Episode 1 of 4
Wreck at Danger Point
- When
- 26 February 1852 (legacy record gives 25 February)
- Where
- Danger Point
HMS Birkenhead struck a barely visible rock near Danger Point on 26 February 1852; only 193 of an estimated 643 people on board survived.
The ship was wrecked on 26 February 1852 at Danger Point near Gansbaai, though the legacy record gives 25 February. A barely visible rock, now called Birkenhead Rock, proved fatal for the troopship carrying soldiers and their families. She had sailed from Simon's Bay with between 630 and 643 people aboard, the exact number being in doubt, and only 193 survived.
Sources
- HMS Birkenhead (1845) Wikipedia, revision of 2026-08-12
- Gansbaai Wikipedia, revision of 2026-10-04
Machine-drafted from the cited Wikipedia passages and checked by a reviewing model, not by a human editor. Every passage cites the revision it was written from; dates and places follow those passages.