HMS Braak (1795)

HMS Braak was an 18-gun brig-sloop of the Royal Navy. She was launched at Rotterdam in 1781 and initially served with the Dutch Republic. The British seized her, in Britain, after the Dutch entry into the French Revolutionary Wars, and took her into the Royal Navy. She served briefly with the British before capsizing off the North American coast. She was subsequently the focus of a number of salvage efforts.

Dutch career
The cutter De Braak was launched as a "botter", or vessel of the 8th Charter. Sources also give her name as Baak, or Brak. She was part of a Mediterranean fleet based at the French port of Toulon.

By the 1790s she was in the Caribbean, and was present at the defence of Willemstad, part of the Dutch colony at Curaçao, against the French in 1793. By late 1794 she was ordered to escort a convoy of East Indiamen to Batavia. En route she called at the English port of Falmouth, unaware that the French had since invaded the Netherlands and proclaimed the Batavian Republic, as a client state, compelling them to declare war on the British. On their arrival at the port the Royal Navy seized the 26 merchantmen, and six warships of the convoy, including the De Braak. Officials from the sloop HMS Fortune (1780) took over the De Braak. Forty-six vessels of the Royal Navy that were at Plymouth shared in the prize money.

British career
The Royal Navy took De Braak into service as HMS Braak and re-rigged her as a brig-sloop. She was initially commissioned under Commander James Drew on 13 June 1797, but was caught in a storm at the end of the year and dismasted. On the completion of repairs, she returned to service in February 1798 and was assigned to escort a convoy to the Virginia Capes. She sailed for Halifax on 17 March. On 2 April, whilst off the Azores, she became separated from the rest of ships. Towards the end of the month she fell in with and captured a Spanish ship, reportedly worth some £160,000 in prize money. The Braak duly arrived in Delaware Bay on 25 May, and took on a pilot from Cape Henlopen. Shortly after this a strong and sudden squall blew up and before the crew could take action the ship capsized. Drew and 35 of his crew were drowned, as were 12 Spanish prisoners.

Salvage and controversy
The wreck lay on the bottom of Delaware Bay, but soon became the subject of rumours concerning the amount of treasure the Braak purportedly carried when she sank, with estimates of the value reaching $500 million. A number of artefacts were raised during the 1980s, but maritime archaeologists criticised these efforts for their disregard for proper archaeological methods, and for their discarding of anything not considered inherently valuable. The hull was eventually raised but in such a way that considerable damage was done to both it and the surrounding archaeology. The hull was eventually placed in a museum, as were many of the artefacts recovered. Only a small amount of coin was recovered, worth considerably less than the cost of the large number of salvage attempts that had been undertaken over the years. The treatment of the wreck of the Braak, and of many others like it, was a contributing factor to the passage of the Abandoned Shipwrecks Act of 1987.