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Batavia

Brief History

The Batavia was a ship and trading vessel owned by the Dutch East India Company (VOC). The ship was the newest in the India fleet and set out from Amsterdam (Holland) in 1628 on her maiden voyage to the Port of Batavia (now Jakarta) and the ship's namesake.
Under the command of Francisco Pelsaert, the 45.28m long wooden ship carried 341 people made up of soldiers, passengers and crew and a cargo of cloth, wine, cheese, 12 chests of silver coins and a casket of jewels. The expensive ship was said to be unsinkable!
On the 4th of June 1629, after 7 months at sea, the Batavia struck a reef on the Houtman Abrolhos, a series of islands off the Western Australian coast. The survivors were left on an island whilst Palsaert, a group of senior officers & a few crew members set off in a small, open boat in search of water on the Australian mainland. Failing to find a sufficient water supply they decided to head to Batavia (now Jakarta) rather than return to the island. They successfully reached Batavia a month later and Palsaert, with a rescue party, headed back to the Houtman Abrolhos for the survivors. On arriving they discovered , much to their horror, that there had been a mutiny and a total of 125 men, women and children had been murdered. The group of mutineers, led by Jeronimus Cornelisz were eventually captured after a short battle. A trial took place on Seal Island where the main mutineers were executed. The remaining mutineers were taken back to Batavia to meet their fate.

Batavia Replica Project

In 1985 the Batavia Replica project began in a shipyard in Lelystad, under the guidance of Master-shipbuilder Willem Vos. The idea of the project was for a group of young people to reconstruct the original Batavia using traditional materials and by traditional means. A great deal of effort was made in researching the ship building methods of the time, before any construction began. Historical resources from archives and museums were studied as were prints and paintings from the 17th century. The wreck and artifacts from the original Batavia, that resides in the Western Australian Maritime Museum in Fremantle, were also studied.
Like the original Batavia, the replica was built from oak and pine. The oak was obtained from Danish forests and the pine, used for the masts and decks, came from the Black Forest in Germany. Twenty four replicas of 8 different models of cast iron guns were made at an iron foundry. There are over 100 woodcarvings on the ship and they were nearly all carved from single blocks of Danish oak. The carvings are of a Northern Renaissance style which was common in the Netherlands during the 16th and 17th century. On the stern at the beakhead is the carving of the Dutch lion.
The 21km of the ship's rigging was made from long-fibred hemp. There was over 900 blocks made for the rigging and they are made from pockwood, oak and ash.
The Batavia has ten sails.
In the ten years it has taken to complete the project over 200 young people have been involved in the reconstruction of the VOC-merchantman Batavia.
On the 7th of April 1995, the replica was launched and Queen Beatrix (Queen of Netherlands) officially named the ship "Batavia". The ship was baptised with Indian Ocean water that had been collected from the Houtman Abrolhos, the location of the shipwreck in 1629. In 1999 the Batavia left the Netherlands for Sydney, Australia and returned to Lelystad in 2001. Today the ship can be found at the Bataviawerf Museum in Lelystad.

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