&sq=&lang=&file=File:Norfolk_(www.tamarpulpmill.info).jpg) A replica of Norfolk
| |
| History | |
|---|---|
 Great Britain | |
| Name | Norfolk |
| Launched | 1798 |
| Fate | Wrecked 1800 |
| General characteristics | |
| Tons burthen | 25 (bm) |
The Colonial sloop Norfolk was built on Norfolk Island in 1798 of Norfolk Island Pine. She was wrecked in 1800.
- "The necessity of a vessel to keep up a more frequent intercourse with Norfolk Island, ...having been much felt by the want of various stores ...occasioned Captain Townson, the Commanding officer, to construct a small decked boat, sloop rigged, in which he sent His letters to this port..."[1][2]
Cumpston describes Norfolk as, “A decked longboat built at Norfolk I[sland].”[3] Governor Hunter quickly put Norfolk under the command of Matthew Flinders, the Sailing Master Peter Hibbs (seaman formerly on the "Sirius") Norfolk was to be used as a survey vessel. In 1798-99 Norfolk was used by Flinders and Bass to circumnavigate Tasmania – proving the existence of Bass Strait. Flinders also took Norfolk north to chart Cook's Morton's Bay (now Moreton Bay) and Hervey's Bay (Hervey Bay).[4][5]
Norfolk was then used to supply produce from the Windsor Area to Port Jackson, until 1800 when convicts seized her at the mouth of the Hawkesbury River. Intending to sail her to Maluku, the convicts ran her aground at what was later called "Pirate Point" on the northern side of the mouth to the Hunter River. Today, the point is in the suburb of Stockton.
- ^ Collins, David (1802), An account of the English colony in New South Wales ..., vol. 2, London: T. Cadell Jun. and W. Davies, p. 85, archived from the original on 28 December 2020, retrieved 20 January 2012 [Port Jackson 15 June 1798.]
- ^ The Matthew Flinders Electronic Archive at the State Library of New South Wales.
- ^ J.S. Cumpston, Shipping arrivals & departures Sydney, 1788-1825, Roebuck, Canberra, 1977, p.33.
- ^ A Voyage to Terra Australis, with an accompanying Atlas. 2 vol. – London : G & W Nicol, 18. July 1814.
- ^ The Early History of Tasmania, R.W.Giblin 1928