Tryall departed Plymouth on her maiden voyage for Bantam on 4 September 1621,[1] carrying a cargo that included silver for trade in the East Indies as well as a gift for the King of Siam.

[2]: 18 The vessel departed on 19 March and sighted the Australian coast on 1 May, apparently mistaking Point Cloates approximately 100 kilometres (62 mi) south-south-west of North West Cape on the mainland, for an island that Captain Lenaert Jacobszoon and Supercargo Willem Janszoon in the Dutch East India Company ship Mauritius had encountered in 1618 and which is now known as Barrow Island.

This navigation error was caused by having sailed too far east, a common problem of the time before an accurate means of fixing a ship's longitude existed.

[3] Captain Brooke, his son John and nine men scrambled into a skiff and the ship's factor Thomas Bright and 35 others managed to save a longboat.

Bright and his crew spent seven days ashore on the Monte Bello Islands, before sailing the longboat to Bantam in Java.

Bright's longboat was full to capacity and stood about a quarter-mile off the wreck due to the danger of capsizing if any of the men in the water attempted to climb on board.

Subsequent analysis of these reports and other documents, as well as searches of the wreck site, raised suspicions that Brooke had secretly removed at least part of the silver into the skiff before the ship sank, and had managed to get it to Batavia without telling anyone.

[citation needed] Due to Captain Brooke's actions, for well over three centuries there was great confusion as to the exact position of the Tryal Rocks.

[7] When an exploration team went to the south western side of the reef which Christiansen had predicted as being the likely location, diver Naoom Haimson almost immediately found the wreck.

His challenge to the State Maritime Archaeology Act eventually led to enactment of Commonwealth legislation protecting wrecks around Australia.

While six cannon, and up to eight anchors of a type expected from the period and some small objects were recorded, no artefacts were found that allowed a positive identification of the site.