Interesting, the only part of that that applies to the Allen Gardner who owns the Ella Warley is that he owns the boat Ella Warley III. Everything else seems to be a confusion of Allen Gardner and some other person.
Bahamas Press: American Arrested for looting Spanish galleon.
- Thread starter Patrimony
- Start date
Whitt
Full Member
- Feb 7, 2013
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Whitt
Full Member
- Feb 7, 2013
- 137
- 47
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Gary Gentile Productions Newsletter-3
Gold from the Ella Warley
Often I have found shipwreck information by means of serendipity: while researching one wreck, I have accidentally uncovered documents pertaining to another wreck that I was consciously researching, or to a wreck that I wrote about years ago, or to a wreck that is on my list of future research projects.
For example, one week prior to commencing this newsletter with an update on the Ella Warley, I stumbled upon additional historical information: not about her loss but about the lawsuit that resulted from it. The Ella Warley was a sidewheel steamer that sank in 1863 as a result of collision with the SS North Star. I wrote about this wreck in Shipwrecks of New Jersey: North (published in 2000).
According to certain court records, “The suit was tried upon libel and cross libel, both vessels found in fault, and the damages ordered to be divided.”
Attorneys for the Ella Warley appealed the court’s decision, citing the liability limitation law. This law constitutes one of the most absurd concepts ever conceived in jurisprudence. It stipulates that the financial liability of a vessel’s owner is limited to the value of said vessel after collision. A million-dollar vessel that suffered two hundred thousand dollars in damage (the cost of repairs), and was consequently valued at eight hundred thousand dollars, limited the owner’s liability to that amount - even if the other vessel constituted a total loss of many millions of dollars.
Imagine the hoopla such a law would create if it pertained to automobile collisions. Any owner found liable would not have to pay any claims that exceeded the value of his vehicle after the collision. In other words, the liable owner of a thousand-dollar junker that suffered only minor damage, might have to pay the owner of a Cadillac - which was totally demolished - no more than a few dollars in restitution! Go figure. Extrapolating from this scenario, if the liable owner’s car was totaled, he would escape scot-free from all resulting claims: for injuries, for fatalities, and for damage to other vehicles and to any other property - even if the driver was inebriated at the time of the so-called “accident.”
This absurdity of maritime law is always invoked in order to protect the liable owner from paying his just due. It may come as no surprise that most of the Congressional representatives who framed and voted this concept into law were major stockholders in shipping companies.
Be that as it may, the value of the Ella Warley at the bottom of the sea was essentially zero. Her owner’s attorneys argued that her owner was therefore not responsible for paying his half of the loss. This absurdity was compounded when the attorneys argued that the owners of the North Star should pay the owners of the Ella Warley for their half of the loss: a clear case of eating their cake and having it too.
The court disagreed with this tautological unreasoning. “According to the general maritime law, in cases of collision occurring by the fault of both parties, the entire damage to both ships is added together in one common mass, and equally divided between them, and thereupon arises a liability of one party to pay the other such sum as is necessary to equalize the burden. This is the rule of mutual liability between the parties.”
And so the case ended.
At the time of publication (2000), I had not encountered anyone who had even heard the name of the ship, much less anyone who knew the location of the wreck. I noted this observation at the end of the chapter.
Lo and behold, several months after publication, I received correspondence from Florida, from one Allan Gardner. He used to live in New Jersey. In 1976, Gardner “worked” the wreck of a sidewheel steamer with his friend Paul Hepler. They “worked” the wreck because two gold coins had been recovered recently from the site. Inspired by these accidental finds, Gardner and Hepler built an airlift to move enormous quantities of sand from the buried wooden hull.
They found no gold coins, but Gardner did recover the handle of a spoon on which was engraved the last part of a name: “LEY”. He looked through a book that contained a list of vessel losses, and found the name Ella Warley, which went down precisely where the wreck was located (and which I specified in my book).
Gardner then ascertained the circumstances of the vessel’s loss from contemporary newspaper accounts. Because the wreck was supposed to have gone down with $8,000 in gold, and an iron safe containing $5,000 in an unspecified form, he and Hepler kept their “work” a closely guarded secret.
Despite their lack of success with the airlift, Gardner and Hepler returned to the wreck the following year: this time looking only for lobsters. Hepler went down first. He came back to the boat with a handful of gold coins that he found without even digging - they were lying on top of the sand! (Undoubtedly, the sand had been shifted by hurricanes or winter storms.) Gardner went down next, and found more gold coins in the same spot: American gold pieces in denominations of $5, $10, and $20.
Gardner and Hepler maintained their secret throughout the years - until Gardner fortuitously read about the Ella Warley in my book. When I contacted Gardner and asked for the full particulars of the story, in order to give him and Hepler credit in the next edition of the book, he provided the information that I have written above. Thus another item of interest has been added to the history of the Ella Warley.
Complete Book List
Thanks to my subscribers for their interest in GGP. My readers are important to me. Without them, there would be no reason for me to write. So come back often. Tell your friends. And stay tuned for future newsletters. Remember: the exploration of shipwrecks is one of the greatest adventures in the underwater world.
