South African Maritime Museum
Historic maritime archive housed in a former shipping-line headquarters, tracing shipwrecks, model ships and a wartime troopship disaster.
Location
About this audio guide
This guide to the South African Maritime Museum in Simon's Town opens with a twisted fragment of hull recovered from the wreck of the SS Mendi, a troopship carrying members of the South African Native Labour Contingent toward the First World War. You'll hear about the fog-bound collision with another liner before dawn on 21 February 1917, and how the museum weighs a widely repeated story about the men's final minutes against what actually got recorded. Look closely at that piece of hull in the case in front of you as you begin.
This audio guide was created using AI.
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