Disasters at Sea: A Visual History of Infamous Shipwrecks - Softcover

Mechem, Liz

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1629141771 ISBN 13: 9781629141770

Publisher: Skyhorse Publishing, 2014

Synopsis

A fully illustrated collection of the most thrilling shipwrecks of all time!

Experience the mystery and wonder of the bottom of the sea with over sixty accounts of shipwreck catastrophes. Illustrated with detailed maps and shipwreck locations, Disasters at Sea takes readers on a fascinating journey through history and to the ocean floor. Learn all about the historical details and theories of the most infamous shipwrecks—from the most well-known sinkings like the Titanic, to the obscure, mysterious drifting ghost ships and unexplained disappearances. Subjects include:

• Tragedies by Mother Nature
• Shipwrecks and war
• Fatal errors
• Legends, myths, mysteries
• And many more!

Whether by human error, collision, piracy, or mutiny, this book has them all. With shipwrecks from the Old Testament, to ancient Greece, to modern times, this exciting book is compellingly written with accompanying sources, high-quality images, and a great deal of evidence. Find out interesting tidbits about Christopher Columbus’s Santa Maria, which eluded discovery for centuries despite long-term investigations. Stay afloat with the Mary Celeste and the Carroll A. Deering—ships that did not wreck at all but whose entire crews disappeared, never to be found. Readers are no doubt familiar with the tragedy of the Titanic, but this book also recounts the Wilhelm Gustloff, which took nine thousand lives at the end of World War II.

Disasters at Sea is sure to offer an addicting and thrilling voyage that will leave you reading over and over again. This is an exciting book for the history buff—or for anyone looking for a fascinating read!

Skyhorse Publishing, as well as our Arcade imprint, are proud to publish a broad range of books for readers interested in history--books about World War II, the Third Reich, Hitler and his henchmen, the JFK assassination, conspiracies, the American Civil War, the American Revolution, gladiators, Vikings, ancient Rome, medieval times, the old West, and much more. While not every title we publish becomes a New York Times bestseller or a national bestseller, we are committed to books on subjects that are sometimes overlooked and to authors whose work might not otherwise find a home.

About this title

About the Author

Liz Mechem is an accomplished freelance writer and editor, holding an MFA from The New School. She is also a graduate from San Francisco State University. She spends her time as an English teacher with New Canaan Country School, and as an adjunct professor with The New School.

Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.

Disasters at Sea

A Visual History Of Infamous Shipwrecks

By Liz Mechem

Skyhorse Publishing

Copyright © 2009 Langenscheidt Publishing Group and Moseley Road Inc.
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-1-62914-177-0

Contents

SHIPWRECKS AROUND THE WORLD, 
Down into the Depths, 
1 · NATURE'S FURY, 
2 · THE FATAL FLAW, 
3 · COLLISION COURSE, 
4 · PIRACY, MUTINY, AND SKULLDUGGERY, 
5 · CASUALTIES OF WAR, 
6 · MYSTERY!, 
7 · BLAZE OF GLORY, 
8 · LEGENDS OF THE DEEP, 
Further Reading, 
Index, 
Acknowledgments and Credits, 

CHAPTER 1

NATURE'S FURY

The San Agustin

SPANISH TREASURE OFF THE CALIFORNIA COAST

Sixteenth-century Spanish traders did a brisk business navigating between two colonial outposts on the Pacific Ocean. In the Philippines, they traded East Asian goods, such as silk and porcelain, and in New Spain (Mexico), they bartered for silver and gold. The San Agustin, a three-masted, 80-foot (24 m) Manila galleon, was one such treasure ship. She holds the distinction of being the oldest known shipwreck off the coast of California.

The San Agustin departed Manila in July 1595. Bound for Acapulco, she carried treasure from her home port in the Philippines. King Philip II of Spain had ordered Captain Sebastian Rodriguez Cermeño to chart the coast of California, in hope of finding a safe harbor. The galleon reached Cape Mendocino, near the Oregon border, and from there she continued south along the foggy coast. Coming around the treacherous waters of Point Reyes in November 1595, the San Agustin put in at Drake's Bay, just north of San Francisco. With the San Agustin safely moored in the bay, Captain Cermeñ±o took most of his crew on shore to explore.

Three weeks after the San Agustin dropped anchor, though, a fierce southeaster blew in, dashing apart the ship and killing two crewmen. The storm left Captain Cermeño and his men stranded on an unfamiliar shore, their 150 tons (136 metric tons) of treasure sunk to the bottom of the Pacific. The wreck of the San Agustin has never been found, but bits of blue Chinese porcelain and other artifacts likely from the lost galleon have washed ashore in Drake's Bay. Archaeologists and federal agencies renewed the active search for the San Agustin in 1997, and she remains a shipwreck ripe for discovery.

