‘Lizzy’ wreck site
(Flying Joan?)
Contemporary chart (pre Star Castle
This is another new mystery Shipwreck found by IMAG. (the Islands Maritime Archaeological Group) Team members Todd Stevens & Robin
Burrows have discovered this unidentified wreck within the
anchorage of St Marys Roads. This is the
7th new wreck site to be found close in and around St Marys Island by the team in recent years. This
one lays roughly half way between St Mary’s Quay and Nut Rock. Local inter island tripper boats pass over it
daily.
A team
member swims over a pair of 4 pdr guns on the Lizzy site.
In 2008-9 team member Todd Stevens conducted a magnetometer
survey of the areas around St Mary’s and within the islands main anchorage.
This work identified over 700 anomalies; some of which warranted closer
investigation. Over the following years these anomalies were being
systematically ground-truthed by the St Mary’s diver. Many man made objects
were found; including anchors, lobster pots, chains, cables and all manner of
uninteresting debris. One shipwreck, carrying a cargo of iron pipes, was also found
near Spanish Ledge and identified as the brig Padstow during this time. As this
ground- truthing of the seabed went on, team member Robin Burrows had built and
perfected his own side-scan sonar for the team to use. In June 2012 Robin’s
work was completed. As a result, the pair were then able to conduct side-scan
sonar survey’s of the magnetometer anomalies. In effect, this work then
identified the best seabed anomalies to target for further investigation. In fact, on their very first survey of an
un-dived magnetometer anomaly out in St Marys Roads, on the computer screen was
what looked to be two long objects about 5-6ft in length laying out in the
middle of St Mary’s Roads. These objects were laying in 14 metres of water and looked
suspiciously gun shaped. On first inspection these two objects did indeed prove
to be two iron guns laying side by side on a flat sandy seabed. These guns were
also found to be laying on top of a wreck which was totally buried under the
sand. This wreckage included some extensive wooden hull structure and a further
two more iron guns. The wreck looked to be very old. Without any evidence as to
which wreck this might be, the site was dubbed- “The Lizzy”. Named as such for two reasons; the wreck
is overlooked by the Elizabethan fort, Star Castle, built in 1593 and also
because the guns on the site appear to have been made during the late Tudor period;
possibly cast during the reign of Elizabeth I.
In June of
2012 the team decided to uncover this wreck. But in todays world this kind of
thing has become illegal without a proper licence granted by the Marine &
Maritime Organisation (MMO) This is a new law. No longer can anyone use a
dredge-or lifting bags without first gaining a licence to do so. Consequently,
Team member, Robin Burrows, set about gaining the team such a licence. The MMO
usually deal with large companies wanting licences to dredge thousands of tons
of material from the sea bed and they pay many thousands of pounds to do this. However,
even sport divers and wreck hunters now came under the same legislation. The
MMO had never yet had a request from sport divers; and, as it soon proved, the organisation had no idea as to how to go
about dealing with the first such request. At first, the MMO asked how many thousands
of tons did the dive team want to move? To which the reply was- ‘no more than 2 at most’ The MMO then
asked- “2 thousand tons? that’s not very
much, but it will cost a fee of £450.” To this, the dive team answered- “No, just 2 tons, thanks” Rather bemused
at such a tiny request, they said they would get back after taking advice. To
cut a long story short, Robin Burrows haggled with the MMO and got the fee down
to £150. The team then had to also get similar permissions from English Nature-
the OANB and English Heritage. From here it soon deteriorated into a long drawn
out bureaucratic process that took over 3 months of paperwork and numerous lengthy
phone calls. English Heritage being the biggest obstacle for Robin to overcome.
No longer can divers just do what they wanted as they had done in the past..
The world we live in.. However, all
thanks to the persistence and relentless pestering, by Robin Burrows,
eventually the authorities caved in. Robin had gained the team a licence to
continue with their work uncovering the wreck. It is interesting to note that
IMAG is the very first dive team in the country to do this.
Guns.
At the end
of September, with the licence in hand, the divers went out and uncovered the
wreck with a dredge. There were only 4 guns to be found on the wreck. Three of
these are directly on the site and appear to be Elizabethan and English made. The
fourth gun lays a short distance away from the wreck and this looks to be a large
swivel gun of an as yet unknown origin. The guns appear to have been active
ordinance of the ship, as one of them lays directly on top of one of its own rear
carriage trucks. During dredging, numerous other gun related items were also
found on the site proving the weapons to have been active ordnance when lost
and not just mere cargo or ballast .
