Adventures of a Sea Hunter: In Search of Famous Shipwrecks

by James Delgado

  As Titanic’s lifeboats rowed towards Carpathia, the sun rose to reveal that rescuer and rescued were in the midst of a field of ice — it lay everywhere, from bergs 200 feet high to chunks “as big as a man’s fist” bobbing in the swell. Beesley said that when his boat rowed past a berg and alongside their rescuer, “We could read the Cunarder’s name— CARPATHIA — a name we are not likely ever to forget.” Another passenger, Colonel Archibald Gracie, reported that when he climbed up a ladder and into an open companionway hatch, he “felt like falling down on my knees and kissing the deck in gratitude for the preservation of my life.”

  As No. 2 lifeboat came alongside, the first to reach Carpathia, Titanic’s fourth officer, Joseph G. Boxhall, went to the bridge to report to Captain Rostron. Rostron knew the answer, but he asked Boxhall a “heartrending inquiry.” Had Titanic sunk? “Yes,” answered Boxhall, “she went down around 2:30.” His composure broke when Rostron asked how many people had been left aboard. “Hundreds and hundreds! Perhaps a thousand! Perhaps more! My God, sir, they’ve gone down with her. They couldn’t live in this icy water.” Rostron thanked the distraught officer and sent him below to get some coffee and warm up.

  By 8:00 a.m., Carpathia had taken aboard more than seven hundred of Titanic’s crew and passengers, many of them stunned by shock.

  As Carpathia stood by, Titanic’s survivors waited at the rails, looking out at the water. Husbands, fathers, sons — as well as women and children — would never return. Rostron held a service of thanksgiving for the saved and a memorial service for the lost, then left the scene of the disaster at 9:00 a.m., just as the Leyland Line’s Californian arrived to offer assistance. Ironically, Californian had been closer than Carpathia to Titanic, and her deck officers had seen the sinking liner’s distress signals — but the wireless operator had gone to bed so they had not received Titanic’s frantic calls for help.

  Carpathia headed for New York, her passengers divided by the gulf of the tragedy. Many of Titanic’s survivors kept to themselves. J. Bruce Ismay, chairman of the White Star Line, sequestered himself in Carpathia’s doctor’s cabin, refusing contact. His actions on Carpathia— and his survival when so many others had died — only reinforced the criticisms leveled against him in the aftermath of Titanic’s loss. Sadder yet, and perhaps more typical, was the reaction of two women who sat wrapped in blankets on Carpathia’s deck chairs, staring at the sea as a steward approached to ask if they wanted coffee. “Go away,” they answered. “We’ve just seen our husbands drown.”

  After running through a storm at sea, Carpathia arrived at New York, reaching Pier 54 at 8:00 p.m. A crowd of thirty thousand had gathered. The news of Titanic’s sinking was the focus of world attention. Wireless operators ashore had intercepted the distress calls, and Rostron had broadcast a brief message to the Associated Press, informing the world Titanic was gone, along with two-thirds of the people who had sailed in her.

  At the Cunard Pier, a clutch of anxious families and eager reporters stood by. After Carpathia’s own passengers disembarked, Titanic’s survivors filed off, many of them wearing clothes donated by Carpathia’s passengers and crew, some of the children dressed in makeshift smocks sewn from steamer blankets.

  The daring dash through the dark and ice-filled seas to rescue the survivors of Titanic earned world fame for Carpathia and her captain. Both received a number of awards — plaques, engraved silver cups and plate, and medals, many of them displayed in a special case aboard Carpathia. The ship returned to her regular run between New York and the Mediterranean, sailing again on April 20 to resume her interrupted voyage.

  CELTIC SEA: JULY 17, 1918

  The coming of war in 1914 disrupted Carpathia’s usual routes, and in 1915 she began running from Liverpool to New York and Boston. After leaving Liverpool with just fifty-seven passengers as part of a convoy on July 15, 1918, Carpathia’s luck finally ran out in the Celtic Sea as she left the British Isles. Just after midnight, in the early moments of July 17, the German submarine U-55 intercepted Carpathia with two torpedoes. The first ripped into the port side and the second went into the engine room. The blasts killed five of the ship’s firemen and injured two engineers. Dead in the water, Carpathia began to sink by the bow as the sea poured in. Captain William Prothero gave the order to “abandon ship” and fired distress rockets to warn the other ships in the convoy that a submarine was nearby.

