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Read more about the article Three ship pile-up in Newcastle Harbour
The entangled ships Ditton, Port Crawford and Peeblesshire in Newcastle Harbour, April 1902.

Three ship pile-up in Newcastle Harbour

It was just on dark, April 4, 1902; the weather was taking a turn for the worse, and among the fleet of ships that appeared off Newcastle, NSW, hoping to enter harbour, was one of the world's biggest three-masters, the 311-foot-long (95m) Ditton. The harbour, apparently, was already reasonably crowded, and there were two fully laden ships - The Port Crawford and the Peeblesshire - tied up at the so-called "farewell buoys" in the channel, ready to leave next day. It was a situation fraught with danger and, unfortunately, the danger was not avoided. The Ditton…

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Read more about the article Newcastle’s great days of sail
Nobbys Headland, Newcastle, NSW, c1900

Newcastle’s great days of sail

WHEN steamships were perfected, they inevitably put an end to the long era of sail as a means of trading commodities across the globe. But sailing ships lingered for decades, and circumstances made Newcastle, NSW, one of the last of the great sailing ship ports. In the early years of the 20th century, the city often hosted as many as 80 sailing ships at once, almost all of them taking Australian coal to the west coast ports of the Americas. Prevailing winds across the Pacific Ocean meant the sailing ships could catch the trades to Australia…

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Read more about the article The logbook of Captain Robert Huddle
Robert Huddle's watercolour of the Royal Mail Steamer Scotia, one of the ships on which he worked.

The logbook of Captain Robert Huddle

A year or two ago I was privileged to receive a remarkable book from the library of a friend who had passed away. It is a hefty bound volume, containing a logbook of the travels of a 19th century English seafarer named Robert Huddle. The book contains an introductory essay, day-by-day accounts of many of his voyages and experiences, and a concluding essay. The book is handwritten in ink, and its pages are interspersed with delightful watercolour paintings depicting some of the ships on which Mr Huddle worked and scenes he observed during his travels. I…

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