Francisco Pelsaert (also known as "Pelsart") was a Dutch sea captain who skippered the Batavia and became famous for a mutiny which occurred after becoming stranded at Houtman's Abrolhos off Western Australia.
Water was scarce and FranciscoPelsaert, the commander and highest authority on board, reluctantly departed with the skipper in a small boat, initially to search for fresh water.
Pelsaert reprieved two mutineers from the gallows and they were marooned instead on the coast of Western Australia.
The tone that surfaces in Pelsaert's journals is urbane and world-weary, written by a man isolated by his authoritative position, wracked with malaria, and having to face up to the knowledge that in his absence hideous crimes had been committed.
The impact threw Commander FranciscoPelsaert from his bed and soon the other 315 men, women and children on board were in a state of panic.
Pelsaert and 47 others, including all the senior officers, headed off in the sloop to find water and to ultimately seek help from the port of Batavia, some 1,200 nautical miles away.
With Pelsaert and the disgraced skipper, Adriaen Jacobsz, both gone, Jeronimus Cornelisz, who was responsible for the ship's cargo, began to hatch a variation on the mutinous plan that had been brewing in his mind since before the Batavia came to grief.
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