GETTING WRECKED
Mystery ships wash up – plus Cook’s Endeavour identified?
CAPE RAY CONUNDRUM
Gordon Blackmore from Cape Ray, Newfoundland, Canada, was surprised to spot a long shadow just off the local beach on an early morning walk on 20 January as there had definitely been nothing like it there a few days earlier. As soon as the tide had gone out, he returned to investigate with his mother Wanda. What they found was a 24-metre-long (79ft) shipwreck that had suddenly appeared in the bay; however, it was not complete, so the original ship had clearly been even longer. Called in to investigate, Neil Burgess, president of the Shipwreck Preservation Society of Newfoundland and Labrador, deduced that the ship was likely to date from the 1800s, as its planks were held together with wooden dowels known as trunnels that were used as nails in ships from that era. He also noted that the wreck contained copper pegs, each more than two centimetres (0.8in) wide, which had also been used to fasten the hull’s planks together – again, something indicative of a 19th century origin. “It was a fairly substantial sailing ship, bigger than a schooner, I think,” Burgess said, adding that if its hull is made of oak, which has yet to be determined, the ship wasn’t built in North America. “This is perfect,” Burgess said. “This is a great, great event.”
The coast of Newfoundland is littered with thousands of wrecks, and it is thought that tropical storm Fiona, which hit the area in September 2022, may have dislodged the ship from the sands, with subsequent storms eventually clearing the wreck of its covering and making it visible again, although it is also possible that it washed out of the sands elsewhere and drifted into the bay where it was found. There are no records of a wreck this size off Cape Ray, so it may take some time to identify the actual ship and discover its story. There are concerns that storms could pull the ship back out to sea, though, while local resident Wayne Osmond said, “Some years we experience sea ice here, if that happens, within a few hours it can cause more damage to the wreck, crushing it, than a century or more of it submerged in deeper water.”
The provincial government has sent a team to visit the wreck, with the hopes of identifying and possibly preserving what remains of the
There are 700 wrecks in the region from the same period
ship, but team archaeologist Jamie Brake has poured cold water on the locals’ excitement. He said that there are 700 wrecks in the region from the same period as the Cap Ray ship, so they already know a lot about vessels from that era and there wouldn’t be much to learn from preserving this one. Given the size of the shipwreck, he added, it’s “really impossible” to pull it out of the water while also keeping it intact. Locals, however, disagree, and are determined to rescue and preserve the vessel. cbc.ca, 28 Jan, 7 Feb; theguardian.com, 29 Jan 2024.
SANDAY SHIP
Sanday, in Orkney, has also been the site of a mysterious revenant shipwreck, although older and not so complete. A large, well-preserved section of a ship, built in a style that dates to the 16th century, has turned up in Cata Bay following winter storms. “It’s possibly been buried because of the lack of marine algae or anything on it, just further out at sea, and I think the last storm has brought it up,” said local resident David Walker, who has examined and photographed the ship’s remains. “It’s very special. It’s such a solid piece in fine condition.” Sanday historian Myra Stockton has catalogued more than 200
shipwrecks around the island, dating back to 1596. “People here are wondering if it could be part of the Spanish Armada,” she said. “We need an expert in historical wooden keels to help identify where this has come from.” Walker says, “I think it’s of national importance,” and is concerned that unless it is removed and conserved it could deteriorate rapidly now it is exposed. “It’s not going to be an easy task to undertake,” he added. BBC News, 21 Feb 2024.
ANCIENT DIVING BELL?
A large copper dome that has been sitting in the Mel Fisher Museum in Sebastian, Florida, since the 1980s, where it had been thought to be an oversized cooking vessel, has been identified as being part of a primitive kind of submarine known as a diving bell. It was found near the wreck of the
Santa Margarita, a Spanish treasure galleon that sank 40 miles (65km) off Key West in Florida in 1622, 160ft (50m) down. Research by marine archaeologists Sean Kingsley and Jim Sinclair suggests that the 147cm (58in) diameter vessel is far too large for cooking and is unlikely to have been used for that purpose as there are no signs of charring on it. “Everybody was calling it a copper cauldron,” Sinclair said, “but I’ve seen quite a few old wooden ships, and [cauldrons] didn’t look anything like that.” Made from two copper sheets, with a heavy rim studded with rivets all the way around, it does, however, fit descriptions of diving bells from the period. The object was also found near a pile of iron ingots that Kingsley and Sinclair believe were used to anchor it to the seafloor. Although there’s no record of a diving bell being used to salvage treasure from the
Santa Margarita, the salvager, Francisco Nuñez
Melián, described casting one in 1625 in his writings, and Sinclair believes this is what they have found. He thinks the dome formed the top of the diving bell, which was completed by watertight lower panels, perhaps made of wood and leather covered by metal, that have since been lost. This would have made it big enough for three divers and it may have been connected to the surface by an air hose.
Attempts to salvage the Santa Margarita in the 17th century were successful, with Melián reporting the recovery of 350 silver ingots, thousands of gold coins and eight cannons from the wreck, which could indicate that a diving bell had been used, given the depth at which the ship rests. Joseph Eliav, a maritime archaeologist at the University of Haifa, and an expert on early diving bells, believes the diving bell identification is “a plausible hypothesis,” which would make it the oldest example ever found. livescience.com, 7 Sept 2023.
A WORTHY ENDEAVOUR
In February 2022, an Australian research team claimed that a shipwreck they had found off the coast of Rhode Island in the US was Captain Cook’s famed HMS Endeavour, in which he made the European discovery of the Australian continent. At the time, this caused a rift with the Rhode Island Maritime
Archaeology Project with whom they had been collaborating, as they felt it was too early to announce the discovery. They felt more work was needed to confirm this really was Cook’s vessel before going public. Now, though, the Australian National Maritime Museum team believe they can confirm the identity of the wreck. By the time it ended up in Rhode Island, Endeavour,
a former coal ship, had been renamed Lord Sandwich, and was both out of date and in poor condition, so was one of five vessels scuttled by the British Navy to block entry to the port during the American War of Independence.
“We will never find anything on this site that screams
Endeavour,” said Kieran Hosty from the Australian team. “We will never find a sign saying, ‘Cook was here.’ We will never see a ship’s bell with Endeavour
crossed out and Lord Sandwich
inscribed on it,” he adds, but believes they now have more than enough evidence to make their case. The Australians say that samples from the ship show that the timbers are British, the size within millimetres of the Endeavour’s, and the length of the keel within inches of survey measurements of Cook’s vessel taken by the Royal Navy. “The stem scarph (a joint in the keel) is identical to what we know from the plans of
Endeavour. We’ve gone through a whole bunch of ships’ plans, and we can’t find anything else like it.” A further discovery they believe ties the wreck to Cook’s ship is coal found in the bottom of the hull, possibly left over from its days as a cargo ship before it was converted for Cook’s voyages. “I think it’s just rattled down from when it was a collier and got stuck in the bilge,” said marine archaeologist James Hunter.
popularmechanics. com, 1 Dec 2023.