The Cardinia was a ‘Jubilee-rigged’ ship. About the time of Queen Victoria’s Diamond Jubilee, many sailing vessels were built without royal-sails above their double topgallant and double topsails. In the photo the upper topgallant sails are not set.
In the early months of World War I, all German-owned ships that were within Australian waters were taken by the government as ‘prizes of war’. The Commonwealth took 28 prizes from Germany: 23 steamers and five sailing vessels. Four of these were four-masted barques but one, the Olinda, was a ‘Jubilee-rigged’ ship.
The Olinda was a large steel sailing ship built in Scotland for a German owner in 1903. At 1915 gross register tons and a length of 80.6m, she was near the limit for a three-masted ship.
When taken as a prize, the Olinda was renamed Cardinia. She was chartered to Scott, Fell & Co, as were three of the other sailing vessels, all of which were lost to enemy action during the war. Though carrying wheat to England on at least one voyage during 1916 and 1917, Cardinia was lucky, as two of the other ‘prize’ sailing ships were torpedoed and the other one bombed.
During the war years the Cardinia brought sugar from Mauritius and carried coal to the West Coast of South America and to Buenos Aires. In 1918 she carried coal to Canada and brought back a very large cargo of timber, and in August that year she arrived in Melbourne from New York.
After the war was over, on April 25, 1919, she brought to Sydney the largest cargo of paper ever transported from Canada by a sailing vessel, and in August 1920 she arrived in Melbourne with a large cargo of oats from Buenos Aires. In July 1921, the Cardinia made a very fast passage with coal from Newcastle to Auckland, crossing the Tasman Sea in around four days.
By the 1920s, however, there were few cargoes offered to sailing ships, as most trade was in steamers. Her final passage was in October 1923, when she carried a cargo of coal to Fiji. She was then loaded with a cargo of copra and left Levuka during the afternoon of September 23, 1923. In light breezes that night, she was wrecked when carried onto a reef by a current. All crew members were saved.
MAURIE HUTCHINSON
President, Peninsula Ship Society
T: 9787 5780
The Peninsula Ship Society meets at Hastings Yacht Club at 10.00am on the fourth Tuesday of each month (except November and December). Visitors are always welcome.
