Wrecking (shipwreck)
From Free net encyclopedia
- For other uses, see Wrecking (disambiguation)
Wrecking is the practice of taking valuables from a shipwreck which has foundered near or close to shore.
This practice is often illegal and equivalent to looting. In the United Kingdom, in many cases, the ship and cargo remain the property of the original owners and all salvaged articles must be reported to the Receiver of Wreck so that ownership can be determined.
In some cases ships were deliberately lured into danger; for example by faking the signals from lighthouses, so that the ship was wrecked and the cargo could be plundered. Wrecking is no longer economically significant, however as recently as the 19th century in some parts of the world it was the mainstay of many otherwise economically marginal coastal communities.
Wrecking was well known in Cornwall, England, where the rocky coastline, strong prevailing onshore winds and (sometimes) the display of false lights led many ships to disaster. Rather than helping shipwrecked sailors, the wreckers often murdered and stripped them of their possessions, for example Sir Cloudesley Shovell. The ships themselves were looted for their cargoes.
Wrecking was a major industry in the Florida Keys for much of the 19th Century. The Keys and, to a lesser extent, the east coast of the peninsula of Florida, were the site of numerous shipwrecks from the beginning of the 16th Century, as Spanish ships returning from the New World used the Gulf Stream, which passes through the Straits of Florida, to speed them to Spain. After the United States acquired the Louisiana Purchase, development of the Mississippi Valley greatly increased trade, making the Florida Straits one of the most heavily used shipping lanes in the world. While Florida was still a possession of Spain, wreckers from the Bahamas started salvaging wrecks in the Keys and along the Florida coast, taking the salvaged ships and cargos to Nassau for auction. After Florida was acquired by the United States, Key West, Florida was established as a port of entry, and Congress prohibited the carrying of any wrecked ships or cargos to foreign ports. Many of the Bahamian wreckers moved to the Keys and continued their trade. A report for the middle of the 19th Centtury reported the following statistics for wrecked vessels brought to auction in Key West:
Year Vessels Value Salvage 1845 29 $725,000 $92,691 1846 26 731,000 69,600 1847 37 1,624,000 109,000 1848 41 1,282,000 125,800 1849 46 1,305,000 127,870
Wrecking is the subject of Daphne du Maurier's novel Jamaica Inn.
There have been some deep-water wrecking operations in the past. Perhaps the most famous example is that of the Central Intelligence Agency-Howard Hughes Glomar Explorer, which successfully brought portions of a sunken Soviet Union submarine back to the ocean surface.
See also
References
- Bathurst, Bella. The Lighthouse Stevensons. Harper Perennial, 1999. ISBN 0060932260.
- Dean, Love. 1982. Reef Lights: Seaswept Lighthouses of the Florida Keys. The Historic Key West Preservation Board. ISBN 0-943528-03-8.