The Whydahs loot

kenb

Bronze Member
Dec 3, 2004
1,894
30
Long Island New York
Detector(s) used
White's XLT
The Whydah's loot

Pirates, the Reality: Loot From the Whydah
Shipwreck's Story Begins Its Voyage in Cincinnati Museum

By Lisa Cornwell
Associated Press
Tuesday, July 3, 2007; Page C07

CINCINNATI -- Imagine touching a silver coin that rested on the ocean floor for more than two centuries.

Or hearing the crash of thunder while feeling the wind on your face and seeing lightning flash on angry waves as it did when a violent storm drove the pirate ship Whydah beneath the Atlantic Ocean.

FROM SLAVE SHIP TO SHIPWRECK
Facts about the Whydah ship featured in the "Real Pirates" exhibit, which opened Saturday in Cincinnati:


· Three-mast, 300-ton galley built as a slave ship in London in 1715.


· Captured by Capt. "Black Sam" Bellamy and his pirate crew in February 1717.


· Sank in storm on April 26, 1717, off Cape Cod, killing all but two of the 146 men on board.

Those are among the experiences in an exhibit on the first fully authenticated pirate ship discovered in American waters -- a display expected to draw scores of visitors fascinated by pirate treasure and swashbucklers, seen in movies such as the hit "Pirates of the Caribbean" series.

However, organizers of "Real Pirates: The Untold Story of the Whydah from Slave Ship to Pirate Ship," which had its world premiere Saturday at the Cincinnati Museum Center, believe people also want to see pirates as they were.

"There's so much more to this exhibit than pirate treasure," said underwater explorer Barry Clifford, who located the first remains of the Whydah in 1984 and is still recovering its artifacts. "It's the story of people who were outlaws but practiced a democracy where former slaves could be elected captains and officers and crew members were treated equally."

The display tells the story of the Whydah, built as a slave ship in 1715 and captured by pirate Capt. "Black Sam" Bellamy two years later. The Whydah sank in a ferocious storm off Cape Cod in 1717, killing Bellamy and all but two of the 146 men on board.

The exhibit was organized by National Geographic and the Aurora-based Arts and Exhibitions International, a producer of major exhibitions at museums worldwide. It is scheduled to visit Philadelphia, Phoenix, Chicago, Denver, Los Angeles and other U.S. cities over the next 5 1/2 years and possibly Europe.

Clifford and his team have recovered more than 100,000 artifacts and expect to recover thousands more. The former schoolteacher -- intrigued by stories of the shipwreck as a young boy -- decided not to sell or give away any of the collection.

"It's so important to me that more people now have the opportunity to see what we've recovered from this extraordinarily important shipwreck," said Clifford, who has displayed some objects at his small museum in Provincetown, Mass., near the shipwreck site.

Clifford researched the Whydah for years, first diving for it in 1982 accompanied by friend John F. Kennedy Jr., who remained interested in the project in the years before his 1999 death.

An archaeological chart prepared by Kennedy and other team members led Clifford to follow a hunch and return in 2005 to the site where the first artifacts were found. He thinks the mother lode of artifacts will be recovered there, buried deeper than originally thought.

Clifford said many people believed he was chasing a foolish dream when he first started looking for the ship.

"There hadn't been many recoveries then and -- like moon shots -- it wasn't something many people did," he said. "But I knew it was out there."

The Whydah carried plunder from more than 50 ships when it went down, and more than 200 objects will be displayed along with thousands of coins. The exhibit will include the ship's bell that confirmed the wreck's authenticity, cannons, swords, jewelry and personal items such as pewter tableware and a silk stocking. The stocking is believed to have belonged to John King, the ship's youngest pirate, who is thought to have been younger than 11.

Accompanied by music and sound effects, exhibit visitors will stroll through a pirate tavern before boarding a reproduction of a portion of the Whydah. Chests filled with thousands of silver coins taken from the ocean floor will be on view.

"The allure of pirate treasure may get some people in the door, but a tremendous amount of research has gone into making sure this depicts the true story of pirates," said John Norman, Arts and Exhibitions International's president.

An advisory panel of academic experts was formed to help ensure accuracy. Panel member and University of New Hampshire history professor Jeffrey Bolster said the exhibit is much more than the story of a pirate ship and its crew.

"You also have this dramatic story showing the impact of the slave trade and slave-produced wealth on that 18th-century era and the role of New England and the Caribbean in servicing that whole system," Bolster said.

Visitors also get a glimpse into underwater archaeology and the high-tech processes used to recover and conserve artifacts.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/02/AR2007070201716.html

kenb
 

OP
OP
kenb

kenb

Bronze Member
Dec 3, 2004
1,894
30
Long Island New York
Detector(s) used
White's XLT
Re: The Whydah's loot

Updated article.

Yet more booty turns up at pirate wreck
By Ryan Haggerty, Globe Correspondent | July 18, 2007

After spending more than two decades combing the ocean floor off Cape Cod, examining the wreck of the pirate ship Whydah, underwater explorer Barry Clifford couldn't shake the feeling that he had missed a spot.

