Category Archives: Military

Thetis

Posted on by
27

THETIS
photos & details from Luke Richardson

Thetis (Greek for Sea Nymph) was launched in Dunedin on the 31st August 1929.  She was built by Mr J McPherson boat builder of Dunedin for Mr Charles Sundstrum.
Thetis was designed by renown naval architect Mr William H Hand Jnr of New Bedford USA.  William ‘Bill’ Hand was the originator of the V-bottom hull type per Thetis.  In addition Hand was an early pioneer of the motor-sailor type. Thetis was designed as a fast day cruiser.
She is 35’1” in length with 8’1” beam, 2’9” draft and a total height of 6’9”. She is a British Registered ship dated 16th August 1929.  The official number is 127819. Her registered tonnage is 4.68 with a Gross Tonnage of 7.57.

Thetis was originally powered by a Chrysler Imperial 6 cylinder petrol engine producing 160hp at 2800rpm.  Later she was re-powered by a Chrysler Royal engine with 140hp.  With a Ford diesel in between she was subsequently re-powered in 2003 with a Mercedes Benz 5 cylinder diesel engine.  That motor is to be replaced now. Documents show Thetis was originally good for 18 knots.  A bigger engine was installed around the war years and its said she has seen 26+ knots.  In current configuration she’s more like 12-13 knots.

Construction is of kauri hull planking and Kowhai frames with teak decks. The cabin was subsequently modified and enclosed by Magnus Smith of Lyttelton, Luke believes the work was done  for Bruce Stewart of Pigeon Bay.

Known Owners
Charles W Sundstrum                         1929-37
Bruce F Stewart (later Sir Bruce)         1937-50
William Carey                                      1950-54
Clarey Beaumont                                1954-57
Des Sinclair                                         1957-67
Laurie Wales                                       1967-1997?
David Martin                                        1997-2006
Brendon Leech                                    2006-2014
Glenn Tod                                            2014-2015
Luke Richardson                                  2015-

Known History
Dunedin to late 1930’s
Pigeon Bay for some 20 years
War Service – she was commandeered by the NZ Navy Naval Auxilliary Patrol Service (NAPS) in WWII and used as a coastal patrol boat.  She commenced service 9th May 1942 and was relieved of duty 23rd February 1944 when the NAPS formally disbanded.  She was assigned the pennant number Z125 and served in the unit based in Lyttelton.  The owner at that time was B.F. Stewart.

Luke purchased her in July 2015 and she is now hauled out of the water for some long overdue TLC.  A period of neglect following the Christchurch earthquakes meant she was long overdue for some maintenance.  Luke would love to know more about any of the owners over the years and any of her history not covered above.

To view more photos & to follow the work, Thetis has a facebook page –  Friends of Thetis

https://www.facebook.com/groups/1608024876125109/

See below an article on Thetis’s launch from the Australasian Motorboat & Yachting Monthly from October 1929. Its a good read 😉

Harold Kidd Input

Charles William Sundstrum was a Dunedin dentist who was a key figure in Dunedin yachting circles for many years. His first launch was the 31ft clinker double-ender VALMAI of 1910 which had a Dunedin-built 5hp Viking engine. He raced her with the Otago Yacht Club including one of their Ocean races to Timaru.
He replaced VALMAI in 1913 with the 40 footer NORANA designed by Joseph Gillanders and built by Miller Bros at Port Chalmers. She had a 16-18hp Jersey Standard marine engine and was a handsome craft. He sold her to Arthur Brett of Auckland in 1927. During WW2 she was taken over by the RNZAF and sent to Fiji for towing work.
THETIS was NORANA’s replacement. Photo of Norana below.

13-05-2017 – Additional Photos ex trademe (Ian McDonald nudge)

 

Ngaio – Sailing Sunday

Posted on by
8

Ngaio – Sailing Sunday
photo ex Nathan Herbert

Todays photos were taken in early Jan 2015 by Nathan & are from Tutukaka. The hauled out ‘yacht’ has an interesting set up – 2 masts + game poles 🙂
I have to say it looks a great spot to haul out.

