Shipwreck survivors 2

In his book British Residents at the Cape 1795-1819 Peter Philip attempts to define the term
'settler' as 'a person who had left his bones or his bairns in South Africa'.  Although many shipwreck survivors left their bones on our shores not many of them produced descendants, most not living long enough to do so or being lost track of due to their isolation in the interior of the country where some were absorbed into local tribes. The story of one of these is told in The Sunburnt Queen.

But it would be extremely difficult, perhaps impossible, to trace the descent of a shipwreck survivor who married local women and produced a mixed race. There is no doubt that this happened and notably in the area known at one time as Pondoland. The paler colour and different cast of feature among many inhabitants testifies to that fact.This region had long ago suffered the incursions of the east coast slave trade run by the Arabs and this also accounts for variety of skin colour and even language found in the area.

Most survivors of wrecks simply didn't make it back to civilization though many tried, some walking incredible distances. Most of those who did get there were sailors, a tough hardy breed, rather than the more refined passengers who expired - as Manoel de Sousa Sepulvedo's wife did, on the coastal sands, after the wreck of the Sao Joao.

Ahead of the people who survived this wreck lay a walk of hundreds of miles north to Delagoa Bay during which they succumbed by turns to exposure, heat, exhaustion, thirst and starvation. Why attempt to reach Delagoa Bay? The initial plan was to build a small caravel on the beach to send to Sofala for help, but there were insufficient usable timbers from the wreck for this purpose. Table Bay, equally far off, held memories of d’Almeida and fifty of his men killed by Hottentots in 1510. Delagoa Bay was chosen as a known stopping point for Portuguese ships for water and trade.

The account of the boatswain’s mate reveals that it took them three months to reach Delagoa Bay, at a rate of about 4.2 miles per day. Only 22 of the original 500 survived – 8 Portuguese and 14 slaves, the latter presumably being used to surviving all manner of circumstances. None of these people remained on the shores which had treated them so cruelly, so no descendants exist - as far as we know.

Shipwrecks on the Wild Coast

If, like me, you love maps and are fascinated by the turbulent Wild Coast, its pioneer and trading families, and especially by the many shipwrecks which for five centuries have occurred along its shores, look no further than the wonderful map of this area available at www.slingsbymaps.com

Among the wreck sites marked are:

Ivy 1878

Sao Joao 1552

Sao Bento 1554

Grosvenor 1782

Nossa Senhora de Belem 1635

Forres Bank 1958

Santo Alberto 1593

Africa and Agatha 1853

Hercules 1852

Oceanos 1991

There’s a strong but controversial possibility that in July 1909 the Blue Anchor Liner Waratah may have disappeared between Coffee Bay and Hole in the Wall on this very coast. 

Read more about this intriguing mystery of the sea at www.waratahrevisited.blogspot.com and also right here on Mole’s blog pages via the search facility.

Port Shepstone Lighthouse, Natal

Port Shepstone Lighthouse July 2013

Port Shepstone, on the southern bank of the Umzimkulu River, was named after the 19th c colonial statesman, Sir Theophilus Shepstone.

The first vessel to enter the Umzimkulu River, in 1880, was the coasting steamer Somtseu. The energetic colonist William Bazley started building a wall at the mouth of the river in 1882 and about ten years later Port Shepstone became a functioning harbour.

Its first light was constructed in 1895: a simple ship's masthead lantern mounted on a platform on a ladder-like structure placed on the southern bluff of the river mouth. This served the purpose of lighthouse and signal station and was manned by a Norwegian, E K Andreason, from June 1889 until his retirement at the end of 1929.

In 1906 the lighthouse at Scottburgh, which had previously marked the southern end of the Aliwal Shoal, was dismantled and put up at the port. 'It was equipped with a petroleum vapour burner replaced in 1912 by an acetylene gas apparatus. This apparatus consisted of a 187.5 mm focal distance, three-panel optic using a twenty litre incandescent mantle burner. It produced a single white flash of 27 000 every ten seconds. The lens was rotated by a weight-driven clockwork machine.'

This was replaced in 1961 by an electric motor reduction gearbox unit, changing the light to one white flash every six seconds. The lighthouse became fully automatic in 1963: the range is 24 sea miles. 

With its circular tower painted in distinctive black and white checks, the lighthouse is a well-known landmark on the south coast. This dangerous coastline is associated with numerous shipwrecks, including those of the Sao Joao and the Grosvenor, occurring two centuries apart but both remaining topics of fascination and research.

