Wreck and Rescue at Gunwalloe

Wreck & Rescue at Gunwalloe: Protected Wrecks | Wreck-related remains | Shipwreck rescue | 3D models

Gunwalloe’s Three ‘Protected Wrecks’

1 St Anthony, PW 1000067; Portuguese carrack, wrecked 1527, Fishing Cove, Gunwalloe

The Site and its Discovery

Discoveries of copper ingots at Fishing Cove led to investigation by diver Michael Hall and maritime historian and diver Richard Larn. The site was identified as wreckage from the royal Portuguese ship St Anthony, and was designated a PW in 1982. The ship was wrecked and many of her people drowned in 1527, on route from Antwerp to Lisbon. She carried a rich cargo, contested in the courts after the wreck; a history revealed in 1968 by John Chynoweth, descendant of one of the officers dealing with the disputes at the time.

Through licensed diving and research on the PW by Anthony Randall in the mid-1980s, many artefacts were recovered and identified, including remarkable little lion-shaped supporters for the base of a splendid brass candlestick.

No undisturbed remains of the ship itself are known. As recorded in 1527, the ship struck at Porth Lingey, or Hingey ─ Hingey is a nearby farm, site of an ancient hamlet. This is probably the old Cornish name for Fishing Cove, re-named in English when its seine fishery was established. The seabed here has been mostly buried in sand since 1988. Search of a ‘new’ area in 2007 found scattered traces, rather than a coherent wreck site.

The Story of the Wreck

This wreck has rare detailed documentation due to the disputes over the salvage. St Anthony was a 3 or 4 masted ‘carrack’, flagship of a fleet commanded by Antonio Pacheo for John (Joao) III of Portugal. Besides the ingots there were jewels, suits of armour, cloth, linen, musical and navigational instruments, candlesticks, and artillery, with pitch, tar, and other goods. Cannons of bronze and iron were also aboard to arm the ship.

When the anchors failed to hold in a foul gale, on January 19th 1527, the master deliberately made for Loe Bar beach, but the ship struck a hidden reef, turned broadside on to the waves, and was pounded to pieces. Forty-five men, half the crew, managed to reach the shore. Goods were salvaged by the survivors and local people, but were fiercely contested.

The Portuguese claimed that local gentry Godolphin, St Aubyn and Milliton robbed them violently, with drawn swords and armed retinues. The three Cornish lords maintained they were sent for to prevent embezzlement of goods, and negotiated and paid for the salvage rights. Enquiries followed, and the case went to the Court of the Star Chamber. Records of the ruling were lost in the Civil War, but John Chynoweth found that the Cornish lords gained greatly, while Henry VIII ensured some return of goods or their value to Portugal.

Salvage recorded later in the 16th century included bronze guns (two went to Pendennis Castle), and, 50 years after the wreck, a silver pipe and chain weighing 1lb. Tradition attributes to the wreck the wooden screen that once embellished Gunwalloe Church.

Heritage of the St Anthony

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Acknowledgements

Sources of information used, which also give further details;

Photographs

The view is almost filled by a broad zone of white surf. The shelving sands above are lined by white foam. Cliffs run away behind into the grey sky. Bits of sand are flying in the air. Surf at Fishing Cove pounding over the remains of the ‘St Anthony’, shot by Anthony Randall who explored and researched the wreck some 40 years ago (in the 1980s).

The torch beam highlights the ornamental screen panels as part of the exploration of their origins. The panels form the base of the dark painted door set in the whitewashed north wall. Cornish church historian Jo Mattingly at the project event in Gunwalloe Church. Jo is highlighting part of the church screen attributed to the St Anthony wreck, built into a door ─ with the help of a divers’ torch from Kevin Camidge of CISMAS.

John Allan is pointing up to a cut in the masonry inside the church, high on the north side of the most easterly of the granite pointed arches between the nave and the aisle, on the former line of the screen. The cut, perhaps as long as a forearm, is partly in the head of the arch and partly in the wall above that. It slants out towards the west, as the rood loft did. There is a corresponding rougher cut trimming back the granite at the springing of the same arch. Fellow church archaeology specialist John Allan of Exeter shares observations of marks where the Gunwalloe Church screen once stood. The screen may have been paid for by the extraordinary rich salvage from the 1527 wreck of the St Anthony.

The candlestick is golden, polished brass. It is highly ornamental, with a splayed base and a broad top with crenelations like a turret around the candle spike. The three small stylised lions holding up its round base have engraved detail representing manes and sleepy faces.

Anthony Randall’s photo of an ornamental candlestick with lion supporters at the base, the lions closely resembling others he found at the wreck of the St Anthony.

The finds lie on a white sheet in natural light as if spread on the clifftop after landing. They look clean and sharp, especially the half-round ingot with its silver shine.

Artefacts from the St Anthony including silver ingot and two brass candlestick parts; found by diving and photographed after landing by Anthony Randall.

