hartlepool history logo
close button

Oscar - a general history

Completed July 1861; Official No. 43501; Code Letters TPGB.

Owners: Leith & London Steam Navigation Co, Leith; 1862 London & Edinburgh Shipping Co, Leith; 1871 Dingwall & Sky Railway Co, Inverness; 1872 London & Edinburgh Shipping Co, Leith.

Masters: 1861-66 T Raison; 1867-68 Robert Campbell Hossack (C.N. 4748 Liverpool 1852); 1869-71 Abraham Howling (C.N.13881 Aberdeen 1856); 1872 Higgins; 1873-74 Hutchison; 1877 John William Robertson.

Miscellaneous: May 1872 John MacDonald, steward, committed suicide by jumping overboard near Queensferry.

Voyages: 1862 Hartlepool for London.

The Oscar left the Tyne on 5 January 1878 bound for Cadiz with fireclay, bricks & 1,400 tons of coal & a crew of 22. At about 10 o’clock that night she ran ashore during thick fog on Whitby Rock. The Whitby lifeboat Robert Whitworth rescued all the crew. At the subsequent inquiry the master was found in default for not using his lead & his certificate was suspended for three months. The vessel was insured in Northern Clubs & was valued at £18,000.

The Oscar remained fast until a high sea in March began to break her up & the locals scrambled for her cargo of coal as it washed onto the beach.

The ship's bell is in use in the bell-tower of the  mortuary chapel at Egton on the North Yorkshire Moors. For an image see Flickrhttp://www.flickr.com/photos/22081583@N06/5804776103/in/photostream

Related items :