Anyone able to shed some light on the boat?

No longer a mystery – its Ngaio, designed by Jim Mason in 1941 – photos below from Dean Wright

Harold Kidd Input

In case Ian doesn’t post, she was designed and built by Jim Mason at Grey Street, Whangarei from a half model and launched in 1941. She was partly mobilised in 1942 by NAPS and crewed by Jim Mason, skipper, Tom McKinnon, deputy skipper, and Jack Carpenter, Bob Baker, Peter Roberts and Ian Crawshaw. Her NAPS number was Z40.
These NAPS boats did a great job during wartime when German commerce raiders and minelayers were busy around New Zealand at the start and were followed by Jap submarines checking us out. The Whangarei boats were in the most likely place for trouble.
Lovely boat.

Input from owner & son of builder, Ian Mason

A following up on Harolds post on Ngaio,all correct I might add. She was built over a two year period. She is carvel planked in kauri over kowhai ribs and pohutukawa stem, stern and floors. Her first engine was a 6 cylinder Delage out of a car owned by my father. When it was replaced in 1957 by an air cooled Enfield they got more for the scrap than Dad originally paid for the car. When she was built kauri was 3 pound 15 shillings per 100 super feet and the copper nails were the equivalent of 75c per pound. The original suit of sails cost 25 pound from Sails and Covers. In those days she carried 750 sq ft of sail. Since the Enfield she has been powered by a Ruston, Bedford and now a 6BB1 Isuzu. I installed this in 1995  and we have had 7000 trouble free hours since. I first went aboard Ngaio when I was 4 months old. I have 4 children and 9 (to date) grand children and they all love her as much as those  that have gone before. I think she will keep the same name and family ownership for a while yet.

 

Betty (Achernar)

Posted on by
3
Betty 1947

BETTY  (Achernar)
photo & details ex Betty Black (Stewart)

Today’s post is an example of what makes ww so special & motivates me to keep doing it. I received the email below last week.

“Dear Alan
 
My son in Sydney was browsing on the internet presumably looking up about his grandfather Bob Stewart, when he came across your blog about Achernar.  I was most interested to read this as I had no idea what had become of the launch “Betty”. It was  requisitioned by the Americans during the war. My grandfather died in 1943  and my father became the owner.   He got it back after the war in an appalling condition.  I remember him saying there was oil all through the bilge.  We had a number of family holidays on it  until the yacht Helen* was built.  The photo was taken by me in 1947 (on a Box Brownie camera).
Kind regards
Betty Black (Stewart)”

To read / see more on Betty / Achernar click here https://waitematawoodys.com/2013/10/14/achinar/

*Photos below of Helen (K1) during 2015 CYA Classic Yacht Regatta

Update 29-07-2019 Oct 1939 photo below

Betty Oct 1939

Helen 2015
Helen 2015

Mansion House Bay On A Bad Day

Posted on by
14

Mansion House Bay On A Bad Day
photo ex Juliana Cooke (nee Turnwald)

Not sure of the date on the above photos but the presence of all the plastic fizz boats & the navy vessels in Mansion House Bay, Kawau Island, must make dating the photo easier.
If you look at the top photo & out into the bay, it must have been the start of ‘the end’ 🙂 i.e. the arrival of plastic fizz boats & plywood Vindexs .There is a cluster of classics in the right hand corner.
In the 2nd photo, who can ID the launch at the wharf – given the origin of the photos, the Turnwald family, I would suspect its ‘Robyn Gae’ but it does not look right to my eye.

Omana > Ngaire > Mavis B

Posted on by
5
Omana Jan 2012
Labour weekend 1947
Z42 – WWII

Omana > Ngaire > Mavis B
photos & details ex Ken Ricketts, with lots of editing by AH

Today’s post follows on from yesterdays Tamaki River boats post & features the launch Omana.

