SEAWARD, the Mystery Yacht--Part 2, Dick Wellington.

Hugh Herd had bought Seaward in Wellington to take her on a cruise, emulating the exploits of Johnny Wray in hisNgataki. It is likely that both men had the same impulse, to get away from sad, Depression-ridden New Zealand and head north to the atolls and high islands of the Pacific, so close to our doorstep. The search for lost simplicity and freedom from the chains of our increasingly artificial technological culture still goes on in our society, taking many forms, but young men of the 1930s had their imaginations captured by the extraordinary voyages of men like Capt. Slocum in Spray, Capt. Voss in Tilikum and Alain Gerbault in Firecrest. They saw the solution to the malaise of western society in adventure and self-sufficiency afloat.

Auckland was a favourite port of call for many of the shoe-string circumnavigators of the time who berthed at the bottom of Queen Street and were feted by Auckland’s yachtsmen. The most recent adventurer had been Norwegian ErlingTambs with his family on the stout Colin Archer redningskoite pilot boat Teddy in 1931. When Johnny Wray crewed on Teddy while she was in Auckland he developed a voracious thirst for offshore cruising and for a boat like Teddy. He was left with no option, as he saw it, but to construct a yacht and sail away to the islands of the Pacific.

In this column I have written about Johnny and his yacht Ngataki and her preservation in Auckland by the TinoRawa Trust as one of this country’s yachting icons. Her first voyage was in September 1934, to Sunday Island in the Kermadecs, Tonga and Norfolk Island during which Johnny taught himself to navigate on the hoof. Ngataki arrived back in Auckland in time to start in the Trans-Tasman race to Melbourne in December 1934 in which the only other entrant was German Georg Dibbern in his 32ft ketch TeRapunga. As we saw in the first part of this article, ,Hugh Herd had decided on his arrival in Auckland in July 1934 against having a cruise to the Pacific and then, later, decided against taking part in the Trans-Tasman race. I think it is likely that he had been in touch with Johnny Wray for some time and perhaps they had contemplated cruising in company to Sunday Island. There’s no doubt at all, however,that they met in Auckland in late 1934 and that Johnny’s crewman Dick Wellington got to have a good look overSeaward.

Daniel (Dick) Wellington was born in 1912 in Penang but emigrated to New Zealand with his parents in 1921. In the 1930s he lived with his father at 24 Curran Street, St. Mary’s Bay, right in the centre of Auckland’s yachting energy, then later at Hattaway Avenue, Bucklands Beach. His first yacht was the 1893Chas. Bailey Jr.-built yawl Daisy in which he cruised the Hauraki Gulf extensively between 1933 and 1934 but sold her to Fred Norris of Devonport when he went off with Johnny Wray on Ngataki. While crewing on Ngataki during her Pacific escapades, Dick had taught himself to navigate and gained extensive offshore experience in all conditions

While ashore in Auckland, Dick worked as a storeman, but I suspect that, like his mate Johnny Wray, he may have received some support from his father for his chosen life. There were also numerous larks between off-shore trips. For example, when in 1935 Auckland yachtsman Shelley B. Atkinson bought the 43ft ketchNeva, built in Rawene on the Hokiangaharbour by J.S. Banner in 1934, hecommissioned Johnny Wray and Dick Wellington to sail her around North Cape to Auckland,renamedTeHongi. She had been built as a centreboarder, but no centreplate had been fitted. With a fair wind, they crossed the Hokianga Bar and made good progress until 6 miles off Cape Maria Van Diemen when a hard northwest gale arose. Her inability to go to weather and stand up in a blow resulted in Wray and Wellington deciding to turn back but, leaking badly, they put down both anchors close in off the Ahipara end of the Ninety Mile Beach. On the morning of 25th June 1935, still in a full gale, by now blowing directly onshore, TeHongidragged ashore on the last of the sandy beach, where locals were ready to drag her up the beach with a bullock team. The two companions took out several tons of inside ballast (mostly sand bags) and set about repairing and recaulking her, soon joined by Auckland boatbuilderSam Ford, himself a great character. After three weeks of hard work, a settled easterly enabled the three men to refloat her on her side using the bullock team to drag her back down the beach and laid a weighted anchor well out to haul her through the surf, keeping her on her side by pinning her down with her sails. After a quick trip down the coastshe crossed the Manukau bar under power and berthed at Onehunga wharf on 16th July from where she was trucked to Sam Ford’s yard in Ellerslie for major work. It had been a great feat of seamanship and salvage. After relaunching she was renamed Lady Edna and registered as B21.

