Cape Borda Lighthouse
Cape Borda, on the north-western end of Kangaroo Island, was the Island’s second lighthouse (after Cape Willoughby), and the third in South Australia. Built in 1858 to guide ships battling the ‘roaring forties’ trade winds, it’s the only square lighthouse in South Australia and stands at the top of the tallest coastal cliffs – over 150 metres – in the state.
That elevation meant the usual elegant round tower was not required, and ships could see the cliff-top light – originally the equivalent of 285,000 candles – more than thirty kilometres out to sea. When storms or fog obscured its beam, the lightkeepers would fire a small canon to warn ships of the cliffs and the reefs beneath them. The canon was also fired every day at 1pm – it still is – so passing ships could set their chronometers and be sure of accurate longitude and navigation readings.
The stretch of coastline between Cape Torrens and Cape Borda is described by Gifford Chapman in Kangaroo Island Shipwrecks as ‘a death trap to shipping. It is rock strewn, and from the shore, the cliffs rise almost sheer to nearly 700 feet’.
Peering over the fence of the lookout between those Capes, I wonder how the survivors of the Fides, a 387-ton wooden Finnish ship wrecked off Snug Cove – further east along the coastline – could have scrambled up cliffs like these. The Fides had left London for Adelaide in January 1860 loaded with cargo ranging from boots, bricks and butter, to gunpowder, sheet iron and lead.
The Fides’ three masts were upright for the last time at 2am on 22 May 1860, just hours after she’d sailed past the Cape Borda lighthouse. In ebony-black darkness and water too deep to drop anchor, the ship was engulfed and the life-boat swept away. Ten of the crew, including the captain, were too. Five crew made it over the rocks and through the ship-smashing breakers, and survived for a couple of days on smoked herrings, cognac and a sheep that floated ashore. While it may once have been destined for South Australia’s breeding flock, the animal was roasted over a fire the survivors started with gunpowder that, fortuitously, had also floated to shore.[i]
Rested after their ordeal, the five scaled the cliffs, cut their way through barely penetrable vegetation – scrub, prickly acacia, vines and creepers – and spent almost three days getting back to the lighthouse they’d seen as they passed the Cape. Head Lightkeeper, William Tapley, and the three assistant lightkeepers cared for them, salvaged what they could from the wreck, and buried a body they recovered from rocks at Snug Cove.
A small cemetery sits beside the ironstone gravel road which leads to the Cape Borda lighthouse. It’s a poignant resting place of some of the early lighthouse keepers, their wives and children. Sixteen humble crosses or headstones mark the graves of GW Woodward, the first Cape Borda lightkeeper who died in 1858 after he stumbled in scrub and a stump pierced his eye; head lightkeepers wives; or children who died of scarlet fever or disappeared in the rugged terrain.
Beyond the cemetery is Harvey’s Return, the only accessible beach—and the only access route to Cape Borda—in 1858. From that date until 1926, supplies for the lighthouse and its keepers landed by boat and were hauled up the cliffs. In an interview for the SA Postcards series, Mick Rosewarne, Ranger at Cape Borda, says that supplies were brought up from the beach ‘on lightkeepers backs until a horse-drawn windlass was installed. Food, kerosene for the lighthouse lamp, paint, horseshoes, timber, all came up the long steep track.
Further reading and some useful websites:
Chapman, Gifford. Kangaroo Island Shipwrecks. Limited Edition published by the Author: 2007 (first printed Roebuck, 1972)
Ibbotson, John. Lighthouses of Australia. Australia: Australian Lighthouse Traders, 2001
Loney, Jack. An Atlas History of Australian Shipwrecks. Sydney: A.H. & A.W Reed Pty Ltd, 1981
Reid, Gordon. From Dusk to Dawn. Australia: The Macmillan Company of Australia Pty Ltd, 1988
Websites
http://www.australiaforeveryone.com.au/places_kangarooisld.htm
http://www.lighthouse.net.au/lights/SA/Cape%20Borda/Cape%20Borda.htm
Postcards online – a SA tourism and lifestyle snapshot series
http://www.postcards-sa.com.au/features2011/harveys_return.html#
Lighthouses of Australia websites
http://www.lighthouse.net.au/lights/Bulletin/0304/Bulletin%20Apr%2003.htm
[i] Gifford Chapman recounts the creative fire-lighting in Kangaroo Island Shipwrecks
australian lighthouses 