- Hardcover: 320 pages
- Publisher: W&N; First Edition edition (14 Feb 2002)
- Language English
- ISBN-10: 0575070242
- ISBN-13: 978-0575070240
- Product Dimensions: 21.8 x 15 x 4.1 cm
- Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars See all reviews (23 customer reviews)
- Amazon Bestsellers Rank: 318,566 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
Batavia's Graveyard
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Amazon.co.uk Review
If you happen to pass Houtman's Abrolhos, the tiny uninhabited archipelago just off Australia's west coast, you'll find out why it's known as Batavia's Graveyard . For there amid the brightly coloured coral, you can still see the sun-bleached bones of the victims of one of the worst civilian maritime massacres. It's not often that the evidence speaks so clearly and yet it's a racing certainty almost no one in Britain had ever heard of the Batavia. As ever when no Brits are involved, we just aren't that interested. But this could all change with Batavia's Graveyard. Mike Dash had a surprise bestseller in 1999 with Tulipomania, the story of the fascination with the tulip in seventeenth century Holland, and Batavia's Graveyard is another slice of Dutch history from the same period.
In 1628, the Batavia, the newest ship in the Dutch East India Company's fleet set sail on its maiden voyage to Java, with its hold crammed full with gold, silver and precious stones. Also on board was a man called Jeronimus Cornelisz, a member of the extreme Protestant sect, the Mennonites, and a dangerous psychotic with it. Cornelisz orchestrated a mutiny on board, but before his plans could be carried out the boat came to grief on Houtman's Abrolhos. And there the fun and games started. The Batavia's captain, Francisco Pelsaert, having got wind of the mutiny, headed off to get help in the only open boat, leaving the survivors to fend for themselves. Which is where Cornelisz steps in; realising that if he wants to remain undiscovered he will need to first kill all the survivors who weren't part of the mutiny before taking out the rescue party on its arrival, he splits the survivors into two groups. The strongest are sent to live on a nearby atoll where Cornelisz anticipates they will starve to death. Then the killing begins. The denouement, when it comes, is too perfectly timed even for Hollywood. It may be X-rated, but this really is the sort of story you just couldn't make up.--John Crace
Review
Good reviews are now coming in for this wonderful narrative: "Dash evokes the Dutch East Indiamen's institutional avarice and brutality particularly well, along with the cheapness of life on voyages lasting several years, and the type of person they subsequently attracted... Dash's version of their hair-raising tale sensibly eschews hysterical romanticism in favour of a springy, understated narrative that lets the horror speak for itself... Awfully good butnot for the fainthearted."SUNDAY TIMES "The details are gruesome but the stor --Sunday Times
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First Sentence
Jeronimus had never meant to go to sea. Read the first page
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
Jeronimus had never meant to go to sea. Read the first page
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Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
23 of 23 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
Batavia's Graveyard has to rank as one of the best books I've ever read. It tells the incredible story of how a bunch of several hundred Dutch people travel (for various reasons) on the great ship Batavia to the Dutch East Indies to fill the ship with spices worth an absolute fortune back home. But the ship crashes many miles west of the Australian coast leaving the many survivors stuck on a tiny island. It's what happens next that is really unbelievable. While the head of the ship sails off in a smaller boat to try and find help, one of the other officers assumes control of the island, which might have saved many lives if he wasn't a genuine psychopath who binded a number of loyal men to him and systematically began killing just for the fun of it. But some survivors collected on another island nearby and made preparations to defend themsleves from the inevitable assault that would come. It really is one of those stories so incredible you couldn't make it up. The author writes in a very neat and reader-friendly fashion which makes the book a real page-turner. Apart from the main story he also writes about the historical context, including the early European history of Australia and the men who got marooned there, never to be seen again. In short, buy it - you'll never read another true story quite as dramatic.
11 of 11 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This book is interesting from a number of perspectives. It tells about life in Holland in the 17th century, gives an insight into life aboard a VOC trading ship (it puts paid to the romantic notion of sailing off to the Far East to make your fortune from the spice trade - the majority of sailors and VOC employees were desperate men and conditions aboard were far from pleasant for most), and recounts the frightening story of shipwrecked life under the assumed command of probably the most bloodthirsty psychopath in history.
The story of the Batavia fired the public imagination for many years after the event, and has over time fallen from memory. Mike Dash has brought the story to life again.
