The clipper Loch Ard struck Mutton Bird Island near the coast of Victoria, Australia, in June 1878 after a voyage from Britain. Only two people, Tom Pearce and Eva Carmichael, survived from more than fifty aboard. Their rescue and the dramatic coastal setting made the wreck nationally famous.

Loch Ard entered Australian ballads and poems that transformed its two survivors into figures of romance, providence and colonial endurance. Later writers have questioned the sentimental legend by returning attention to the many migrants whose lives ended anonymously.