75 Mile Beach
Fraser Island Qld 4581
Fraser Island does not immediately come to mind as having any association with the Great War. In the 19th century the survivors of a celebrated 1834 ship wreck of the Sterling Castle lived with indigenous people who had a long history of occupation of the site, and a century later in the early 1940s the island became a training ground for Australian commandos: the famous Z Force. But a connection with the Great War is to be found toward the north-eastern end of the island, which locals explain is the largest sand island in the world. It is sand that obscures an unexpected, tangible link to the war - the rusting remains of the hospital ship SS Maheno.
Built in Scotland in 1905, Maheno boasted excellent facilities for the first-class passengers on trips between Sydney, Melbourne, Hobart and Wellington. After conversion for use as a hospital ship, early in 1915 - including conventional repainting in white with green stripes and prominent red crosses - the ship sailed to Mudros Harbour, on the island of Lemnos in the Aegean, in August 1915. The ship paused there for only a day, after which it was anchored just off Anzac Cove, receiving casualties after the battle for Hill 60.
Maheno's substantial medical staff included 5 doctors, 14 nurses and more than 60 soldiers of the Army Medical Corps. Throughout 1915, it plied a life-saving trade between the Gallipoli battlefields, the more comprehensive medical facilities on Lemnos and Malta, and the extensive network of hospitals in Egypt. Refitted in 1916, Maheno was moved to Britain, where it transported wounded soldiers from the battlefields of the Western Front to hospital in England, before it was dedicated to carrying wounded home to New Zealand from Europe.
In 1935, while Maheno was being taken to Japan for scrap, a towing line broke and the ship drifted onto Fraser Island, where it now lies on 75 Mile Beach, with fragments of its teak decking and the portholes below the upper deck washed by waves.
References
- Fraser Island Shipwrecks. http://www.fraserisland.net/fraser-island-shipwrecks.html
- Fraser Island's Maheno will be 110 years old next year. http://www.frasercoastchronicle.com.au/news/management/2192517/
- Image of the Maheno, painted in the colours accepted by the Haig Convention for use by hospital ships. http://natlib.govt.nz/records/23193984