr Taylor of continuing to run the quarantine station a permanent one, in front of a no doubt astonished and possibly furious Hunt, who rescinded the appointment soon afterwards in any case. To Taylor’s deep and justified dismay, His Excellency, it seems, was happy to let the contradiction of his directive stand.

  Christopher McRae and his friend were probably not the only ones to escape the beach camp, evade the guarding constables on the boundary line and make their own way north, but details are sketchy. Donald McDonald recalled, in a January 1917 edition of The Argus, that some restless passengers, ‘hearing the continued call of the siren of Bendigo and Fiery Creek, bolted like Buckley of an earlier time, and made the toilsome circuit of the eastern shore’.

  It is from McDonald also that we learn that some may have even found some romance to pass the time. The lime-burners, evicted to the boundaries of the station, were nevertheless suddenly in the proximity of a large amount of single females, and those who were healthy had a good deal of time on their hands. As McDonald somewhat eloquently put it in his article:

  These gallants of the lime pits saw few women, and amongst the ‘souls’ of the Ticonderoga were spinsters still comely, others hardy, if not handsome. So the lime-burners broke bounds upon one side, and the maidens upon the other. Once again, love laughed at locksmiths and quarantine became a name.

  Some, at least, made the attempt to engage in more cerebral pastimes, such as Charles McKay, who had travelled with his wife Margaret and their five children to take up a role as head of the prestigious Scotch College, and who had performed the role of schoolmaster on board the Ticonderoga. It appears that he made attempts to establish something similar on shore, seeking the help of the person who had performed the same role in the women’s quarters, Isabella Renshaw. It seems to have not been a success, however, mainly due to Miss Renshaw herself becoming sick with fever during her time in quarantine.

  As McKay would have realised, many of the faces to whom he had taught a few of the basics of reading and writing on the ship in the earlier stages of the voyage—as well as empowering some of them to sign their name for the first time—were now gone. He was aware, too, of his good fortune in that none of his family had caught the awful fever, and perhaps was civic-minded enough to wish to continue to give back to the small, deeply scarred community of which he was now a part. For his tireless efforts, both on the ship and on shore, McKay was eventually awarded the princely sum of £5.

  Miss Renshaw was not nearly so lucky. Having been voted by the single girls with whom she travelled to be their matron and guardian, then having watched over them as they mixed with the other passengers on those risqué evenings spent on the warm deck as they passed over the equator, delighting all with their sweet voices singing the beautiful songs of the Highlands and feet moving swiftly in country dancing, and then having seen them fall, one by one, to the dreaded and unstoppable disease, cooling their brows and soothing them with words, Isabella Renshaw, 38, herself died at the quarantine station on 18 November.

  In front of them, still anchored where she had disgorged her human cargo weeks before, lay the Ticonderoga, still a beautiful ship, now emptied of her passengers and thoroughly cleaned inside and out with limewater and whitewash. She would not stay empty for long.

  28

  The last journey

  On 19 December, Dr Hunt, who had spent the last few days satisfying himself that the crisis was abating, gave the all-clear for the Ticonderoga to leave and complete the final stage of her long journey from Birkenhead to Port Phillip. Some passengers, though, now employed by the government in quarantine, were more than happy with their lot and elected to stay on at the cove, which would become known as Ticonderoga Bay as the station became established.

  In her extensive research, Mary Kruithof has discovered the identities of those who remained behind as their fellow passengers departed.1 James Swan, having travelled from Ayrshire with his wife Margaret and four-year-old son, and who was employed as one of the first of the station cooks, felt he had landed himself an excellent position. Some of the stonemasons—Robert Taylor, Alexander Gardiner and Henry Goodrich—likewise thought the terms of 6 shillings a day offered by Captain Ferguson to start building the station’s first structures agreeable, and decided to remain there.

  As more passengers recovered and more were released from the Lysander, the employed hospital attendants were also let go. This was not so for the Fanning family, who chose to stay on the Lysander, which for the time being would be a permanent part of the station, continuing to serve as a floating hospital. Having set the most sterling example in being among the first of the few at sea to answer the captain’s and the doctors’ calls for volunteer nurses, they continued to do so at the station, Mary as a nurse and John as a cook.

