The Kentledge of broken guns

 These are a few images taken by Ben Dunstan of what remains of the wreck of the Phoenix which sank here at Scilly in 1679. Ben is also the diver alongside the main pile of about 12 of the 16 broken guns that are down on the wreck.

So why are there no whole guns on the Phoenix site? 

The archives prove she was carrying these broken guns as ballast- "The Phoenix to sail with a Kentledge of broken guns" is how the East India Company described them. In the archives she is also described as a 30 gun ship- so where are all of her 30 main operational guns? Well these were either salvaged off the site just after she sank in 1679-or where never present to begin with- which I now believe is highly likely. This was not a vessel owned by the EiC. The Phoenix was only ever hired out to them by its Captain, whom was responsible for commissioning her to be built. When she was first constructed, Phoenix, would have been built to take operational cannon for protection- but an independent vessel didn't need to fight, and in most cases such ships could not get all the men needed to operate, in this case- 30 guns. They had too much competition, with regards to recruitment of men, from the Navy and from the EiC -whom both often resulted to the use of press gangs themselves. Therefore, Wildy, could probably only just about get enough sailors to sail his ship properly let alone man 30 guns.

This ship was not built as a fighting vessel, she was a trading vessel built for speed. Not only to get cargoes home quickly but also in order to evade any would be captors at sea. On her maiden voyage there is a report that she had an incident with a dutch ship aiming to capture her. Shots were fired and it is recorded that a few sailors aboard the Phoenix were injured. Captain Wildy was given a gratuity for any damage suffered and they were grateful that he successfully brought his cargo home under those circumstances. It sounds more like Wildy had simply set sail and made a run for it to evade capture by the dutch rather than having had a sea battle. The report does not say if Wildy ever fired any weapons.              

                                

At that time the Phoenix was brand new so was at her best. She was recorded as being the smallest ship to sail in that seasons trade fleet. Without operational guns she could carry more cargo than a normal to make up for her size. If she was owned by the EiC then she probably would have had a full accompaniment of guns and more crew to man them. But being privately owned this was not so easy to do and so unlikely that full gun crews were ever aboard. No trained gun crews would negate the need for guns.

Another factor to look at comes in the manner and way that the EiC had commanded Wildy to sail her to and from the east. Wildy was told- 'to keep well out to sea to evade capture'- they also told him to- 'avoid the usual routes and keep well out of sight of the African coast line and to get to the safety of St Helena', and to- 'form up with other ships into a fleet for the rest of the journey'. This advice was heeded by Wildy outwards and back. Had she been well armed and well manned maybe there would not be a need for such advice? Maybe she was one of those vessels that had all the appearances of a 30 gun ship but never actually was one in reality. It was all a front and quite a normal occurrence- especially for independent ships like her. I have read before that it was something that was sometimes adopted by the EiC with its own faster vessels later on in history. So why not earlier too?

Why is it that in the list of items saved from the wreck -and the other odd references to salvaged items too- there are no mentions of guns having been salvaged when 30 guns are clearly missing? The cargo belonged to the EiC, whereas Wildy owned everything else. Therefore it was not up to the EiC to salvage the ships guns unless they were asked to do so. That particular salvage operation was up to the ships owner- Wildy. Furthermore, had the EiC salvaged any guns then they should appear somewhere-but they are not in the list of items saved from the wreck -and no records of charges for the salvage of any guns- or-receipts for payment from Wildy for them being raised- or - payments or receipts with a salvage man for his services, in company minutes or their letter books. Yet the records are quite good for this later 17th c period in EiC historic documents.

                            

 We know there was a local salvage man present on Scilly at this time in-Thomas Ekins. So either Wildy had paid for the huge expense of raising them himself with someone like Ekins- and Ekins miraculously managed to salvage every single one of them-or that salvage operation never happened.

Lastly, even after heavy salvage, the majority of 17th century shipwrecks nearly always retain at least a few of their armament guns. This is because salvage was so primitive that far back. They fished them up from the surface only and unless the ship stayed perfectly upright, which is highly unlikely, then to get at those guns in the very bottom of the wreck was extremely difficult to do-hence we nearly always see the odd few guns remaining on such wrecks for us to find today. Over here Ekins salvaged the Golden Lyon and the Shaftesbury and the Princess Maria and on all those sites we know he failed to get all their guns up- and yet they were all salvaged from a similar depth to the Phoenix. The salvaged goods list proves somone clearly salvaged the wreck of the Phoenix-and Ekins was here at the time the wreck went in as we know he was here during the build of our first lighthouse in 1680. A local story that I have never yet proved with research either, is that proceeds from the salvage of the Phoenix went to build the first wooden church on St Agnes Island-(where Ekins lived and built the Lighthouse) Sadly there is not yet any evidence of guns ever being raised-and yet 30 guns are clearly missing. To me all the above circumstantial evidence points more towards there never being any whole guns on the ship to begin with.

