Gloucester Wreck

Gloucester Wreck

Sealed bottle. May have been owned by royalty

 Went to see the Gloucester shipwreck display in Norwich. The ship sank in 1682 and is just my kind of shipwreck-"a proper wreck" -as I always call them. The display was really good with a good fly over video of the site. There was also a nice video of how the divers searched for and found the site. So nice to see them getting the recognition they deserve-a rarity in todays world where archaeologists take over and usually cut the finders out by just writing a footnote like -"discovered by local divers" -a real cop out of a statement usually written by anyone with an agenda to push.

Bottles being conserved in deionised water

Among the many old iron cannons the divers recovered many artefacts including 150 valuable wine bottles-some still containing wines or spirits. These are all the more valuable because the context is known and Royalty was aboard when the vessel sank. lovely!! It was nice to see that they use deionised water to conserve the bottles. This is something I always use as it stops the bottles from flaking. Only deionised water can disolve and flush out the chlorides that get inbeween the glass layers and force them apart if left there. I have found a few old onion bottles in my time but none are pre 1700 and the forms of bottles from just 20 years earlier are so different in form. They are a distinctive uniform shape in the 1680's whereas post 1690 they get more random in shape like the makers didnt care any more.

Another reason for visiting the display is that it is a wreck that sank within 2 years of my Wreck of the Phoenix and others Im diving for of the same period. It was nice to see similar artefacts and compare finds. I also learn more about my wrecks from such displays. I visit these types of things all the time, been doing this for years which is why I am able to identify and date objects like bottles, pottery, clay pipes and all manner of shipboard objects. Im always learning about dating anchors and cannons as its so useful when you find a new wreck. its going to displays like these and reading books and diving in general that made it possible for me to date and identify many of the wrecks i have found over the years...... and hopefully more in the future too.