QUEENSLAND'S GERMAN CONNECTIONS - PAST, PRESENT AND FUTURE

Nineteenth century migrants from the German states and principalities left their homeland from one of a number of ports of departure, but the choice was not generally their own. The migration agents contracted with the shipping companies to provide transport to the Fifth Continent, and their head office determined whence the migrants departed. Most emigrant ships departed from the great river ports on the Elbe and the Weser: Hamburg, Cuxhaven and Bremerhaven. After 1880, the German shipping lines withdrew from the business of transporting migrants, and most of those leaving Germany went first to London, whence they sailed on English ships. In the decade before 1859, the main stream of migration was to the southern states following the discovery of gold and metals there. Numbers wishing to settle in the Moreton Bay region were so small that only ten migrant ships came directly to Brisbane, all of them between 1855 and 1858, six of them from Godeffroy and Son, which had begun their migrant passenger service to Australia after the discovery of copper in South Australia. The Godeffroy line was also developing a large trading venture in the South Pacific, which finally became its main business interest, and was thus well-placed to meet the demand when the large flow of migrants to Queensland began in the early 1860s. Johann Heussler, the German businessman appointed by the Queensland Government as its Immigration Agent in Germany, developed a close commercial relationship with Godeffroy, with whom he contracted the transport for migrants. The migrant ships

Five of the first seven migrant ships to Brisbane flew the Godeffroy flag. Eleven made 26 journeys to Queensland during 1861–1866, all to Moreton Bay. Cesar Godeffroy made three more voyages after its first in 1855, La Rochelle four, and Beausite three. The other ships were Johan Cesar , Helene , Grasbrook , Alster , San Francisco , Sophie, Susanne Godeffroy , and Wandrahm . For six years the higher standards of the Godeffroy ships ensured a monopoly on the Fifth Continent route. After 1866 no migrant ships left Hamburg for several years, although some still left Bremen, and Godeffroy refocused on its South Pacific interests. When demand again grew after the government’s relaxation of its requirements under the Crown Lands Alienation Act of 1868, Robert Miles Sloman, an Englishman based in Hamburg, took up the opportunity. Between 1870 and 1879 he sent 12 ships on 29 voyages from Hamburg to Queensland, by which time the state had developed sufficiently to be able to provide basic port facilities north of the capital. Five Sloman ships came to the river port of Maryborough (the Reichstag three times) and four to Rockhampton’s coastal Port Alma on Keppel Bay. Two went further north to Port Denison (Bowen), and in 1873 the Lammershagen sailed as far as Townsville. The Reichstag made five voyages, the Lammershagen , Humboldt , Herschel and Friedeburg three each. As the new German nation stabilised, imperatives to leave diminished and, between 1874 and 1876, only two Sloman ships sailed from Hamburg. Apart from the health and disease risks en route, shipping casualties were surprisingly rare. The Aurora had an awkward arrival in March 1855, beaching on Moreton Island, with doubts cast on both the master’s charts and the conduct of the Cape Moreton lighthouse-keeper at the time, although all 300 aboard were saved. More tragic was the fate of the 247 emigrants aboard Godeffroy’s Wilhelmsburg , which sailed on her third voyage to Australia (her first bound for Queensland), under the command of her second skipper E C Kross, only to founder, a few days out from Hamburg, on the treacherous sand- bars of Terschelling, in the Frisian Islands of the North Sea coast, with the loss of all on board.

Above: Godeffroy ships continue to confuse historians, as some vessels variously took the family name as part of their own, others (mis-)reported by only a christian name; Cesar (left) and Helene are shown in this painting. Image courtesy State Library of Queensland. The main background image shows a typical scene in one of Hamburg’s many harbours on the Elbe banks, with the Sloman’s Baumwall offices on the right.

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