Woodwork.
When
uncovering the structural remains, the woodwork appeared to be just one end of
the vessel but it cant be categorically stated which end of the ship it is yet.
However, through evidence found, it looks to be the Bow end of the ship with the rest buried near by and severly eaten away by worms . There
is no evidence of steering gear at this end the site, whereas some 50ft away,
at the other end of the site, lay what could be the remains of the rudder. Further
to this, Todd and Robin believe the vessel to be a small armed pinnace which may
not have had a bowsprit. As one of the guns being directly on the bow end of
the site where the bow sprit would have been situated if one was present. This suggests
the ship was used for attack purposes and not for defence as per a merchant
vessel. The bow gun is a classic feature of warships and or privateer vessels also fits the bill. Although
quite a small ship, 40 to 50ft long and 15ft wide at most, the wooden frames that
make up the hull of this vessel are very tightly packed together,
suggesting rather a heavily built little
ship with a bluff bow, like that of an early small gun boat/naval pinnace.
There are
no copper fastenings present on the site or any kind of sheathing obvious either.
There are many wooden treenails evident in the construction of the ship but
very few iron nails. All these things suggest a vessel that is as old as the
guns appear to be. The timber seems to be oak and looks to be in remarkably
good condition for its age. Circa 1600. The
hull structure runs from the bow gun over to, and underneath, the two bigger
guns that lay side by side nearby. Here the wooden structure ends with only
fragmentary evidence of timber to the east of the pair of bigger guns. However,
using a metal detector, numerous concreted iron objects were identified in the
sand in an area to the east of the 2 guns. This suggests that the ship had lay on the sea bed with its stern end up off
of the sea bed and this rotted away to leave the spread of iron work to fall
into the sand below it; whilst the other (bow) end, which was under the weight
of the three guns now still found upon it, was forced to sink into the sea bed
to become perfectly preserved as found. The vessel must also seems to have been
sitting on the seabed at a slight angle with its keel slightly towards the
north.
Image above showing the possible bows and bow
chaser gun which is placed as such solely for attack purposes and not defence
as a merchantman would be. Note how numerous the frames are and so very closely
placed together.
Artefacts
During
excavations, the site was fount to be very much contaminated, and disseminating
which objects are from, or of, the wreck, is difficult to identify. There also seems
to be much debris about on the sea bed, including coal, coal dust and boiler
slag, from centuries of shipping laying at anchor within the anchorage. Also,
pottery and glass fragments of all types and dates can also be found littering
the whole area making dating the site very difficult.
The
positive wreck finds are few and far between and these we have to separate into
two categories: Those which were found buried within the wooden remains and
those which were found around the immediate area. To west of the site we found
the swivel gun and a red clay pipe that is datable to1630 or earlier. Numerous pottery
fragments found vary in nationality- English; French and Spanish but,
interestingly, all are of the Tudor period.
Using a
metal detector, we have also found some iron shot, these are sizes 2lb and 4lb
to match the guns on site. We also found one bronze pulley sheave; the kind of which
has also been found on the wreck of the Mary
rose (1545) Similar, but much bigger
wheels have also been found on the Association
(1707) & Victory (1744) and Invincible (1758) wreck sites. Although
these were part of the bilge pump mechanisms on these ships and not as used rigging. This kind of rigging sheave was totally out
dated by the time wooden sheaves, made of Lignum Vitea, came into use during
the 17th century and more widely used after 1700. (Lignum Vitea was
non existent in England
A team member with the bronze sheave found with
a metal detector on the site.
A further
possible clue to dating the new wreck came in the form of a small sounding lead
-see an image below. This lead does not have a tallow hole in its base, which
is interesting, as it could be pointing towards a time when they had not yet
worked out how to take sea bed samples for navigation purposes. Also found near the site was an almost
complete Bung hole jug dating from the late 1400’s.
Small sounding
Lead found on the Lizzy site. There is no tallow hole in its base end as is
usually found on later wreck sites.
Cropped and blown up image of the Garrison
shore line (Hugh Hill) An approximate position of the Lizzy is also shown.
Possibility.