       

EiC Salvage list of the Phoenix

Thank you Ben Dunstan for the pictures. (Want to see some good entertainment -Check out Bens- 'Ben o Cam' - videos on Youtube

Shipwreck Artefact Recording.

The guys deep at work.

In a post last summer I reported how an underwater archaeological team came to Scilly to asses my wreck of the Phoenix which sank here in 1680. Well that was done but it was only half the job. Two more professionals came over last week to finish the job and properly record all the finds I raised from the site. These included almost 400 gold and silver coins and well over 70 items of contraband gold jewellery. Also all the other artifacts like 3 pairs of dividers used by captain Wildy. I even had parts of his sword and numerous weights from the pursers kit. Its always a lovely thing to be able to touch things that you are pretty certain you know who previously owned them and were the last person to handle them. 

Contraband Jewellery I found on the Phoenix.

Everything went well until they tried to go home and got fog bound here. Unfortunately we had guests taking up their rooms after they left and they had to go seek other accommodation. Luckily a guest house opened up especially and took them in-otherwise it was sleeping in our utility room on a blow up bed together. Not a good prospect and one im sure their employers-Wessex archaeology- wouldnt want for them.

Photographer left and coin expert on the right

One of the guys photographed every item and the other,who was a coin expert, had to write descriptions of everything. All very tedious stuff in my opinion but it desperately needed doing because the law states that the whole collection has to be sold at auction. That part is out of my hands as everything is currently held by the Receiver of wreck until sold.  My understanding is that, now everything is recorded, it will  all be taken by that office to London to be valued so that interested museums can get an opportunity to buy any of it at that valued cost-which i think is a bit unfair and not sure if its actually legal. I will consult with a solicitor about this as Im sure it can only be fair and legal to go to auction where the museums can bid like everyone else-otherwise those who stand to benefit from said auction could potentially loose out and im sure that is not right or proper. For those who dont know- the law is thus-if an item salvaged from a wreck is worth over £5000 it has to go to auction so that the secretary of state can decided what percentage cut of the proceeds to give to the Crown. See my earlier post called -'the duchy take' for my view on this. 

Some other items from the wreck.

Anyway, one day soon the final report on the wreck will be made. Then the authorities involved will decide what to do with the wreck site. I was told that it will likely get protected. I made my feelings known on this particular action. I cant see the point in it. All it does is make visitors to the wreck have to do paperwork and get a licence to visit the site. This is something unique to underwater finds as nonone has go through such things to visit land sites. You just visit them.  To even get the chance to apply for a licence you have to be a qualified diver which already limits it down to a selective few who can go and see it. I have two other wrecks with protection orders over here on Scilly and I dont visit either of them because I cant be bothered with the paper work. Whereas if they were not protected I would still dive them time to time. It just makes me think they are protecting these wrecks from me!

I am rather hoping to get back and keep some of the items in the final deal so that a small display can go in the local museum if they wanted it. However, as things stand Im sure they wont have room for it for quite a while to come as, last I heard, they are temporarily homeless. But I am talking in the future because one day they will be reestablished somewhere and when I get old I have stuff from other wrecks, like colossus, that I hope will end up on display with them again also. I only see myself as simply custodian of the best of anything I find for a short while. Sadly, the Phoenix stuff is already out of my hands- none of it can ever end up back in my possession unless I buy it at auction or can cut a deal for some items to return to Scilly.

 

Home from home

Sorry I have not posted recently but we have been away on holiday. Spent 3 weeks in Mahe in the Seyshelles. Like the Caribbean only better. Its friendlier without the crime. Bit like Scilly really and  its heaving in nice beaches like here too.  Did a lot of snorkelling and drinking of the local rum called Takamaka. Unlike Scilly they have huge bats instead of seagulls. We hired a car for the whole time we were there and found so many lovely beaches without a soul on them. You just park your bum under a nice tree in the shade crash and noone bothers you. Loved it.

 

Tribute to Ed.

Ed Cumming RIP.

