Adrian Henry Williams (1882 - 1954)

Born 23 Jul 1882 in Charters Towers, Queensland, Australia

Ancestors

Husband of Ethel Janet (Smith) Williams — married 14 Jun 1910 in Mosman, New South Wales, Australia

Descendants

Died 11 Feb 1954 at age 71 in Plympton Park, South Australia, Australia

Problems/Questions Profile manager: Neil Smith [send private message]

Biography

Adrian was born in 1882. He was the son of Stephen Williams and Annie Tucker. He passed away in 1954.

At 15 he went to sea, and for 27 years roamed in strange places. He received his Master Mariner's Ticket 602 on 25 Oct 1907, and later, with increased family responsibilities he settled into a shore job and family life, working for the Spencer Gulf [later Adelaide] Stevedoring Co., in Port Pirie, South Australia. He retied in 1946.

His Career

Recorder (Port Pirie, SA: 1919 – 1954), Friday 6 September 1946. ^[1] MEN OF OLD SAIL DAYS ARE STEADILY RETREATING FROM PUBLIC SIGHT Capt. Adrian Williams Had Interesting Career On “The Seven Seas” Disappearing from the public view in steady succession are those hardy men who before the day of the steamer and turbine-driven ship sailed the seven seas with no coal or fuel oil troubles on their horizon. They depended upon a stout mast, a billowing sail, and a “heart of oak” to get them there and back. Those who remain have nothing but memories of hard yet glamorous days. One such is Capt. Adrian Williams, just-retired manager of Adelaide Stevedoring Company. He went to sea at 15, and for 27 years roamed in strange places before he settled into a shore job and family life. Pressure of office duty removed, Capt. Williams was quite happy to light a pipe, sit in the sun, and tell something of his wide experiences. He illustrated again what “The Recorder” has always noted among “old salts” — the remarkable memory they carry. Capt. Adrian’s father was a mining engineer at Charters Towers, Queensland, and when his son was about 12 the family moved down to Sydney. Adrian was an avid reader from the time he could understand black and white, and had an abnormal thirst for literature dealing with sea adventure. It was natural, then, that when he left school toil in the office of an architect did not appeal and he pestered his parents to allow him to “go forth.” Williams, sen., was friendly with the administrators of the Burns Philp firm, and when he appealed to them they advised him to let his son go. “We shall soon sicken him of the sea, “they declared. So off he went to the South Sea Islands as supercargo in one of the company’s vessels. Contrary to expectations, the life was “right up his alley,” and after a year or so trading among the islands he was, apprenticed for overseas runs in the full-rigged ship Port Crawford. Man-Size Job “We loaded coal at Newcastle for Chile said the veteran, “and then took on salt petre for Hamburg (Germany). I have never forgotten the loading of that cargo in those times, for instead of having a gang below to stow the bags one man did the lot. As each bag contained 500 lbs. of the petre – you can guess how amazing; was his performance day after day — and all day. The Port Crawford had originally been, a China trade clipper named Turkestan, and was a stout vessel. “We traded a lot to Tocopilla Chile, a port noted for the story that when Drake first sailed round the Horn and sacked South American ports he denuded Tocopilla of all its goat’s. “Back at Hamburg I was transferred to the four-masted barque Port Stanley due to take from Antwerp general cargo for San Francisco. We topped our load with thousands of kegs of Scotch whisky, sent from its country of origin for the purpose of being well shaken up by means of voyages round the world. We would dump the whisky on the wharf at ‘Frisco, discharge our cargo, and then load it again to continue its ‘maturing’’ process at sea. “On my first trip we were a month pottering round Cape Horn, backing and filling, sighting in turn the land to the north and the ice to the south. The run to San Francisco took us 75 days. On our return to Antwerp women used to handle the salt petre, slitting the bags and allowing the stuff to run down chutes into the bins. My life as an apprentice was happy. My dad had had to pay £26 for my four-year run and he saw to it that there was a letter in port awaiting me regularly with a little pocket money. I did not do so badly. Days Of Coal Exports Australia at that time was doing a tremendous export trade in coal, and it was nothing to see 50 to 100 ships in Newcastle awaiting, their turn to load for West Coast ports. “On one occasion we loaded coal at Cardiff (Wales) for South America. We had crossed the equator west of Brazil when we were troubled with that curse of all coal carriers — internal combustion — and were forced to put back to San Salvador. That night the ship Norfolk Island blew up from the same cause, and we were joined by some of her crew. “We left Bahia San Salvador the following night, and had barely got well out than it was ‘All hands on deck!’ for the ship was afire. After a battle we got the boats lowered and sheered off, only to find in the morning that a French ship was standing by. Fearing that they would seize the abandoned Port Stanley the captain ordered all boats back again. “For two days and nights we fought the fire below, saved the ship, and got her safely to Cape Town. The Boer War was in progress then, and we saw much activity among the troops. Ashore one day I met a couple of Australians in the Bushmen’s contingent in ‘The Lion’s Rump’ Hotel and yarned with them. Years later, in a little pub in Sydney, I ran across one of them again. ‘’We discharged our coal, took in ballast, and set sail for Sydney – for coal for the West Coast again. I had been three, years at sea, and was eager to see my people. So I hit Sydney again, proud of my massive sea chest of cedar (I still have it, as a tool, chest). Within it were a few Continental fancy postcards and one ostrich feather. But I had a chest, anyhow. Picturesque Peru “Then I visited Peru, to discover new methods and customs. In the port of Mollendo if one did not run into ‘surf – day,’ when it was impossible to land, some saint or other was being honored, and everyone was on holiday. They honored a saint about every second day. I do not think that I have ever been in a more God-forsaken spot. The Andes come right down to the coast, and there is no vegetation. When I was there they had had no rain for years. “While we were lying in Mollendo we were honored by a visit from the Peruvian Navy. The entire outfit consisted of a gunboat about half the size of our Kekerangu, with a couple of guns mounted for’ard. The navy was an imposing sight with her patches of red lead here and there and the officers a mass of gold braid and buttons. They were great on color; those people. “While we were there one of the innumerable battles was set going. The people would start war at the drop of the hat, and we had the spectacle of Government troops, picking off striking laborers as they fled up the hills. Their bodies wore buried in the salt petre fields to remain there as if pickled. The squabble we witnessed was over the action of the strikers in blowing up a train, supposed to be loaded with the troops. But they picked the wrong train.” So Capt. Williams roamed round the world with coal, salt petre, and general cargoes until he landed in North America without a ship. Eager to get back to Australia and go after his ticket, he sought in vain for a berth. He was offered a second mate’s job, but when he found he was to be a strike-breaker he turned the offer down. Long Term in Steam Then he worked back to England and signed on the Port Caledonia, bound for Melbourne with steel rails. After a holiday at his home he joined the steamer Miowera, for Vancouver. That started his long term in steam. He became employed by the Burns Philp Line, running from Sydney on the first of each third month for Brisbane, New Guinea, to Bismarck Archipelago, back to Darwin, and on to the East Indies. Then he transferred to the small steamer Isabel, which travelled all, day and anchored all night running between Thursday Island and New Guinea. He was second mate on the Isabel when running up to such now well-known places as Milne Bay, Samarai and Moresby. “Then came one of the most interesting experiences of my life,” said Capt. Williams. “The White Australia policy was being enforced, and my ship was ordered to the job of deporting Kanakas from Queensland back to their islands. What a task! Orders were that the natives (and their wives and children, if they had them) were to be delivered, to spots they nominated as their homes. “When we took them ashore at some of the most desolate places in the world I was the only white man in the boat. They would find their villages gone altogether, but that made no difference. Orders were orders, and many were placed on barren shores with food and left to their own devices. They had to find or make their own homes. On that job I nosed into places where no white man had. Ever been. In my earlier days as a supercargo I had seen much of the recruiting of native labor for the plantations, and I knew the game backward.” Skipper Was The “Baby” Capt. Williams gained his master’s ticket when he was 25, and joined the A.U.S.N. Line. His first command was the steamer Aramac, and he was the youngest man aboard. There followed a long succession of ships on which he trod the bridge, including the Makara, Amara, Arrawadda, [Arrawatta] and others. He took the Amara to Fiji and brought back the Flinders. For a time he was master of the Kyarra, with which a trip to New Guinea was contemplated. No other master of the line had ever been there, and Capt. Williams was sent. There were no charts of Bookless Inlet, his destination, but he had been told that Japanese and German ships had run in behind the reef there. He discovered later that no vessel had ever been into the inlet, so when he arrived he worked his way through the reef and before he departed charted the inlet carefully. There was a sort of fragile jetty, not long enough to permit normal loading of the copper ore. So Capt. Williams had to run the nose of his vessel into the mangroves, while lie loaded her aft, and then ease her back for forward loading.