  Carpathia’s passengers and the 218 surviving crew members climbed into the lifeboats as the ship sank. The U-boat surfaced and fired another torpedo into the ship to hurry the end, and Carpathia finally went under. The submarine was approaching the lifeboats when the armed sloop HMS Snowdrop hove into view and fired her deck guns to drive away U-55, then came about to pick up Carpathia’s survivors.

  At 12:40 a.m., Carpathia sank at a position that Snowdrop recorded as 49.25 N 10.25 W, off the southern coast of Ireland about 120 miles west of the famous Fastnet. The loss of the famous ship was one of many during the war and was overshadowed by the sinking of other liners, such as the well-known tragedy of Lusitania and the loss of Titanic’s sister ship Britannic in the Mediterranean. But the memory of the gallant liner never faded. Her former captain, Arthur Rostron, eulogized Carpathia in 1931: “It was a sorry end to a fine ship … She had done her bit both in peace and war, and she lies in her natural element, resting her long rest on a bed of sand.”

  THE SEARCH FOR CARPATHIA

  Exactly where Carpathia rested spurred the efforts of many shipwreck hunters, particularly Clive Cussler, the famous author whose bestseller Raise the Titanic had launched not only the fictional career of Dirk Pitt of the National Underwater and Marine Agency (NUMA), but also fueled Clive’s real-life NUMA and its quest, funded largely by his book royalties, to search for famous shipwrecks. Carpathia was high on Clive’s list of ships to find, and in 1999, when John Davis of Eco-Nova Productions proposed a television series based on Clive’s book The Sea Hunters, they chose Carpathia as the first wreck to look for. When The Sea Hunters crew was assembled, I had the good fortune to be selected as Clive’s co-host for the show and as the team’s archeologist, joining veteran diver Mike Fletcher.

  The search for Carpathia was more daunting than it sounds, because the general location of Carpathia’s loss was a U-boat killing ground during two world wars, and hundreds of sunken vessels lay on the seabed. It would take systematic searching and as comprehensive a survey as possible to try to find Carpathia.

  Under NUMA’S sponsorship, British explorer Graham Jessop mounted a search for Carpathia. In September 1999, he thought that he had discovered the wreck in 600 feet of water, 185 miles west of Land’s End, England, but bad weather drove off his ship before he could verify the discovery by sending down underwater cameras. When Jessop later returned to the site, he found that it was not Carpathia. A dinner plate lying on the sand, marked with the crest of the Hamburg-America Line, was one of several clues that finally identified the wreck as Hamburg-America’s Isis, lost in a storm in November 1936. Only one of the crew, a cabin boy, survived the sinking.

  * * *

  Mike Fletcher headed out to sea in May 2000 for another try at finding Carpathia. He watched the side-scan sonar pen trace black-and-white images of the ocean floor. At the same time, he also checked a magnetometer as it scanned the seabed for a large metallic object — like a sunken ship. After a month of surveying, slowly running straight lanes in what ocean searchers call “mowing the lawn,” he felt that at last the survey was narrowing down where Carpathia should be.

  Finally, on May 22, 2000, as Mike watched the side-scan sonar and magnetometer, he was rewarded by the ghostly outline of a sunken ship in profile, rising clear of the bottom, and by the shadowy image of it from reflected sound waves. But the weather was getting bad, and again there was no opportunity to drop in a camera to take a look at the wreck up close. The wreck was the right size for Carpathia and was in the right spot, just a few miles from where Snowdrop had placed it. However, The Sea Hunters
kept the news under wraps until we could mount a second expedition to confirm the facts. “You don’t know till you go” is tried and true wisdom in the difficult task of shipwreck identification.

  In September, John Davis of Eco-Nova headed for England to visit the wreck we all hoped was that of Carpathia. Nine days later, John and his team set out in the teeth of a storm. Working under difficult conditions, they were able to deploy a remotely operated vehicle with a camera to dive down to the wreck and capture four hours of video. With the precious footage in hand, John flew to Halifax, to meet with the rest of the team.

  * * *

  John, Mike, Clive and I all gather in the theater of the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic, after hours, as the guests of its director, Michael Moore. The large-screen television in front of us the center of attention as John Davis takes the videotape out of his bag (he has already made a copy in case something goes wrong) and pops it into the machine. I’m ready, leaning forward, with photos of Carpathia and the ship’s plans spread out before me. After more than two decades of shipwreck hunting, diving and research, I’m still as excited as a child at Christmas by a new discovery. So is everyone else.

