Brier Holme


Oscar Larsen, the sole survivor (AOT, PH30/1/4129)

Brier Holme, iron barque 921 tons, sailed from London for Hobart on 21 July 1904, but failed to arrive. In January 1905 wreckage from the vessel was found near Port Davey on the west coast, but two official expeditions failed to find the exact location of the wreck or any of its crew.

On 19 February 1905 Oscar Larsen, sole survivor of the Brier Holme, was discovered by fishermen at Port Davey. He reported that the ship had been wrecked north of Port Davey on 5 November and that he had been the only one of the crew of nineteen to land alive. He spent the next three months subsisting mostly on tinned food washed up from the wreck.

Graeme Broxam