It dawned on me recently that I had not made any personal tribute to the passing of a good friend Ed Cumming. I wasn't doing this blog when he passed so thought I'd like to do something now. Ed  truely was a lovely man. He was a huge force behind the excavation of the Earl of Abergavenny wreck in Weymouth bay. When he moved to Scilly in about 2005, he and I teamed up and bought a boat together. We then worked together well on various projects during his time here. His research skills shined through on the wreck of the Nancy Packet shipwreck project where he unveiled the real story of that disaster. He taught me an awful lot about research. On that project I wrote the book and did everything to do with the light house and the facts behind the ghostly tale in the story- and Ed did a wonderful job uncovering the story of the Captain and Ann Cargill who was an illustrious passenger on board. Our collaboration was such that we published a small book about that wreck called 'Ghosts of Rosevear' and we won the adopt a wreck award for our work on the whole project. I did all the diving and he was boatman as he could no longer dive due to heart problems. We also worked together on our Scilly shipwreck reference book where again his skills in research and trudging through heaps of dross shone through. I researched everything from 1800 back to medieval times and he did from 1800 onwards. Mine was less material but harder to find- whereas his part was vast with much dross and modern inaccuracies to deal with. He was retired and had the time- whereas I was working full time. Evenso, he was relentless right up until he died. I dont like to mention the name 'Rich Larn' but I will and Ed Im sure would approve as he found him to be as difficult as I have. (see my page on Mr Larn) Mr Larn, the self professed  -"Authority on shipwreck Research" - had the audacity to publish himself as such. He got an OBE for his work to 'Maritime archaeology.' Hmmm- is all I wish to say on that one!  He was also given the Lloyds archive and paid a substantial fee to transfer it into book form. It should have been a very worthy project but sadly, for me, Larn has always seemed far too subjective in his approach for such an honorable undertaking- as Ed and I often found out when researching past publications for our own reference book.- Oh- and noone paid Ed or I to do our book!  In fact we sold our reference book at cost price so we never made a penny from it. I could easily say that was Ed's influence  but that was the way both Ed and I ultimately liked to work. We just wanted to get the information out there for all to read, for free, if at all possible. 

                              It was a pleasure to work with him. We became very firm friends.

 Another example of Ed mind set was when he set up an internet site called 'Scillypedia'. It was a huge undertaking a fabulous ongoing archive of work. That site started because Ed had seen another internet site about Scilly Shipwrecks that charged people for research. This kind of thing made Ed angry and so Scillypedia shipwreck site came into being- and it just grew and grew into a site about Scilly as a whole.  And while I fed Ed with lots of material for the site, it was he who again did all the day to day leg work.  To my mind Ed was a far, far, better researcher than Richard Larn could ever hope to be. He was simply more thorough and always Objective rather than Subjective.

Ed was retired and lived on Scilly for about 5 years and we never stopped talking when together. My only regret is that I had to work, which meant that Ed had to fill his days elsewhere until evenings and  weekends. He was a good boatman at Weymouth but not so confident to use our boat at Scilly alone. Too many obstacles and tides to learn about in his short time here. He so wanted to help the museum here but was unfairly thwarted there at every turn, which was so very sad as he had so much to give.. So, to fill his time, he set himself to research at home instead but you cant do the same thing all day, every day. There wasnt enough for him here- so in the end - he made a return to his beloved Weymouth- where he still had so many old friends and family. I missed him dearly when he left and was so very sad when I heard he had suddenly passed.  Maybe he knew it was coming. 

                                                                            Ed and me.
 

As was typical of Ed, he was researching right up until the end. Just before he died he told me of an new branch of research he had uncovered and when I was writing reports to him about 3 new wrecks I had found for an update to our reference book, he said he had come up with 60 more pages of scilly shipwreck related material noone else had yet seen. That was Ed and he did it all for the love of it. If anyone deserved an OBE for his work to maritime archaeology it was ED Cumming. He did it all for nothing in return.

 To the outside world he and I must have seemed an unlikely pairing but we just seemed to fit. It just worked. Put the two of us together and we just clicked. Rarely do you meet people in your life who are just right for you. Kindred spirits. We never stopped talking and thus learned a lot from each-other. In some way he made up for the loss of another dear friend. Not long before Ed and I met I lost, Francis Bliss, another dive buddy who I just fitted well with. It was like someone had sent me a replacement buddy in Ed. I do miss you both- Frank & Ed. Hope you two have met where ever you are now. I know you would get on famously. Thank you both for blessing me with your presence. Ed Cumming. RIP.

