First issued in 1929. 8vo. xvi, 288 pp. Plates, index. Blue cloth, dust-jacket. #121121
The Cape Horners are a dwindling group of men and women united by their shared
memories of the windjammers, the greatest tall ships the world has ever seen.
Surprisingly, little is known of this remarkable part of Australia’s history.
By the 1890s improvements in the design of steam engines made the steamship a more
efficient cargo carrier than sail. If it wasn’t for Gustav Erickson, an Aland Islander, the
tall ships would have died out long before 1949.
“These great ships that were still sailing in the 1930s and 1940s were the culmination of
hundreds of years of sailing ships. They were the last hurrah in the domination of steam
for the world s oceans.” Garry Kerr, historian.
As the death knell was sounding on the tall ships, Erickson built up the last great cargocarrying sailing fleet the world would ever see. During the First World War freight rates
were extremely high for ship owners willing to take a risk. Erickson bought the Lawhill
in 1917 and for him the risk paid off. After the War the Germans were forced to hand
much of their shipping over to the Allies and Erickson was able to build up an impressive
fleet of windjammers at scrap prices. At the same time Europe needed grain to feed its
war-torn population and Australia produced more grain than it needed. The grain trade
between Australia and Europe became the last trade left to the tall ships.
And so it is that the link between Port Victoria in the Spencer Gulf of South Australia and
the Aland Islands, in the Baltic Sea, between Finland and Sweden, was formed.
Erickson’s ships mostly sailed in ballast from Mariehamn in the Aland Islands to South
Australia. By the time the ships got to the small town of Port Victoria many of the
Finnish crew had had enough of the harsh conditions on board and jumped ship. This
meant that some young Australians could join up and fulfill their dreams of being a
“Cape Horner”. They’d heard about the windjammers through the writings of people such
as Allan Villiers, an Australian adventurer and writer whose books, “By Way Of Cape
Horn” and “Falmouth For Orders” brought to life the romance of the sailing ship and
inspired not just sailors but paying passengers, including women, to sail on a
windjammer.
Port Victoria took on a new lease of life when the ships were in town, not only did they
provide work for locals but they also boosted the town’s social calendar. Sometimes there
were as many as eleven ships anchored four miles off port and the crews from these ships
came into town to attend balls and suppers.