Position: 30 44 30.1 South, 30 27 33.0 East


Further reading: Harold Williams: Southern Lights, Lighthouses of South Africa (Waterman 1993)]

Revisiting the Site of the Sao Joao wreck

Artist's impression of the Sao Joao wreck

Before the anniversary of the loss of the Waratah, my thoughts were with another, much earlier ship, the Sao Joao, the Great Galleon, wrecked in the vicinity of what is now Port Edward an entire century before the arrival of Van Riebeeck at the Cape. (Think about that for a moment.) It was almost exactly a year since my previous visit to this stretch of the coast south of Natal and in the interim it had lost nothing of its mysterious charm.

I sat on a high point looking out over the coastal forest lands below towards the Indian Ocean, on a bright sunny day two shades of deep blue fringed at the land’s edge by white lacy foam. Beneath that foam lurks the malevolent rocky reef on which the Sao Joao foundered. The beach upon which those who survived landed was empty, stark and unfriendly. Those Portuguese mariners were indeed between the devil and the deep blue sea. 

The shells on this beach are pounded to fine fragments by their passage through the rocks; few, perhaps the tiniest, reach the shore whole. Miraculous, then, that porcelain pieces survive at all, having gone through the devil’s cauldron of surf and jagged granite. Yet they continue to be found, five centuries after the ships and the men who sailed them were cast up as offerings to Neptune.

Fernando Pessoa cries:

‘Oh Salty sea, how much of your salt

Are tears of Portugal!’

The litany of Portuguese ships lost along these south eastern shores justifies the poet’s grief: Sao Joao 1552; Sao Bento 1554, Sao Thome 1589, Santo Alberto 1593, Sao Joao Baptista 1622, Sao Goncalo 1630, Nossa Senhore de Belem 1635 and Nossa Senhore de Atalaia do Piheiro 1647.

Approximately 500 souls are believed to have reached the shore after the Sao Joao was wrecked; injuries from the maelstrom through which they fought for life must have been severe. Were they more fortunate than those who drowned? Probably not, because ahead of them lay a walk of hundreds of miles north to Delagoa Bay during which most succumbed to exposure, heat, exhaustion, thirst and starvation. They were subjected to attacks by wild animals and encounters with indigenous tribes. The latter were not always confrontational but they were curious and keen to acquire the strangers’ possessions. Stripped of her clothing, Dona Leonor, the finely-bred Castilian wife of the captain, Manoel de Sousa Sepulvedo, chose death before dishonour, burying herself alive in the sand. Her husband buried their two dead children and, a broken man, walked into the bush never to be seen again.

Why attempt to reach Delagoa Bay? The initial plan was to build a small caravel on the beach to send to Sofala for help, but there were insufficient usable timbers from the wreck for this purpose. Table Bay, equally far off, held memories of d’Almeida and fifty of his men killed by Hottentots in 1510. Delagoa Bay was chosen as a known stopping point for Portuguese ships for water and trade.

They kept as close to the coast as possible, to make use of mussels and other such foods, but the coastal bush frequently forced them inland, as did the need for fresh water. They crossed rivers and estuaries, ran the gauntlet of snakes and beasts, and as they neared the tropics the sun grew hotter.

The account of the boatswain’s mate reveals that it took them three months to reach Delagoa Bay, at a rate of about 4.2 miles per day. Only 22 of the original 500 survived – 8 Portuguese and 14 slaves, the latter presumably being experienced in survival against all odds.

 For more on this topic enter 'sao joao' in blog search facility.

Porcelain from Sao Joao and other shipwrecks.

Nearly 500 years after the Sao Joao was wrecked (1552), pieces of porcelain continue to be found on beaches near Port Edward, Natal - the location of the wreck according to current research.

In fact, typical blue-and-white Chinese porcelain shards occur at 10 locations along this south-eastern coast of South Africa. The wrecks believed to be associated with these sites are:  Sao Joao 1552; Sao Bento 1554, Sao Thome 1589, Santo Alberto 1593, Sao Joao Baptista 1622, Sao Goncalo 1630, Nossa Senhore de Belem 1635 and Nossa Senhore de Atalaia do Piheiro 1647.

Porcelain found on beach near Port Edward,
in all likelihood from the Sao Joao.

The porcelain washed up in the Port Edward vicinity is usually in small pieces making identifying marks - for dating purposes - difficult to find. According to experts, however, the porcelain from the Sao Joao dates to the Jiajing period, 1522-1566: (Ming dynasty).