Mavis B was built in 1910 by James Reid for Albie Braund. She started life steam powered & had 2  steam engines in a short period of time (sub 3 years) these were replaced with an oil engine. She retained the steam funnel for many years after the upgrade.

She was later owned by a  S B Atkinson, who brought her to the Waitmata from the Manukau and renamed her Ngaire. Atkinson ‘modernised’ her, with a raised flared bow, bridgedeck, tram top, dodger & flying bridge (refer Labour weekend 1947 photo).

During the war years she was owned by Bernie Mc Jinn, who changed her name back to Mavis B. McJinn ran her as a Navy patrol craft (#Z24 in war photo). Her engine had been re-powered with a P6 Perkins diesel engine.

Ken Rickitts first sighted Mavis B in 1946 at Matiatia where she was permanently moored & believes she belonged to a Mr Wheeler of Waiheke Island, who had her in the mid & later 1940s.

Ken next saw Mavis B c.1960, when she was bought  by Jack Hayman of Riverview Rd Panmure who lived almost next door to Lane Motor Boat Co & on the waters edge of the Tamaki River, where she was moored. The Hayman’s did a dramatic 3rd generation re-birthing that saw the vessels name changed again, this time to Omana.

The Hayman’s had the Lane Motor Boat Co., along with much personal input from themselves, refit her to the configuration she is today (refer 2012 photo). They also fitted a 6 cyl. Ford diesel which is probably the same one she has today.

Omana may now reside in Havelock in the South Island.

Harold Kidd Update 10-05-2015

MAVIS B and her subsequent history is quite well, if briefly, covered in Robin’s and my book “Vintage New Zealand Launches” on pages 81 and 100 and there are two excellent Winkelmann pics of her, one in 1922 and one in 1928.
The book is still available at Boat Books at Westhaven at a modest cost (plug).
A couple of phtos, below, showing her in her early days as a neat little steamer.
Jas Reid built her hull for marine engineer and famous rugby player Albie Braund who personally built her first engine, a 15hp tandem with a boiler by G.Fraser. She was a sister-ship, hull-wise, to Reid’s SEABIRD which had won the Rudder Cup in 1908. After that she had a more powerful Simpson Strickland steam plant and then a succession of petrol engines including a 6 cylinder Alpha, a 50hp Harbeck, a 140hp Stearns and then became dieselised. She kept her yellow funnel for many years after losing her steam engine.
J Waldrond of Onehunga owned her on the Manukau 1933-7 and changed her name to NGAIRE. At the time she was the biggest private launch on the Manukau.
Shelley B. Atkinson brought her back to the Waitemata in late 1937. He was a great customer of Sam Ford so I guess Sam did the bridgedeckerisation for him.
Bernard Godfrey McGinn (1900-82) (not McJinn) owned her 1937-45 and skippered her with NAPS as Z24 when she was still Stearns-powered. The Perkins came later.
She was returned to Bernie McGinn’s ownership in 1944. He sold her to W.L. and O.E. Wheeler in 1945. Jack Hayman of 5 Riverlea Ave (not Riverview Road) was the next owner. From then on Ken’s tale is accurate enough. Jack was a builder and did much of the work converting her to her OMANA configuration.
She went to the Sounds and Nelson and is now owned in Nelson where SEABIRD also lives.
Her then owner had her for sale on Trade Me in 2011 as a “1963 Lanes bridgedecker”. The 1963 bit would relate to the Hayman rebuild at Lanes. Her owner was quite shocked to find her true provenance but took it on the chin very well.

c.1928
c.1911

Lest We Forget

Posted on by
5

 Lest We Forget

The Gallipoli campaign was failure, 1 in 5 of the NZ force were killed, 1 in 3 were wounded. 100 years later its easy for the historians to look back & say that the campaign show cased the Kiwi attitude & attributes & helped define us as a nation but the truth is 130,842 young men from both sides lost their lives in vain. When you read the personal stories from our troops it was just a total balls up. Imagine this, the casualties we so high & the stench from the dead so bad, both sides agreed to a cease fire so they could attempt to bury their dead. Sometimes I think we overlook that the ‘enemy’ almost lost twice the number of men ‘we’ did.
When you look at the numbers – maybe, just maybe, today’s ‘smart’ wars are not all bad.

