HMS Pandora (1833)

HMS Pandora was a 3-gun brig of the Royal Navy, in service from 1833 to 1862.

Map of the Cape of Good Hope with soundings made by Pandora in 1851

Pandora in 1861, painted by Thomas Lyde Hornbrook
History
Name: HMS Pandora
Ordered: 11 December 1831
Builder: Woolwich Dockyard
Cost: £7,821
Laid down: August 1832
Launched: 5 July 1833
Commissioned: 1 June 1836
Reclassified: Converted to survey ship 1845.
Fate: Sold January 1862
General characteristics
Class and type: Pandora-class brig
Tons burthen: 318 6894 tons bm
Length:
  • 90 ft (27.4 m) (overall)
  • 71 ft 3 in (21.7 m) (keel)
Beam: 29 ft 3 in (8.9 m)
Depth of hold: 13 ft 10 in (4.22 m)
Propulsion: Sails
Complement: 50 (later 60)
Armament:

From 20 December 1850 to 5 June 1856[1] her captain was Commander Byron Drury,[2] under whose command she spent four and a half years surveying the New Zealand coast.[3]

  • Soundings made off the Cape of Good Hope at the Agulhas Bank in 1851.
  • Took part in the survey work of New Zealand, between 1851 and 1855. This work, together with that of HMS Acheron between 1848 and 1851, led to the publication of the New Zealand Pilot.[4] . On 8 February 1853, Pandora ran aground at Manukau whilst departing for Onehunga.[5]
  • In December 1854, surveyed Sumner Bay, including the bar and mouth of the Avon-Heathcote Estuary for the Canterbury Provincial Council. Drury wrote a report and produced a detailed chart of the area, with soundings.[6]

Thomas Kerr her Master.

Notes

  1. Davis, Paul. "Pandora Byron Drury R.N." www.pdavis.nl. Retrieved 13 February 2019.
  2. Davis, Paul. "Byron Drury R.N." www.pdavis.nl. Retrieved 13 February 2019.
  3. The Times newspaper (9 November 1888). "Obituary: Admiral Byron Drury". Retrieved 13 February 2019 via www.pdavis.nl.
  4. Richards, G.H.; Evans, F.J. (1875). The New Zealand Pilot (Fourth ed.). London: Hydrographic Office, Admiralty.
  5. "Ship News". The Morning Post (24858). London. 23 August 1853. p. 8.
  6. Amodeo, Colin (1998). Rescue: The Sumner community and its lifeboat. Sumner, Christchurch, New Zealand: Sumner Lifeboat Institution Incorporated. p. 2. ISBN 0 473 05164 8.

References

  • Day, Jean D. The Search for Thomas Kerr, Mariner, Mapmaker, Missionary, Meteorologist, 1825 - 1875. Create Space, 2015.
  • Lyon, David and Rif Winfield. The Sail and Steam Navy List: All of the Ships of the Royal Navy, 1815-1889. London: Chatham Publishing. 2004, p. 126.
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