shipwreck

By Kameryn Griesser - CNN
 

Beneath the rough waters of South Australia’s coast, marine archaeologists say they have discovered the lost Dutch merchant vessel Koning Willem de Tweede, which sank nearly 170 years ago.

The wreck captures a tragic moment in maritime history during the 19th century Australian gold rushes. The 800-ton sailing ship was beginning its journey back to the Netherlands in June 1857 when a severe storm capsized the vessel near the port town of Robe, according to a news release by the Australian National Maritime Museum.

Two-thirds of the crew drowned. Just days before, 400 Chinese migrants headed for gold mines in Victoria disembarked from the ship. The crew transported the laborers as a “side hustle” for extra money, according to James Hunter, the museum’s acting manager of maritime archaeology. The practice was a common but questionably legal voyage at the time, he said.

While the captain lived to tell the tale and litigate his losses, the bodies of his crew members remain lost in the sand dunes of Long Beach.

However, on March 10, after three years of searching for the site of the wreck, a team of divers supported by the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Netherlands’ Cultural Heritage Agency spotted what they say is the sunken vessel.

“There’s always a little bit of luck in what we do,” said Hunter, who was the first diver to see the ship underwater. “The sand had just uncovered just a little bit of that shipwreck so that we could see it and actually put our hand on it and say ‘we’ve finally got it.’”

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