2 Schiedam, PW 1000049; Dutch flute, wrecked 1684, Jangye-ryn, Gunwalloe

The Site and its Discovery

Anthony Randall found nine iron guns at Jangye-ryn in 1971. Over the next decade, he dived here with a team, initially Roy Davis, Michael Hall, Richard Larn, Peter McBride, Kenneth Simpson, Michael Stevens and Ian Spooner. The wreck was identified, from the style of its guns, with the notorious loss of the English prize Schiedam sailing from Tangier.

The site was designated a PW in 1982. Licensed diving continued when the ever-shifting sand and gravel revealed the wreckage. In 1982, for example, divers could discern 3 guns. Two small excavations were made through loose material to reach the concreted remains, and several pewter artefacts were found. In 1983 even less was visible. In 1984, though, the team could see a dozen guns, and used a datum line, fixed daily among the gullies and reefs, to start measuring in these ‘landmarks’ of an ever-changing site.

Many artefacts have been recovered, among them cannons, pewter and copper kitchen ware, bronze castings, grenades, worked marble, and some timbers and other organic material preserved in sand. In 2026 licensed divers David Gibbins and the late Mark Milburn found 3 half-hundredweight bronze merchant’s weights, bearing the arms of Portugal, attributed to the Portuguese occupation of Tangier and dated to c1500. David recovered the weights in 2020 for conservation, publication and display (forthcoming).

The Story of the Wreck

Schiedam was a fluyt or merchantman of c400 tons from Hoorn in Holland. Sailing in the Mediterranean in 1683, she was seized by a Corsair frigate. Ten days later she was taken again, by the English ship, James Galley, whose captain was Sir Cloudesley Shovel (later wrecked and drowned on Scilly). The James’ log, transcribed by Anthony Randall, notes ‘This morning about ½ an hour past 5 a Clocke, we see a Saile Bere N W b W off us….we ffetcht upon her hoping her to be a Priz ….at 11 a Clock we Came up with her it is a flyboat off 400 Tun: Callid ye Groette Scherdam van Horn….’

The English took their prize to Tangier, acquired by Charles II in 1661 but now being evacuated as indefensible. Samuel Pepys was there, making valuations for compensation purposes. Schiedam served as a water carrier, then sailed to England with material stripped from Tangier, and a large ship’s company, and horses. The heavy load may have been a factor when she struck at Gunwalloe on April 4th. Her people survived, but with much distress. A group of caulkers, petitioning the King for unpaid wages, had ‘lost their Clothes, Tools, and other things then on Board’. The horses sadly were lost too, with much cargo, although a Richard Sampson salvaged some gear and guns in the aftermath.

Heritage of the Schiedam

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Acknowledgements

Sources of information used, which also give further details;

Photographs

The appeal 'To the King's most Excellent Majesty' is written in a flowing, accomplished hand on behalf of Henry Dale and six other named caulkers. It refers to their 'Extraordinary Service at Tangier in working night and day for the demolishing thereof.' Anthony Randall’s record of the petition to the King from a Master Caulker, Henry Dale, one of the distressed survivors of the Schiedam, requesting payment of lost wages.

Despite the low tide, Jangye-ryn beach in the foreground is hidden, covered by masses of creamy foam piled in by the wind. On the Schiedam wreck site beyond, sharp black rocks rise from the white surf. Rough sea on the Schiedam site; from licensed diver David Roberts’ 2009 report.

The diver is looking down at a cannon bearing red and amber coloured seaweed. The yellow rim of the diver’s mask, and a swarm of white bubbles around it, stand out against their dark scuba suit and the opaque turquoise water. Schiedam Gun 1, one of a dozen cannon ‘landmarks’ on the wreck site, courtesy of the late Mark Milburn.

The gun is lying with its ribbed barrel facing towards us and tapering swivel end behind. The iron fabric is rough but appears well-preserved, perhaps newly blacked. A scale indicates it is approximately a metre long. One of the Schiedam swivel guns with 50cm scale; photo from Historic England archives.

The three objects are lying close together showing different sides. The light in the old photo, although not ideal for the purpose, catches the gouge marks one corner of the Schiedam pot to the right, which help distinguish it from the others. The pots are very similar, but it seems the central one is slightly larger and that on the left lacks lugs. Lead vessels from ‘Hollandia’ and ‘Schiedam’. Photo courtesy of Anthony Randall.

This upper surface of the plate has an enhanced, ridged edge, and a broad rim. The rim bears a coat of arms featuring an anchor engraved to one side, and opposite this across the plate, a row of four different small stamped symbols. The knife marks in the centre are quite fine but fairly numerous. The scale shows the plate is about 24cm in diameter. Pewter plate with knife scoring as well as maker’s marks and crest. Photo courtesy of Anthony Randall.

