Unity (ship)

The " Unity " was a ship that went missing in 1813 off the coast of Tasmania, Australia.

The "Unity" was a schooner and was moored in Hobart when on the night of 24 April 1813, between 11pm and midnight, a gang of seven armed convicts boarded the ship. They seized the crew and the ship's owner, William Hobart Mansel, a merchant from Sydney, and held them captive as they sailed the ship down the Derwent River. Off Cape Frederick they released their captives - Mansel, the captain and three seamen, and set them adrift in the ship's boat. Mansel and the crew navigated their way back to Hobart. The "Unity" was never heard from again. with a special inquiry hearing on 3 May 1820 in front of Special Commissioner J.T. Bigg, that the ship had not been seen at any port, anywhere. The ship was presumed lost.

Of the seven convicts, five had arrived on the "Indefatigable" and two in the "Guilford" in 1812. [ "Australian Shipwrecks - vol 1 1622-1850", Charles Bateson, AH and AW Reed, Sydney, 1972, ISBN 0 589 07112 2 p49 ]

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