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SOME DETAILS ABOUT CERBERUS
Tonnage: 3,340 displacement.
Length: 225 feet.
Engines: Twin Maudslay horizontal engines. Nom.
HP 250.
Trial speed: 9.75 knots (not rigged or
armed).
Draught: 13' forward, 14' 2.5" aft.
Armament: 4 x 10" RML guns: 4 x 1" Nordenfeldt
MGs.
Complement: 82 (incl. 3 engineers and 3
gunners).
Laid down: Jarrow, U. K., 18 September
1867.
Launched: 2 December 1868.
Completed: September 1870.
Cerberus was one of seven 'near to'
sister ships. These were
Abyssinia, Cyclops, Gorgon* (Devonport
UK), Hecate, Hydra
& Magdala.
Abyssinia and Magdala were used to guard
the Indian harbours
of Bombay and Madras.
None of these ships, except Cerberus,
has survived.
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* An earlier HMS Gorgon was commanded by
Sir Charles Hotham,
whose ship ran aground in a storm in South
America. Using steely
determination. Hotham ordered the crew to dig a
channel to the sea.
The ship's company was saved. Sir Charles later
became Victoria's
Lieutenant Governor, and managed the Eureka Rebellion crisis in
December 1854.
The Abyssinia. From The Illustrated
London News.
In an epic, dangerous voyage from England to
Australia,
the ship rolled alarmingly in stormy weather.
With only
a skeleton crew of 25, in case of mishap, all
hands during
one storm worked frantically to bail out the
lower deck. Most
of the crew broke ship at Malta, where one man
drowned and
ten were gaoled. Near Aden, the temperature in
the stoke hold
reached 142 degrees fahrenheit. Crossing the
Indian Ocean the
heat browned paint in most cabins when
ventilation engines were
turned off to save coal. The ship had been
fitted with temporary
wooden sides and three masts and sails.
Somehow, with luck and
good seamanship, she reached Melbourne on 9
April 1871.
Cerberus in the Alfred Graving Dock in the
1870s.
One Melbourne newspaper unkindly described the
ship as a
floating gasworks. Cerberus however
proved effective as a
deterrent to hostile raiders. None ever
attempted to tackle the
'Guardian of Hades'. The ship was handed over
to the Royal
Australian Navy after Federation. She was
eventually sold for
scrap to a salvage company. She was purchased
by Sandringham
City Council in 1926 as a breakwater off Black
Rock.
CURRENT OWNERSHIP OF CERBERUS
Cerberus is owned today by Bayside City
Council. Numerous
plans to raise or stabilise the ship have been
formulated, and
current estimates to save the ship run to $ A
10 million. A
spokesperson for the Council told 'Defending
Victoria' that
"no-one has put up their hand for the ten
million". The National
Trust is one of a number of important
organisations that are
striving to save the ship.
The 5-year project plan to save the ship.
Action
should have commenced in
1996.
Cerberus is often pounded by
destructive, stormy seas.
(Photo
by Bill Billett).
Naval Historian Bob Nicholls has come up
with a new idea. He
thinks the Cowper Cole turrets are the most
significant parts of
the hulk. If the whole ship cannot be saved, he
advocates that
one turret be sold (to Britain) which would
provide funds to save
the other turret. This could then be preserved
onshore somewhere
in Melbourne, and perhaps restored to working
order. In the
absence of other funding, this idea needs
careful consideration.
See a model of the
Cerberus take shape <-------Click.
The forward 10-inch RML guns of
Cerberus.
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Buffel's ornate stern.
Schorpioen
today.
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