In early winter of 1822, Captain Samuel Barrett Eads became a hero.

He was sailing in the southeast Pacific when he and his crew encountered a Dutch ship

that was in trouble.

Eads managed to save every single one of the Dutch soldiers and then headed for the city

of Batavia, known today as Jakarta, to drop them off and see if a reward could be collected.

While he waited, he did some shopping.

Now Eads wasn't rich by any stretch of the imagination, but he owned a small portion

of the ship he sailed, and of course he was expecting a handsome reward for his heroic

efforts.

With this in mind, he kept an eye open for something unusual and conversation worthy

to take home.

And that's when he saw it.

It was a mummified mermaid.

It was over two feet long, had the curved tail one might find on a fish, but the upper body

of something much more human in shape.

It was brown from the preservation process, wrinkled with age and entirely addictive

to look at, and Captain Eads knew instantly that he had to own it.

In late January of 1822, he did something bold. He sold the ship he did not fully own

and used the proceeds to buy the mermaid.

Then he found transportation back to London and put the odd creature on display, because

just about everyone who saw it, believed that it was real.

Of course there were those who could see through the hoax.

...