Although
the Lizzy guns appear to be circa 1600, it is possible that this is the site of
a privateer vessel lost at Scilly during the English civil war. (The bow gun being
a classic privateering war-like tool) Indeed, there is a reference that two such
vessels were lost within the immediate area. 10th
May 1651 : ‘two
of the royalists best frigates, which rode under the Hugh hill, near there
shore, to prevent out boats coming into land there’ drove ashore in a storm. Isles
of Scilly Museum Star Castle
No checks
have been made on the circumstances referred to above, in which these two royalist
frigates were lost. Did both these ships drive ashore in a storm as suggested
by the author, or did one in fact sink at anchor? The above is just one quick suggestion we need
to consider. However, similar to the gunsite the team found at Innisidgen &
the wreck they discovered near Pendrethen in recent times, the Lizzy is
probably another one of those many wrecks here at Scilly that went completely
unrecorded. Another mystery to be solved. Another possibility, probably better than the one above- is that this is the wreck of the Flying Joan. The Flying Joan of 120 tons. John
Chidley was her Captain and he had a crew of 25 men. A fleet under Sir Walters
raleigh, that numbered 13 ships in all,
left Plymouth the
12th June 1617 . Just west of Scilly these ships were
scattered by a storm. Most of these vessels made it in relative safely back to
port. However, one ship, referred to simply as: a fly boat, under Captain Sam King, was
blown way up into the Bristol Channel and
went ashore there. Also, somewhere, circumstances unknown, at an unknown
position at, or near, Scilly, the
Flying Joan is known to have come to grief and sunk. It appears
that the crew may have got away as not long after the incident Captain Chidley
rejoined Raleigh Elizabeth
Southampton 80
tons. Captain J Bayley.
The reports on this fleet differ in ship names
/sizes/captains. However, here are some of the details I’ve tried to put
together.
The Destiny. 440 tons,
Sir Walter Admiral with his son as Captain.
Jason 240 tons. Captain J Pennington.
Encounter. 160 tons. Captain
Ed Hastings (Capt Whitney. After Hastings
died at sea)
Thunder. 150 tons. Sir
Warham St Leger.
Flying Joan. Pinnace. 120 tons. Captain J Chidley.
The Page Pinnace. 25 tons.
Captain James Barker
Convertine. Captain
Keymis
Confidence. Captain Woolaston.
Flying Heart. Shallop. Captain John Ferne.
(A fly boat) Captain Robert Smith.
(A Fly boat) Captain
King.
The Chudleigh. A Carvel
Search
As well as100
metres immediately around the wreck, a search of the nearby Garrison shoreline also
took place. Among later shipwrecks and other modern debris, an anchor of the
correct size and date to our wreck was found. This anchor is in the shallow
water on the very end of a rocky out crop called the Drs Keys. If a vessel is
lost anywhere between that position and the Steval along the garrison coast
line to the west, then the tide and weather can, and will, push debris, or even
a small wreck such as the Lizzy, further
out into the St Mary’s anchorage. Due to us failing to find any anchors on the
Lizzy site to date, this leads to another
idea that this could easily have been the case, as a very strong flooding tide
comes from the direction of the Steval, right over the Lizzy site and moves NE
towards the Crow rock. Add this fact to a strong swell, that always prevails
from the WSW into the anchorage, and we have the ingredients to move a wreck.
These circumstances are little different from that which happened to the
Colossus wreck site off nearby Samson island, where the stern of that great
ship was pushed half a mile away from its original place of wrecking.
Another interesting thing to note is the
position of the swivel gun at about 50m to the SW of the bows of the Lizzy site.
Almost suggesting it was the gun thrown over as an emergency anchor to arrest the
ship from dragging in a westerly gale? Either
that or it was dragged away from the site by a ship dragging its anchor over
the wreck site. It is interesting to note that no anchors of the correct size
and date have been located on or immediately around the Lizzy wreck site to
date. Certainly, the position of the broken swivel gun is directly up tide and up
swell from the Lizzy and in correct alignment with the wreck; the bows of the
wreck pointingf in almost the exact direction of the swivel gun. Lastly, the
swivel gun is broken off at the base of its barrel. Did this damage occur to
the swivel gun when used as an emergency anchor?
Whatever
this vessel actually was, this shipwreck
appears to date from anywhere between the late 1500’s to the mid 1600’s. We
have an ongoing project to further search all around this wreck; this includes
another later dated new shipwreck located just north of the Lizzy. Watch this
space!
Our thanks
to other team members and co-opted local divers and friends who aided us in
this our latest project. Phil Roberts; Andy Williams; James and Daisy Fletcher;
Paul Stevens; Carmen Stevens; Ed Cumming; and ‘the London
