Plumper (H.M.S.)

Royal Navy survey vessel built as an auxilliary bark-rigged steam sloop. This vessel was commissioned on April 5, 1848. This vessel left England on March 26, 1857 and arrived at Esquimalt on November 09, 1857. This vessel was relieved by H.M.S. Hecate in January 1861. This vessel departed for England under Commander Anthony H. Hopkins RN who had brought H.M.S. Hecate out. The Plumper appears on the armorial bearings of Sidney BC - wearing the White Ensign, rigged, sails furled and anchored proper. This vessel was bark-rigged, with an oak hull. Her first commitment on the west coast was to determine the point where the 49th parallel met the coast in the Semiahmoo extension of Boundary Bay.

They encountered the United States Boundary Commission there and their locational estimates varied by 8 minutes of latitude. In February they began surveying in the San Juan and Gulf Islands. The ship's pinnace had her freeboard raised and with a half-deck was re-named Shark and used semi-independently. Plumper grounded on Waldron Island (took the ground) in May but got off with minor damage. On the 16th this vessel returned to Esquimalt to receive news of the Fraser Gold Rush. This vessel surveyed in Haro Archipelago to October 8th. This vessel was taken in December to Commercial Cove in Nanaimo for repairs to her copper sheathing. Plumper surveyed Victoria Harbour and the mouth of the Fraser River (Sandheads to Fort Langley).