Dunstaffnage

The iron sailing ship Dunstaffnage was launched from the Southampton yard of Oswald Mordant and Co Ltd (Yard No 187) in January 1881. She measured 268.4′ x 39.7′ x 24.0′ and her tonnage was 1945 gross tons. She was ordered by Mr J Houston of Liverpool who registered her in this port and began carrying loads around the various port cities of Great Britain and Ireland.  She also had two successful lengthy trips to Calcutta and San Francisco during her first twelve months of operation.

However, her career was to be a short one. On 16th March 1883, having unloaded her cargo of jute from Calcutta, she departed from Dundee at 8:30am bound for her home port of Liverpool in ballast under the command of Captain Charles Wellburn.  She was under tow by the tug Recovery.  Wellburn had a crew of twenty men aboard plus his wife and child. By 11:30am they were east of the fairway buoy off the mouth of the Tay and set a course NE by E intending to take the northerly route round Scotland through the Pentland Firth and then down the Scottish west coast. As the day wore on the moderate north westerly breeze freshened to Force 4 but neither skipper was concerned. They reached Girdle Ness around 7pm with the wind continuing to strengthen veering to ENE until, by 2am on 17th, it was blowing at hurricane force. The two vessels were in trouble.

At this point, with a heavy sleet squall blowing through, the pin securing the shackle on the tow line aboard Recovery shattered and the line with the shackle attached fell over her stern. The skilful and dangerous attempts of the tug’s skipper to reconnect with the Dunstaffnage were unsuccessful hampered by the snowstorm which, by now, had reduced visibility to virtually zero. The two vessels lost contact and, despite the Recovery’s skipper attempts to re-establish contact, the Dunstaffnage was not seen again. The only signs of the ship were large quantities of wreckage washed ashore at multiple locations between Findon Ness and Carron Rock. At the time is was impossible to determine if the ship had foundered in deep water or had been driven ashore by the storm.

The subsequent enquiry, with witness statements from a number of the crew of the Discovery, focussed on the seaworthiness of the Dunstaffnage and the adequacy of the ship’s stone ballast which had been topped up to 580 tons after she offloaded her jute cargo in Dundee. A number of other questions predominantly focussed on the actions of the skipper of the Recovery. In all cases these questions were, as best as could be determined without any testimony from anyone aboard Dunstaffnage, answered positively and so the enquiry concluded that the loss of the Dunstaffnage and the loss of the twenty three persons aboard were the result of an accident caused by the extreme weather and sea conditions encountered on the voyage.

The wreckage of the Dunstaffnage lies in position  57° 04.101’N, 002° 05.499′ at Findon Ness.  The wreck was discovered by Ken and Allison Farrow. It is scattered in shallow water but was positively identified by the recover of the ship’s bell in 2015.  An anchor and other scattered remains are still visible.  The site is very tidal so best dived at slack water.  To dive the wreck drop into water beside the north facing wall at Findon Ness. There is some wreckage at the foot of the wall which then spreads out eastwards down a slope with concentration of wreckage including a steam winch at the bottom of the slope. The bow points north and the stern and decking plates to the south.

We would like to thank Brain Burnett for his contribution to this article providing the location of the wreckage and the photographs of the bell.