If your on the water today, raise your glass to the 14,000 Kiwis that climbed into those little boats & rowed ashore. And for the 2,779 that had a one way ticket, raise your glass again 😉

Devonport, Auckland. Photo Libby Houghton

2015 Lake Rotoiti Antique & Classic Boat Show – Nelson Lakes

Posted on by
5

Lake Rotoiti Antique & Classic Boat Show – Nelson Lakes
photos & details from Greg Lees & Gary Drummond

As featured on the ww post ‘Summertime’ Greg Lees daughter Rosie recently launched a run-about / speed boat that she built. No sooner had she splashed it but she was off down south (home) with the the boat in tow. Post launch the first major outing for the boat was the Nelson Lakes, 2015 Lake Rotoiti Antique & Classic Boat Show. Rosie had entered Summertime in the “Best New Build” competition category & Greg reports that she missed out on this award, the winner being a 14 year old whom had built a mini hydroplane, and according to Greg, he deserved the prize. Nor did she win best ‘Outboard Boat’ or ‘Powerboat’ prize.

BUT –  she won “Best Boat of the Boat Show”.  That young lady is a winner 🙂

Rosie is pictured in one of the photos above with a bottle of Mumm champagne, she has been carrying that bottle around with her since it was given to her by Barbara & David Cooke at the launching of Summertime – given the absence of a cork its safe to assume it was cracked at the prize giving.
Rosie went on to win her race in the ‘Over 40 hp’ division the next day.  A T-shirt was the trophy.
In the photos above there is a red row boat – one of very popular, Ian Oughtred designed, St Ayles skiffs, this one ‘Kaikoura Lass, was built in Kaikoura as a community project.
The event is a magic gathering of classic boating enthusiasts & the organisers welcome all i.e. not just wooden vessels , plus  classic cars are invited along to the weekend so its a hit with young & old.

Note: Press clipping below from the Nelson Mail

Iawai (Tidesong)

Posted on by
6

Iawai (Tidesong)

The above photos were sent to me by Andrew Pollard, owner of the 1913 Tom Le Huquet launch Aumoe.
Andrew received them from the grandson of Aumoe’s original owner, Mike Brookfield.

Can anyone ID the launch? (done)

Harold Kidd (+ Baden Pascoe) Update

She’s the 55 footer IAWAI, built for Judge H.G. Seth-Smith of Russell by James Reid’s brother David Reid at Customs St W in late 1911. She had a 40hp (rated) heavy duty 4 cylinder Buffalo engine. She was the largest pleasure launch in Auckland at the time. Seth-Smith donated her to the Government in 1915 for war work. The Government sold her to R.B.S. Hogwood in 1922 and then she went to Auckland metal and carrying contractor A.W. Bryant and used for commercial work, heavily modified from this configuration, but looking very smart. I’ll post a pic later. Baden and I struggled over this pic for some time until Baden hit the spot.
In 1933 she was renamed TIDESONG and run by C.D. Cooper until 1938 when F.D. Cadman bought her and had her renovated by Joe Wheeler at Bayswater. She was taken over by the RNZAF as W95 by 1942 for towing at Hobsonville. She also possibly went to the flying boat base at Lauthala Bay. There is some confusion in the RNZAF records on this (and her correct W number).
Post war she was used as a hire launch at Gisborne and Tauranga. She finished up being a total loss when she sank at anchor in Shipwreck Bay, Northland on 23rd June 1972 when owned by Roy Callister of Browns Bay.

