John Chatterton: The Shadow diver - December 2020 Immerse Yourself, with John Chatterton
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- čas přidán 15. 12. 2020
- Join John Chatterton, one of the world's most accomplished and well known wreck divers, to wrap up the Museum's 15-year anniversary!
John will talk about his past project working on the Golden Fleece shipwreck in the Dominican Republic. The search for the shipwreck is highlighted in the book, Pirate Hunters, by Robert Kurson.
For sure one of the top if not the best divers in the world. John Chatterton is a wealth of knowledge in the world of diving. I’ve had the privilege of diving with John and have gained so much knowledge from him in such a short period of time.
I have so much respect for you and Mattera for the kind of effort you put into this project. Your perseverance paid off.
I was introduced to this world when I read Perfect Storm. When I read Shadow Divers, I was just floored.
Now I've found this. Unfortunately
I have to come back to it because I have a Shitszu. He was bred for companionship and thats what he expects. Very hard to concentrate!
Will comment further when I watch it all, and he is sleeping!
One of my all time favorite books, I've never dived once in my life but this book sent me on a spiral of diving books and am now signing up for my first certification!
Beautiful book! Amazing just mind blowing! Couldn’t get enough of it!!!
Great book, nice to hear and see his description.
John, how can you be absolutely sure this is the Golden Fleece? I just finished the book and watched this video. Amazing, all of it. But, there was no iron clad proof this was indeed Bannister's ship.
Hi there! I forwarded this question to John, who provided the following answer:
This is a very good question!
Aside from the artifacts that were recovered and the general 17th Century appearance of the wreck, there is specific archival and physical evidence that led us to believe that this wreck was undoubtedly the Golden Fleece. What we learned from the wreck, matched the detailed historical record perfectly.
We were drawn to the exact location of the site, from a magnetometer survey we performed. After the battle in 1687, the British returned to the site a few weeks later to locate any remaining pirates, and to recover the cannons, and anchors they might have left behind. These were of significant value and removed, meaning that would not find these items on the wreck, which we ultimately did not, and it would be much harder to locate the wreck utilizing a magnetometer survey. We could not expect anything large to show up on the mag survey, but we did get several small hits we identified upon diving the hits as firelocks, which looked like pipes. The stocks, and steel trigger components were mostly lost to time, but we had the barrels and brass butt plates remaining.
When Captain, later Sir, William Phips went looking for the wreck of the Spanish Galleon Concepción, in 1687, it was only months after the sinking of the Golden Fleece, he noted in the log of his ship the James and Mary, that he had visited the site of the recent battle, and found the wreck of the Golden Fleece in 24 feet of water. He could look down into the water and see firelocks laying on the main deck of the wreck, "where the pirates had dropped them". He also noted that if he did not find the Concepción, he planned to return to the pirate wreck, and salvage what he could before returning home. Of course Phips did find Concepción, and never returned to Samaná. What we found more than 300 years later, in 24 feet of water, on top of the wreckage, was a half dozen or so, firelocks as described by Phips in 1687.
From the Taylor Manuscript at the National Library of Jamaica, there is a first person drawing of the battle, made by Englishman John Taylor and included in his manuscript on Colonial life. He claimed to have witnessed the battle. This can easily be found in late historian David Buisseret’s book, Jamaica in 1687, along with analysis of the drawing and Taylor’s personal notes on the battle. The drawing depicts the area’s geographical features that we can easily identify today as Cayo Vigia, Pigeon Island, and Punta Gorda. John Taylor also places all of the participant ships, as well as the Golden Fleece on his drawing, Where we eventually located the wreck, is exactly where Taylor drew it in 1687. The wreck is adjacent to the island of Cayo Vigia, and in the heavily overgrown area above the wreck we easily located dozens of cannon balls, some of them marked with the English Broad Arrow, identifying them as English cannon balls. As the wreck was excavated, more cannon balls were found in the water, as well as some tools of the trade for pirates, including a broadax, pistols, and a sword.
At the end of the two day battle, the British retreated, and the Golden Fleece suddenly exploded and caught fire. On the wreck, we found the wooden components of the hull on the periphery of the wreck to be charred, as one might expect.
I hope this answers your question.
JC
Just about finished Pirate Hunters book about all this. The commitment to find this wreck was great and how exciting to dig up the cannon balls! Awesome stuff.
I’m reading this book about this (Pirate Hunter’s) and just checked utube to see if there were any documentaries about “The Golden Fleece” because I’ve become very interested in this too. The book is wonderful and very exciting with many more details than the video. Bannister sounds like a real card, he bribed himself out of jail the second time when his ship had been de-masted & his crew got it ready “quietly” , he snuck onboard and off they went & weren’t seen until the second fort…..they nearly made it!!😢
Interesting video, thanks for sharing
I wish this was a movie
What I never understood when reading the book was why the name “Cayo Levantado” was considered solid evidence of a careening place when it only translates to “raised key.” That could very well and probably likely refers to its visibly within the bay.
The young lady host sounds like a gal I met on an Islamorada dive boat some years ago; former accountant who was working on her dive ratings.
Anyone know Uwe Rath here ?