Frederick (ship)

The "Frederick" was a ship that was wrecked at Cape Flinders on Stanley Island, Queensland, Australia in 1818.

The "Frederick" was a wooden ship of 210 tons. [ [http://oceans1.customer.netspace.net.au/qld-main.html Encyclopaedia of Australian Shipwrecks] ] It was under the command of Captain John Williams when it left Hobart, Tasmania on 27 June 1818 bound for Mauritius. It was carrying sheep and cattle but these died from heat at the Percy Islands off the east coast of Queensland. The captain ordered the crew to collect spars to take to Mauritius instead and it was at this time that the ship was wrecked at Cape Finders in May 1818. Two boats were launched and shortly after the ship broke in two. In one boat were the master, two men and two boys while the long boat carried the remaining twenty-two of the crew.

Williams and the four other crew were rescued by the ship "Duke of Wellington" which had been travelling with the "Frederick" for much of its journey. The long boat was not seen again and it can only be assumed that the twenty-three surviving crew drowned or were killed by aborigines. Williams had sailed with a sixteen year old girl whom he had bought from her father, much to the scandal of the colonial community. The girl may have been lost when the long-boat was swamped, or may have been captured by aborgines as there were rumours later of a white woman having been seen with aborigines in the area.

The wreck of the "Frederick" was found by Captain Phillip Parker King of HMS "Mermaid", on 13 July 1819 while it was on a surveying expedition. [ "Australian Shipwrecks - vol 1 1622-1850", Charles Bateson, AH and AW Reed, Sydney, 1972, ISBN 0 589 07112 2 p57 ]

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