Windlass on the L.R. Doty

In October of 1898, the wooden steamship L.R. Doty disappeared in Lake Michigan in a storm with seventy mile an hour winds and thirty foot waves. Her crew of 17 and two ship’s cats were lost.   A group of Wisconsin divers recently discovered the shipwreck , intact and upright, in 300 feet of water off the Milwaukee shore.

Sunken Treasure In Lake Michigan: Century-Old Ship

L. R. Doty Shipwreck Video Clip

Beachcomber stumbles upon historic shipwreck

Ray Midgett hunts the Corolla beaches on the Outer Banks of North Carolina almost every day.

“Beachcombing, or metal detecting, or relic hunting is in my blood,” said Midgett, a retired government worker who hits the sand between October and April.

“There are so many shipwrecks up here, it’s just beautiful.”

Midgett drives his pickup truck right onto the beach using the access road near the Currituck Beach Lighthouse. With a metal detector and shovel in tow, he’s uncovered everything from antique coins to wedding rings.

Yet his biggest discovery came in December when he located the remains of a historic shipwreck.

The wreckage, hidden under the sand for centuries, became fully exposed after a winter of brutal Nor’easters, making it the oldest shipwreck found off the coast of North Carolina.

But historians had to act fast to recover the ship, according to Meghan Agresto, site manager of the Currituck Beach Lighthouse.

Archaeologists originally thought the wreck could be the HMS Swift, a British Navy ship from the late 18th century that originally ran around in the southern Chesapeake Bay off Virginia’s coast.

The HMS Swift drifted to the Outer Banks, where it was looted once it hit shore, then disabled by the looters so it wouldn’t resurface.

After further examination of the ship’s 12-ton skeleton — complete with wooden peg fasteners — archaeologists determined that it was not the HMS Swift, but most likely a merchant’s ship dating to the mid- to late-1600s.

That makes it the oldest shipwreck found along the state’s coast.

“History is the one thing we have that has a reasonable amount of certainty attached to it,” said Joseph Schwarzer, director of North Carolina Maritime Museums. “It tells us where we’ve been, it tells us what’s happening, and it’s a directional sign for where you need to go next.”

Before the Corolla Beach discovery, the oldest shipwreck found along the state’s coast was Queen Anne’s Revenge, the presumed flagship of Blackbeard the pirate said to have run aground in 1718, according to the North Carolina Maritime Museums.

A Scandalous Star 

“When the packet ship, The Nancy, was wrecked off the Isles of Scilly in 1784 one of the victims included Ann Cargill, one of the most famous and highest paid Opera singers of the time and whose numerous affairs and elopements had scandalised London.”

Divers close in on lost fortune of Ann Cargill, a scandalous star
Divers believe that they have found one of Britain’s most romantic shipwrecks, reputedly laden with jewels owned by the wealthiest and most notorious actress and opera singer of her day.

When The Nancy was dashed to pieces off the Isles of Scilly in February 1784 the victims included Ann Cargill, a singer whose many affairs and elopements had scandalised London.

Her body was recovered a week after the sinking off the uninhabited island of Rosevear, with an infant – believed to be her illegitimate child – cradled in her arms. But neither The Nancy nor Mrs Cargill’s vast fortune in jewels and cash – amounting to at least £200,000, according to newspapers at the time – was ever found.