  We watch as the ROV moves across a mottled sand and gravel bottom. Then, suddenly, coming out of the dark gloom, we see a propeller. It is covered with encrustations of marine life, but the outline is clear: three blades, one buried in the sand, attached to a shaft that is braced by a strut that comes out of the hull. So far so good — it’s the right shape, has the right number of blades and is off-center, showing that it is one of two propellers that should be on either side of the rudder.

  The ROV swings around, looking up at the hull that curves out from the keel. Then it turns, and we see the rudder, still attached to the sternpost. As John freezes the video frame, we study the ship’s plans and match the rudder — its shape, fastenings and size — to them. Just beyond the rudder, we spot the second propeller. As I watch the screen, I think of how fast those propellers were spinning in the early morning hours of April 15, 1912—faster than they ever had either before or after — on that heroic dash to aid Titanic. Carpathia’s engineers and captain pushed her so hard that the hull rattled and shook—“she was excited as we were,” said one engine-room hand.

  The ROV climbs the stern, which has a very distinctive shape. There is no mistaking it, and the curving lines before us match what until now we had seen only on black-and-white photos taken in a bygone age. Moments like this remind all of us how privileged we are to relive history, as stories and faded photographs come to life. The ROV is on the deck now, and a pair of davits for a lifeboat comes into view. They are in the right place to help confirm that this is Carpathia, but even as I note that technical fact, my mind is back at Titanic, looking at her empty davits.

  Our first disappointment comes when the ROV encounters a mass of wreckage where the superstructure once was. We were hoping the superstructure was not damaged, but it is gone. The ROV passes over an intact bronze porthole lying on the deck, its glass unbroken. After marine organisms consumed the wood that held this porthole in place, then it fell free to lie where we see it. We go back and forth as the robot traverses the deck, revealing fallen bulkheads and electrical wire, broken glass and ship’s hardware. Carpathia’s deckhouses and bridge have collapsed, and I think of those plaques and awards, now buried beneath tons of rusting steel.

  The ROV moves off the deck and follows the hull, whose steel plates are torn and mangled, but it is hard to say if the damage came from the torpedoes that struck the ship or from the red-hot boilers exploding as the cold sea flooded them. Gradually, it becomes clear that we’re looking at damage from a torpedo that struck Carpathia on the starboard side. The ROV does not completely survey the port side, but another hole, perhaps from the first torpedo hit, shows up near the area of the vanished bridge. It’s a sad moment as we inspect these wounds of a long-ago war.

  When the ROV’S lights pick out a row of portholes along the hull, I am struck again by a voice from the past, recalling Lawrence Beesley’s description of watching from one of Titanic’s lifeboats as the lights blazing from Carpathia’s portholes signaled that help had at last arrived. The ROV climbs back to the deck and passes the steam winches of Carpathia’s forward cargo cranes — there is no doubt now, as we look at their position next to the No. 1 cargo hold, that this is Carpathia. But forward of the hold, the bow is in bad shape, and it is clear that the liner’s final plunge was bow first — like Titanic’s. But instead of falling thousands of feet into the depths, Carpathia sank in water shallower than her own length: the 558-foot ship went down in 514 feet of water. Her bow hit the bottom — hard — before her stern left the surface. It is ironic to see that Carpathia, while not torn in two like Titanic, is in worse shape than the liner she had once rushed to help.

  The videotape is nearing the end now, and as we gaze into the murk, John Davis points out the most interesting discovery of all. There, lying on the bottom near the hull, half buried in the sand, is the ship’s bell. It is a riveting sight. We strain our eyes to see if we can make out if the name is there, but marine growth has covered the bell’s surface. More details are filled in: Carpathia’s fallen stack lies off her starboard side, with the ship’s brass whistles lying flat in the sand nearby, and debris blown out of the hull by the blasts is scattered over the seabed. Later, a group of British technical divers descend to the wreck and find some of the ship’s dishes, which they say have the Cunard crest on them.

  To confirm that this is Carpathia, I look for ten exact matches between the wreck and the ship’s plans. Not only is this ship the right size but her decks are laid out exactly like those on Carpathia’s plans. The position of the deck gear, the single stack, the twin screws at the stern, are also identical — and then there’s the torpedo damage and the fact that the ship sank bow first. The excitement of the discovery and confirmation that this other important part of Titanic’s story has come to light is on all our minds as the tape ends.