Photos ex Harold Kidd

23/02/2015 – A message from Shelley Arlidge , the Curator at the Russell Museum

Hi Alan,
I was able to narrow down the date of that photo of Iawai to about a five year window. Your commentators say that she was built in 1911. There was a Russell Regatta in 1912 after a gap of some years and then every year after that until the 1950s. There is a building in the background of your photo of Russell’s first town hall. It collapsed in a storm in 1916 and a new one wasn’t built until 1922. So this photo must have been taken in the years 1912 to 1916.

Mechanics Bay 1945

Posted on by
19

Mechanics Bay April 1945

photo ex James Dreyer ex ‘Old Auckland’ facebook

I thought it was time for an old b/w photo & a who can tell us more about the motor boats featured.

Updated ex Harold Kidd

My pennyworth is the the left hand launch is one of the Hubert Scott-Paine designed control tenders, built by his company, British Power Boat Co, in 1939 for Tasman Empire Airways Ltd for the flying boat base at Mechanics Bay and later copied here. They floated around between RNZAF and TEAL operated by the Civil Aviation Board so it’s hard to be precise, at this distance, on which one she was. The first Hythe-built one arrived on EMPIRE STAR in June 1939 and was 37ft 6ins x 8ft 6ins and had twin 100hp petrol engines (Meadows I think, as fitted to Invicta and Lagonda sports cars and those Bren Gun carriers which didn’t have Ford V8s). They were guaranteed to do 18 knots but could touch 25.
I think the middle launch is TASMANAIR, built for TEAL by Colin Wild in July 1941 with a very similar spec to the Scott-Paine boats, but had a large passenger capacity.
The right hand boat is possibly the Scott-Paine 23 foot aircraft tug brought out on the EMPIRE STAR in 1939, fitted with a single Meadows.
My Standard 5 and 6 classrooms at Devonport School, high up on Mount Victoria, had splendid views of proceedings at Mechanics Bay. We had one student teacher who would stop the class and let us see all departures and landings. There were some hairy ones, especially Catalinas in a strong westerly.

PS the little launch coming in at left is probably one of the locally-built runabouts used at Mechanics Bay for general purposes, often in charge of Flight Sergeant Johnny Wray of NGATAKI fame. Dave Jackson will probably be more precise on that one as his father was in the RNZAF Motorboat Section. It could even be the Collings & Bell 28 footer PIRI PONO which got rather modified by the Air Force and had a Chrysler Crown installed in place of its “orphan” 150hp Niagara..

Additional photo added ex Pam Cundy

Harold Kidd input

It’s a pity we can’t see if the Scott-Paine launch in the foreground of Pam’s pic has a W number on the bows, which would identify it precisely. My guess is that she’s W6 which was returned to Auckland in May 1944 from Lauthala Bay, Fiji. The plane in that image is an RNZAF Short Sunderland.
The planes in the top pic are the Short Empire class civilian flying boat ZK AMC “AWARUA” in the foreground, 3 RNZAF Sunderlands and an RNZAF Consolidated PBY5 Catalina at the rear. As a child, I thought it strange that AWARUA had been named after the Auckland Meat Company.

Rehia Z15

Posted on by
5


REHIA
photo ex Scott Taylor & details ex Harold Kidd

Rehia was launched by Colin Wild on 26th January 1939 for Gordon Bartleet but was bought by Frank Pidgeon of the Ace Tyre Co shortly after. She was powered by a single 6 cyl. petrol Buda that was imported by Seabrook Fowlds and installed by Allely Bros. A newspaper report at the time said she had twin Budas, but was wrong. She was fully mobilised with NAPS in 1943 as Z15 with Frank Pidgeon as skipper and Ron Hunt (married Jack Brooke’s sister) as crew. Bill Ryan bought her about 1948 (or possibly straight from the postwar disposal sale). She was loosely referred to as a “shortened Amakura”.

Scott Taylors father Mac, crewed on Rehia during the war when she was on boom patrol at North Head. Below are the navy documents recording Mac’s time aboard. click to enlarge.

More Rehia photos & details here.   https://waitematawoodys.com/2013/04/23/rehia/