TO MEXICO IN A PLANK BOAT

AFTER THE WRECK OF HIS SHIP, Captain Cermeño was faced with a near-mutinous crew of 76 men, stranded on a beach some 2,000 miles (3,200 km) from their destination in New Spain. Crew members' letters and journals and the captain's own log document their incredible passage to safety.

Cermeño decided to press on toward Acapulco by any means necessary. During their three weeks ashore, the crew members of the San Agustin had been assembling a small plank boat, called a vicoro, intended for inland exploration. Captain, crew, and one dog piled into the rickety craft and headed south. Navigating out to sea, they would have drifted past the perennially fogbound San Francisco Bay, one of the world's safest natural harbors. Two months later, in January 1596, the vicoro arrived safely in Acapulco. Cermeño had lost the king's ship and a fortune in goods, and he had failed to discover the sought-for safe harbor, but his fortitude had saved his crew.

FLOTSAM & JETSAM

Drake's Bay in California is named for the swashbuckling English privateer Sir Francis Drake (1540 — 95), who roamed the seas plundering Spanish ships.

Nuestra Señora de Atocha

SUNKEN TREASURE IN THE FLORIDA KEYS

Guns and cannons can protect against pirates and buccaneers, but they are no match for a ferocious hurricane. The hundreds who perished on the Spanish galleon Nuestra Señora de Atocha learned this bitter lesson. The Atocha was one of a fleet of 28 ships to leave Havana in 1622, laden with precious metals and other bounty of the New World destined for the coffers of the Spanish crown.

The voyage across the Atlantic to Spain was perilous, but never more so than in the initial stretch. Pirates, who roamed the Caribbean, frequently targeted treasure-laden galleons, so armed escort boats accompanied each fleet. The 112-foot (34 m), three-masted Atocha served her fleet as almiranta, or heavily armed rear guard. Because she was so well protected by firepower — including 20 bronze cannons — she carried a ransom in treasure. Experts believe that the Atocha carried some 24 tons (22 metric tons) of silver bullion, 125 gold bars and coins, and huge measures of copper, tobacco, indigo, and jewels.

On September 4, 1622, the fleet set sail, weeks later than it intended. That night and the following morning, the wind began to rise, and the flotilla made for the calm waters of the Gulf of Mexico. The Atocha, along with two other ships in the rear guard, didn't make it. High winds and monstrous waves drove the Santa Margarita, the Nuestra Señora del Rosario, and the Atocha onto a coral reef near the Dry Tortugas. With 260 souls and tons of treasure aboard, the Atocha, her hull badly damaged, sank in only 55 feet (17 m) of water. Five men who clung to the mizzenmast survived to tell the tale.

FLOTSAM & JETSAM

"Once you have seen the ocean bottom paved with gold, you'll never forget it."

— Mel Fisher (1922 — 98)

THE SALVAGE OF THEATOCHA

Days after the Atocha sank, rescue teams attempted to salvage her sunken treasure. But another hurricane blew in, tearing the standing masts and sterncastle from the hull, and obliterating any trace of her whereabouts. Searchers found her sister ship, the Santa Margarita, in 1626, and salvaged much of her treasure. But the Atocha faded from memory, too far submerged to hope for recovery.

Three centuries later, though, hope drove wreck diver Mel Fisher to search for the Atocha. Fisher and his crew had already helped discover the 1715 Spanish treasure fleet (see pages 18 — 19), and his success now led him to a greater challenge: the Atocha. Most rescue efforts had focused on "the last key of the Matecumbes," the location noted by seventeenth-century records. In 1985, after nearly 16 years of searching, Fisher discovered the Atocha and her sunken treasure near Florida's remote Marquesas Keys. A legal battle ensued, with both the United States government and the State of Florida laying claim to the bounty. Finally, the court ruled in favor of Mel Fisher. Many of the Atocha's treasures are now housed in a museum in Key West, Florida.

TOOLS OF THE TRADE

MEL FISHER HAD PERSISTENCE, SKILL, AND DRIVE, but he also had the right tools for the job. He invented a device he called a "mailbox," which sent a stream of clear water down to the ocean floor, enabling treasure hunters to spot their quarry. Fisher also used a proton magnetometer, a highly sensitive form of magnetometer. These devices are commonly used in archaeology; they measure variations in the earth's magnetic field, indicating the presence of ferrous objects, or metals.

