William left England on 4-5 February 1854 on board the 'Brahmin' bound for Sydney along with four other passengers and a crew of 35 under the command of Captain Malcolm McEacharn. By late May the vessel was sailing under gale force winds west of Bass Strait and at around midnight on the 21st the vessel struck a reef off the west coast of King Island.;;Despite the conditions, the vessel held together until daylight when the ship's longboat was launched. The boat was subsequently swamped with the loss of 12 of the crew and four passengers before the remainder reached the shore. ;;Weight and the survivors of the wreck spent five months on King Island until the schooner 'Waterwitch' was wrecked there in September. Using a small boat from the 'Waterwitch' two of the crew managed to sail to Melbourne to seek help. The steamships 'Electra' and 'Manchester' were despatched to pick up the remaining castaways who arrived in Melbourne on 25 October. After six weeks in Melbourne, Weight returned to King Island and was employed in salvaging materials from the 'Brahmin' and 'Waterwitch'.;;Later Weight was employed as assistant lighthouse keeper on the island. In June 1865 the schooner 'Arrow' was shipwrecked on King Island. On 16th April 1866 police arrived on the island and a search was made of William's premises when furniture and other items suspected to be from the 'Arrow' were seized. He was arrested and sentenced to two years imprisonment and dismissed from the lighthouse service for obtaining goods illegally from the schooner. When his wife left the island a month later it was suspected that she too had possessions from the 'Arrow'.;;William's father, William Snr kept his son's letter to his mother about the shipwreck of the 'Brahmin' as well as transcripts from newspaper accounts of the day. These papers were handed down the family to William Jnr's grand-daughter Aileen McIllree Moorhouse.