Wiebbe Hayes Stone Fort

Wiebbe Hayes Stone Fort
The fort in 2001
Interactive map of the Wiebbe Hayes Stone Fort area
General information
TypeDefensive structure
LocationWest Wallabi Island, Australia
Coordinates28°27′41″S 113°42′15″E / 28.4613357°S 113.7041114°E / -28.4613357; 113.7041114
Construction started
1629
Official name
Ruins of Two Stone Huts
TypeHeritage Council
Designated31 July 1995
Part ofHoutman Abrolhos Islands
Reference no.3990
Official name
Batavia Shipwreck Site and Survivor Camps Area 1629
TypeHistoric
CriteriaA, C, D, G
Designated6 April 2006
Reference no.105887
17th century depiction of attack[1]

The Wiebbe Hayes Stone Fort on West Wallabi Island (also known as Wiebbe Hayes Island) is the oldest surviving European building in Australia,[2][3] and was built in 1629 by survivors of the Batavia shipwreck and massacre.[4] West Wallabi Island is 63 kilometres (39 mi) from the coast of Western Australia.

History

Following the shipwreck of the Batavia in 1629, a group of the marooned soldiers under the command of Wiebbe Hayes were put ashore on East Wallabi Island to search for water.[2] A group of mutineers, led by Jeronimus Cornelisz, took control of the other survivors and left Hayes' group there, secretly hoping that they would starve or die of thirst. However, the soldiers discovered that they were able to wade to West Wallabi Island,[2] where there was a fresh water source. Furthermore, West and East Wallabi Island are the only islands in the group upon which the tammar wallaby lives. Thus the soldiers had access to sources of both food and water that were unavailable to the mutineers.

Later the mutineers mounted a series of attacks, which the soldiers repulsed. The remnants of improvised defensive walls and stone shelters built by Wiebbe Hayes and his men on West Wallabi Island are Australia's oldest known European structures,[5][6][7] more than a century and a half before expeditions to the Australian continent by James Cook and Arthur Phillip.[4] The remnants of the fort are:[4]

nothing more than a tiny, sandstone-coloured rectangle in the scrub about 100 metres [110 yd] from the sea. It is unimpressive and isolated and yet this simple structure, just some loose rocks piled up to make a simple fortress, is the first building Europeans constructed in Australia.

See also

References

Sources

Further reading

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