The 1715 Treasure Fleet

THE WRECK OF THE WEALTH OF THE INDIES

Spanish treasure ships had been lost before, but none so dramatically, or with the loss of so many men and so much wealth, as the treasure fleet of 1715. The new king of Spain, Philip V (1683 — 1746), inherited a nearly bankrupt realm, ravaged from the long War of Spanish Succession (1701 — 14). He desperately needed the bounty of this fleet. But instead of bringing home a fortune, the 1715 treasure fleet was wrecked off the coast of Florida. Its sunken treasure became one of the most spectacular salvage discoveries in modern maritime history.

The fleet of 11 ships — primarily galleons — had been lying in port in Havana, Cuba, for two years, held up by political strife back home in Spain. As July approached, the impatient captains, Antonio de Escheverz y Zubiza and Juan Esteban de Ubilla, must have been well aware that hurricane season was already underway. But the date for departure was set. The 1715 fleet intended to follow a well-traveled route to Europe, riding the Gulf Stream. The fleet included a French frigate, the Grifón. Historians differ as to whether the Grifón was a 12th ship, or counted among the 11. In either case, she was to become the sole surviving ship on the disastrous voyage.

Laden with precious metals, jewels, porcelain, and other goods, the fleet sailed from Havana on July 24, 1715. Historians believe that the total worth of the registered cargo was around $86 million in modern currency, mostly in the form of silver and gold. Hundreds of trunks were filled with cobs, crude chunks of precious metal, and close to seven million of the famed Spanish coins, pieces of eight. Treasure fleets are often called "plate fleets," after the Spanish word for silver, plata.

On July 31, 1715, a violent hurricane swept north from the Gulf. Those ships in the front of the fleet were wrecked in deep water and lost their entire crews and treasure. Some crew and passengers in the rear guard, whose ships were closer to land, managed to survive, but an estimated 1,000 men were lost in the powerful storm.

THE BATTLE OF VIGO BAY

ARRIVING HOME FROM THE NEW WORLD, the Spanish plate fleet of 1702 met with a disastrous fate. The flotilla entered Vigo Bay on the west coast of Spain and dropped anchor. On October 23, English and Dutch ships — enemy combatants in the War of Spanish Succession — attacked. Spanish and French ships, carrying millions of pesos in gold and silver, constituted the treasure fleet. Some of the treasure had already been off-loaded, but the Anglo-Dutch forces captured several of the ships — and a small fortune along with them. Under orders from the French commander, the crews of the remaining ships set fire to them in order to avoid capture or pillage. The sunken treasure in Vigo Bay has eluded centuries of salvage operations.

SALVAGE — THEN AND NOW

When news of the wreck reached Havana, the Spanish governor had but one concern — immediate salvage of what treasure could be found. It is thought that nearly half of the fleet's precious cargo was recovered from these salvage operations. Not all of this wealth was restored to the Spanish, however. With such riches at stake, the wreck of the 1715 fleet became a prime target for pirates and privateers. A feeding frenzy of treasure hunters and pillagers descended on the site. Others lay in wait for ships carrying salvaged goods. Among these was the notorious English privateer Henry Jennings, who made off with about 400,000 pesos from a salvage fleet.

Two and a half centuries later, in the 1950s, a Florida man named Kip Wagner stumbled on a gold coin while walking on the beach. Wagner devoted years to the pursuit of the coin's source. Teaming up with treasure diver Mel Fisher, Wagner and his associates discovered numerous wreck sites from the 1715 treasure fleet and the precious goods that had gone down with the ships. Many of these treasures are on view in museums; others are traded on the active numismatic market.

One of the ships that sank in shallow water, the Urca de Lima, survived both storm and salvage nearly intact. Today, the Urca de Lima is a favorite site for divers. The Florida shoreline where the 1715 ships sank — the counties of Martin, Indian River, and St. Lucie — is known as "Treasure Coast." Both long- term professional wreck divers and casual day divers continue to unearth the sunken wealth of the Indies.

FLOTSAM & JETSAM

The nickname "two bits" for the U.S. quarter derives from the Spanish dollar — the peso or real de a ocho ("piece of eight"). The real was sometimes cut into eight pie-shaped pieces to make smaller change.

THE SPANISH GALLEON

THE GALLEON WAS THE WORKHORSE of Spanish treasure fleets from the sixteenth to the eighteenth centuries. Distinguished by a high forecastle and an even higher sterncastle built onto a high, flat stern, the galleon also featured a prominent beak and bowsprit. Galleons carried from three to five masts. These were square-rigged on the fore- and mainmasts; the mizzenmast and bonaventure mizzen (the third and fourth masts) were lateen-rigged, or fitted with triangular sails. These powerful ships were commonly armed with a battery of cannons for protection and could engage as readily in war as in trade.

