When sold by the Navy in 1929 a prominent Sydney boat builder purchased the old Sobraon largely for sentimental reasons and to save her from the scrappers. The ship lay off Ford’s boat yard in Berry’s Bay where at times in the Great Depression she was used as a refuge for unemployed and homeless men.
Despite considerable public agitation to save the old ship and serious attempts by private investors to raise the money needed to restore the ship and fit her out as a nautical museum and exhibition centre, the economic conditions in the 1930s were not right for such a venture. Even so, the final breaking-up of the old Sobraon was delayed until 1941 when the ship’s component materials – iron, steel, brass, copper and her heavy timbers were needed for Australia’s war effort.
Following the end of WWII there was a world-wide movement to preserve some of the great square-rig sailing ships of the nineteenth century. Had the old Sobraon survived for just a few more years she, almost certainly, would have been restored to sailing condition after the War.