Shipwreck conference 2022

By Cathy de Lara

So, Friday evening saw us heading down to Plymouth, we spent just enough time in the hotel to check in and then headed out to meet Plymouth Sound BSAC. Unsurprisingly we found them in a pub, they were holding a quiz and raffle evening, so we joined in (on the winning team -of course!!) they are a friendly bunch and we were made to feel very welcome.

The next morning was a bit of a struggle but we did manage to get there on time (helped by a large full English breakfast!).
The first talk was a Michael Pitts film about the great storm of 1703 which wrecked HMS Northumberland on the Goodwin sands, which should be released soon on Dan Pascoe’s YouTube channel (Pascoe Archaeology).
Next up was Steve Mortimer who told us about finding the wreck of the submarine chaser “Chasseur no 7” which led to permission to dive the pre-dreadnaught battleship HMS Formidable (with lots of guns!) Following that dive a U-boat expert had a wreck thought to be UC49 but he wasn’t sure so sent in a dive team to investigate, this led to the discovery that the German UC49 was in fact the British D1. She was the first modern attack submarine and was the first sub to have a transmitting radio, diesel engines and torpedo tubes. (The full story was published in SCUBA).
After coffee was the story of a fairly modern wreck, the Texaco Caribbean was in a collision in 1971, this caused an explosion and the bow sank. The stern continued to float and over the next 3 nights was hit by 3 other ships, 2 of which sank. As a result, they had to put lots of light ships over the wreck to prevent further incidents.
Phil Short gave a fascinating talk on the Gribshunden (Griffin hound, 1495) She was the king of Denmark’s flag ship, now being excavated with the aim to create a museum of the artefacts. Phil was managing safety, allowing the scientists to work while a “guardian” monitored them. The main discovery was the beautiful wooden figurehead of a Griffin hound (looks a bit like a croc) with a human head in its mouth which is now in the Blekinge museum. Other finds included wood, leather and foodstuffs but no iron, this was possibly eaten by anaerobic bacteria. Photogrammetry was used on this site to map the dig and could be used to electronically pin point the location of the artefacts. The finds included barrels full of bones, these belonged to a single Sturgeon (now extinct in the Baltic) these fish could only be eaten by the king. A wooden flagon, still with a bubble of gas in it. Silver coins in a stack. A basket of saffron. Crossbows still with the string on them. And some links of chain mail made of a precious metal, one of the tiny links had the makers stamp of the kings own armour maker.
Following lunch we heard from Cornwall shipwreck hunters and how the report of an anchor right next to the shore led to a telescope, ships chronometer, 2 small cannon and lots and lots of copper coins dating from between 1727 and 1790.
We also heard about diving the wreck of HMS Victory (no, not the one in Portsmouth this is the one before that, from 1737) She was very similar to the famous one both in size and guns, she cost £50,000 to build, that’s a whopping £1.2 billion in today’s money. All 1150 of her crew were lost when she sank in a storm near the island of Alderney, so they decided it was the lighthouse keepers fault and court marshalled him! The wreck was found in 2008 about 60Nm west of Alderney so it wasn’t the lighthouse keepers fault after all. All that’s left are about 100 cannon, 1 is now in the Royal Navy museum in Portsmouth, another is in the current HMS Victory, she looks a stunning dive.
We finished the conference the same way we started it, in a pub! It was a really interesting