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'Ship of Death'

When 149 Dorset adults and children joined the vessel, the Emigrant at Plymouth on the 5th March 1849 they were joining a vessel that was to become known as the ‘Ship of Death’. More than half were from the villages of Stourpaine & Durweston, about 30 were from Child Okeford and the remainder came from different villages around Blandford. 

Durweston clergyman, Sydney Godolphin Osborne saw them all embark on board the 754 ton three-mast barque, whose master was William Henry Kemp. Also on board were the captain’s wife, Sarah and three-year old daughter, Fanny. The voyage had been organised by the Blandford Colonisation Society who had held its first meeting in January earlier that year. It could be said, however, that the real purpose of the Society was to export the problem of the district’s poor to the Antipodes. Living conditions at the time for ordinary folk were poor and often insanitary with the situation in the village of Stourpaine being particularly bad. For those in work, the average weekly wage was little more than nine shillings (45p). Matters were made worse by the demise of the Dorset button industry with the hand-made button being replaced by those made by machines. Many Dorset women had, until then, been able to supplement family income by making and selling buttons.

In view of what would happen the next year, the Dorset passengers on the  Emigrant were fortunate as there was only one death during the voyage, due to consumption. However, there was an outbreak of measles among all the 117 children on board.

Emigrant left Plymouth a year later, again carrying emigrants seeking a better life in Australia. Sarah Kemp was to write later to the British Ladies Female Emigration Society describing graphically the disease of typhus which raged through the vessel. After a terrible four months at sea the immigrants finally arrived at Moreton Bay in Queensland. They were then placed in a recently opened quarantine station on Stradbroke Island for another three months.

In total, twenty six passengers on the Emigrant died including the ship’s surgeon and a young woman who committed suicide. The 149 Dorset folk who had travelled the previous year on the vessel, later described as the ‘Ship of Death’,were indeed fortunate individuals. Unsurprisingly, the Emigrant was then sold by its owners and its name was changed.

Sources: Ship of Death by Jane Smith (2019), Child Okeford Village Website & the Brisbane Times.


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