page_title: HMS Wager (1739)
section_title: Wreck of Wager
hierarchical_section_title: HMS Wager (1739) / Wreck of Wager
caption_attribution_description: English: The Wreck of the Wager
context_page_description: HMS Wager was a square-rigged sixth-rate Royal Navy ship of 28 guns. She was built as an East Indiaman in about 1734 and made two voyages to India for the East India Company before the Royal Navy purchased her in 1739. She formed part of a squadron under Commodore George Anson and was wrecked on the south coast of Chile on 14 May 1741. The wreck of Wager became famous for the subsequent adventures of the survivors who found themselves marooned on a desolate island in the middle of a Patagonian winter, and in particular because of the Wager Mutiny that followed.
context_section_description: On 13 May 1741 at 9:00am, the carpenter went forward to inspect the chain plates. Whilst there he thought he caught a fleeting glimpse of land to the west. Lieutenant Baynes was also there but he saw nothing, and the sighting was not reported. Consequently, no one realised that Wager had entered a large, uncharted bay.
  At 2:00pm land was positively sighted to the west and northwest and all hands were mustered to make sail and turn the ship to the southwest. During the operations that followed, Captain Cheap fell down the quarterdeck ladder, dislocated his shoulder, and was confined below. The ship's disabled and worn-out condition severely hampered efforts to get clear of the bay.
  At 4:30am the next day the ship struck rocks repeatedly, broke her tiller, and although still afloat, was partially flooded. Invalids below who were too sick to get out of their hammocks drowned. The ship was steered with sail alone towards land, but later in the morning the ship struck again, and this time became hard aground.
  Wager had struck the coast of what would subsequently be known as Wager Island in position 47°40′43″S 75°02′57″W in Guayaneco Archipelago. Some of the crew broke into the spirit room and got drunk, armed themselves and began looting, dressing up in officers' clothes and fighting. The other 140 men and officers took to the boats and made it safely on shore. On the following day, Friday 15 May, the ship bilged amidships and many of the drunken crew still on board drowned.
caption: The Wreck of the Wager, the frontispiece from John Byron's account
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