Bronze plate : SS Buka

Bronze ship's plate taken from the SS Buka. The plate is rectangular and has a hole in each corner for attachment to the ship. Cast into the front of the plate is 'ULDERUP & SCHLUTER / HONG KONG / NO 45 April 1911'. On the reverse of the plate is cast 'BUILT & ENGINED / BY / MITSUI BUSAN KAISHA / NO1 - 1907 / HONG KONG'. A number of Japanese characters are also cast into the plate at the bottom.

Upon learning that the Australians had captured Rabaul in September 1914, the German District Officer at Kieta, Bougainville Island, felt there was a risk that the wooden steamer, Buka would be captured if Kieta was taken. He decided to sink the 24 metres long vessel, with the intention of raising her when the danger had passed.

In November, 1914, after greasing and painting her engines he took her to a neighbouring bay and with the assistance of his police master and several trusted natives opened the cocks and sank her close to the shore in about fifteen fathoms.

On 9 December a detachment of the Australian Naval and Military Expeditionary Force (ANMEF) occupied Kieta. Later, the Australian destroyer Warrego arrived there and when her commander enquired after the Buka some native boys directed him to the spot where the vessel lay.

In 1915 she was examined by a diver from the sloop HMAS Una to check her condition for the possibility of raising her and her hull and fittings were reported to be in a satisfactory state. Una, formerly known as the Komet, was the yacht of the administrator of German New Guinea, before she was been captured on 11 October 1914 and commissioned into the RAN. However, although she was in good condition, Buka was not raised during the war and when she was re-examined six years later, her hull and engines were found to be ruined. The diver who examined her on the second occasion brought this plate to the surface.