Secret

Between 17 and 19 February 1921 Sharks Bay experienced the biggest storm on record. It struck the fishing fleet, causing damage and wrecking multiple boats. Some of the fishermen lost everything in this storm. From 19 February missing boats were searched for, and crews were accounted for. Despite the number of wrecked vessels, it seemed all the crew members were accounted for except two from the Secret.

Inspector Edwards and Police Constable Ward attempted to launch the Shark to look for boats and crews. It appeared that while boats were wrecked, the crews were safe. They met with George Fry on his boat Seaplane. He reported the crews from Useless Inlet were safe, although vessels had been wrecked. This news was related to Geraldton and surrounding districts, which was printed in newspapers.

Then the worrying news came in that cutters Secret and Pearline were missing and were not located in the area they were last seen pearling. A three-day search was launched around Dirk Hartog Island.

On 25 February the Inspector of Fisheries F. Aldrich received a telegram from Inspector Edwards of Sharks Bay. Inspector Edwards had been around Dirk Hartog Island, South Passage and Useless Inlet for the missing boats, Secret and Pearline. The Pearline was found high and dry at Tetroden Loop on Dirk Hartog Island and their crew was safe. The Secret and her crew were still missing and no sign of her was discovered.

Secret was a small boat, ideal for working in and around the islands of Shark Bay and Useless Inlet. Shark Bay pearlers Mr W.A. Hughes and Percy Whitewood owned her. She does not appear to have been officially registered, so her details are not available. Her two crew members were Alfie Pearson, a First Nations pearler/fisher and Sambo Miller, a South Sea Islander. Shark Bay is the traditional country of the Malgana, Nanda and Yinggarda people.

On 22 May the remains of the cutter were discovered by Percy Whitewood. The boat had been blown over 22 miles [35.4 kms] into South Passage and had been dashed into pieces. Parts of the boat were spotted high up on a rocky point of Dirk Hartog Island. The huge tides had thrown pieces between 15 feet [4.57 metres] and 60 feet [18.3 metres] high. After looking around, Percy said the only salvageable part of the boat was the anchor chain.

Upon further inspection, Percy found the bodies of Alfie and Sambo close to where the boat had hit the rocky cliff. It was unclear whether the men had been drowned before the boat wrecked, and were washed up onto the rocks, or whether they were on board and died when the boat struck the rocks. The bodies were able to be identified despite their poor condition from the wreck and exposure to the summer heat.

The bodies were buried by Messrs WA Hughes, W Farr, A Gallagher and P Whitewood at the scene, above the high-water line. Sand dunes throughout the Shark Bay area are littered with the unnamed and unmarked remains of pearlers who drowned or succumbed to diseases like dysentery and beri beri.

Seventeen years earlier in 1904 a larger vessel called Secret worked the Shark Bay area. She was a two-masted ketch, wrecked on Faure Island. Many fishers were superstitious, and it was considered unlucky to call a boat Secret in the Shark Bay fishery after that.