Southern Isle: 92 Foot Nelson Scow
Build Date
1901
Boat Builder
D.M. Darroch
Length
92 feet 1 inch
Beam
22 feet 2 inches
Building the Southern Isle and her wreck on Farewell Spit
Built by D.M. Darroch in Omaha the Southern Isle was a Schooner-rigged scow that was later converted into a dredge.
First owned by a Nelson settler, William Oliver Caldwell of Pakawau. It had two 16hp engines, three masts and weighed 83.42 gross tons (70.76 registered net tons). The Southern Isle had ten sets of owners from 1901 until 1916. She was one of the larger scows and could carry 180,000 feet of sawn timber.
On the 31st May 1916 the Southern Isle was caught in a SE gale and was found floating upside down off Farewell Spit. She was spotted by the Lighthouse Keeper but it was too late to save the five crew who were drowned. A court of inquiry is believed to have found the boats hatches had not been secured shut properly which resulted in the Southern Isle taking on water an capsizing in the rough seas.
The Southern Isle was towed to Nelson where the hull was sold to Nelson Harbour Board. They turned her the right way up converted the scow into a grab dredge. In 1927 Port Nelson registered the Southern Isle as an oil engine vessel with no masts and two 30hp engines. She now weighed 87.26 gross tons (59.23 registered net tons) and was renamed Te Wakatu.
Dismantling the Southern Isle
In 1942 the Nelson Harbour Board registered the Southern Isle as being dismantled in Nelson. At some point after this Chappie Kellor a farmer in Croiselles Harbour purchased the Southern Isle.
Then around 1946 Francis Wells and Noble (Tom) Wells purchased the Southern Isle and towed her to Wakatahuri with Francis’s boat Pearl. This was the first vessel brough by Tom and Francis for their Sounds Wrecking Company. They partially wrecked the Southern Isle to remove the kauri timber and fittings. Then they beached her to slow down the erosion of the foreshore. The remains of the Southern Isle are still at Wakatahuri today.
References
To research the Southern Isle we used the book Boats For A Lifetime by Yvonne M Fell and the 2009 anniversary edition of Marine News which outlines the history of the Sounds Wrecking Company. We also used information from the Port Mapua Maritime Museum exhibition.
Related Posts
Tiroa – 111ft Trading vessel that worked throughout NZ before she was purchased by the Sounds Wrecking Company.
Marilyn – 112 ft NZ Navy vessel built in 1943 for WWII which would later become a fishing boat.
Venture – 46ft scow built by the Hadfields of Awaroa to be their trading vessel in Tasman Bay.
Orakei – 69ft scow built in 1892. Orakei had many owners including the Puponga Coal Company who sunk her.