An interesting factor when it comes to dating porcelain shards from shipwrecks is that porcelain was regularly in use as ballast i.e. material laid down in the hold of a vessel to provide stability. Porcelain was also carried for the export trade market: the Portuguese were the first seafaring people to reach China via the Cape of Good Hope. In the early 16th c they carried the first consignment of china wares via the Cape to Europe.

Further reading: 
Turner, M: Shipwrecks & Salvage in South Africa
Vieira de Castro, F: The Pepper Wreck: A Portuguese Indiaman at the Mouth of the Tagus River

In contrast to the other major European imports of the time (for example textiles or spices), ceramics are able to withstand exposure to water, thus making it the ideal merchandise to serve as ballast cargo in the great ships. (Vieira de Castro, F: The Pepper Wreck) 

More on the Sao Joao story

The coast north of Port Edward, currently  believed to be the area
where the Sao Joao met her fate.

Wonderful on a calm clear day but imagine a wooden ship
 being dashed against rocks like these.

Night on a barren shore must have been terrifying for survivors.

Historian Graham Mackeurtan in his 'Cradle Days of Natal' refers to the Sao Joao being wrecked just north of the Umzimvubu River - i.e. he chooses the Port St John's location, as did George MacCall Theal and other authors. Though more recent research prompts us to disagree with Mackeurtan's choice of site, he does give an account of the circumstances of the wreck and of the sufferings of the survivors:

'In four hours the ship was smashed to atoms, and her debris and disintegrated cargo strewed the shore. There was not a piece of the galleon as large as a man's arm remaining. The surrounding country was barren, and practically deserted ... After waiting twelve days for the sick to recover, the party set out for Lourenco Marques on 7 July 1552. Donna Leonor, the Captain's wife and a woman of noble rank, delicate and young, was borne in a litter ... For a month they travelled in this way ... subsisting on rice saved from the wreck and fruit found in the thickets.'

Sepulveda, his wife and children, died along the way in circumstances of unimaginable hardship; a small number of Portuguese and slaves survived the march north. A memorial, today unfortunately much ravaged by wind and weather, was placed at Port Edward and offers a verse by the Portuguese poet Luis de Camoens:

Dear gentle soul who went so soon away
Departing from this life in discontent,
Repose in that far sky to which you went
While on this earth I linger in dismay.
In the ethereal seat where you must be,
If you consent to memories of our sphere,
Recall the love which, burning pure and clear,
So often in my eyes you used to see!
If then, in incurable, long anguish
Of having lost you, as I pine and languish,
You see some merit - do this favour for me:
And to the God who cut your life short, pray
That he as early to your sight restore me
As from my own he swept you far away.

  

The wreck of the Sao Joao June 1552

Taking a break from genealogy I spent some time on one of the most evocative coasts in South Africa - the south-eastern stretch, graveyard of too many ships to mention individually. In particular, I was enthralled to find myself walking on the beach where the great Portuguese galleon Sao Joao was wrecked in June 1552.

Though controversy has dogged the matter of the precise wreck site, experts currently suggest this is slightly north of what is now Port Edward.

Port Edward in the distance

For those who like accuracy, there's E Burger's study (University of Pretoria 2004), chapter one of which pays attention to the puzzle concerning the location of the wreck and refers to various sources speculating on this topic. Historian George Theal in the early 1900s held the view (unsubstantiated) that the Sao Joao was wrecked off Port St John's at the mouth of the Umzimvubu River. However, despite the fact that the galleon gave her name to Port St John's, the wreck at this location has subsequently been identified as that of an entirely different and much later ship - the Nossa Senhora de Belem, 1635. 

Engraving: wreck of Sao Joao

The Sao Joao left Cochin, China, in February 1552 under the command of Manuel de Sousa Sepulveda. At 900 tons the ship was one of the largest built at the time for the India route and this was the return trip of her first voyage. Richly laden, she carried a great quantity of pepper - one of the most highly-prized spices - other export merchandise and about 600 souls.

A storm hurled the vessel on to the rocks, breaking it up so completely that no remains of her hull have been found. About 120 people perished in the wreck and perhaps they were the lucky ones. The survivors, decimated by starvation, exhaustion, disease and attacks by indigenous tribes, attempted to walk to Delagoa Bay (Maputo): only 25 reached their destination almost six months later.