The Essington was a two-masted wooden brig of 123 tons, built in 1826 at the Government Dockyard in Sydney as the Isabella and one of the earliest sizeable vessels built in the colony. She served as a government transport before passing into private hands and taking her later name, and by the 1850s she was working the Bass Strait and western district trade under owners connected with the whaling pioneers Captain John Mills and John Griffiths of Port Fairy. On 3 May 1852, anchored in Port Fairy Bay, she was caught by a south-east gale; she struck the bottom repeatedly as the swell drove her onto the shoal, the rudder broke, and water came in faster than the pumps could clear it. The crew stripped her of fittings and cargo and abandoned her, and she broke up where she lay.

Heritage Victoria regards the site as archaeologically significant for the remains of an early Australian-built vessel and for its association with the whaling industry and the first years of settlement at Port Fairy. For divers it is the deepest of the four Port Fairy Bay wrecks recorded by the Scuba Doctor, in up to 11 m off Battery Lane, and the least visited. Like the others it is a low-relief scatter of timbers, ballast and iron fastenings partly buried in sand rather than a recognisable ship, and finding it without a boat and sounder takes patience. The reward is historical: a hull built in Sydney in 1826 is among the oldest located wrecks in Victoria. It is a protected historic shipwreck and nothing may be disturbed. As a dive it is a calm-day exercise for someone interested in the town's maritime past, best combined with the Thistle, Lydia and Socrates a few hundred metres to the north and a visit to the Port Fairy maritime and shipwreck walk.

Port Fairy is 28 km west of Warrnambool on the Princes Highway. From the town centre follow Gipps Street across the Moyne River and turn onto Battery Lane, which runs to the Battery Hill reserve and the southern end of East Beach; park at the beach reserve. Walk down to the sand and swim out on a bearing toward the published position, which lies in the bay a few hundred metres offshore.

Boats from the Griffiths Street ramp on the Moyne River reach the site in five minutes. Warrnambool Diving is the nearest dive shop (28 km).

Port Fairy Bay opens to the east and south-east, and the town's history of thirty wrecks between 1836 and 1876 was written by southerly and south-easterly gales that drove anchored ships ashore. The shallow wreck sites in the bay require, in the Scuba Doctor's words, calm conditions and a very low swell – under about 0.5 m – with light offshore westerly to northerly winds; any easterly or south-easterly sea breaks in the bay and makes the sites both dangerous and opaque. Visibility is poor in any water movement.

High tide gives slightly more water over the remains; low tide exposes more to a walker. Check the Port Fairy Bay swell forecast before travelling.

Swim out from East Beach on a bearing to the published position, descend in 8–11 m and search the sand in a circular pattern for timbers, ballast and iron fastenings, which are partly buried. Photograph what is exposed, turn at half gas and return on the reciprocal bearing to the beach. A boat and a sounder make locating the low-relief site much easier.

No operator – occasional visits by shipwreck enthusiasts and Warrnambool club divers; the deepest and least visited of the four Port Fairy Bay wrecks.