I've heard a lot of stories about this wreck, including one that said early pioneers had found it on the beach and cleaned it out.
When the San Felipe grounded off Ensenada, it was eventually brought into a surf zone where it broke up. Here is a good site to get some idea of what they are looking at. They have even determined that the San Felipe had lead sheeting.
http://www.captainrick.com/SanFelipe.htm
With the San Augustin, it directly struck a shoal at the mouth of Drake's estero and broke up. It scattered artifacts for about 3 miles down the beach, as boards washed up from it, as well as bales of silk, blocks of wax, pieza shipping boxes, and the sailors' chests. There appears to have been an effort by Carmeno to retrieve and concentrate these items in one area on the beach, probably on the high dunes near the south west tip of the beach. They were never salvaged, but the Miwok indians probably had a ball.
There are reports from early Spanish explorers that they found the remains of the San Augustin's masts in San Francisco Bay in the 1770's, and I remember reading a historical article in the 1970's about 2 men who had found several old style silver cob reals on one of the beaches below the Marin headlands, perhaps from the remains of a sailor's chest.
I think that that the San Feliepe wreck would be a closer in comparison to the Beeswax wreck. The physical circumstances of the San Augustin's wreck are unique to the area it wrecked in.
There are reports that Cape Medicino was the first point seen by most early Manila galleons; and in 1604, two galleons were almost lost near it. The Faralones were well known, and some ships immediately turned south east when they encountered seaweed, sealions, and the strong southren winds off the coast. They would eventually come to the Faralones, and travel southward within sight of the coastline to Acapulco.
It seems that the San Filepe deposited the wax that was found in a certain area of the beach or dunes, while the china was scattered with wave energy down the coast line. The San Augustin seems to have dropped most of its cargo in what was Drake's Estero, with the porcelin and most items coming to shore in a relatively small area. Some items are also found along the beach, as in the case of the wax I found.
The "Beeswax Wreck" at Nehalem Beach would have had to have been off target for some reason, possibly from a storm, wrecked masts, or because the crew became incapacitaited by sickness. If the wax is concentrated in one area of the beach, that would be a good indication of the wreck area, even if it was stacked by someone after the wreck. It seems that these ships may have been armed with cannon after 1610, as a order was put into place forbidding the removal of artillery from the ships to be used in forts.
Looking at that stuff in the case, it kind of looks like things I have seen. My wax block was irregular. I have concluded that the teak wood used to build the San Augustin was a dark brownish purple in color with a white frosted surface where it was exposed on the outside of the ship. It has a very deep banded striation when looked at across the grain. A dark brown, fine grained mahogany was also used, and a yellow brown pine like wood called Lanang for planking. That cut of wood in the beeswax case looks more like a section of sandalwood, which many of these ships carried as a trade good.
I think it could be concluded that it is close to land because of the artifact deposit, and probably broke up near shore, which is what these other two vessels eventually did.
Small fragments of pottery washing to shore may mean a couple hundred feet away. Big pieces like plates would mean it was right there on the beach. From what I also understand, there has been a rise in sea level of four feet in the last 200 years. After looking at their beach area, their wave energy is working a little different than what I was thinking before. I saw that big fragment of plate, and it kind of makes me wonder. Not inconcievable that it was brought in also.
Last summer, right after an old mast began rolling over parts of the Drake's Estero's mouth, I found part of a tea cup that looked like it had just been broken. That is what these pieces in the picture remind me of- stuff sticking up that got nailed by debris. The bright blue coloring seems to indicate that there is little sand wear from this pottery rolling around in waves, which kind of fits in well with either dune erosion, or a muddier, less violent surf action.
The San Francisco Xavier seemed to have been in service since 1699, and was lost in 1705. S. A. Clark's Pioneer History of Oregon has a lot to say in it about wrecks on that beach. One is kind of familiar to me: it says that a ship grounded off the beach and gradually went to pieces, releasing the wax. This is similar to what happed to the San Felipe. Wood from it must have come ashore also. The San Francisco Xavier was designed to carry 60 cannons, including 2 salvaged from the Concepcion's wreck at Saipan.
In my own tracking of the wax block I found, it had been deposited about 2 miles from the wreck area of the San Augustin at the high-high tide line against the base of a sand dune. It had evidently been released out of the sand in the bay, perhaps, in 2008. I have often considered walking around the base of the estero cliffs closest to the sea to see if there might be additional pieces there, but have so far not done so.
That newspaper article is full of inaccuracies and tries to tie the loss of the ship to the Chinese uprising of 1610.
ummm could be.
