Qualla: Cataraqui https://qualla.com/cataraqui-ship en-us © 2026 Bendyline Mon, 20 Jul 2026 10:21:28 GMT Qualla serial false Qualla support@bendyline.com yes https://qualla.com/_res/siteimages/rsslogo.png Qualla: Cataraqui https://qualla.com/cataraqui-ship Cataraqui: Introduction https://qualla.com/cataraqui-ship/ They had survived the longest part already. After more than three months at sea, the barque Cataraqui carried its passengers across the bottom of the world toward Port Phillip and the new lives waiting there. Five babies had been born during the voyage; six children had died. Then, at half past four on the black, storm-lashed morning of 4 August 1845, the ship struck rock just off King Island in Bass Strait. Of the roughly 410 souls aboard, only nine would ever set foot on solid ground again. It remains the worst peacetime maritime disaster in Australian history.

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]]> Mon, 22 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/r/0/y/k/cataraqui-ship-wp/r0yk-cataraqui-intro.mp3 0:06 1 full Cataraqui: A Ship Full of Hope https://qualla.com/cataraqui-ship/ The Cataraqui was an 802-ton barque built in 1840 at Quebec, her name borrowed from "Katerokwi," the Mississauga word for the place now called Kingston, Ontario. Registered at Liverpool by Smith and Sons, she was fitted out to carry assisted emigrants, ordinary working families l...

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]]> Mon, 22 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/r/0/y/k/cataraqui-ship-wp/r0yk-cataraqui-a-ship-full-of-hope.mp3 0:06 2 full Cataraqui: The Night the Sea Took Them https://qualla.com/cataraqui-ship/ Bass Strait is a graveyard, a shallow, storm-funnelling gap between two landmasses, and that night it earned the reputation. The Cataraqui drove onto jagged rocks roughly 140 metres offshore near Fitzmaurice Bay. There was no gentle grounding, only a ship pinned in the surf as wa...

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]]> Mon, 22 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/r/0/y/k/cataraqui-ship-wp/r0yk-cataraqui-the-night-the-sea-took-them.mp3 0:06 3 full Cataraqui: The Convict Who Buried the Dead https://qualla.com/cataraqui-ship/ The nine survivors were not alone for long. David Howie, a former convict living on the island, found them after spotting wreckage in the water. His own boat was wrecked too, so he could not carry them to safety, but he sheltered and fed them through the weeks that followed. He a...

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]]> Mon, 22 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/r/0/y/k/cataraqui-ship-wp/r0yk-cataraqui-the-convict-who-buried-the-dead.mp3 0:06 4 full Cataraqui: What the Disaster Left Behind https://qualla.com/cataraqui-ship/ Loss on this scale forced change. The Cataraqui was one reason the Cape Otway lighthouse was built on the Victorian mainland, and the sinking of this very ship prompted the construction in 1861 of the Cape Wickham lighthouse at King Island's northern tip, at 48 metres still Austr...

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]]> Mon, 22 Jun 2026 00:00:00 GMT https://qualla.com/_m/r/0/y/k/cataraqui-ship-wp/r0yk-cataraqui-what-the-disaster-left-behind.mp3 0:06 5 full