With apt sailors scarce, a British captain, making what was to be his last voyage, had to make some tough decisions if he was to transport Australia's bountiful wheat harvest in 1901.
On a Saturday afternoon, a fleet of British sailing ships crowded the piers of Geelong, Victoria. The barque BESSFIELD, loaded to the plimsoll with 2000 tons of grain, was anchored at Corio Bay and, although ready to depart for Falmouth, was eight men short of her complement.
Eight able seamen were due to arrive from the Melbourne Sailors Home onboard the EDINA to expedite the departure of the barque so that she could catch the last of the ebb tide at the heads, it was arranged that the Melbourne Steamship's tug RACER, with the captain of the BESSFIELD aboard, would intercept the EDINA and transport the men direct. Captain Forbes, the well-known veteran master of the EDINA, agreed to this plan and, slowing down, allowed the EDINA to come alongside.
However, all efforts to induce the men to board the tug were in vain. A most villainous looking lot; they comprised all nationalities and were led by a truculent Liverpool Irishman, oddly attired in a threadbare clerical black coat. They demanded to be landed at the pier and supplied with a meal and liquor before they would consent to join the vessel. Since sailors were hard to come by, the elderly captain, anxious to leave port, complied with the demand. After a delay of two hours, and still openly mutinous, the sailors sullenly condescended to go aboard and man the capstan.
When the vessel got underway, the RACER extended the full scope of her 700 ft. seagoing hawser, safely negotiated the Hopetoun Channel, which was narrower then than it is now, and entered the first leg of her 40 mile run to the Heads.
The RACER's crew had been on duty the night before, when they towed the LOCH CARON to sea. Making up for lost time at nearly eight knots and confidently expecting to clear the Heads during slack water, they hoped for a speedy return home, but, to their astonishment and dismay, when the vessels were abreast of Sorrento, the BESSFIELD's end of the hawser dropped to the bottom of the South Channel.
The tug's crew has strong suspicion that the new crew had surreptitiously cast it off. With the help of Willis Wy, the diminutive Chinese cook who drove the two-rope winch, they lost no time in heaving it in and overtaking the BESSFIELD, which had by then drifted to within a mile of
QUEENSCLIFF. Captain Dan Fearon, master of the RACER and Captain McWilliams, pilot of the barque, indulged in a passage of arms about "slippery hitches". Twenty minutes later, on the inner edge of the Rip, they were stemming the first of the young flood. The RACER surged ahead, nearer to Point Lonsdale, hugging the reef in an effort to beat the tide. To lose this meant holding the BESSFIELD up for six hours.
Fumes of blistered paint rose from the red hot funnel while Captain Fearon, proud of his 'good old RACER watched the red sector of the Lonsdale light change to white, the signal that they were out and clear.
Before they had time to appreciate their tug's splendid feat, the BESSFIELD, to their amazement and alarm had been cast adrift again. The barque was rolling heavily and quite unable to gain an offing under her fore and aft canvas and, caught in the grip of the inrushing stream, was soon re-entering the Heads. Aboard the tug, hove to and rolling heavily as well, again, it was a case of all hands and the cook to the hawser. Even in the pitch darkness, as there was no electric light on the RACER, the hawser was "flaked" down in record time.
By this time, all doubts were dispelled; the mutinous crew were evidently determined to delay the vessel's departure, even to the extent of wrecking her. So, once more, the RACER hastened to the recue. Those on the tug felt that the barque's safety was assured because she was in the hands of a most capable pilot and her anchors were ready to be let go. But twice her lights seemed dangerously close to Point Nepean. As the tug traversed the Rip once more, the lights of the BESSFIELD shone dimly two miles abreast of the quarantine station at Portsea.
On this occasion, the mutinous crew made no pretence of assisting, so the hawser was secured with the aid of the pilot, mates and apprentices. Nothing remained then but to point the barque's bow to the tide, and for five dreary hours', the RACER at half speed, kept the QUEENSCLIFF's lights abeam. No chances were taken on the BESSFIELD for, armed with revolvers, the mate and second mate kept vigil on the forecastle head. At 3 a.m. the RACER, with the barque in her wake, once more cleared the Heads. Three miles out, the pilot was dropped. The RACER sounded her whistle to make sail and to make sure the disgruntled crew, resigned to the inevitable, manned the topsail halliards. Ten miles seawards, the tug sounded her whistle to cast off. She considered that she had more than fulfilled her contract.
Tristan Da Cunha SG646. Log Book Dec 2004
This article was originally published in the Annual Dog Watch' 1951 vol. 8 p57-59 by Captain H R Watson and has been published in Watercraft Philately.