The Essex

RENDEZVOUS WITH THE LEVIATHAN

If truth is stranger than fiction, the story of the whaleship Essex is a case in point. Widely regarded as inspiration for Herman Melville's classic novel Moby Dick, the Essex, an 87-foot (27 m) long ship, was smashed by a whale in 1820. Eight men out of a crew of 20 survived, 5 in open boats on the sea, 3 others on an uninhabited Pacific island. All 8 were eventually rescued, but not until those adrift had resorted to cannibalism — even drawing lots on who was to survive and who was to become fodder for his fellow castaways.

One of the survivors, first mate Owen Chase, wrote an account of the ordeal, published in 1821 to wide acclaim. In 1980, experts authenticated another account of the disaster, this one written by then 14-year-old cabin boy Thomas Nickerson. From these two narratives, historians have pieced together a detailed picture of the horror and despair that followed the wreck of the Essex.

FLOTSAM & JETSAM

Harpooned whales could drag whaleboats at speeds up to 23 miles per hour (37 km/h). Sailors called this a "Nantucket sleighride."

"WE HAVE BEEN STOVE BY A WHALE"

Whaling had become big business on Nantucket Island by 1819, when the Essex set sail for the last time. The trade in whale blubber, which furnished lamp oil, had enriched the close-knit Quaker community. The quarry of choice was the massive sperm whale, named for the highly prized waxy liquid, or spermaceti, carried in its protruding forehead.

After hunting the sperm whale nearly to oblivion in the Atlantic Ocean, whaling crews were obliged to sail around Cape Horn and into the Pacific to track their bounty. It was here, on November 20, 1820, that a huge sperm whale attacked the Essex. Chase's narrative puts the whale at close to 85 feet (26 m) in length, although few sperm whales have been recorded longer than 60 feet (18.2 m). The whale rammed the Essex twice — the second time, as Chase describes it, "with tenfold fury and vengeance in his aspect." With scant supplies, the crew set off in three whaleboats to find land that they knew to be more than 1,000 miles (1,600 km) away.

CAST ADRIFT

Chase and Nickerson manned one rickety whaleboat, along with four other crewmen. Seven men each piled into the remaining two boats, but three put off at uninhabited Henderson Island to await their fates.

The captain and one other crewman were the sole survivors of their boat; a passing ship discovered them 90 days later. The desperate men had survived by eating their dead, including Owen Coffin, the captain's young cousin. Faced with certain starvation, the men had drawn lots for who would sacrifice his life for the others; Coffin chose the black spot. Chase, Nickerson, and boatsteerer Benjamin Lawrence, who likewise had eaten their dead, were picked up 93 days after the wreck of the Essex. Rescue arrived for the men on the island soon after. The third boat has never been found.

THE WHITE WHALE

HERMAN MELVILLE'S 1851 novel Moby Dick owes a direct debt to Owen Chase's narrative. Melville's dramatic, biblical prose, rendered in first-person narration, tells of a captain's relentless quest for vengeance on a white whale that had wrecked his boat years before. In 1841, on board the whaler Acushnet, Melville met Chase's son William, whose ship had paused for a "gam," or meeting, with Melville's boat. William Chase gave Melville his own copy of his father's narrative.

USS Monitor

THE ILL-FATED IRONCLAD

Built for battle, the USS Monitor was cheated out of her promised military glory when she met with an untimely end. The Monitor was the first ironclad warship in the U.S. Navy's fleet and served as a prototype for dozens of similar vessels. The brainchild of Swedish engineer John Ericsson, the Monitor was built in 1862 in just over 100 days, part of a Civil War arms race. She was to be the answer to the Confederacy's own ironclad, the CSS Virginia. The two ships would soon stand off in the hallmark naval battle of the Civil War, the Battle of Hampton Roads. Neither ship survived her first year.

With a length of 172 feet (52 m), the Monitor carried an innovative revolving gun turret on her deck, providing 8-inch (20 cm) thick walls of iron protection for the gunners inside. Two 11-foot (3.5 m) Dahlgren smoothbore cannons could fire and retract through gun ports fitted with hinged doors. The 9-foot (2.9 m) high, 22-foot (6.7 m) wide gun turret, along with the deck, the smokestack, and the pilothouse, were the only portions of the ship that sat above the waterline. The remainder lay below water, making her a semisubmerged ship. A steam-driven propeller, or marine screw, powered the Monitor at a steady but slow pace; her maximum speed was 5.5 knots.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from Disasters at Sea by Liz Mechem. Copyright © 2009 Langenscheidt Publishing Group and Moseley Road Inc.. Excerpted by permission of Skyhorse Publishing.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

Edition details

• Publisher: Skyhorse Publishing
• Publication date: 2014
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1629141771
• ISBN 13: 9781629141770
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 192