About two years ago, relying on a hunch and a map of the seabed drawn in 1982 by John F. Kennedy Jr. and other divers looking for the wreck, Clifford returned to the spot where his dive team had first discovered artifacts from the Whydah in 1984.

A lthough he didn't exactly strike gold -- not yet, at least -- he did find about 30 cannons buried 10 feet beneath the ocean floor. In recent days, three of the newly discovered cannons were hauled out of the ocean, spurring excitement that a long-hidden portion of the ship's treasure might be revealed.

Clifford believes the weaponry could be covering artifacts, including a trove of silver and gold coins, the ship's navigational equipment, and the personal belongings of the roughly 140 pirates who were on board when the Whydah capsized and sank during a northeaster just off Marconi Beach in Wellfleet on April 26, 1717 .

"This area was eliminated by archeologists as an area that had been completely excavated, and there was no reason to go back except for a hunch I had," Clifford, 63, said by telephone yesterday, just after two cannons were trucked to his Brewster laboratory. "For the last 25 years, we'd been looking all over the place for where the center of the ship would be, and it wound up being right where we started, except 10 feet deeper."

Clifford, a Cape Cod native, has had plenty to keep him busy in the years between his discovery of the wreck and his unearthing of the additional cannons.

The Whydah, considered the world's only verified pirate shipwreck and lying in pieces in about 50 feet of water, already has yielded 200,000 artifacts, including coins, jewelry, pistols, and swords. Also found were the fibula, silk stocking, and shoe of John King, who, at no more than 11 years old, was the youngest member of the ship's crew.

More than 200 artifacts from the Whydah are included in "Real Pirates," a traveling exhibit currently on display at the Cincinnati Museum Center. Other artifacts are stored at the Expedition Whydah Sea-Lab and Learning Center in Provincetown. The newly recovered cannons, found just 2,000 feet from the shore, range from 4 feet long and 500 pounds to 8 feet long and 1,500 pounds. They probably will join the traveling exhibit after being examined at the Brewster laboratory, Clifford said.

Kennedy, who Clifford said was the first person to dive in search of the Whydah, in November 1982, may have glimpsed some of the cannons that Clifford is now beginning to retrieve and examine. The map drawn by Kennedy and other divers, long disregarded by the wreck's explorers, shows three cannons lying in a row on the ocean floor, probably before they were buried by shifting sand, Clifford said.

Still, the discovery of the cannons -- all of which were taken from ships captured by the Whydah -- surprised Clifford, who had already recovered most of the Whydah's 22 to 28 original cannons.

"We had no idea that there were 30 extra cannons on board this ship," Clifford said. "Every time we go down there, we find another tip of another iceberg."

Because the extra cannons were stored in the hold at the very bottom of the ship, they crashed through the decks when the Whydah capsized, presumably trapping much of the ship's contents -- including loot stolen from at least 54 other ships -- beneath them, said Ken Kinkor , the Whydah museum's historian.

Removal of the cannons could take years to complete. But even if the work reveals the bulk of the Whydah's stolen treasure, Kinkor says, the artifacts will be used for education, not profit.

"We don't sell treasure," Kinkor said. "Our goal is education through exhibits."

Ryan Haggerty can be reached at [email protected].


kenb
 

OP
OP
kenb

kenb

Bronze Member
Dec 3, 2004
1,894
30
Long Island New York
Detector(s) used
White's XLT
Re: The Whydah's loot

One more.

http://www.capecodonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070717/NEWS/707170315

Reclaiming mysteries of the deep
Text Size: A | A | A
Print this Article Email this Article Share Photo 1 of 2 | Zoom Photo +


By Mary Ann Bragg
STAFF WRITER
July 17, 2007
PROVINCETOWN — It took a sky-high crane to lift the barnacled, misshapen cannon up onto MacMillan Pier last week.

Visitors gawked, and harbor masters kept a wary eye until the gnarly, encrusted piece of artillery was loaded on a truck and whisked away for analysis by underwater explorer Barry Clifford, owner of the Expedition Whydah Sea Lab & Learning Center, located at the end of the pier.

Whydah Treasures
1717: The Whydah, a pirate ship, sinks in a gale off Marconi Beach in Wellfleet. About 180 to 210 pirates are aboard at the time of the sinking. The ship was originally a slave ship that was seized by Samuel "Black" Bellamy on its maiden voyage to Africa in 1716. According to the survivors (an Indian guide and a shipwright who had been taken prisoner), the ship contained 30,000 pounds of silver, 10,000 pounds of gold, 20 tons of ivory and jewels from the West Indies (a pound was measured as a pound sterling). Nearly 110,000 artifacts have been recovered from the pirate shipwreck.

1985: Barry Clifford's excavation vessel, Vast Explorer II, finds the remains of the Whydah. The ship's bell is unearthed in October 1985 with the "The Whydah Galley 1716" etched on it.

1996: A new museum, the Expedition Whydah Sea Lab & Learning Center, opens to display the artifacts at the tip of MacMillan Pier.