Iron Cargo wrecks

Towing a magnetometer behind a boat for days on end nearly always yields results-but not often the results you wanted. Quite often the hits turn out to be rubbish but occasionally another wreck entirely from the one you are looking for shows up. In this case its ships with an iron cargo. These kinds of hits always gets the treasure hunters juices flowing. This is because you are looking for a similar size hit. An iron cargo mound will give off a similar sized hit as a decent cannon site. This has happened to me quite often and it always makes me wonder if I should employ a reverse psychology, by looking for these iron cargo ships -because then maybe I may find the actual cannon site wrecks Im looking for.  Lets take a look at a few of these below. All are wrecks I have inadvertently found over the years. The first three images are of a wreck I found south east of the Crim reef. It turned out to be the Bassenthwaite lost in 1836. I found this one while looking for HMS Romney. At the time it was very disappointing. But in time it turned into quite an interesting wreck in its own right. I quite like diving this one now as you never know what it is going to reveal next. It is in 30+meters and has a very eclectic cargo surrounding a huge iron cargo. It was copper nailed and copper bottomed.

The whole sea bed here seems made of iron

My torch picks out  cannons on the Bassenthwaite

 The next two images below is what I believe to be the wreck of the Padstow lost in 1804.  I found this iron cargo wreck while hunting around the Spanish Ledges. The images look like rock but it is all iron items in a huge solid concretion. Again I was hoping for an old spanish cannon site but got this instead.  I remember the first dive on it when my eyes told me what I wanted to see. It is in a very strong tidal zone in 20m of water. I wanted it to be a cannon site so much that in my excitement I had convinced myself I was looking at guns all concreted together and I said as much to a friend later that day.  The second dive proved the reality of simple iron castings like rail tracking and pig iron and instead of a 17th century site it was an early 19th c or late 18th c at best. The anchors were of that period around 1800 and English.  The debris trail was towards the Spanish ledge so she must have glanced off that reef and sank nearby.

 A big conger lives under the iron mound.

Padstows iron mound 

The two images below are of an unidentified site I believe to be the wreck of the Plenty. I found this one on my birthday in 2005. I had read a passage in a book written in 1852 regarding an indiaman lost in that area where the wreck now lays. I magged all day for the indiaman and got this juicy hit off little ganinick island. I thought it was going to be a cannon site and a fab birthday present. The wreck was another iron cargo vessel. This time it was carrying replacement mining equipment. There were numerous wheels on the site so I dubbed it the 'Wheels wreck.' as I had no positive ID of the ship then. Since then research I think has proven it to be the Wreck of the 'Plenty' lost in 1840. This is because a narrative placed its loss in 44ft of water just 1 mile away from St Marys. This wreck fits that description and date.. Its an interesting site but not my kind of wreck and certainly not what I was hoping it to be.  To cut a long story short the site received a government protected order over it-this was as a direct result of a request by the Trevithick society in Cornwall and not anything of my doing. Not quite sure what it is being protected from though?, and as a result of the government order noone ever dives it.  The trevithick society thought it was an important find and this was the result. Sadly, I have not dived it since as I cant be bothered with the unnecessary paperwork needed to visit it.

A couple of the many wheels found on the site

My wife measures one of a few iron clack valves found on the 'Wheels wreck' site.

Shipwreck videos.

A good friend of mine makes some great little shipwreck videos and he came over last summer and we made a couple featuring 2 Scilly wrecks for his channel.  All the treasure and artifacts in this video is currently held by the Receiver of Wreck until its release and then will, as the law dictates, be sold off at a public auction in London.  Enjoy!

Phoenix?

 Custos or Douro?

Check out Bens youtube Channel- Ben o Cam. Hes a real thrill seeker. He dives old mine shafts and caves as well as a wreck hunter like me. He even flies a microlight. One time he flew from Lands End to Scilly. Then, when Bear grills did the same, and /bear thinking he was first to do it and published as much- Ben put him straight. Ha ha ha

Humpbacks & Finns

 We have had Humpback whales and Finn whales about the islands over the last couple of months. The Humpbacks have been coming in close to shore but the Finns stay further out. Lots of Dolphins too. I aske how can you tell a finn from a humpback and was told that the finns water spout is much higher. Boy it is too. We were watching a couple about  miles off shore and their spouts must have been going up 20 feet or more.  We had not had many whales for quite a while here but when lock down occurred a couple of years back the Humpbacks must have seen it as a signal to come into the islands. One we could see from our lounge window just across the way. I was working at a house right by the shoreline at the time  and it came within a 100m of the shore just off the Newman.  It was also seen just a few meters away between the Woolpack rock and the garrison shore by a friend. I have dived in that gap and the water is not very deep there but there he was swimming through the gap so that people on the shore could get a good close view.  At present they are hanging about just south of St Marys and between St Marys Island and the Gugh.  Not sure what is kepping them here and coming back each year but it must be food. They seem to hang about in the very tidal areas here the most. Long may the sightings continue.