Gun Island is one of the larger

islands An island (or isle) is an isolated piece of habitat that is surrounded by a dramatically different habitat, such as water. Very small islands such as emergent land features on atolls can be called islets, skerries, cays or keys. An island ...

in the

Pelsaert Group The Pelsaert Group is the southernmost of the three groups of islands that make up the Houtman Abrolhos island chain. it consists of a number of islands, the largest of which are Gun Island, Middle Island, and Pelsaert Island. The g ...

of the

Houtman Abrolhos The Houtman Abrolhos (often called the Abrolhos Islands) is a chain of 122 islands and associated coral reefs, in the Indian Ocean off the west coast of Australia, about west of Geraldton, Western Australia. It is the southernmost true coral ...

, in the

Indian Ocean The Indian Ocean is the third-largest of the world's five oceanic divisions, covering or ~19.8% of the water on Earth's surface. It is bounded by Asia to the north, Africa to the west and Australia to the east. To the south it is bounded by t ...

off the west coast of Australia. It is nominally at , about north and east of Half Moon Reef and is a flat limestone outcrop of about in size. The island is part of the Houtman Abrolhos Important Bird Area, identified as such by BirdLife International because of its importance for supporting large numbers of breeding seabirds.

History

Between June 1727 and March 1728, crew of the Dutch

VOC VOC, VoC or voc may refer to: Science and technology * Open-circuit voltage (VOC), the voltage between two terminals when there is no external load connected * Variant of concern, a category used during the assessment of a new variant of a virus ...

ship were stranded on the island after it struck Half Moon Reef. A

longboat A longboat is a type of ship's boat that was in use from ''circa'' 1500 or before. Though the Royal Navy replaced longboats with launches from 1780, examples can be found in merchant ships after that date. The longboat was usually the largest boa ...

with 11 seamen was dispatched to go for help, but it failed to return, and the remaining survivors used wreckage to construct a sloop, which they named the ''Sloepie''. Of the 88 crew who survived, 82 arrived in

Batavia Batavia may refer to: Historical places * Batavia (region), a land inhabited by the Batavian people during the Roman Empire, today part of the Netherlands * Batavia, Dutch East Indies, present-day Jakarta, the former capital of the Dutch East In ...

on 30 April 1728. During

Admiralty Admiralty most often refers to: *Admiralty, Hong Kong *Admiralty (United Kingdom), military department in command of the Royal Navy from 1707 to 1964 *The rank of admiral *Admiralty law Admiralty can also refer to: Buildings * Admiralty, Traf ...

surveys of the north-west coast in 1840, the crew of discovered a

brass Brass is an alloy of copper (Cu) and zinc (Zn), in proportions which can be varied to achieve different mechanical, electrical, and chemical properties. It is a substitutional alloy: atoms of the two constituents may replace each other wit ...

gun of about three pounds

calibre In guns, particularly firearms, caliber (or calibre; sometimes abbreviated as "cal") is the specified nominal internal diameter of the gun barrel bore – regardless of how or where the bore is measured and whether the finished bore match ...

and an iron swivel gun on which paint was still adhered. Captain Stokes, with Commander

John Clements Wickham John Clements Wickham (21 November 17986 January 1864) was a Scottish explorer, naval officer, magistrate and administrator. He was first lieutenant on during its second survey mission, 1831–1836, under captain Robert FitzRoy. The young ...

, named the place Gun Island. They also discovered several coins, including one dated about 1707 and another dated 1720. Also seen was what appeared to be the beam of a ship with an iron bolt through it, and glass bottles and clay pipes. The material was presumed to have been left there by the ''Zeewyk'' castaways 112 years earlier. In 1883,

Charles Edward Broadhurst Charles Edward Broadhurst (1826 – 26 April 1905) was a pioneer pastoralist and pearler in colonial Western Australia. He was a member of the Western Australian Legislative Council in 1874 and 1875. In 2009, he was recognised as one of Weste ...

, who had been granted a lease for guano export, discovered several campsites, as well as the bones of seals which had evidently been killed for sustenance by the crew of the ''Zeewyk''. Gun Island was one of the islands of the Abrolhos most heavily worked for guano. Guano workings continued on a commercial scale from the 1880s to the 1920s, and again in the mid-1940s. A stone jetty on the south-eastern corner, built for loading guano, remains intact. The yacht ''Nautilus'' was wrecked at Gun Island in 1897. From June to November 1968, a

stratigraphic Stratigraphy is a branch of geology concerned with the study of rock layers (strata) and layering (stratification). It is primarily used in the study of sedimentary and layered volcanic rocks. Stratigraphy has three related subfields: lithostra ...

test well was drilled on Gun Island (28º53'30.11"S, 113º51'27.0"E) by BP Petroleum Development Australia. It was drilled within the

Perth Basin The Perth Basin is a thick, elongated sedimentary basin in Western Australia. It lies beneath the Swan Coastal Plain west of the Darling Scarp, representing the western limit of the much older Yilgarn Craton, and extends further west offshore. C ...

and reached a total depth (TD) of . The extent of the drilling platform near the wharf can be seen on satellite images.

Archaeology

In 1974, an archaeological expedition was made to the island by members of the

Western Australian Museum The Western Australian Museum is a statutory authority within the Culture and the Arts Portfolio, established under the ''Museum Act 1969''. The museum has six main sites. The state museum, now known as WA Museum Boola Bardip, officially re-ope ...

. Gun Island is classified as having "High" conservation significance and is one of the seven protected zones in the Abrolhos Islands. Protected zone restrictions mean that "visitors shall not carry out any digging or major earthworks within the zones around declared maritime archaeological sites unless permitted to do so", and that they shall also not take

metal detecting A metal detector is an instrument that detects the nearby presence of metal. Metal detectors are useful for finding metal objects on the surface, underground, and under water. The unit itself, consist of a control box, and an adjustable shaft, ...

devices onto the island. A -wide rock called Gun Islet is about off the southern tip of the island.

References

{{reflist Pelsaert Group Important Bird Areas of Western Australia