Desolation Island by Patrick O'Brian

I finished re-reading Desolation Island by Patrick O'Brian. During an ill-fated cruise to Australia, Jack runs afoul of a Dutch man-of-war, much larger than he is, who sets after him. Discretion being the better part of valor, Jack flees south into an Antarctic storm. Think The Perfect Storm and you have a pretty good idea of the conditions. When a lucky shot of Jack's takes out the Dutchman's foremast, the Dutch ship slews sideways, is capsized by a giant wave and is lost. Boom. Just like that.

I'm thinking that is a hell of an event. Something like that would be a capital subject for a painting, so I go looking for one. 

Loss of HMS Blenheim and HMS Java in a hurricane - Thomas Buttersworth

I didn't find much. Two large British warships, the HMS Blenheim and the HMS Java were lost in a hurricane in the Southern Indian Ocean in 1807. This is closest event I could find to the fictional one in the book. It takes place in the same part of the world, the two ships are of similar size to the ones in the story, and a hurricane sounds similar to the conditions our heroes encounter.

We have one painting of the event (above), but I don't think it portrays the situation very well. I suspect that not many first class painters experienced a hurricane on board a ship.

This scene from Black Sails does a better job.

into the storm | Black Sails 3.01-3.02 storm tribute
alameli
After surviving the storm and an encounter with an iceberg, our heroes wind up on Desolation Island where they rest, recover and repair their ship.

Dutch whalers near Spitsbergen - Abraham_Storck, 1690

An American whaler stops by and lends them some assistance. Though this painting is of a place on the other side of the world, I think it gives us a good picture of the situation. Except for the whale. There is no whale in the harbor at Desolation Island.