Beacon Island, also called Batavia’s Graveyard, is a small, J-shaped coral island in the Houtman Abrolhos archipelago, off the coast of Western Australia. It covers 5.25 hectares (13 acres), is about 350 meters long, and has a low elevation, rising just two meters above sea level. The island is mostly sandy with some exposed coral and pockets of guano. It is uninhabited today and is part of the Morning Reef complex on the eastern side of the Wallabi Group1.

Beacon Island is most famous as the site of the Batavia shipwreck, mutiny, and massacre. In June 1629, the Dutch East India Company ship Batavia struck Morning Reef nearby. Of the 316 people on board, most survived the wreck and reached the small islands in the area, with Beacon Island being the largest and most accessible12.

Commander Francisco Pelsaert and 47 others left the survivors to search for water, eventually sailing all the way to Batavia (now Jakarta, Indonesia). During their absence, under-merchant Jeronimus Cornelisz led a brutal mutiny. Cornelisz and his followers murdered around 120 men, women, and children among the survivors, burying many victims on Beacon Island. When Pelsaert returned, he captured and executed the ringleaders. Out of the original 341 people who left the Netherlands, only 116 survived the ordeal124.

Beacon Island’s grim history led to its nickname, Batavia’s Graveyard. The site has been the focus of archaeological interest since the 1960s. Excavations by the Western Australian Museum have uncovered remains and artifacts linked to the Batavia tragedy. In 2014, all buildings and structures were removed from the island to restore it to a natural state and better protect its heritage12.

The island is listed on Australia’s National Heritage List due to its association with the Batavia shipwreck and massacre1.

After the events of 1629, Beacon Island and the surrounding Abrolhos islands saw occasional visits from sealers and guano miners in the 19th century. In 1877, survivors of the Hadda shipwreck lived on the island for five days. Later, crayfishermen established temporary shacks and storage sheds on the island, but these have since been removed as part of conservation efforts1.

It’s worth noting that there are other islands named Beacon Island, such as one in Hudson Strait, Nunavut, Canada, and another at the mouth of the Piesang River in Plettenberg Bay, South Africa. However, the Beacon Island most historically significant is the one in the Houtman Abrolhos, Western Australia, due to the Batavia tragedy58.

Beacon Island remains a stark reminder of one of maritime history’s most infamous shipwrecks and mutinies, and today stands as a protected heritage site12.