  For the majority of those still on the beach, however, the time was approaching to leave it behind. Early on the morning of 22 December, Dr Hunt gave the final signal to depart and, once again, the Ticonderoga’s passengers began the difficult process of embarkation. Unlike at Birkenhead, however, there was no dock on which to line up, and certainly no brass band playing them off on their way. It was nevertheless another tediously slow process, with the ship’s rowboats being the only means of ferrying people and their luggage to the ship.

  None had been in greater need of the weeks of enforced rest than Captain Boyle, who had not only exhausted himself in the course of the terrible voyage, but had lost his own brother on the day they landed. Some of the passengers had not even realised that Boyle was still among them on the beach camp, but now he was quite literally back at the helm, directing the little flotilla of boats and again issuing commands to the crew in preparation to sail.

  It took many hours for the hundreds of passengers, as well as their luggage, to be reloaded onto the ship. Many had dreaded the idea of ever setting foot on her again, and would have preferred the trials of any kind of overland route to Melbourne if one could have been arranged. For the many passengers who had lost family members while at sea, it was a particularly unwelcome reunion with the vessel, associating it as they did with nothing but death, filth and suffering. A handful of patients, still gravely ill, remained on the Lysander with their supporting families—some to recover, others to be numbered among the Ticonderoga’s final dead. For those who had the capacity to comprehend it, however, the imminent departure of the Ticonderoga while they remained in hospital must have seemed a death sentence in itself.

  As soon as people stepped foot on board the Ticonderoga, they immediately felt they could have been on a different vessel entirely. The ship they had remembered from the voyage was now almost unrecognisable.

  The first thing they noticed was the smell—or rather, the lack of it. The revolting typhus stench of hundreds of dead and dying people, which had seemed to pervade the very beings of those subjected to its stink, was now gone, replaced by the strong, acrid waft of the limewater that the crew had applied to every surface. The deck was tidy, ropes were properly coiled and a sense of order prevailed. That section where, several weeks earlier, corpses awaiting burial had been piled horribly under a rough piece of canvas was now just another part of the foredeck.

  Down below, the difference was even more stark. Several fresh coats of whitewash had transformed the filth and gloom of the voyage’s terrible denouement into a clean and orderly internal area that, on account of all the bunks having been disposed of, was also now remarkably more spacious. This, ironically, left precious few places to sit, and passengers now had to squeeze themselves and their trunks into any nook they could secure for the several hours’ journey up to Hobson’s Bay.

  Before their departure, all those on deck, having once again picked out some of their better clothes for their belated arrival into Melbourne, stood transfixed as the last of the rowboats returned to the ship, laden not with people, but with some of the large pile o
f luggage that had, for all the weeks of quarantine, been kept out of the weather at a quiet corner of the beach. This colourful collection of trunks and boxes was the luggage of the dead, being brought solemnly back to the ship, the names of their deceased owners still clearly marked on the sides. The passengers watched the melancholy progress of the little boats quietly, as if observing a funeral procession. Then their eyes turned back to the shore, to the cemetery that had started as a patch of green but that now held nearly 70 of those who would never complete their journey. Even from the deck, some of the graves could be made out, marked by raw blocks of sandstone pulled up from the beach or some bits of timber purloined from the ship. Other graves were more pathetic, and perhaps even more poignant, indicated by nothing more than a couple of sticks nailed into a little cross. Many other passengers were simply buried in unmarked graves, decorated with little scatterings of seashells, pebbles and some of the more colourful wildflowers that abound on the peninsula in spring.

  Weighing anchor at last, the Ticonderoga caught some of the warm wind blowing from the west and, again under the command of Thomas Boyle, turned away from the little beach forever.

  29

  The Maitland

  The sight that greeted the people on board the Ticonderoga as she approached Melbourne’s port in Hobson’s Bay was an astonishing one. Even in ports much larger than this, Captain Boyle noted, it would be rare to find such a forest of masts. Dozens and dozens of ships of all sizes lay before them in the bay, and all with their sails reefed and their decks utterly empty—abandoned in a ghost town of sail. This was a picture of a city drained by a gold rush. For some time now, ships’ masters had been reluctant to even tie up at the Hobson’s Bay wharf, as their crews would immediately descend the rails and bolt off, seeking the quickest way to the goldfields. Standing off in deeper water, however, had done little to slow the practice, as smaller boats—keen to charge seamen a premium for quickly spiriting them away under the noses of their captains—had probably made more money than they could ever have hoped to at the Ballarat diggings.