Quebec Mercury #44, Page 266. Saturday, June 3, 1826.
	The Active arrived Wednesday, spoke the bark Sydney Packet from Liverpool, which vessel had been on shore on St. Paul's Island, where the passengers, nine in number, and 4 seamen with the boat, left the vessel and remain on the Island. The Sydney Packet has since grounded on White Island shoal.     The Shakespeare reports a bark and a schooner to be on shore on the east end of White Island shoal.
Quebec Gazette #3648 05/06/1826 Page 1, Col, 4C.
	Captain Wood, of the bark Sydney Packet, ashore on White Island, has come up, and reports his vessel much damaged. Part of the materials had been landed, and it was expected that the remainder would be saved, but it is feared, from the exposed situation of the vessel, that she will go to pieces.
Quebec Gazette #3649 08/06/1826 Page 2, Col. 3T.
	A schooner arrived yesterday at Quebec with the rigging, sails, cables, &c. of the Sydney Packet, wrecked at White Island. Two other schooners laden with materials belong to the same vessel are expected up tomorrow.
Quebec Gazette #3650 12/06/1826 Page 1, Col. 4C.
	Underwriters sale in front of Messrs. R. & T. Froste & Co's stores, St. James Street, Atkinson's wharf: On Wednesday next, 14th instant, will be sold for account and benefit of the underwriters or others concerned: The hull with the lower masts, topmasts, bowsprit, &c. of the barque Sydney Packet, 275 tons burthen per register, Wood, master, from Liverpool, as she now lies or did lie wrecked on the east end of White Island.
	After which in convenient lots:
	The whole of the stores saved from the above wreck consisting of standing and running rigging, sails, anchors, a patent chain cable, hempen cable, hawsers, warps, blocks, chain sheets, &c. &c. Sale to commence at one o'clock precisely.

			J. Wurtele,
			Auctioneer & Broker
	12th June 1826.

Quebec Gazette #3655 29/06/1826 Page 2, Col. 3C.
	Pursuant to a commission of appraisement and sale issued out of his Majesty's Court of Vice Admiralty, for the Province of Lower Canada, in a certain business moved and prosecuted in the said Court by William Hunter, John Jenkins and John Davies, late mariners on board the bark called the Sydney Packet, against part of the tackle and apparel, that is to say, the lower rigging, a windlass and several other articles. Public notice is hereby given that the said several articles will be exposed to public sale, on Friday the 30th June instant, at one o'clock in the afternoon, on the Honourable William Burns' wharf, in the lower town of Quebec, and that the said several articles will then and there be sold to the best bidder.

			Joseph Fenwick,
			Auctioneer & Broker.
	Quebec, 28th June, 1826.

Quebec Gazette #3661 20/07/1826 Page 2, Col. 2C.
	In the Court of Vice Admiralty, Lower Canada. William Hunter, John Jenkins and John Davidson, vs. Divers articles saved from the wreck of the bark Sydney Packet.
	Saturday, 13th July, 1826.
	Judge Kerr,     As this case present a cause of common occurrence at this port, and as it is of much concern to the trading and shipping interests to know what the law is upon the subject of it, I have taken some time to deliberate before giving judgment.     The case is brought into Court by summary petition on the part of the mate and two seamen of the Sydney Packet, a vessel which sailed from Liverpool to this port, and was lost on White Island shoal, on the 29th May last. The petitioners state that the articles then brought by them to Quebec, together with other effects, which were here sold for upwards to £200 arising from the goods sold at private sale, and the proceeds of the articles brought by them to this place, their wages may be paid, and that a reasonable sum be decreed to them for services and their clothes lost in the ship.     On the return of the accusation, a claim was given in by Joseph April and Thomas Chassée, for the sum of £41 10, in name of freight, for bringing in their schooner the articles attached by the process of the Court.     The articles delivered over to this Court by the petitioners, having, under a commission of appraisement and sale, only produced the sum of £36 4 5 currency, it is quite obvious that if the claim of April and Chass´e be maintained as a preferable lien, the whole fund over which the court has control (the £200 not having been brought into the registry) will be absorbed so that however meritorious the services of the petitioners may have been, their claim must remain unsatisfied.     The whole case comes before the court summarily, on the affidavits of William Wood, late master of the bark; of William Hunter, the mate; and of April & Chass´e; and though the Court was satisfied, from these affidavits, that April & Chass´e did actually bring up articles, delivered over to the marshall, it did not consider itself justified in decreeing to them the sum asked for or any part of it, without knowing whether in the charge of £41 10s, was included the freight or any other parts of the wreck and cargo than those which were sold by order of the Court, and whether they had received the whole or any part of that sum.     With the view of attaining this information, certain inter- rogatories were propounded to Captain Wood, but after obtaining his answers on oath, I am constrained to say that so far from any light being shed on this subject, it is involved in the same darkness as before. He says 'tis true that there were other articles saved from the wreck than those sold by order of the Court, but that he cannot enumerate them; that they have been sold, but he cannot say the amount of the proceeds nor how they have been disposed of; that there were, he believes, about three of four schooners and boats employed in bringing the articles to Quebec, but he does not know who are the owners of them; that he has not paid any freight for the carriage of the articles to Quebec, and if any freight has been paid he cannot say to whom.     It is difficult to reconcile ourselves to a belief that the master of a vessel on whom, after the loss of his ship, the policy of the law imposes the duty of acting for the general benefit of the owners, underwriters, and others concerned, and who did actually assume upon him this agency, should have been entirely ignorant of what was most necessary for himself and them to know. In stating that there were, he believes, three or four schooners and boats employed in bringing the articles to Quebec, I am led to think that the £41 10s, which far exceeds the proceeds now in the register, is the whole freight of the articles saved from the wreck, and brought to Quebec, and as it is a rule of equity, to consider that as done which ought to have been done, I cannot but presume that this sum for freight was, as it ought to have been, paid out of the £200, or such other sum as accrued from the sale of articles saved from the wreck before the petitioners had arrived at this port.     In this view of the matter, the claim of April and Chass´e is in substance a demand set up by Captain Wood to recover out of it money now in the registry, what he or his sub-agents have already paid for freight, and of course it cannot on any principle of law or justice affect the claim of the petitioners. I have no hesitation, therefore, in dismissing their claim with costs.     As to the demand of the petitioners Jenkins and Davidson, an attempt has been made to impeach it on the grounds of disobedience of orders and desertion. But this is completely answered by the affidavit of the mate, and the fact that these seamen accompanied him with part of the articles save from White Island.     It has always been the practice of the Court founded on the policy of the law (and it is said that a late decision has been given in the High Court of Admiralty which sanctions this course of proceedings), to decree wages out of the price of such articles belonging to the hull, apparel and furniture of the ship as may have been saved by the exertions of the crew. But the fund now at the disposal of the Court after the payment of expenses affording no means by which the petitioners wages can be decreed to them, I can only deduct a reasonable sum pro opere et labore G in taking charge of the articles and bringing them to Quebec, reserving to them such recourse for their wages earned to the period of the loss of the ship, out of the proceeds of such other parts of the ship as may have been saved by their exertions, and exposed to sale without the authority of this Court. The mate and seamen having been employed twenty days in this service, I allow to them £10 13 9 currency, that is £4 13 9 to the mate and £3 to each of the seamen.     Frederick Andrews, Esquire, proctor for petitioners, and     Henry Black, Esquire, proctor for claimants.

G.R. Bossé©1999-03.

Posted: Nov. 28, 1999.

Updated: July 15, 2003.