The large iron barque Southesk was built by A. Stephen & Sons of Dundee for David Bruce of that city and completed in 1877. Registered at 1,210 tons gross (1,154 net), she measured 225 feet in length with a 35 foot beam, and was rated A1 by Lloyd's who surveyed her in her home port of Dundee. Bruce owned the Dundee Clipper Line which ran a regular service to New Zealand and Queensland (Australia) using a fleet of eleven vessels of which Southesk was the last to be built. All had spacious passenger accommodation and ran extremely profitably during the emigration boom of the late 1870's before competition from steam forced fares down to record lows. By the mid-1880's Bruce was charging as little as (15 for a second class ticket to Brisbane and a mere (5 per head for steerage, neither of which can have produced much profit given an average passage time of ninety days. Eventually sold to R. Ritchie, also of Dundee, she ultimately passed into Norwegian ownership around 1905, and wrecked off Priest Pond, Prince Edward Island, on 8 November 1906 whilst on passage from Algoa Bay to Cambeltown, New Brunswick, in ballast.