Farmer's Weekly (South Africa)
The epic journey of the São João shipwreck survivors in 1552
The Portuguese galleon São João ran aground on the KwaZulu-Natal coast in mid-1552, leaving hundreds of castaways on a mysterious and forbidding continent. Mike Burgess tells of their desperate struggle to survive.
By the turn of the 15th century, the Portuguese had established a sea route to India around the southern tip of Africa. Known as the Carreira da India, it replaced the overland spice route, but was every bit as dangerous, with six Portuguese ships being wrecked along Africa’s notorious south-east coast between 1552 and 1593 alone. The first, the São João, came to grief in June 1552 at present-day Port Edward, and the harrowing tale of its survivors has passed into historical accounts and even poetry.
A DAUNTING SEA VOYAGE
The key destination of the
Carreira da India was the trading base at Goa on the west coast of India; from here, the Portuguese did business as far afield as China, Indonesia and Japan. Ships carrying spices, ceramics, beads, shells and fabrics would then return to Lisbon, a journey of six to eight months.
The São João, laden with riches, set sail from India for Europe in February 1552, but as it approached Africa four months later, violent storms claimed its sails, mast and rudder. The battered vessel was taking on water and drifting helplessly, yet the crew managed to anchor it in a bay near the Mtamvuna River on 8 June and began ferrying passengers to safety in three boats. The first of the 500 survivors (300 of whom were slaves) to reach land were the captain, Manuel de Sousa Sepulveda, and his family. Unfortunately, the rescue boats sank before everybody could be removed from the wreck and more than 100 people eventually drowned.
While the corpses washed up along the coast, the survivors regrouped in a makeshift camp to wait for the injured to recover and to salvage items from the wreck. These included food, firearms, swords, and pieces of metal for bartering for food from any local people they encountered. During this time, they collectively decided that their best chance of rescue would be to head up the coastline to present-day Mozambique, where the Portuguese traded for ivory.
On 7 July, they set out on their daunting journey of more than 1 000km. Progress was slow along the rugged coastline, and the castaways were forced to forage for sustenance in the sea and coastal forests while bartering with local tribes where possible.
Sadly, a number of these encounters descended into conflict. On occasion, armed Portuguese took food from villagers by force, while some local people, in turn, abused the castaways. For example, it is said that when the survivors reached the Incomati River at Maputo Bay, a chief offered them shelter on condition they surrender their weapons. Once they had done so, however, they were robbed and expelled.
With limited options, the wretched party trudged on, only to have their clothes stripped from their bodies by villagers near the Limpopo River.
It was here that the captain’s wife, Dona Leonar, refused to continue, eventually dying of starvation, along with her children. Sepulveda, who had been foraging desperately to feed them, vanished inland, no doubt crazed with grief and hunger.
Although some survivors managed to settle in local communities along the way, the large majority died, and in the end just eight Europeans and 17 slaves (probably Asian) eventually reached Inhambane in January 1553. There, to their unspeakable relief, a Portuguese trading vessel lay at anchor.
THE TELLING OF THE TALE
The story of the São João survivors first appeared in print via a pamphlet titled História da muy notável perda do galeão grande São João, in 1555. The death of Dona Leonar and her family was recounted in Luís Vaz de Camões’s epic poem of 1572, The Lusiads. More than 150 years later, the São João incident appeared in the História TrágicoMarítima, published in Lisbon.
South African historian GM Theal translated narratives of the História Trágico-Marítima into English between 1898 and 1902. Then, in the 1950s, the British historian CR Boxer translated and published a selection of the História Trágico-Marítima accounts with informative footnotes.
These texts, along with archaeological and salvage work, proved critical in identifying the Portuguese wreck sites in the 1970s and 1980s, with Dr Tim Maggs of the KwaZulu-Natal Museum playing a central part in locating the São João wreck site.
In the late 1980s, further research on the sites was published under the title Dias and his Successors, a work that shed light on the tragic maritime disasters that inadvertently led to the very first interactions between Europeans and Africans in Southern Africa.
• Vernon, G. 2013 Even the Cows were Amazed – Shipwreck Survivors in South-East Africa 1552-1782. Jacana Media; heritageportal.co.za > Sao Joao.