John Sen Inches Thomson

John Sen Inches Thomson and his brother, Andrew, were sealers and whalers in the waters surrounding Australia and New Zealand. They were partial owners in the sailing ships Friendship and Bencleugh. The Bencleugh was a 66-ton wooden schooner built at Port Chalmers, New Zealand in 1872 by Sutherland & Co., and registered out of Dunedin, Otago, New Zealand.[1][2]

In early July in 1877, with a crew of 19, the Bencleugh left Port Chalmers, New Zealand, on a sealing trip.[2] They originally sailed beyond Macquarie Island looking for Emerald Island.[1] Emerald Island had first been reported in 1821 by the sailing ship Emerald.[1] After finding no trace of the island, they concluded it never existed and began their return to Macquarie Island.[1] The crew spent the next three weeks fighting storms of wind, snow, fog and hail, never able to land at Macquarie.[1] During a break in the gales, the crew was able to land a whaling boat filled with supplies.[1] The next day, 6 August 1877,[3] a large wave overtook the Bencleugh and pushed it into the breakers.[1] The storm had driven the ship into a natural cleft in a reef, but the row boats had been washed ashore.[1] The crew determined that the only viable option was to get off the Bencleugh before it broke up was for a volunteer to swim to shore with a rope.[1] Inches Thomson determined that as the ship's owner, he should be the one to attempt this dangerous feat.[1] His first attempt failed and he was pushed back by the sea, but his second effort to swim through the kelp fields and the icy water was successful.[1] Using the rope as their guide, the entire crew was able to make their way off the ship and onto Macquarie Island.[1]

As a sealing island, Macquarie Island had several crude sealing huts on it.[4] The Bencleaugh crew was able to seek refuge in them.[4] Many of the crew had tossed their coats and shoes in preparation for their swim to shore, so even the minimal protection the huts provided was a welcome relief.[4]

Two of the crew had either broken or dislocated legs, and several more had other injuries.[4] The night after the shipwreck, chief harpooner, Henry Whalley, died in one of the huts of his injuries.[1][4] Whalley was buried on the island.[4]

The day after the shipwreck the crew was able to salvage additional supplies from the Bencleugh before it broke up.[4] These were used to supplement the provisions the crew had offloaded the day before.[4] The sails were cut up and used as blankets and to cover the tops of the huts.[4] The men also combed the beaches daily for tossed items that the tide eventually washed in.[4] Included in the items the crew was able to salvage were several casks of food, a whole box of tobacco and a rifle.[4]

Fourteen days after the Bencleugh shipwrecked, her sister ship Friendship arrived at Macquarie Island.[4][5] The Friendship had left Port Chalmers shortly after the Bencleugh.[4] After a short sealing run, the Friendship left with the Bencleugh's three injured sailors and as many of the remainder of the Bencleugh crew as could be arranged and returned to Port Chalmers.[4] After arriving at Port Chalmers, the Friendship was immediately fitted out again and dispatched back to Macquarie Island.[4] The Friendship finally returned nearly four months after the wreck of the Bencleugh.[4] The Bencleugh crew busied themselves on the island by sealing and had made 15 tons of oil by the time of the Friendship's return.[4] After four challenging months, with many of the crew wearing sailcloth for clothes, the Bencleugh crew arrived back in New Zealand in time to celebrate Christmas 1877.[1][4]

The Bencleugh was insured in the Victoria, Australia, office for £800.[5]

Sealing Huts on Macquarie Island, Sketch by John Sen Inches Thomson

In 1912, Inches Thomson's book, Voyages and Wanderings in Far Off Lands and Seas, was published by Headley Brothers, London.[6] The book detailed Inches Thomson's experiences sailing the seas as a sealer and whaler, including his four months stranded on Macquarie Island.[6] In addition to writing the text, Inches Thomson also completed several accompanying illustrations. The Scotsman Newspaper's review of the book opened with this gracious summary: "Mr. Thomson's all too brief narrative of the incidents on his voyages and wanderings must be given a high place among the literature of travel and adventure."[6]

Born John Sen Thomson in about 1845 in Alloa, Clackmannan, Scotland,[7] His father was shipowner, Watson Thomson, whose cousins Alexander and William founded The Ben Line. John added Inches to his surname after his 1896 marriage to Margaret Anne Inches. Margaret, or Maggie as she was known, was the only child of Charles Hood Inches of Hope Park, Blairgowrie, in Perthshire. It is believed the couple's surname addition was intended to honour his wife's family. Margaret and her father were members of the Smalls of Dirnanean. The couple had no children.

As an inventor, Inches Thomson patented a device for recording the course of a vessel[8] and an improved pneumatic churn.[9]

Margaret Inches Thomson died in 1919[10] and is buried in the Inches family plot in Blairgowrie Cemetery. After his wife's death, Inches Thomson removed to New Zealand where his brother Andrew's family and his cousin, Captain William Thomson of Alloa, lived. He died there at Dunedin on 20 March 1933.[11]

• John Sen Inches Thomson at Find a Grave