‘Bell’, 1883

The ‘Bell’ was a 95-ton schooner that was wrecked at the entrance to the Tomaga River on 4th July 1883.

She was a well-known coastal trader having, for example, been chartered on several occasions by Burns, Philp & Co. About a fortnight before she was wrecked she had been purchased by Jennings, Pickering and Company (timber merchants of Sydney, who also owned the Pioneer Sawmill Company of Tomakin) from a Mr Cruickshank of Adelaide.

At 2pm on July 3rd 1883 she had finished loading 7,000 super feet of sawn timber from Tomakin and was about to depart for Mackay in Queensland. But the weather changed – ‘a gale of wind and heavy sea setting in suddenly from the eastward’, she dragged her anchors and, despite assistance from six men from on shore, was driven ashore about 5am on July 4th, fell broadside over and became a total wreck.The four men on board made it safely to shore although one, the mate Charles Johnston, ‘swam ashore from the wreck naked, having lost everything’.