Philip Laing

Philip Laing was the second ship to arrive in Dunedin, New Zealand, carrying Scottish settlers. She departed from Greenock on 23 November 1847, and, after sheltering from bad weather along the Scottish coast, made its final British departure from Milford Haven in Wales on 20 December 1847. The ship arrived at Port Chalmers on 15 April 1848 after a passage of 114 days. Her sister ship, John Wickliffe, arrived three weeks earlier. Philip Laing was a 459-ton barque, somewhat smaller than the 662-ton John Wickliffe. Despite this, she carried the majority of the first settlers (247, to John Wickliffe's 97), the larger ship having largely been laden with provisions for the new settlement.^[1]

The voyage of the settlers was extensively recorded by the diary of The Rev. Dr. Thomas Burns, who was to become one of the leaders of the new Dunedin settlement.

The later career of Philip Laing included service carrying troops during the Crimean War of the 1850s, and she made further sailings to New Zealand, bringing passengers and cargo from London to Wellington and Lyttelton in 1856.^[1]

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