Sometime around 1890, a man named Heron, obviously wishing to see civilization in his rear-view mirror, leased Armit from the Queensland government, and built himself a little hut on the island. Heron was a great collector of plants, which he used to start an orchard on the island’s western aspect. One day, some yachtsmen anchored off Armit, and one of them went to Heron’s hut for a chat. The visitor was greatly impressed by the silence and isolation of the place, and he asked Heron if he didn’t find it oppressively lonely living by himself.
“Oh, no,” Heron replied casually. “A sailor keeps me company.”
The bemused yachtsman, who had seen no other signs of human habitation on the island, tried to get more information, but the hermit suddenly clammed up and refused to say any more about the matter. Other visitors to the island heard Heron mention this mysterious “sailor,” but they too were unable to get him to provide further details.
The explanation for Heron’s enigmatic remarks was finally discovered by one Captain Gorringe, who was raising sheep on nearby Lindeman Island. On one occasion, Gorringe spent a week camping on Armit. Like the other visitors, Gorringe was told of Heron’s sailor friend, but, not being a terribly inquisitive man, he asked no questions. However, when after several days this sailor failed to make an appearance, the captain couldn’t help but ask about him.
Heron matter-of-factly explained that soon after his arrival on the island, one night he was awakened by some noise, and left his hut to investigate. As he went outside, he was shocked to hear an agonized scream coming from the slopes of the island. He then saw the figure of a man dressed in the clothing of an 18th century sailor emerge from the brush and walk to the water’s edge. Heron called out to the man, but received no response. He was stunned to see the sailor walk into the water…and disappear.
After that, Heron often watched the same scene play out: the horrible cry, the march to the water’s edge, the vanishing into the ocean. Heron told Gorringe that he assumed this was the ghost of a crew member of a long-ago ship who had come to a tragic end on Armit.
Heron was not the only visitor to Armit to see the sailor. One night in 1908, one Charles Anderson anchored his cutter off the island. Happening to look towards the beach, he saw a figure walking through the trees to the water’s edge. Anderson later said that “there was something about it which immediately convinced me that it was not the figure of a living man. It did not walk so much as float a few inches above the sand. The phantom came and went so quickly that I did not have time to examine it properly, but my impression was that the sailor clothes on the ghostly figure were those of the seventeenth century.”
In 1938, a Queensland author named Frank Reid visited Armit with a group of fishermen. After fishing for some hours, the men made camp on the western beach. After a late dinner, the party relaxed on the sand, talking and smoking. This peaceful scene was rudely interrupted by the sound of a “shriek of horror” coming from the woods. It was like nothing they had ever heard before.
When the dreadful cry was not repeated, one of the men dismissed it as the sound of some strange bird, and the group began to settle in for the night. Then, Reid saw an apparition emerging from the nearby trees. It was of a man dressed like a “sailor of Nelson’s days.” The figure stared straight ahead, ignoring the fishermen. Silently, eerily, the sailor glided across the beach and into the water.
I do not know of any more recent sightings of the spectre--every haunting, no matter how persistent, seems to have an expiration date. However, if you are ever on Armit Island, and you hear a heartrending scream, don’t be frightened. It is just a spirit, doomed to endlessly march into the sea…
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