On 6th October, 1855, she was hauled through the pier heads amidst the cheers of a patriotic crowd of sightseers, with the boast of “Sixty days to Melbourne” flying from her signal halliards. The passage was one of light and moderate winds. Schomberg was 28 days to the line and 55 days to the Greenwich meridian. Running her easting down she averaged 6 degrees daily to 130° E., her greatest speed being 15½ knots and her best run 368 miles. She made the land off Cape Bridgewater at 1 p.m. on Xmas day, the wind being fresh at E.S.E. On 27th December after two days’ tacking, with the wind still blowing fresh from ahead, Forbes went about at noon when 4 miles off shore and tacked out; at 6 p.m. he tacked in again. At about 10.30 p.m., the land being faintly visible, the wind gradually died away. It was a moonlight night. Forbes was playing cards in the saloon when the mate came down and reported that the ship was getting rather close in under the land and suggested going about. As luck would have it, Forbes was losing and, being a bit out of temper, insisted on playing another rubber of whist before tacking ship, and the danger point had been overstripped when at 11 o’clock he came on deck and gave the order to ’bout ship.
As there was next to no wind and a current running 3 to 4 knots to the westward, the Schomberg refused to come round. Forbes next tried to wear her, with the result that the ship slid up on to a sandbank 35 miles west of Cape Otway. On sounding round the ship it was found that she was stuck fast in 4 fathoms of water. Sail was kept on her in the hopes of it pulling her off into deep water again.
Forbes, on being told that the ship was hard aground, said angrily:—“Let her go to Hell, and tell me when she is on the beach,” and at once went below.
Henry Cooper Keen, the mate, then took charge, and finding that the Schomberg was only being hove further in by the swell and current, clewed up all sail, let go the starboard anchor and lowered the boats. And it was subsequently proved at the inquiry afterwards that it was chiefly due to the chief officer and a first class passenger, a civil engineer of Belfast named Millar, that all the passengers were safely disembarked and put aboard the steamer Queen, which hove in sight on the following morning.
All efforts to save the ship failed and she presently went to pieces. Forbes at the inquiry was acquitted of all blame for the stranding, the sandbank being uncharted, but at a mass meeting of his passengers in the Mechanics’ Institute, Melbourne, he was very severely censured. Many of them declared that he was so disgusted with the slowness of the passage that he let the ship go ashore on purpose. Others complained of his tyranny during the voyage and even made worse allegations against his morality and that of the ship’s doctor; altogether the affair was a pretty scandal and Forbes never obtained another command in the Black Ball Line.
The Best Outward Passages—Liverpool to Melbourne, 1854-5.
| Ship. | Captain. | Date Left. | Date Arrived. | Days Out. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1854 | ||||
| Red Jacket | Sam Reid | May 4 | July 12 | 67 |
| Mermaid | Devy | „ 3 | „ 17 | 74 |
| Miles Barton | Kelly | „ 4 | „ 22 | 78 |
| Lightning | J. N. Forbes | „ 14 | „ 31 | 76 |
| Marco Polo | Wild | July 22 | Oct. 25 | 95 |
| Arabian | Bannatyne | Aug. 19 | Nov. 13 | 86 |
| Morning Star | — | Sept. 6 | „ 20 | 75 |
| Champion of the Seas | Newlands | Oct. 11 | Dec. 22 | 72 |
| 1855 | ||||
| Indian Queen | McKirdie | Nov. 12 | Jan. 31 | 80 |
| Shalimar | Robertson | „ 23 | Feb. 7 | 76 |
| James Baines | McDonald | Dec. 10 | Feb. 12 | 64 |
| 1855 | ||||
| Lightning | A. Enright | Jan. 6 | Mar. 20 | 73 |
| Blue Jacket | Underwood | Mar. 6 | May 13 | 69 |
| Marco Polo | Clarke | April 6 | June 26 | 82 |
| White Star | Kerr | „ 30 | July 18 | 79 |
| Oliver Lang | Manning | May 5 | „ 31 | 87 |
| Arabian | Bannatyne | „ 21 | Aug. 13 | 84 |
| Donald Mackay | Warner | June 6 | „ 26 | 81 |
| Champion of the Seas | McKirdy | July 5 | Sept. 26 | 83 |
| Shalimar | Robertson | „ 20 | Oct. 16 | 88 |
| James Baines | McDonald | Aug. 5 | „ 23 | 79 |
| Emma | — | „ 21 | Nov. 17 | 88 |
| Lightning | A. Enright | Sept. 5 | „ 25 | 81 |
| Red Jacket | Milward | „ 20 | Dec. 4 | 75 |
| Invincible | — | „ 30 | „ 18 | 79 |
1855-1857—Captain Anthony Enright and the “Lightning.”
When Forbes was given the Schomberg, James Baines offered the command of the Lightning to Captain Anthony Enright, who had earned a great reputation as a passage maker in the tea clipper Chrysolite. At the same time the White Star Line asked Enright to take over the Red Jacket, and it was only after considerable deliberation that he decided to take the Lightning, first demanding a salary of £1000 a year. The Black Ball Line replied that it was a great deal more than they had ever previously given to their captains, but eventually they agreed to his terms rather than lose such a good man.