Rare Silver Coins Recovered from the Rapid Shipwreck - Certified Genuine

The Rapid was an early 19th-century American vessel that wrecked on Ningaloo Reef (NW WA coast) in 1811. It was bound for Canton (Guangzhou) in China, and had a cargo of 280,000 Spanish silver dollars when it sank. 

Not only was this an incredible sum of money in those days (the weight of this silver was just shy of 8 tonnes), the survival story of the men on the Rapid is one of hardship and endurance. In addition to that, the discovery of the wreck in 1978 has been described as being one of the most incredible finds in Australian maritime history. Click this link to read our article on the background to this historic wreck.