A round bell with a slit opening and some engraved lettering and patterning worn by the sea. A scale shows it is less than 5cm across. Small bell for horse harness, to warn of approach. Photo courtesy of Anthony Randall.

The plan is oriented to the north. Several broad ragged bands of reefs run across the site north east to south west. Sixteen cannon or parts of them are plotted, mostly between the reefs. Twenty areas shaded different colours represent areas of archaeological features or concretions and/or excavations plotted at different times. A key shows how the 6 different shades relate to specific phases of work in the 1980s and 1990s. The scale indicates an area around 32m across overall. Schiedam survey of 2004, produced 2005, by Wessex Archaeology; incorporating plans made by Anthony Randall in several phases (coloured).

President, or ‘Loe Bar Wreck’, PW 1000076; English East Indiaman, wrecked 1684, Loe Bar

The Site and its Discovery

Scattered iron objects including guns and an anchor were found here in 1998. The cannons are of 17th century type, and the remains are attributed to the recorded loss on Loe Bar of the President, an English ‘East Indiaman’ or large 3-masted well-armed merchant ship designed for sailing to and from southern Asia. The President was built in 1671, and wrecked in 1684 on a homeward voyage. The site was Designated a PW in 1999, as a rare seventeenth-century Indiaman shipwreck.

Another British East Indiaman, the Trial, lost in 1622 on an uncharted reef off the north coast of what is now Western Australia ─ then unknown to the English ─ is Australia’s oldest protected wreck.

The site is on the rocky seabed 10-11 metres deep, swept by surge from the offshore swell which shifts material away or covers it in sand and shingle up to 3 to 4 metres thick.

Nevertheless, notable finds include one of the guns discovered in 1998 which had a wooden tampion still in its muzzle. A deposit that seemed to have flowed over the rock between the guns was sampled, and found to contain manganese oxide, apparently derived from some source on the vessel.

Smaller items are known to survive on site too, in gullies in the rock. In 2012, for example, licensed divers David Roberts, Des Glover and Chris Cattlin could see the ship’s sounding lead, wedged between rocks.

The Story of the Wreck

Documentary evidence shows that the President carried an extremely valuable cargo, including spices, indigo, 100 tons of pepper, and a small quantity of diamonds. It was stated that ‘On the Sunday immediately following, in Sermon-Time, the People of the next Town first heard of the Wreck, whereupon with one consent they ran out from their Devotion to the Spoil, leaving the Parson to Preach to the bare Walls. The Company sent down several Persons to recover what they could; which was scarce enough to pay for their Journey. The vessel nevertheless was of very rich Lading, being modestly judged of no less than a hundred thousand pound Fraight; of the Companies; beside what belong’d to private Persons, with much Jewish Treasure of Pearl and Diamonds.’

This account mentions several customs relating to ships’ cargo and to wrecks. Crew and passengers would carry, for their own gain, goods sometimes of high value not included in cargo lists, about their person or in their quarters on board. And on the coast where wrecks occurred, most of the local population, or ‘country people’ as they were called in contemporary reports, would take part in salvaging and ‘cellaring’ (storing) goods.

Local people might seize and conflict over wreckage; conceal and use cargo themselves; consume spoilable goods like oranges; and trade valuable finds away. This might be exaggerated, though, by owners and other parties, in the complex play of wreck rights and disputes. Local people also secured finds on behalf of owners’ agents, or gave them up in return for compensation. Moreover, they saved lives from wrecks, even at great risk or loss of their own. After seeing the deadly destruction in 1807 of HMS Anson also on Loe Bar, Henry Trengouse of Helston drove the invention of rescue equipment used into modern times to save thousands of lives around the coast.

Heritage of the President

You can explore through a ‘Wreck and Rescue’ 3D model:

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Acknowledgements

Sources of information used, which also give further details;

Photographs

The cannon lies on sand and low slabs of reef on the seabed. It is angled like the one in Figure 16, with its muzzle facing us and its swivel at the far end. Unlike that other gun it seems at first almost organic, with low clumps of green seaweed and white encrustations.

Swivel gun at the wreck of the President, c2011, in a 2012 dive report by licensee David Roberts. Our Schiedam section above shows a photo of a similar gun recovered by divers, and one of the Schiedam 3D models is of a concreted gun from the beach near that site.

The lead appears to be a long cylinder. Like the cannon in the figure above, it lies on sand among stone slabs and is effectively camouflaged with a coat of white and green seaweed.

Sounding lead of the President, 2012; David Roberts’ 2012 dive report.

The photo is blurry with spray in the air. It shows the sea filled with breakers, crashing on a sequence of dark headlands. In the distance is a group of white houses on the outskirts of Porthleven.

President wreck site in rough wintry sea, 2012; David Roberts’ 2012 dive report.

Wreck & Rescue at Gunwalloe: Protected Wrecks | Wreck-related remains | Shipwreck rescue | 3D models