Voyages

At the time of writing only a handful of the Wimmera‘s many thousands of passengers are known to have penned travel accounts which include references to being aboard the vessel. All are generally from published sources although many unpublished accounts such as in personal diaries or journals, letters and postcards may exist besides those already referred to on this site.

In addition to these voyage accounts a page on “Life at Sea” is also included to provide some further insight into what a traveler might have expected during their time on board and at sea during this period.

The passengers whose respective travel accounts are provided here are:

Life at Sea

Passengers embarking the Wimmera or other coastal passenger ships of the period would have encountered a world probably far different from life at home. Life at sea for our Edwardian travelers would be dominated by two main subjects: the weather, and food. Comfort, and getting a good night’s sleep would also be important and this…

Robert Chisholm 1905

Robert Chisholm, a businessman and former mayor of Dunedin, produced one of the few identified descriptions of voyaging on the Wimmera, and which first appeared in serialised form in a New Zealand newspaper and later in book form as ‘A holiday canter round the globe’. In March 1905 Chisholm, his wife, and daughter, embarked the…

John Bartholomew Cleary 1906

John Bartholomew or ‘J.B.’ Cleary was a farm labourer living at Devenish north of Benalla, Victoria. In January 1906 he left to take a holiday to New Zealand. One year later, from January to May 1907 a description of his travels was published in the Benalla Standard in an 11-part series under the title ‘A…

William McKeon 1906

Coincidently, another account of a similar journey taken in 1906, appeared in The Fruitful Years: a cavalcade of memories, the autobiography of New Zealand architect, William John McKeon, published in 1971. In Chapter Three of McKeon’s book, the then young traveller’s experience is described: ‘In 1906 my father decided that we should have a holiday…

Daisy Quinlan 1906

In late June 1907 an account of a passage from Melbourne to New Zealand six months previously was published in the Otago Witness. On this occasion the writer was Sarah Julia Pinn (Quinlan) a columnist / correspondent for the newspaper and who went under the nom de plume of “Daisy Primrose.” The following is the…

Sir Henry Coward 1911

The experience of The Sheffield Choir In June 1911, the Wimmera endured cyclonic conditions on her passage from Sydney to Auckland. On board at this time were members of the Sheffield Choir. Such were the harrowing conditions that were experienced the vessel was nicknamed the “Swimmera” and the tale recorded, as follows, in Sir Henry…

Robert Blair Hay 1913

In October 1913, the journalist Robert Blair Hay was a passenger aboard the Wimmera on a trip from Sydney to Hobart.

“Golightly” Morrill 1915

In April 1915 the pastor and founder of the People’s Church of Minneapolis, Gulian Lansing (aka Golightly) Morrill, his wife Ada, and adult son Lowell, boarded the SS Wimmera in Hobart. Their voyage to Wellington, New Zealand was only one leg of a journey which saw them visit Australia, New Zealand and Pacific Islands over…

William Brinton Harvey 1915

In September 1914, 52 year-old William Brinton (W. B.) Harvey (1862-1947), the Superintendent of Westtown Boarding School, Pennsylvania and an elder in the Society of Friends (Quakers) set off with two companions William Charles Allen (1857-1938) and his wife, Elizabeth C.B. Allen, on a journey to the Far East to visit Japan, Korea, China and the…

Sydney Greenbie 1916

In October 1916 the SS Wimmera arrived in Melbourne from the Bluff, New Zealand. Aboard was 26 year-old American traveller Sydney Greenbie. In his book “The Pacific Triangle” published in 1921, Greenbie briefly recounts his voyage to Melbourne aboard the ship. Crisp and clear in the bright morning air shone the towering peaks of the…