What has been uncovered:


$14 million in gold (entire bounty could be worth $400 million)


18th-century gold and silver coins


cannons and wooden muskets


handcuffs, leg irons, flintlock pistols


teapots, plates, eating utensils, navigational tools


caboose, or ship's galley

Also discovered was a leg bone attached to a small, leather shoe. There is speculation that the bone and shoe belonged to 10-year-old John King, the youngest pirate aboard the Whydah.

Source: Cape Cod Times archives
As it turns out, the 7,000-pound lumpy mass — called a "concretion," or a mass of mineral and other fused matter around an artifact — is likely headed to Cincinnati to a new exhibit about the Whydah pirate ship, which sank in 1717 off the Cape coast near Marconi Beach in Wellfleet.

The cannon, perhaps 300 years old, was the first of about 30 to be brought to shore from a wide-ranging stash of artifacts to be excavated this summer at the site of the sunken, 100-foot Whydah, Clifford said.

The new exhibit opened two weeks ago at the Cincinnati Museum Center at Union Terminal and will continue for six months.

The show, named "Real Pirates: The Untold Story of the Whydah from Slave Ship to Pirate Ship," is sponsored by the Cincinnati museum, National Geographic, and Arts and Exhibitions International. The exhibit will also travel to Philadelphia, Phoenix and Denver, Clifford said.

"It's the tip of the iceberg," he said of the new section of the Whydah found two years ago, about 10 feet deeper than the first sections found in 1984. The Whydah is believed to have held 4½ tons of treasure and about 200 passengers when it sank.

At the pier yesterday, Clifford's Vast Explorer vessel held two precious pieces of cargo wrapped in burlap. Two more cannons had been pulled from the seafloor over the weekend, one about 550 pounds and the other 1,500 pounds.

Covered by blackened lumps of metal that has accumulated over the years, the old cannons were watered down with a hose to help preserve them.

Clifford returned to the original site from 1984 based on a hunch he had two years ago, he said. About 100 concretions in total — most believed to be cannons — are among the newly found ruins, which will be examined and then added to the traveling exhibit, Clifford said.

The ongoing effort to recover, analyze and save the Whydah artifacts is headquartered at the Sea Lab & Learning Center. Clifford's archaeological searches for the Whydah are privately funded.

An exhibit of Whydah artifacts planned this year at the Tampa Museum of Science and Industry was rejected when African-American and other residents of the Florida city objected to the ship's history in the slave trade, according to the Times archive.

Mary Ann Bragg can be reached at [email protected].


kenb
 

OP
OP
kenb

kenb

Bronze Member
Dec 3, 2004
1,894
30
Long Island New York
Detector(s) used
White's XLT
Re: The Whydah's loot

Explorer recovers booty from pirate shipwreck off Cape
By Ryan Haggerty, Globe Correspondent | August 3, 2007

A boat piloted by underwater explorer Barry Clifford towed a 10,000-pound mass of cannons, gold coins, and other artifacts from the sunken pirate ship Whydah to a pier in Provincetown yesterday, a find that is expected to yield more secrets and treasure from the nearly 300-year-old wreck, Clifford said.

The artifacts are encased in a concretion, a mineral composite formed by a chemical reaction between iron and saltwater. The concretion is the latest and largest recovered from the wreck and was too heavy to be lifted by crane, Clifford said by cellphone yesterday from his boat, the 75-foot Vast Explorer.

A custom-built net was attached to the mass, which was lifted from the ocean floor by four flotation bags, Clifford said.

Clifford discovered the concretion last summer in the same spot, about 50 feet down and 2000 feet off Marconi Beach in Wellfleet, as a smaller mass of three cannons that he retrieved last month, Clifford said.

The newly found cannons, believed to be among about 30 the Whydah had stolen from other ships and was storing in its hold, were found about 10 feet beneath the ocean floor at the spot where Clifford discovered the first artifacts from the wreck in 1984. He owns the wreck site.

The concretion, about the size of a sedan, was to be tied to a pier in Provincetown last night and left underwater until it can be transported to a laboratory in Brewster for examination later this week, Clifford said.

"All we know is that there are some cannons and other artifacts sticking out of it, but until we get it in the lab and X-ray it, we won't know exactly what's in there," Clifford said. "It's pretty suspenseful."

The Whydah, laden with loot from at least 54 other ships and manned by a crew of about 140 pirates, sank in a northeaster off Wellfleet on April 26, 1717. Clifford has removed about 200,000 artifacts from the wreck, some 200 of which are on display in Cincinnati as part of a traveling museum exhibit. He declined to put a value on the recovered items, which he has said are priceless.

Ryan Haggerty can be reached at [email protected]

kenb
 

bigelephant1

Newbie
Feb 7, 2012
2
0
Primary Interest:
Beach & Shallow Water Hunting
Re: The Whydah's loot

when coming down the steps at Marconi do you turn right or left
 

Top Member Reactions

Users who are viewing this thread

Top