Type :
|
Iron paddlewheel
steam ship
|
Launched :
|
1850
|
Builder :
|
Thomas Chowne
Pyrmont, NSW
|
Gross weight :
|
22 tons
|
Dimensions :
|
51.80 x 9.60 x 4.80 (feet)
|
Passenger capacity :
|
unknown
|
Speed :
|
unknown |
Agenoria
was a small paddle wheeler of some 52 feet, built at Pyrmont by Thomas
Chowne for the Gerrard Brothers in 1850. She weighed in at 22 tons and
was driven by a 10hp steam engine.
The primary news sources of the day indicate that she was a tug
and general roustabout; on at least two occasions she was
chartered to assist with taking rigging and cargo from wrecked sailing
ships (
Algerine in July 1851
and T
wo Friends in November of
the same year). As well, she was advertised as carrying various cargoes
from Brisbane Water, Botany Bay and Port Aitken.
Graeme Andrews (Ferries of Sydney 1976) describes her as a steam scow
(in the original sense, this is a flat bottomed boat with a blunt bow,
often
used to haul bulk freight) and has her working the North Shore along
with
Ferry Queen and
Brothers when not engaged
otherwise. Anthony Prescott has her listed in his Sydney Ferry Fleets
(1984) as well, so she may well have worked part time as a ferry -
something not unusual in those days. The newspaper advertisments do not
list her in such a role however, although the other two boats received
nearly daily advertising.
Whatever the case may have been, she did not last long in Sydney and
departed for Melbourne on the 19th of October 1852. She arrived on the
13th of November, just in time to escort the
Great Britain into Port Philip Bay.
In Melbourne she was engaged to carry passengers, cargo and mail to
Williamstown from Melbourne on a thrice daily schedule. She was joined
in 1854 by another ex-Sydney vessel
Comet
to provide a three boat service (the third being a vessel called
Gazelle).
All three vessels were listed for sale in December 1855 and into
January 1856 as the owner was retiring; no further mention of her is
made until 1870 when she was mentioned (along with the other two boats)
in bankruptcy proceedings.
Prescott states that she was struck off the register in 1869.