Page 422 - The Dutch Caribbean Isles
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he Dutch Antilles authorities interned Jewfish was reported living in the forward not by negotiation but by Schmidt refus-
section. Antilla is a popular dive site, and ing to lower the gangway and the marines’
T as enemy aliens 220 German nationals, has been popular for penetration diving. captain deciding to wait for daybreak. A
Storm damage has continued to break up third misconception is that when scuttling
including Antilla’s 35 crew. The Dutch made the wreck, and some divers consider it now the ship, the crew heated her boilers so that
Antilla’s crew build an internment camp unsafe to enter. the seawater entering through her sea-
on Bonaire to house their fellow detainees. cocks caused a boiler explosion, and that
However, the British authorities had agreed P opular misconceptions have arisen this explosion broke the ship in half. In fact
to take them and intern them on Jamaica. around Antilla. One is that she was between May and August 1940 Dutch divers
On 5 July 1940 all 220 detainees were em- secretly a U-boat tender. In fact between found that the wreck was intact. It was not
barked on the British banana boat Jamaica her arrival off Aruba in September 1939 and until 1953 that it was found to have bro-
Producer. It took them to Jamaica, where Germany’s invasion of the Netherlands in ken in half, and this was caused by storm
they were interned for the rest of the war. May 1940 the Dutch authorities repeatedly damage. A fourth misconception is that
searched Antilla for weapons and found Captain Schmidt of the Antilla spent the
A ntilla is one of the Caribbean’s largest none.[3] One source even claims Antilla was war in a prison camp in Bonaire and after
shipwrecks, exceeded by only the 600- a tender for Operation Neuland, despite the the war bought the camp to build the Divi
foot (180 m) cruise liners Bianca C and An- fact that this operation was in February and Flamingo Hotel. In fact the entire crew was
tilles. Antilla lies on its port side in Malmok March 1942, 21 months after Antilla was transported to Jamaica and after the war
Bay, Aruba in up to 60 feet (18 m) of water, scuttled. A second misconception is that the camp was bought by local entrepreneur
but with a small part of its starboard side when the Dutch sought to take over the Mr. Lodewijk Gerharts who built the hotel,
exposed above water. By 1953 storm dam- ship, Captain Schmidt negotiated a 24-hour initially named “Hotel Zeebad”.
age had broken the wreck in two amidships. delay. In fact the delay between the Dutch
Corals and tube sponges have colonized the marines reaching Antilla and boarding her
wreck, which attracts lobsters, hawksbill sea was less than two hours. This was achieved
turtles and many species of fish, including
moray eels and blue tang. In 2010 a large
