The money ship of Käräjäluoto

Käräjäluoto Lohtaja

In the 1740s, a sailing ship wrecked off the Rahakallio cliffs of Käräjäluoto island, and this ship is believed to be the Swedish tax-collection ship Förstfodingen. The shipwreck had long been based on oral folk memory only, but its existence received more evidence when copper coins of one and two öre and dozens of copper plate coins were found on the spot in the 1930s. Further finds have been made later. Based on the remnants of the ship, it was 12–14 meters long.

At the end of the 1980s, the diving club Bothnia Navalis explored the wreckage area so thoroughly that almost a thousand more copper coins were found. They are from the years between 1718 and 1748.

However, Rahakallio (“money cliff”) did not receive its name from this shipwreck. According to folk memory, a smaller sailing ship had previously wrecked when hitting the cliffs and lost its coin cargo into the sea.