Sincerely,
Gary Gentile
Gary Gentile Productions
email: [email protected]
web: http://www.ggentile.com
Gary Gentile Productions Newsletter-3
Gold from the Ella Warley
Often I have found shipwreck information by means of serendipity: while researching one wreck, I have accidentally uncovered documents pertaining to another wreck that I was consciously researching, or to a wreck that I wrote about years ago, or to a wreck that is on my list of future research projects.
For example, one week prior to commencing this newsletter with an update on the Ella Warley, I stumbled upon additional historical information: not about her loss but about the lawsuit that resulted from it. The Ella Warley was a sidewheel steamer that sank in 1863 as a result of collision with the SS North Star. I wrote about this wreck in Shipwrecks of New Jersey: North (published in 2000).
According to certain court records, “The suit was tried upon libel and cross libel, both vessels found in fault, and the damages ordered to be divided.”
Attorneys for the Ella Warley appealed the court’s decision, citing the liability limitation law. This law constitutes one of the most absurd concepts ever conceived in jurisprudence. It stipulates that the financial liability of a vessel’s owner is limited to the value of said vessel after collision. A million-dollar vessel that suffered two hundred thousand dollars in damage (the cost of repairs), and was consequently valued at eight hundred thousand dollars, limited the owner’s liability to that amount - even if the other vessel constituted a total loss of many millions of dollars.
Imagine the hoopla such a law would create if it pertained to automobile collisions. Any owner found liable would not have to pay any claims that exceeded the value of his vehicle after the collision. In other words, the liable owner of a thousand-dollar junker that suffered only minor damage, might have to pay the owner of a Cadillac - which was totally demolished - no more than a few dollars in restitution! Go figure. Extrapolating from this scenario, if the liable owner’s car was totaled, he would escape scot-free from all resulting claims: for injuries, for fatalities, and for damage to other vehicles and to any other property - even if the driver was inebriated at the time of the so-called “accident.”
This absurdity of maritime law is always invoked in order to protect the liable owner from paying his just due. It may come as no surprise that most of the Congressional representatives who framed and voted this concept into law were major stockholders in shipping companies.
Be that as it may, the value of the Ella Warley at the bottom of the sea was essentially zero. Her owner’s attorneys argued that her owner was therefore not responsible for paying his half of the loss. This absurdity was compounded when the attorneys argued that the owners of the North Star should pay the owners of the Ella Warley for their half of the loss: a clear case of eating their cake and having it too.
The court disagreed with this tautological unreasoning. “According to the general maritime law, in cases of collision occurring by the fault of both parties, the entire damage to both ships is added together in one common mass, and equally divided between them, and thereupon arises a liability of one party to pay the other such sum as is necessary to equalize the burden. This is the rule of mutual liability between the parties.”
And so the case ended.
At the time of publication (2000), I had not encountered anyone who had even heard the name of the ship, much less anyone who knew the location of the wreck. I noted this observation at the end of the chapter.
Lo and behold, several months after publication, I received correspondence from Florida, from one Allan Gardner. He used to live in New Jersey. In 1976, Gardner “worked” the wreck of a sidewheel steamer with his friend Paul Hepler. They “worked” the wreck because two gold coins had been recovered recently from the site. Inspired by these accidental finds, Gardner and Hepler built an airlift to move enormous quantities of sand from the buried wooden hull.
They found no gold coins, but Gardner did recover the handle of a spoon on which was engraved the last part of a name: “LEY”. He looked through a book that contained a list of vessel losses, and found the name Ella Warley, which went down precisely where the wreck was located (and which I specified in my book).
Gardner then ascertained the circumstances of the vessel’s loss from contemporary newspaper accounts. Because the wreck was supposed to have gone down with $8,000 in gold, and an iron safe containing $5,000 in an unspecified form, he and Hepler kept their “work” a closely guarded secret.
Despite their lack of success with the airlift, Gardner and Hepler returned to the wreck the following year: this time looking only for lobsters. Hepler went down first. He came back to the boat with a handful of gold coins that he found without even digging - they were lying on top of the sand! (Undoubtedly, the sand had been shifted by hurricanes or winter storms.) Gardner went down next, and found more gold coins in the same spot: American gold pieces in denominations of $5, $10, and $20.
Gardner and Hepler maintained their secret throughout the years - until Gardner fortuitously read about the Ella Warley in my book. When I contacted Gardner and asked for the full particulars of the story, in order to give him and Hepler credit in the next edition of the book, he provided the information that I have written above. Thus another item of interest has been added to the history of the Ella Warley.
Complete Book List
Thanks to my subscribers for their interest in GGP. My readers are important to me. Without them, there would be no reason for me to write. So come back often. Tell your friends. And stay tuned for future newsletters. Remember: the exploration of shipwrecks is one of the greatest adventures in the underwater world.
Sincerely,
Gary Gentile
Gary Gentile Productions
email: [email protected]
web: http://www.ggentile.com
old man
Bronze Member
Patrimony, This case is almost 3 Years Old. Since the case is that old, I would think that this case would have gone to court and there would be a Judgement, one way or the other. Do you have an update on a Court Ruling
Whitt
Full Member
- Feb 7, 2013
- 137
- 47
