IT was 22 February 1906, a wild Thursday afternoon and the 3,000-ton steel sailing ship, The Speke, was bound for Geelong to load a cargo of wheat after having completed her voyage from Peru to Sydney Heads.
The Speke was the second largest triple masted full-rigged vessel afloat, only being beaten by her sister ship The Ditton by an inch or two.
She had passed the Wilson Promontory and now faced the full force of the gale, battling the mountainous seas of Bass Strait and in the words of the first mate Mr Cooke, they were “as high as the topgallant mast”.