1. Themes
  2. A to Z

Polly Woodside

This ocean-going trading vessel, able to carry 1000 t and a crew of fifteen, was built in Belfast in 1885 and travelled more than 800 000 nautical miles (nearly 1.5 million km) carrying coal and nitrate between Europe and South America. Renamed Rona in 1904, she worked in the Tasman Sea and Pacific Ocean for 20 years and saw wartime service in 1943-45. Her last seafaring years were as a coal hulk refuelling steamships in the Port of Melbourne. In 1968 National Trust volunteers restored the ship and her original name. One of only two ships of her type afloat in Australia, she is moored at the Polly Woodside Maritime Museum on the Yarra River.

Alistair Harkness