In April 1936 Dick skippered the yacht Ariel from Auckland to Sydney for her owner, Chris Fell of Russell. Ariel was built by Roy Lidgard for himself in 1931, a 32 footer registered as C16. Bitten with the offshore bug too, Chris bought the yacht in 1934, had her lengthened by 4 feet and converted her to yawl rig for the voyage.At the end of a very pleasant five weeks’ trip by way of Norfolk and Lord Howe islands Ariel was hauled out at Rushcutters Bay on arrival in Sydney and sold, plans to go on to the Great Barrier Reef abandoned. Returning to Auckland, Dick crewed for George Mills-Palmer on his new Percy Vos-built 45ft ketch Soubrette on a trip to Suva and back during September-October 1936.

In 1937, Dick and Keith Dawson bought the little yacht Roxane to repeat and complete the Ariel plan “and possiblygo on to Java”. Roxanehad been designed and built by the Tercel brothers in 1934 for A. E. Fisher of Whangarei. She was relatively tiny for the task at 26ft 3in loa and 8ft beam; an Austin 7 engine was winkled in as a cheap auxiliary and the bermudan rig was reduced in height. With one crew member, Les O’Brien, they set off on 24th May 1937.It was a stormy trip, crammed with incident. The news clipping relates an experience they had at Norfolk Island.In fact, on arrival back, the yacht had no anchor,so Les O’Brien swam ashore in Cascade Bay in a life-jacket to summon help and an anchor was taken out.Roxanethen followed Ariel’s track, visited Lord Howe andreached Sydney on 16th Julyafter sailing through a bombing exercise off the Heads. Then, after a successful trip to the Great Barrier Reef, they sold Roxane and she stayed in Australia.

Dick Wellington returned to Auckland and bought Seaward from Hugh Herd. For offshore work she offered him hugely more room and stability than either Ariel or Roxane. Herworking boat origins, with massive construction and generous beam,made her an ideal Ngataki substitute and companion vessel. I imagine the price was right too as she had been in Auckland for over three years and had possibly not received a great deal of maintenance during that time.

I confess I have strayed somewhat from the Seaward story this month, but who could blame me for being hi-jacked byswashbucklerslike Wray and Wellington? Next month we’ll see what adventures Dick Wellington got up to with Seaward.

SIDEBAR

I was delighted with some immediate feedback on Part I of this article. Here’s part of an email from Bill Bourke .

My information on Herd only applies to his war years. Herd was the Skipper of ML 432 ex Singapore on which my Father Sub. Lt W. (Bill) A. Bourke RNZNVR (Squadron Member) was second in command. After leaving Singapore during the evacuation, 432 ran aground while trying to evade Japanese aircraft. They managed to get her off on the next high tide but at least one of the vessel’s propellers had been damaged reducing her speed to c. 14knots. In common with hundreds of other vessels escaping Singapore she was intercepted by a Japanese cruiser and escorted intact to Muntok on Banka Island. From there after a few weeks, they were transferred to Palembang, Sumatra, there to begin an increasingly harrowing time as POW’s. John Maddever also ended up in the same Palembang camps, but how he got there is unknown to me – probably on one of the many vessels that were captured or sunk by the Japanese blockade.

On May 25th 1945, Herd and Maddever were transferred to Changi by the Japanese, along with around 400 odd remaining Senior officers and some other ranks classified as “Fit for light duties”. This was on a collier which took some four days’ to make what was usually a 12 hour journey – probably dodging RN and USN submarines which were marauding those waters at the time in the war. Conditions were horrific, one contemporary account noting that several jumped overboard rather than continue. On arrival at Singapore, many were sent straight to the Camp’s hospital where they stayed until release in September ‘45.

In this regard they were lucky, as those that remained in Sumatra, including my father and Sub Lt Arkley RNZNVR, suffered increasing privation, and if the war had lasted another couple of months would have probably died of malnutrition or disease. Some 300 did in the final months before the Japanese surrender. As you note in your article, a tribute to their toughness.

On the lighter side,Ponsonby Cruising Club stalwart Graham Murray recalls a party at the home of the eccentric Les Crago, who had photographed Seawardextensively in Auckland while Hugh Herd still owned her. Les had just bought a new motor mower, quite a rarity at the time. As the evening wore on, and ales were consumed, Les decided to demonstrate the effectiveness of the mower by using it on the shag-pile carpet in his lounge.

CAPTIONS;

  1. Dick Wellington (second from right) and Johnny Wray (right) aboard Ngataki. [DickWellingtonNgataki.jpg]
  2. TeRapunga and Ngataki set off on the 1934 Trans-Tasman race without Seaward. [n046.jpg]
  3. TeHongi on the beach at Ahipara in 1935, Dick Wellington working underneath. [Te Hongia.jpg]
  4. An excerpt from an article by “Speedwell” (Wilkie Wilkinson) in the Auckland Star of 17th July 1937 on Roxane’s visit to Norfolk Island. [roxane086.jpg]
  5. Ariel at Lord Howe Island in May 1936.[ariel084.jpg]
  6. Les Crago (centre) onNgataki.[seaward075a.jpg]