Posted on 05/19/2012 3:52:18 PM PDT by Ron C.
NEW ORLEANS – An oil company exploration crew's chance discovery of a 200-year-old shipwreck in a little-charted stretch of the Gulf of Mexico is yielding a trove of new information to scientists who say it's one of the most well-preserved old wrecks ever found in the Gulf.
"When we saw it we were all just astonished because it was beautifully preserved, and by that I mean for a 200-year-old shipwreck," said Jack Irion, maritime archaeologist with the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Ocean Energy Management in New Orleans.
Video shows muskets and gin bottles littering the Gulf bottom, along with sea life mingling in the wreck.
Scientists say the ship is about 200 miles off the northern Gulf coast and about 4,000 feet deep. The depth has kept it largely undisturbed during two centuries of storms and hurricanes. And although most of the ship's wood dissolved long ago, the copper hull and its contents remain in place.
(Excerpt) Read more at foxnews.com ...
It seems logical to me - if those are really gin bottles. The War of 1812 was in part caused by the later Napoleonic Wars and the related activities - especially the impressment of American sailors into the service of the Royal Navy.
The Spanish, part-time allies of Napoleon, lost their grip on some of the Balearic Islands to the British. IIRC, the Brits used the island of Menorca (and its port city, Mahon) as a refitting and resupply base for their Navy. Even today there's an active gin distillery on the island, a legacy of the days of British control.
Bump!
There was a Royal Navy squadron assigned to blockade the Gulf Coast ports, primarily Mobile and New Orleans.
And then there's this.
With the price of copper, there's probably some homeless guys building a diving bell right now.
WOW! very cool!
That clear bottle in the middle looks like a Chrystal decanter and up towards the upper right hand looks like the stopper is laying there.
Imagine diving on a WWII cargo ship and finding a sealed crate of Thompsons, or Garands, preserved in cosmoline...
Wonder if they’d still be workable, or able to be restored, or would they be total basket cases...?
Y-you mean, Bush was causing global warming back in 1812?! NOOOOOOOOOO!
I’m not sure about Bush, but Dick Cheney’s great-great-great-grandfather was living in Massachusetts just before the Revolutionary War. Maybe he conspired with Ben Franklin to build the “Weather Machine”.
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