Batavia (ship)
From Free net encyclopedia
- For other meanings of "Batavia" see Batavia
Image:Batavia sets sail from sydney.jpg The Batavia was a ship of the Dutch East India Company (VOC), built in 1628 in Amsterdam, which was struck by mutiny and shipwreck during her maiden voyage, upon which a drama followed. Batavia is also the name of a replica of the same ship.
Contents |
Mutiny on the Batavia
On 29 October 1628 the newly built Batavia went underway to the Dutch East Indies for spices, under captain Adriaan Jakobsz and commissioned by merchant François Pelsaert (also on board). These two had sailed on the same ship before, where they had developed a hatred for each other. Also on board was the "lower merchant" Jeronimus Cornelisz from Haarlem, a bankrupt pharmacist with heretic ideas (for which he had to flee the Netherlands). During the voyage, Jakobsz and Cornelisz conceived the plan to hijack the ship and start a new life somewhere with the gold and silver on board (meant for trading). They had already gathered a group of men around them and arranged an incident from which the mutiny was to ensue.
But on 4 June 1629 the ship struck a reef on Beacon Island off the Western Australian coast (28° 30' South, 113° 47' East), part of the Houtman Abrolhos (today the Wallabi reefs). Of the 341 on board (including 38 passengers, women and children), 40 drowned. For the VOC, a shipwreck was not so unusual, but this time things went very bad. Because there was no water or food on the island, the senior officers, Francisco Pelsaert, a few crew members and some passengers, left the disaster site in search of drinking water, leaving 268 people behind on the wreck. The commanders' group soon aborted the search for water on the mainland and made their way to the city of Batavia (now Jakarta) in a sloop (of which a replica has also been made). This journey took thirty-three days. After their arrival in Batavia, Pelsaert was sent back to rescue the survivors who were still on the wreck. He arrived at the site two months after leaving Batavia on the vessel Saerdam, only to discover that a mutiny had taken place after all.
Jeronimus Cornelisz was well aware that Pelsaert would report the impending mutiny and that Jakobsz would put the blame on him. So he made plans to hijack the rescue ship when it arrived and seek a safe haven with that. He even made plans to start a new kingdom. For this he needed to eliminate any possible opponents. His followers murdered a total of 125 men, women and children, after having moved a group of soldiers under Wiebe Hayes to a nearby island under false pretences. But just as he was about to eliminate this remaining group as well, Pelsaert arrived and this combined force captured the mutineers after a short battle. The worst offenders were executed on the island after a brief trial. Two young sailors were cast away on mainland Australia, never to be heard of again. The lesser offenders were taken back to Batavia to be tried. In Batavia most of them were executed, after already having been punished by flogging, keelhauling and being dropped from the yard arm. As an example, Cornelisz's second in command was broken on the wheel because Cornelisz himself had already been executed. In total, almost all mutineers were killed, except Jakobsz, who didn't confess despite torture, so not enough evidence could be amassed against him. What happened to him is however not known. Pelsaert was held partly responsible for what happened because of lack of authority. Wiebe Hayes was promoted. Cornelisz never committed any murders himself, using his powers of persuasion instead to let others do the dirty work for him. Of the original 341 on board the ship Batavia only 68 made it to the city Batavia.
The wreck
In 1970, the wreck and many artefacts were salvaged. In 1972 the Netherlands transferred all rights to Dutch shipwrecks on the Australian coasts to Australia. Some of the items, including human remains, which were excavated are now on display in the Western Australian Maritime Museum in Fremantle, Australia. Others are held by the Geraldton Region Museum. These two museums are presently engaged in a dispute over the rights to the remains.
The Replica
A replica (or rather "reconstruction") of the Batavia was built at the Bataviawerf in Lelystad, the Netherlands. The project lasted from 1985 to 7 April 1995 and was conducted as an employment project for young people under master-shipbuilder Willem Vos. The replica is now on display at that same shipyard/museum. The shipyard is currently reconstructing another 17th century ship. In contrast to the merchant ship Batavia, the new replica is a man-of-war, the Zeven Provinciën; Michiel de Ruyters' flagship.
This authentic replica was built with traditional materials (such as oak and hemp) and the tools and methods of the time of the original ship. For this, good use was made of the above-mentioned remains of the original ship in Fremantle (and of the Vasa in Stockholm), but also historical sources, like 17th century building descriptions (actual building plans were not made at the time) and prints and paintings by artists (who at the time generally painted fairly true to nature) of similar ships.
On 25 September 1999 the seaworthiness of the new Batavia was put to the test when she sailed to Australia, where she was moored at the National Maritime Museum in Sydney. On 12 June 2001 she returned to the wharf in Lelystad, where she has remained to this day and can be visited daily.
Specifications
- Length over all: 56.60 m
- Breadth of beam: 10.50 m
- Maximum draught: 5.10 m
- Height of main mast from keel: 55 m
- Unladen weight: 650 tons
- Displacement: circa 1200 tons
- Total length of rigging: 21 km
- Sail area: 1180 m²
- Guns: 24 cast-iron canons
- On board in 1628: 341 heads
Books and an opera
Commander Pelsaert died the year after the event, leaving behind his journal of the events. This journal, together with the pamphlet Ongeluckige voyagie van 't schip Batavia (The Unlucky Voyage of the Vessel Batavia), published in 1647, made it possible to rediscover the wreck.
Journalist Hugh Edwards published an account of the shipwreck and its rediscovery by Dave Johnson, Max and Gerard Cramer and Greg Allen, under the name Island of Angry Ghosts: Murder, Mayhem and Mutiny (1966).
Deborah Lisson's book 'The Devil's Own', which is aimed at young adults, is also based on the events of the Batavia mutiny and massacre. This book won the Western Australian Premier's Award in 1991.
Arabella Edge's 2000 novel The Company is also based on the events of 1629.
In 2002 historian Mike Dash's book, Batavia's Graveyard: The True Story of the Mad Heretic Who Led History's Bloodiest Mutiny told the whole story in more detail than ever before, making extensive use of Dutch archival sources to explore the early life of Cornelisz and a number of the Batavia's other passengers and crew.
In 2006 writer Simon Leys published The Wreck of the Batavia: A True Story, relating the fate of the Batavia and her crew. The french version of this book Les Naufragés du Batavia (2003) won the Guizot Prize.
The story was also retold in the form of an acclaimed opera, simply titled Batavia, composed by Richard Mills and first performed by Opera Australia in 2001.
See also
- Ship replica (including a list of ship replicas)
External links
nl:Batavia (schip) fi:Batavia (laiva)
Categories: Age of Sail merchant ships of the United Provinces | Exploration ships of the Netherlands | History of Western Australia | History of the Netherlands | Museum ships | Mutinies | Sailboat names | Sailing ships | Sailing | Shipwrecks in the Indian Ocean | Shipwrecks on the Australian coast