16th Century Wreck filled with Jade, Coins, and History

Deep Blue Marine Underwater Recovery thinks they uncovered a wreck of the Dominican Republic that sank not long after Columbus “Discovered” America.

The wreck has been tentatively named after the Captain of the ship that found it: “Rawson’s Wreck.” Locals have secretly known Rawson’s Wreck, but it is thought that the actual discovery of this wreck by other treasure hunters was hindered by its close proximity to a sunken German Steel-Hulled wreck. Deep Blue Marine feels any previous sweeps of the area that set off magnetometers would have been attributed to the German wreck and not investigated. It wasn’t until they moved the mast of that German ship that they were able to pinpoint the artifacts under the sand with there own metal detectors.
 
It is though that most artifacts have settled deep into the sand, but Deep Blue Marine reports “simply moving the sand between the coral and rock fissures, we have found silver coins, silver discs with imprinted seals, indigenous stone figurines, small pieces of gold jewelry, and other artifacts such as stone cannon balls and small iron balls covered with lead.  Additionally, we have found a 5-link iron chain (encrusted with sulfides) that was used to support the boat rigging.  At this point we are quite certain that this ship went down sometime in the middle of the 16th century as most of the coins appear to have been minted in the original Mexico City mint prior to 1550.”

My favorite detail from this story is how they determined that the ship sank in a Hurricane. “While the prevailing winds in this area typically blow from east to west, hurricane winds are quite the opposite and blow from west to east.  The position of the ballast stones and the artifacts on this site suggest that the ship blew in from west to east, as would happen in a hurricane.”

As they search deeper into the sand, I can’t wait to hear what else they find. Hopefully they will continue to uncover treasures and stories of early European exploration. And continue to excite us all with what can be discovered as we dive under the surface of the sea.