The Shipwreck Archives

When the men of the Essex came on shore in Nantucket they might have been expected to abandon the sea forever. Their voyage in small boats had been a terrible one after their ship was sank by a whale. In the end they had been reduced to cannibalism. Captain Pollard and two of the men who had also survived the Essex almost immediately were on board another whaling ship though, and headed back out t...

The General Grant was a Maine built American ship, traveling from Australia which was at the time experiencing a gold rush. Due to a tragic combination of circumstances it would only get as far as the Auckland Islands before it found itself trapped in a cave. The ten people who survived the wreck would fight for survival on the subantarctic islands for the next 18 months until they were rescued. T...

The Serapis is best known for being the opponent of the Bonhomme Richard under the command of John Paul Jones. Her story did not end with the famous words "I have not yet begun to fight" however. Starting her life as a fifth rate Roebuck class ship in the British Navy, she went on to be John Paul Jones's next ship, before being transferred to the French Navy. She would end her life off of the coas...

The Palme was a ship from what is now Finland but at the time was a part of the Russian Empire. On Christmas Eve she sought shelter in Dublin Bay but in the raging storm the bay did not offer her enough shelter to stop her from dragging her anchor. The Captain and the people on board the ship could see their ship drawing closer to the rocks and they fired their rockets as a sign of their distress....

When the White Ship sank, a medieval drunk boating accident, she took with her not only the heir to the throne of England, but also over 150 members of the leading families of England. This would spin the dynasty of William the Conqueror into chaos and cause a fight over the throne that no one had expected.  Ship Name: The White Ship Ship Type: Timber Longboat  Built: 1120  Wrecked:...

The Hera had her cargo catch fire in the storm but still managed to keep it under control until they could reach Tofino in British Columbia. With rescue in sight however, order began to break down and it took some actual threats from the would be rescuers to get the people on board to stay calm enough to be rescued.  Ship name: The Hera Ship Type: Three Masted Wooden Schooner Tonnage: 700 ton...

The Invincible found herself aground under the fire of cannons from a Mexican Man of War during poor weather outside of Galveston Harbor, which she had failed to enter. She was never able to get free and the one remaining war ship of the Independent Republic of Texas's Navy, The Brutus, ran aground trying to come to her rescue. This chain of events was to be the last time that the Republic of Texa...

The Loch Ard sank when in struck Mutton Bird Island in a dense fog off of the coast of Australia, close to the end of its voyage. When the public discovered that there were only two survivors, a young man and a young woman of about the same age, and that he had saved her from drowning, the general agreement of the newspaper reading public was that he had won her hand in marriage. She was not so su...

The Avondster had no reason to wreck when she slipped her anchor in Galle Harbor, all it required was the officers to come on deck and give the correct orders. Unfortunately for the aging yacht, her officers decided going back to bed was a preferable option, leading to her death on the sands near Galle Fort.  Ship's Name: Avondster Wrecked: Galle Harbor Date Wrecked: 1659 Ship Owned By: The D...

When the Elingamite hit heavy fog her captain believed that she had safely passed the Three Kings Islands. Instead the ship and over a hundred people would find themselves wrecked on the rocks and trying desperately to survive.  Name: Elingamite  Size: 2585 Tons  Launched: 1887 Sank: 1902 Sources:  http://www.tynebuiltships.co.uk/E-Ships/elingamite1887.html https://teara.govt.n...

The Sindia was on the last leg of her journey when she made her way firmly onto the beach at Ocean City New Jersey in 1901. This wreck immediately garnered local interest due to her mostly intact nature, but also caused a good deal of rumor. Everyone had a theory about what really happened to cause the wreck. The fact that she was owned by John D Rockefeller did not calm the rumors, indeed, it onl...

The ship of the pirate Captain Bowen wrecked on the island of Mauritius in 1702, mainly due to a drunk crew who was not paying attention.   Year Built: Unknown   Place Built: Probably France   Year Wrecked: January 7th, 1702  Captain: Captain Bowen   Tonnage: 500  For further information please see the following sources: http://archeologiedelapiraterie.fr/en/projets-d...

The Eliza Anderson was well past the point where she belonged in the scrap yard when she was pressed into service to bring miners to the Klondike Gold Rush in Alaska in 1898. She was never to finish to voyage. Ship Name: Eliza Anderson  Tonnage: 275 Lives Lost: None  Built: 1858 Ship Type: Sidewheel Steamer Sources:  Rogers, Jason. “Steamer Eliza Anderson: An Early Puget Sound Steam...