Title: Table Bay Cape of Good Hope
Medium: Watercolour
Signed – inscribed with title and dated 1854
Unframed: 22cm x 73cm
Framed: 64cm x 113cm
The painting, Shipwreck, depicts a wreck behind Hangklip (the protruding rock in the background). Most of the ships that wrecked in the Hangklip area were not well documented and the well-known wrecks are dated after Bowler’s return to England in 1867. For this reason, I believe this was really a commentary painting rather than a painting representing an actual event.
From various references it is obvious that wrecks were always regarded as a rare gift from the sea by the inhabitants of the area behind Hangklip. Because the area was out of site from the Cape and it would take officials several days to reach them the valuable goods from the ships were looted long before officials arrived. Lawrence Green (Blake 1999:37) reports that “many houses on the west and south coast were furnished with what washed ashore and brides were given Eastern pottery and glassware. Also, what divers brought up in official salvage operations, did not necessarily correspond with what they found beneath the water. Visit the Bredasdorp Shipwreck Museum to see what was later donated by the descendants of the farmers in the region.”
The most well-known wreck was the Schoonberg, a Dutch ship, that ran ashore on a sandy beach in fine weather at Struisbaai in 1750. Rita Blake (1999:37) in her book on Rooiels explained the circumstances around this event as follows: “She was loaded with tea from Batavia, spices, silk and boxes with gold, jewels, and silver. No lives were lost and Captain van Soest sent part of the ship’s crew along the beach to send news to the authorities. Meanwhile his accomplices, Jacob van der Heyden, Hendrik Klopper and Jacob Malan arrived from the Cape with ox wagons and loaded selected items. When Governor de Chavonnes’ men arrived at the wreck three weeks later, they found her burned. He was suspicious about the circumstances surrounding the wreck and the timely arrival of the wagons. Van Soest was found to have smuggled rum and tobacco earlier with the help of the farmers, and the sailors began spending silver in the Cape. The men were arrested, Klopper committed suicide, Van Soest was broken on the wheel and the others deported to Batavia. Although a search reported in the newspapers of 1859 found the ship’s bell on the farm, the treasure was never found.”
Bowler knew about this famous historical event. The painting, Shipwreck, in my opinion commented on the looting by the local farmers behind Hangklip.
