150 years ago this month, the QGSY Lucinda steamed from Dumbarton, Scotland bound ultimately for Queensland. This extract from the Chief Engineer’s log records an estimated 80 tons of coal on board for the journey on 30 December 1884.
The QGSY Lucinda arrived in Brisbane on 7 May 1885. Named for Lady Jeannie Lucinda Musgrave, the second wife of the then Governor Sir Anthony Musgrave, the QGSY Lucinda was built for government business. A sad duty was when she helped to rescue passengers from the Pearl ferry disaster on the Brisbane River in 1896. A highlight of her service was accommodating the Constitution Committee during the drafting of the Australian Constitution, as documented in the caption of this photograph.
Read more about the officers who served on the QGSY Lucinda in the Register of public servants and the Queensland blue books held at Queensland State Archives. More detail about the voyages of the QGSY Lucinda can be found in the Log Books of QGSY Lucinda.
Jo Seccombe
Senior Reference Archivist
G’day Friends – The following poem is in regard to an important piece of Australian History, the final draft of Australia’s constitution was signed in the smoking room of the “Steam Paddle boat Lucinda” in the year 1891. This piece of our nation’s history happened while she cruised on the “Hawkesbury River” in “New South Wales”.
She is now a rusting piece of land-fill in the mouth of the “Brisbane River” in “Queensland”. Please enjoy.
The Steam paddle boat Lucinda.
By Gregory M. Dillon @. 2001.
The old “Lucinda’s” lying still
beneath the mud of “Moreton Bay”.
Remembered by so very few,
the role she had to play.
Built and launched in Scotland,
in eighteen eighty four.
She plied the mighty oceans,
to reach Australia’s shore.
She wasn’t large by any means,
fifty metres over-all.
Appointed in the grandest style,
tradition could install.
Trappings of a grander time,
rosewood, teak and brass.
Told the tale to those aboard,
this ship was built for class.
She cruised the “Hawkesbury River”
great paddles beating time:
With the band upon her deck,
to the strains of “Auld Langsyne”.
She saw Australia come of age,
that day in eighteen ninety one.
With a constitution duly signed,
a nation had begun.
The old Lucinda’s lying still,
beneath the mud of “Moreton Bay”.
She saw Australia come of age.
That was her finest day.