On a voyage in 1824 on which she first transported convicts to Van Diemen's Land she was damaged on the Sow and Pigs Reef inside Port Jackson Heads, New South Wales, Australia.

[3] Phoenix, under the command of Captain Robert White and with surgeon Charles Quaede, left England on 29 March 1824, and arrived in Hobart, Tasmania, on 21 July 1824.

Phoenix picked up a pilot just outside Sydney Heads but on entering the harbour struck the Sow and Pigs Reef.

[12] The New South Wales Colonial Government bought Phoenix for £1000 and converted her to a prison hulk for convicts awaiting transportation to Norfolk Island and Moreton Bay.

[11] She was considered a much better place to be imprisoned than on shore; contemporary reports described her as cleanly wholesome and ...spacious.