Model of Carelmapu Ship Pre-wreck
Description
Probably the most dramatic shipwreck, and one of the most costly in human lives, was that of the Chilean full-rigged ship Carelmapu on Gowland Rocks off the West Coast of Vancouver Island. The C. P. R. steamer Princess Maquinna left Tofino on Thanksgiving day in the face of extremely heavy wind and seas which had done extensive damage to offshore shipping. As the vessel proceeded down the Vancouver Island coast the weather worsened, Capt. Gillam stating that it was as bad as he had ever seen in his many years of navigating this dangerous route. He was preparing to put about and run for shelter when the lookout reported a sailing vessel in distress and almost in the breakers off the port bow. She was soon made out to be a full-rigged ship, her few sails in tatters, most of her yards bare, and plunging wildly to two anchors. It was the Carelmapu (formerly the Liverpool-built Kinross), inbound for Puget Sound from Caleta Buena, Chile by way of Honolulu and in command of Capt. Fernando Desolmes, and unable to find a tug off Cape Flattery. After lying at the entrance to Juan de Fuca Strait all day, she had been caught by the rising southeast gale and beaten up the coast of Vancouver Island, her sails being stripped away as the velocity of the wind rose to hurricane force. When the Princess Maquinna was sighted, both anchors of the square-rigger were dropped in 240 fathoms. Capt. Gillam skillfully worked his steamer to within 200 yards of the Carelmapu, and efforts were made by the Chilean seamen to launch two boats. Both were swamped in the 50-foot seas. The Princess Maquinna had also anchored, but the terrible seas literally tore the steel anchor winch from her forward deck, winch, chain and anchor all being lost. The same seas swept the Carelmapu, parted both her anchor chains and sent her crashing on the rocks. The Princess steamer, hard pressed for her own survival, could do no more. Upon reaching Victoria Capt. Gillam reported the Chilean ship lost with all hands. However, as the ebbing tide left the remains of the vessel high on the rocks, Capt. Desolmes, three members of the crew and a young passenger crawled from the wreckage and made their way ashore. The remaining 20 men of the ship's company were lost in the boats or swept from the decks before she struck. A passenger on the Princess Maquinna, H. H. Tanner, a well-known mining man of Seattle and British Columbia, took a series of photographs of the ship's last moments which are among the classic marine pictures of all time. Gordon Newell, "Maritime Events of 1915,"
H. W. McCurdy Marine History of the Pacific Northwest., p.256.
W.G. Bellanger has models in many of the major Maritime Museums in North America – including the Maritime Museum of British Columbia and the Vancouver Maritime Museum. His largest were the David Dows (a five-masted schooner) which was five feet long. He also built a scale model of the aircraft carrrier USS Wolverine that was scaled to match available plastic aircraft kits for the aircraft on deck. A model so large it had to be moved in a van.
