The Hercules, commanded by
Captain Benjamin Stout, is remembered in the Captain’s own Narrative of the
Loss of the Ship Hercules, published in 1798. In this account the author states
that the ship was wrecked on 16 June 1796 in a violent storm, at no great
distance from the spot where the Grosvenor was lost in 1782. This is dubious as
it rests mainly on eye-witness reports by local tribesmen. If the site had been
near the Grosvenor the rate of progress of the Hercules' survivors to Cape Town Cape
without losing a single life.
A traveller named John
Barrow states that the Hercules was wrecked between the mouths of the Keiskamma
and the Beeka (Bira) Rivers, near Madagascar Reef. He says ‘we saw the wreck of
the Hercules on the coast of Caffraria at the
precise spot indicated by the Captain’. But he also mentions that he met Stout
and some of his crew at the Cape, which is impossible as the Captain left the
Cape in September 1796 and Barrow did not arrive in South Africa
However there was a wreck at
the site Barrow refers to, near the Umtana. This has been accepted as being
that of the Hercules but may not be. According to various experts, the guns
found at the spot had been reported years earlier and that pottery found there
is too early. The latter could be explained by the theory that Chinese porcelain is
not always a good indication of date for a wreck as this material was often
used as ballast and could be of earlier origin.
There might have been more
than one wreck in this vicinity. Some researchers have claimed that the
so-called Hercules wreck might be the Bennebroek.
Another maritime mystery
left for us to ponder. The name Hercules appears on maps of the area, possibly
from the wreck.
2 comments:
Thank you for the interesting post, Mole. Solving maritime mysteries is fraught with difficulties, complicated by distorted historical accounts such as you have outlined. One wonders what motivated witnesses to alter facts? Andrew
An interesting saga indeed. I do believe though that the ship, if the story is true, was wrecked closer to the Bennebroeck than the Grosvenor.
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