Highly recommended.
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
A superb and fast-moving telling of the tragic story of the Dutch East Indiaman "Batavia" that ran aground on a archipelago of tiny islands off the coast of Australia in the early seventeenth century. The captain sails off in a small boat over a vast expanse of barely known sea to get help (shades of Captain Bligh and the "Bounty"). Ironically (and tragically) a mutiny among the merchants and crew is evolving at the time of the shipwreck, and from this murder and mayhem erupt among the survivors left to fend for themselves on the islands. Incredibly, there are enough survivors to eventually tell the world the whole story, and from their accounts and the archeological evidence Mike Dash weaves his story.
Dash tells the story at a fine pace in clear and readable prose. This, admittedly fascinating, slice of history is as enthralling as a novel. Interspersed in the narrative is everything you would want to know (and much you might not) about the Dutch East India Company, life in seventeenth century Holland (rapidly becoming the richest society in the world), religious dissent in early modern Europe, the spice trade, the early European explorations of Australia and the East Indies, and (what lingers in the mind longest) the truly appalling conditions of life at sea at the time. One ends up wondering why anyone ever went to sea during this period of human history, even if desperate, after reading about the putrid water, limited salty food, non-existent hygeine, infestations of lice and cockroaches, barbaric punishments and terrible risks.
The mounting horror of the murders and anarchy among those stranded on the island and the eventual rescue and response of the authorities is superbly evoked, together with the "follow up" of the survivors, as far as is known. History comes alive in the all too human stories of ordinary people desperately trying to survive under unimaginable conditions.
Only a couple of quibbles - Anabaptists were generally not violent (despite the exception at Munster where there was peculiarly individual circumstances, including a charismatic leader), many were pacifists (as are Memmonites today). To blame Cornelieuz' behavior on his religion is almost certainly misplaced, although combined with his personal disasters, it may have increased his sense of being an outsider. Secondly, diagnosing Cornelieuz as a psychopath (a twentieth century psychiatric term) is enormously difficult at this reach of time, there may have been other social, psychological or medical reasons for his (admittedly appalling) behavior, and simply calling him a psychopath is uncharacteristically glib and frankly unhelpful. These don't detract, however, from the well told story.
Highly recommended - read it.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
The past made vivid life
Other reviewers have summarised the basic narrative of Mike Dash's engrossing book. Suffice to say, they do not exaggerate the skill with which the story is told. Read more
Published 3 months ago by G. M. Sinstadt
Absorbing, shocking, engrossing
I found this book by chance after searching for sea voyages and exploration on Amazon. Even though I had never read anything at all concerning Dutch shipping I couldn't put this... Read more
Published 8 months ago by zebra2006
utterly compelling
No point in writing a long review - I think everybody's said it. I stayed up all night to read this. Read more
Published 12 months ago by Miss M. Maguire
Backing up James Powell below....
James Powell's review below is very good. The book is well written and the story so shocking that you cannot put this book down. Read more
Published 13 months ago by Jerry Hibbert
Captivating but confusing in places.
I eagerly anticipated reading this book after reading reviews about it and I was gripped. I finished the book within 2 days of almost nonstop reading. Read more
Published 14 months ago by Blake
A fascinating story that is told brilliantly
The author really is a brilliant writer. He gives just the right amount of detail and historical context and of course it is a very interesting story. Read more
Published 17 months ago by The Emperor
shipwreck
In the autumn of 1628 the East Indian ship Batavia set sail from Amsterdam to Java but unfortunately it was wrecked on the Houtmans Abrolhos on the west coast of Australia on 4... Read more
Published 18 months ago by G. I. Forbes
Fascinating history book
After I saw the wreck of Batavia during my visit to Fremantle in West Australia, I wanted to know more about the ship and the bloody mutiny on it. Read more
Published 23 months ago by Dr. Petr Janecek
Bloody, great history
Harrowing and fascinating by turns this book tells of the true story of a shipwreck and subsequent mutiny of a small group of sailors of the ship Batavia. Read more
Published on 20 Dec 2009 by Ste to the J
Horrific story, but a gem of a book
"Batavia's Graveyard" is the horrific, but true story of the bloodiest mutiny in history on the Dutch ship "de Batavia" in 1629. Read more
Published on 20 Mar 2009 by Basileus
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