Oldest Surviving Colonial-Era Boat Preserved For Display At Maritime Museum

Australia’s oldest surviving colonial-era boat is set to make its new home above the ground after it was unexpectedly uncovered during excavation for the Barangaroo metro.

 The vessel spent about 150 years buried under wharves, warehouses and shipyards on what was once a small harbourfront beach before being unearthed at the site of the future Barangaroo metro station in 2018. Maritime archeologists spent two months carefully excavating all 294 pieces of timber before conducting detailed conservation work to preserve it. 

The individual pieces were been treated with Polyethylene Glycol to reinforce the cell structure of the wood and reduce further degradation, before it was snap frozen for transportation to Braeside in Victoria to be professionally freeze-dried.

Also uncovered were hundreds of then-everyday items, with maritime archaeologist James Hunter telling the ABC they included, “glass bottle fragments, lots of decorated ceramics, leather shoes, smoking pipes, toothbrushes, even bones of remnants of things that people ate.”

“You can see the bite marks of humans on cow, sheep and pig bones, and then you can see where rats have gnawed into the bones after humans have thrown those bones away.”

Made from Sydney Blue Gum, Stringybark and Spotted Gum sourced in the Sydney basin, it’s believed that the boat was used to transport goods around Sydney Harbour and Parramatta River.

Transport minister John Graham said it was a nice bit of symmetry that aligned the most modern form of Sydney transport with the nation’s oldest colonial era boat.

“This is a piece of Australian history we are determined to protect for many more centuries to come,” he said.

“I want to thank those who carefully excavated the boat, preserved it and the Australian National Maritime Museum for giving it a permanent home so generations to come can get a unique look at was life on Sydney Harbour in the early 1800s.”

Now in the hands of the Australian National Maritime Museum, the vessel is expected to be ready for permanent exhibition by mid-2027.