Uncle Ben

[?]e Last Of The Wanderer In Search Of Uncle Ben

If r. Alan Lennox-Boyd, former \tish Secretary of State for the Monies, is currently visiting the nth Pacific where he hopes among er things to find some evidence the fate of his great uncle njamin Boyd (see Editors Mail -7) The search has created quite ioi of interest in Australian and w Zealand newspapers. ,/M from time to time has pub lished reports on the colourful Scot, Boyd, who in 1842 sailed Australia in his sch o o ne_r under er, and who was in 1851 led by natives on Guadalcanal.

Dne of the contributors to PlM’s ies of stories was Mr. Norman Wallis iPIM, April, 1958), who an article in The Sydney Morning raid in January during the em it discussion started by Mr. nnox-Boyd’s trip, brought the in flation on Boyd up to date. [n his Herald article Mr. Wallis ints out that after seven enter- Lsing, dramatic and disastrous ars in Australia, during which dissipated about £500,000 en isted to him by British investors, >yd sailed for the Californian Idfields hoping there to recoup e fortune. But after a little more le “Wanderer”, passing Hawaii by oonlight—a painting by John ebster, which is now the property Mrs. E. St. Julian, of Suva,

Webster’s grand-daughter.

than a year this was unsuccessful, and Boyd sailed from California to the Pacific Islands, with some vague idea of forming a Polynesian Republic. , , , At what was later named Wanderer’s Bay, Guadalcanal, Boyd, hunting ashore with a native servant named Kapertania, was attacked. Neither was seen again, though the native’s head was alleged to have been recovered later.

Mr. Wallis says there are still historical errors and misconceptions in existence about the life and death and Boyd.

Forty-six years after Boyd’s death, John Webster, sailing master of the Wanderer, was still complaining of the spate of inaccuracies which persisted in stories of the Wanderer’s Bay episode.

Mr. Wallis adds that in 1959 he

saw the extensive collection of Boydiana which Mr. Lennox-Boyd has established in his home in Belgrave Square in London.

These include historical docu ments, personal belongings of Ben Boyd, a scale model of the Wanderer and paintings of the famous schooner by Oswald Brierly, the marine artist who accompanied Boyd to Sydney.

Rare Book Mr. Wallis gave Mr. Boyd one of the seven extant copies of John Webster’s The Last Voyage of the Wanderer and photostat copies of five letters written by Webster, George Crawford (mate) and William Ottiwell (master) of the Wanderer— the originals of which were presented to the Sydney Mitchell Library by Mr. Wallis in 1958.

The letters were discovered in the pages of one of the volumes, un earthed in the ’Thirties. Webster’s letter, to a friend, described the attack by the natives on the Wanderer, the hand to hand fight on board; and the subsequent bombardment and firing of the villages.

Later in The Sydney Morning Herald, Alexandra Wilkinson, of Wahroonga, Sydney, wrote to say she had almost completed a biography of Benjamin Boyd. She also made one or two corrections of Mr. Wallis’ material— although not on any of the facts that are re ported here.

Photos: Rob Wright, Fiji PRO

Mr. Alan Lennox-Boyd (right) greeted by the Governor of Fiji, Sir Kenneth Maddocks on his arrival by air in Suva during his current Pacific tour. In the background are Lady Maddocks and Lady Patrica Boyd.