Jimmy's gone for a Soldier.

The Coffin ship is found

Ahoy Shipmates. Most of you who have played music with me over the years, or been to a Rubbles/Starboard watch/Cactus 5 gig somewhere in my travels, have probably heard my song "The Wreck of the Steamship Coramba". This song has always been very dear to me, in part because it links me to a part of my family that is forever lost to me, and yet keeps that history and family alive in my heart. It also allows me to share with the listener a story from a different time. A time of hardship and deprivation: the Great Depression. When the Coramba was lost seventeen men never came home from the sea, seventeen families lost their sole economic support and over 70 children were orphaned. Uncle Henry Jensen, who raised my mum as his own ,and her sisters, was, sadly among the doomed crew of the little ship when she disappeared on the perilous night of November 30th 1934. One of the great tragedies of the wreck of the Cormaba is that she was safe in port at Warnambool, and her Captain was ordered to put to sea, despite his expressed concerns about the approaching storm. Thanks to the dedicated efforts of Des Williams, Mark Ryan and southern Ocean Exploration the ship has been found. Her find bringing peace and closure to the surviving orphans of the Coramba. I've attached an article and a video of the first dive to the wreck o f the Steamship Coramba. Enjoy.  http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/sweet-relief-as-wreck-find-ends-76year-mystery-20110604-1fmal.html

The Coffin Ship:Shipwrecked.

Shipwrecked.

“I was the convict sent to Hell, to make of the desert a living well. I split the rock, I felled the tree. The nation is because of me.” Mary Gilmore. I wrote this song when I was reading Robert Hughes’ book “The fatal shore”  A lot of folks probably don’t know this, but Australia was founded as a British penal colony when the crown was no longer able to ship it’s felons to the plantations of the Carolinas during, and after the revolutionary war. Now ‘felons’ is a big word. It conjures up in the contempary mind visions of dope dealers, gang bangers and corrupt politicians. But way back in the day they were usually petty offenders. Many simply trying to feed families in difficult times, a great number having served their King in a time of war. These poor battered hopeless souls may as well have been sent to the moon for all the hope they had for their future. The first fleet was nine months at sea before running up the colors at Botany Bay. (The effect of this action on the indigenous peoples is a whole other can of worms and songs.) For the convict, transportation was in most cases, effectively a life sentence, for many a death sentence. Like the crew and convict freight of the Neva. The Neva sailed from Cork, Ireland for Sydney on 8 January 1835 carrying 150 female convicts with 33 children, nine free women (probably wives of convicts) with 22 children., and 26 crew, under the command of Captain Benjamin Peck. With the deaths of a crewman, a convict and a free woman, and one birth, during the voyage, by the time the Australian coastline was reached the total complement was 239. Hells’ gate too far for these lost souls.

Shipwrecked.

Me babe was so hungry I’d of slit your throat for a shilling there was no work for laborers even those that was willing.

Who’d work for a pittance shoveling dung, the great Lord said. “I’m sorry, but jobs there are none.”

I was a gunner with Nelson, I smashed our enemy’s to Hell, and all this before the Kings’ court I did try to tell.

Too explain my folly to the high magistrate. “Our bellies was empty and our need was great.”

But stiff back he sneered. “I’ll reward your crime, I’ll sail you to Hell for fourteen years time.”

Cut up on the coral and dashed on a reef with our timbers stove in and our bones bare and bleached. Shipwrecked, shipwrecked we be, shipwrecked, at a loss on the great Pacific sea.

 Shipwrecked, shipwrecked we be, shipwrecked, at a loss on the great Pacific sea.

England so far for us good men in chains, us felonious thieves all branded with blame.

Bound for Port Jackson, manacled as one, chained ‘tween the decks soaked, frigid and numb. Whores, poachers and bandits transported in tears, away, away from Portsmouth for fourteen grim years.

Cut up on the coral and dashed on a reef with our timbers stove in and our bones bare and bleached. Shipwrecked, shipwrecked we be, shipwrecked, at a loss on the great Pacific sea.

 Shipwrecked, shipwrecked we be, shipwrecked, at a loss on the great Pacific sea.

We crossed the line they gave us a tot of rum that burned  a hole in my belly like a frigates great gun.

Then the decks they plunged and creaked, as our little ship did start to leak, when the water rushed up around our guts the captain had the chains struck off of us. For we were aground in a great filthy squall and an old sailor cursed: “Death is equal, let God judge us all.”

The Coffin Ship. (The wreck of the steamship Coramba.)

The wreck of the Steamship Coramba.

  The SS Coramba was a costal trader serving the communities of the Western districts of Victoria, Australia. She was a lifeline of prosperity to the isolated coastal ports, as she plied the treacherous waters of Bass straight, four round trips per month.  Melbourne, Apollo Bay, then to Port Fairy: her port of registry.  Warnambool to Portland and back again. She was a workhorse of trade, bringing raw materials and the fancies of city living to the country, and then returning with the bounty of farm and foundry.

  She left Apollo bay in November, 1934 steaming to the East, fully laden with seventeen hands to work the ship. She was last seen standing off from Westernport bay in a storm whose fury was, at the time, the worst ever recorded in the region. During the perilous night of November 30^th the Coramba foundered with all hands. She is believed to lie in deep water to the East of Westernport bay off the Nobbies. For nearly eighty years she has kept her secrets and her crew in their iron coffin, among them our beloved Henry Jensen

"The wreck of the Steamship Coramba"

D / A / G /D /A / G /D

D                                                                              A

Henry Jensen was a stoker who worked below the water line.

G                                                         A

He fed the boilers black coal between swigs of red wine.

D                                                         E m                 G                          A

As the wives, and the children, waved bye-bye Papa from the old stone quay.

Bound for Melbourne four times a month, with a family man in every bunk,

The Cape Otway skies already grey, as the steamship Coramba left Apollo bay.

Lade up with cargo and fuel for the trip, with srventeen men to handle the ship.

But wild Bass straight would not be calm and the old ship shook in alarm.

The decks awash with the company’s tax dodge. Well insured and all a sea in the lap of the Gods. With no wireless between the ship and the shore, seventeen men caught in a gathering storm.

D / A / G /D /A / G /D

                 G                               A                              D                              Em                          G

Chorus... Westernport bay is a sailors grave, for seventeen men buried under the waves, in the wreck

A                           D

of the steamship Coramba  X2

The captain shouted. "Stoker Jensen. She's taking it rough...douse the fires, get a lifebelt and haul your arse up. I'll put her head to the wind and get the boats away. We'll stand away from the land till the break of day."

The Argus reported the worst storm since federation and posted the missing men lost, at their destination.

The merchants and wharf rats gathered at the quay but the old ship had gone well astray.

Chorus... Westernport bay is a sailors grave, for seventeen men buried under the waves, in the wreck of the steamship Coramba. X2

Break.  C / D / C / D / E m / D /

My Grandfather Weir, Henry Jensen’s best mate, could not abide the little ships fate.

In a dory he searched along the rocky shore but only pulled in a lifebelt off of Cape Woolamai. The seaman’s' union established a trust. The kin buried no bones or scattered their dust. Of the Captain and crew, it seemed only God knew, where their drowned bones did lie.

D / A / G /D /A / G /D

Yes, Westernport Bay is a sailor’s grave for seventeen men buried under the waves in the wreck of the steamship Coramba... For the word all abroad, was that insurance fraud, lured the ship from the safety of shore. To the wreck of the Steamship Coramba

D / A / G /D /A / G /D

                                                                       C & P ARONSONG