Raised from the depths: Massachusetts woman stumbles across the remains of 1884 shipwreck on beach – 140 years after it sank in monster storm on the way to Boston
- Nantucket resident Jesse Ahern made the find last week on Miacomet Beach
- The 139-year-old three-masted schooner was initially lost on December 22, 1884
- The ship wrecked on the beach during a voyage from New Orleans to Boston
A woman walking her dog on a beach in Massachusetts came across the 139-year-old wreckage of a historic ship lost in 1884.
Nantucket resident Jesse Ahern made the stunning discovery last week, recording video of a section of the three-masted schooner known as the Warren Sawyer.
The ship was lost on the night of December 22, 1884, and wrecked near Miacomet Beach during a voyage from New Orleans to Boston.
Loaded with a cargo of cotton and scrap iron, the ship was eventually blown off course by gale force winds.
Ahern was walking her dog when she came across its remains, she immediately suspected it belonged to the 19th-century ship, due to several smaller part being found in the area weeks earlier.
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A woman walking a beach in Massachusetts came across the 139-year-old wreckage last week
Nantucket resident Jesse Ahern made the stunning discovery last week, recording video of a section of the three-masted schooner
She soon contacted Egan Maritime’s Evan Schwanfelder, who sent photos of the wreckage to Dave Robinson, the head of the state Board of Underwater Archeological Resources.
Upon analyzing fragments – which included several wooden beams and portion of the ship’s stern – Robinson and his team were able to confirm they belonged to long-lost Warren Sawyer.
The seasoned archaeologist said he rushed to the island to inspect the shipwreck days after Ahern’s discovery, which came about 300 yards west of the site where the ship is thought to have wrecked.
He told the Nantucket Current that he had already spent the past two months researching the ship with Nantucket officials like Schwanfelder from Egan Maritime after other, more difficult to identify fragments were found in the area.
He said and his team, after pouring over all ‘available literature, archival, photographic, and archaeological evidence’, were able to conclude the fragments Ahern found indded belong to the Warren Sawyer.
‘The more interesting information I looked at, the more that I found,’ Robinson said of his unraveling of the mystery of the 19th century coastal schooner – a task the archeologist said ‘was a bit like pulling a thread on a sweater.’
Officials were able to confirm the wreckage belonged to the Warren Sawyer. The ship was lost on the night of December 22, 1884
The ship wrecked near Miacomet Beach during a voyage from New Orleans to Boston. Loaded with a cargo of cotton and scrap iron, the ship was blown off course by gale force winds.
Video recorded by Ahern, meanwhile, caused waves when it was shared to social media last week, showing the savaged hull of the ship with her dog in the background.
Speaking to Storyful, she remarked on how she instantly knew the remains belonged to an old ship, due to the other parts being discovered on the beach as early as December.
‘That schooner wrecked on the beach in Miacomet December 1884 and was recently discovered this past December,’ Ahern said. ‘So we walked up to what we thought was that.’
She quickly realized, however, that this wreckage was larger than anything found in prior weeks. She quickly contacted Schwanfelder, who had already been embroiled in intensive research with Robinson.
The first pieces of would only later be confirmed to be the century-old ship were found on December 8, spurring Robinson, along with BUAR Board member Graham McKay, who is also marine archaeologist, to make their first visit to the island.
Video recorded by Ahern, meanwhile, caused waves when it was shared to social media last week, showing the savaged hull of the ship
The pair soon met with Schwanfelder, as well as chief curator at the Nantucket Historical Association Michael Harrison, and the town of Nantucket’s preservation planner, Holly Backus. The group proceeded to survey the site and began the archiving process.
Their efforts, and this weeks discovery, represent a remarkable finding tantamount to the maritime history of the 19th century America.
The Warren Sawyer wrecked on Nantucket on the night of December 22, 1884, around 11 p.m., after encountering gale force winds that quickly enveloped the craft, ‘with only the swaying masts visible in the blackness of the night’ according to an account of the wreck printed in The Inquirer and Mirror newspaper in 1945.
Ahern said she suspected the remains belonged to an old ship, due to the other, smaller parts being discovered on the beach as early as December
The article recounts how local residents assigned to a nearby lifesaving station saved the crew of the ship by securing a line over its bow and haul all eight men on board to safety.
‘With the schooner lurching under the impact of the seas, it was a difficult task to keep a steady strain on the hawser, but the experienced life savers worked unceasingly and with the coming of the morning of the 23rd, all hands had been safely landed on the beach,’ the 89-year-old piece reads.
The rescued, and their ranks, were as follows: “Captain Edwin L. Saunders, of Boston; Andrew F. Coffin, Addison, Me., mate; seamen, Thomas Coleman, Boston, Alexander McLeod, Boston, John O’Daniel, London, Daniel J. Kane, Yonkers, N.Y., George Sibley, London, and Antone Swazey, New Bedford.’
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