Runnymede (ship)


Runnymede was convict ship built in 1854 at Sunderland, England, and made her first voyage from London to Australia in 1856.
Specifications were as follows: type: frigate, three masts, oak hull, 720 tons, 156.0 ft. long, 29.5 ft. breadth, 19.5 ft. depth,
She was owned at one stage by Brass & Co of Bristol, where she was also registered. She commenced sailing from Sunderland to the East Indies. As the 17th ship of male convicts for the Western Australian colony, she departed Plymouth for Swan River on 15 June 1856, and arrived in Fremantle on 7 September 1856 with 248 convicts, 30 guards with their 19 wives, 18 sons and 22 daughters on board, there having been no deaths recorded on the voyage.

Fate

In 1866, while carrying wool and copper ore between Wallaroo, South Australia and Tasmania to Swansea, Wales, she sprang a leak off Cape Leeuwin, continued on towards Mauritius, and eventually sank near Klippen Point off Eastern Cape, South Africa.