Notices

UNPROTECTED HATCHWAY. BRISBANE. Tuesday. Sydney Morning Herald. Wednesday 22nd June 1921 ^[2] Captain Adrian Williams, of the steamer Mallina, was to-day fined £15, with costs, for leaving a hatchway open without a special watchman in charge. Sergeant Henderson informed the bench that a seaman left the forecastle on the night of May 11 to post a letter. He jumped on the hatchway, thinking it was covered, and next morning he was found dead in the hold below.

The Advertiser (Adelaide) Thursday 12th September 1946 ^[3] PORT PIRIE. - Captain Adrian Williams (manager of the local branch of the Adelaide Stevedoring Co.) has retired after 23 years in Port Pirie in that position.

Recorder (Port Pirie, SA : 1919 - 1954), Friday 12 February 1954. ^[4] DEATH WILLIAMS. — At Royal Adelaide Hospital on February 11, ADRIAN HENRY (Capt.), beloved husband of Ethel Janet Williams, and loving father of Adrian Leonard, Joan Margaret, Alan Fyfe, and Keith Henry. Aged 71.

Sources

1. ↑ http://trove.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/96160253
2. ↑ https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/15952457
3. ↑ https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/35755460
4. ↑ https://trove.nla.gov.au/newspaper/article/96184036

• https://www.familyhistory.bdm.qld.gov.au
• Birth - Adrian Henry Williams - Qld BDM BC C 3499 / 1882 - M = Annie Jane Tucker, F = Stephen Taylor Williams.
• https://familyhistory.bdm.nsw.gov.au/lifelink/familyhistory/search
• Marriage - NSW BDM MC 5692/1910 - Groom = WILLIAMS, ADRIAN H; Bride = SMITH, ETHEL J - MOSMAN.
• https://www.genealogysa.org.au/resources/online-database-search
• Death - WILLIAMS , Adrian Henry - Adelaide - Book/Page 807/856 1954
• Link - https://www.familysearch.org/tree/person/details/LY6B-J8X

Acknowledgements

• Williams Family & shaz1