On the high seas
The ship was said to be unsinkable. It was a British passenger luxury liner, with an estimated 2,224 passengers and crew on board. It was her maiden voyage, from Southampton to New York City. But, as chance would have it, it collided with an iceberg and sank in the North Atlantic Ocean. Yes, it is the RMS Titanic — the largest ship afloat at that time, and year, 1912. The enormity of the vessel and the magnitude of the tragedy has caused it to be of continued interest to all.
The voyage of Erebus and Terror is a gripping story. Named after volcanoes in Antarctica, they were part of the Franklin expedition. It was to be a prestigious expedition to find the fabled northern route from Europe to South East Asia, to open up trade possibilities. On May 19, 1845, they set sail with Sir John Franklin, the leader of the expedition captaining the Erebus, and Francis Crozier captain of the Terror. A year later there was no information about the ships.
By 1846, the silence was daunting and a rescue mission was planned. In 1848 the rescue expedition set off. Signs of the Franklin expedition was discovered on Beechey Island, Canadian Arctic Archipelago of Nunavut, Canada. Subsequent rescue missions, many funded by Lady Franklin, came to the conclusion that Franklin had died, the ships sunk and the crew lost. But, it was nine years before the story first came out and 33 years before rescue and recovery attempts ended.
In September 2014, the Victoria Strait Expedition, a search, found Erebus in east Queen Maud Gulf to the west of O’Reilly Island, Canada. It was well preserved and largely intact. Two years later, Terror was discovered in a bay south of King William Island, once again remarkably intact.
The sinking of RMS Lusitania changed the course of history. On May 7, 1915, the super-luxe liner was torpedoed by a German submarine off the coast of County Cork, Ireland. The 787-foot vessel plunged 300 feet to the bottom of the Irish Sea in 18 minutes. Only 761 of the 3000 people on board survived. The attack on Lusitania caused many countries, who until then had maintained neutrality, to join the Allied forces, and was one of the primary catalysts for President Woodrow Wilson’s decision to formally enter the U.S. into the conflict two years later.
The Black Swan Project is the kind of story legends are made of, as it is believed to have excavated the largest haul of gold treasure in history. The Spanish warship Nuestra Senora de las Mercedes, was sunk by British Navy ships in October 1804. It was part of a small flotilla that was transporting silver, gold, vicuna, cinnamon and quinoa. The project excavated the treasure.
Lastly, what is sea travel without a pirate or two? Queen Anne’s Revenge was an 18th century warship known to have been the legendary pirate Blackbeard’s vessel. It was first with the British Navy, then captured by the French and then by Blackbeard in 1717. He used the ship for just one year, but achieved some of his greatest prizes during this time. In 1718, he grounded the ship and abandoned it, escaping capture by the British by boarding a smaller ship nearby.
Stories of the sea continue to captivate and fascinate. Although wrecks are found, as also their cargo, there is no story to bring it to a conclusive end. Erebus, Terror, Queen Anne’s Revenge, Nuestra Senora de las Mercedes…all have a story to tell. Can we hear it?
Fun facts
The world’s oldest intact shipwreck was the one discovered in the Black Sea, 50 miles off the coast of Bulgaria. Archaeologists working with the Black Sea Marine Archaeology Project, found a 75-foot ship underwater. They believe it could have been in its watery grave for more than 2,400 years.
On Fraser Island, Australia stands the rusty wreck of the S S Maheno. Once an ocean liner, it was then re-purposed as a hospital ship during World War I. When the war was over, the ship was sold to a ship-breaker in Osaka, Japan. However, in 1935, as it was being towed to it’s new home, a cyclone struck up and the broke the line connecting the two ships. The SS Maheno, literally, all at sea, drifted off to Fraser Island, and has been there ever since.
One of the most tragic stories is that of The Belle. The skeletal remains of the ship and an unknown French sailor was discovered on Halloween in 1996, in the Gulf of Mexico. The Belle has been underwater for 310 years. It was one of four ships belonging to the explorer and nobleman La Salle. The ships were carrying almost 300 people, on their way to a new life in a new country. But, faulty maps led the ships many hundred miles away and The Belle was abandoned after storms caused it to sink in Matagorda Bay.
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