  In the morning, we will announce the news of the discovery, and once again Carpathia’s name will flash through the airwaves and appear on the front page. My hope, as I look at the fleeting images from the bottom of the sea, is that people in the modern, fast-paced world we now live in will remember the tragedy that led to Carpathia’s fame and the special mettle of her officers and crew who, despite the dangers, acted in the best traditions of the sea. In the days that follow, we are not disappointed. Carpathia again dominates the world’s stage, if only briefly, as we prepare for more sea hunting.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CATHERINE THE GREAT’S LOST ART

  OFF FINLAND: OCTOBER 4, 1771

  Reynoud Lorentz and his ship Vrouw Maria were in serious trouble. The ship was stuck fast on a rock, and from where Lorentz stood near the stern, he could hear water pouring into the hold. Everywhere he looked, he saw more rocks surrounding the ship like giant teeth waiting to devour her. Vrouw Maria was already badly damaged, and the violent surf threatened to overwhelm the efforts of the crew, who strained at the pumps to try to keep the flooding down. Panicked, the men shouted up at Lorentz, demanding that he give the order to abandon ship. Better to save their own lives than the cargo, they argued. Lorentz did not want to leave his cargo behind, particularly not this cargo. The narrow stack of crates in the hold, loaded quietly on the dock in Amsterdam, was far too precious. But, in the end, he conceded that it was time to go.

  The voyage that was now foundering along with Vrouw Maria had begun on August 12, 1771, as workers began to load her with cargo for St. Petersburg. On September 5, as a strong southwest wind filled the sails, Vrouw Maria raised anchor and headed out to sea, “in the name of God,” as Lorentz wrote in the logbook. Heavy winds and stormy weather battered the tiny ship as she made her way up the North Sea, passing Jutland in a driving rainstorm. Finally, on the morning of September 23, Vrouw Maria anchored off the Danish port of Elsinore, where all ships running through Danish waters had to stop and pay cus
toms duty.

  The records of the custom house list Vrouw Maria’s cargo as sugar, “Brazil wood,” cotton, cambric, calico, linen, zinc, cheese, paper, indigo, mercury, butter and other items — a nondescript array that would hopefully fetch a good price in the Russian winter capital. No mention was made of the ship’s “special cargo,” a shipment for the Russian Imperial Court. Its presence on Vrouw Maria may have been a secret, or, as Finnish historian Christian Ahlstro m has noted, because royal shipments were usually exempt from customs duties, it simply may have not been listed by the Danish authorities.

  Heading up the Baltic towards the Gulf of Finland, Vrouw Maria sailed into a storm on the September 30. For the next three days, the ship beat through heavy seas and rain. Lorentz did not realize that Vrouw Maria, drifting in the storm, was off course. Then, on the evening of October 3, the ship hit a submerged rock. The collision brought Vrouw Maria to a sudden stop, and Lorentz wrote in the ship’s log that “at first we thought that we would sink when a high wave lifted us.” As she drifted along, the ship hit another rock: “We struck hard and lost our rudder and part of the stern.” Leaking badly, Vrouw Maria drifted off again, and the crew anchored her. Every man took a turn at the pumps to try and get rid of the water that was rapidly filling the ship. They pumped all night, but by the early morning, the storm was still blowing and the crew was exhausted. “Since we could not continue pumping and save the ship and its cargo,” said Lorentz, he gave order to abandon ship.

  Crowded into a small dinghy, the crew rowed over to a small island, not much bigger than a rock, and spent a cold night. When help arrived the next morning, Lorentz and his men learned that they were stranded off the southern coast of Finland in the Turko Archipelago, a maze of twenty thousand islets, islands and rocks. The ship, surprisingly, was still afloat, though there was little chance of saving her as the decks were close to the water. But some of the cargo might be saved, so Lorentz ordered the crew back to Vrouw Maria. For the next three days, they worked the pumps to keep the rising water in the hold from swamping the ship. The sugar cargo was certainly ruined; when Lorentz tasted the water pouring out of the pumps as the men labored, it was sweet. His dismay deepened when each stroke of the pumps brought up gouts of coffee beans. The crates, bundles, bags and boxes in the flooded hold were banging and bumping around, and breaking up.