This must have been too hard, Whoops, sorry crew, the ships name was the HMS Valetta. I remember walking over it a lot when working for Club Croc in the early 1990s. There is now virtually nothing left, however a lot of stuff over the years has washed up around the Whitsundays, including our sailor.
THE VALETTA., Captain Dacre. Beached near Cape Gloucester, near Bowen, Queensland, after striking rocks, July 1825. There are conflicting reports concerning her ultimate fate. One suggests she was abandoned after attempts had been made for three weeks to repair her. Another states she was refloated only to be lost at the Pelew Islands about a year later. While surveying the Whitsunday Islands in 1848, a seine net snagged on the remains of an old ship lying off the head of Port Molle. The net was manned by sailors from HMS Rattlesnake, under Captain Owen Stanley. Cannon balls were picked up on the nearby beach and coins and cutlery found on Long Island. Aborigines said the ship went back several generations. In June 1983 however the wreck was identified as being that of the Valetta, Sydney to Manilla, 1825. [LQ],[HH2],[ASW1]
