Emerald beach just 20 km north of Coffs is one of our most stunning towns where it seems to have the most idyllic lifestyle on the Coffs Coast, but have you ever gone for a walk around its headland and discovered its history ?
There are several memorials to folk who lost their lives due to two ships colliding back in 1886. MV Keilawarra and the Helen Nicoll colluded in the month of December 1886 when somehow they collided and unfortunately 48 people lost their lives. The Keilawarra was a fairly large vessel weighing in around 780 ton and at the time carrying passengers and freight up the coast when it collided with the Helen Nicoll, history reports say that it was a violent crash and the boats sunk very rapidly. As you walk the path down to little Shelley’s at Emerald there’s a little stone memorial with a few stones around the base giving thoughts to those who lost their lives, nothing more and nothing less, it’s in a sad state.
In fact there has been 14 ships that have sunk up and down off the coffs coast even with the Solitary island lighthouse in operation between 1851 and 1929, some wrecks found and some still lost. After the inquest of the ship collision it was decided to install a signal station on the headland at Emerald, this was to keep the lighthouse in direct contact with the mainland via a submarine cable back in 1887. The signal station was manned by a Mr Dammerel 24 hours a day and was ‘equiped’ with a telescope, rain gauge, flags to signal and a tall mast. Mr Dammerel’s duties was to log ships that passed by, pass on messages and to keep appropriate records, during the night morse code was using a morse light. The tall pole ( mast ) was used to raise different flags to use as day signals and at the top a wind vane was installed. Each morning a weather report would be sent to the Solitary Island lighthouse by Mr Dammerel’s daughters who also would transmit family matters and news from the Herald magazine.
The Dammerel family held the position of signal house for many years and helped in the rescue of many sea accidents until 1918 when the signal station closed down with the invention of the wireless radio. Today at Emerald headland a small fenced off area gives recognition to the Dammerel’s who served their time here where you can view an information board and a concrete base where the station one stood.
