Wallowing in memories

[Blak bart]

Yes sir... that mind set is still strong in the islanders here. Nothing is wasted....I used to drag a magnet across our property in andros....always thrilled to get a handful of nails...straight ones were used sometimes immediately. Bent nails would be used as fishing sinkers....lead was almost a precious metal in the islands. Today I use much of the nautical pieces I find in my art and driftwood furniture. We also have a thrift type store across the street... they take all manor of nautical items on consignment...much of it stripped from wrecks and resold. The name of this used marine store is "mother ocean" he has a whole group of wreckers bringing him goods. When he sells your stuff he calls and you can go and pick up your money less his comission....10% for me...but I'm sure each wrecker/picker/beachcomber cuts there own deal and percentage. It is a bustling store with a high turnover of goods. Great stuff can be had at pennies on the dollar.View attachment 1929842
Here is an example of my wrecker/beachcombing art. All the port holes were dove up in the bahamas or keys, all the wood is from beachcombing, and all the copper nails and hardware was scavenged from wrecks and recycled, and all the rope and boys were beachcombed....just need some mirrors behind the portholes !!

 

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[Blak bart]

 

[Oceanscience]

Nice! I like this kind of decorations for my beach house. Where is that shop?

 

[Oceanscience]

[FONT=&quot]Riga and the masts
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[FONT=&quot]During the war of 1812, the frigate USS CONSTITUTION fought a fierce battle with the HMS JAVA, of the coast of Brazil. The HMS JAVA lost. The USS Constitution suffered some damage and returned to the US for a refit.
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]The HMS JAVA surrendered after all her masts went down, was burned, blown up and sank. It has been said, that the USS CONSTITUTION won the battle because she was built stronger (old ironside). Her masts suffered some damage, but could be “fished”.
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[FONT=&quot]The masts of the USS CONSTITUTION were made of Hemlock. The masts of the HMS JAVA a former French ship, were made of Riga Pine, like most masts of the French navy of the time.
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]When I went down that “rabbit hole”, I discovered some interesting information about European ship building.
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[FONT=&quot]It seems that most of the masts came from the Baltic, mostly Riga. The same about ropes and sails. More surprising even, many of the ships were entirely built on the Baltic.
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[FONT=&quot]Here is an example: When the Dutch fleet (with Piet Heyn) conquered the harbor and town of San Salvador in 1624, they captured 3 Portuguese or Spanish galleons and found these had been built in Stralsund on the Baltic.
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[FONT=&quot]In 1625 a joint Spanish and Portuguese fleet recaptured the town.
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[FONT=&quot]In 1627, Piet Heyn returned to San Salvador. This time he did not conquer the town. He only took the ships in the harbor. Then he sailed to Cuba, where he captured the Spanish treasure fleet in Matanzas.
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Sailing up the Florida Strait he is supposed to have lost 2 or more (Marx says 5) ships of his fleet. Possibly the “Lucaya wreck” might be one to these ships.
[/FONT]
[FONT=&quot]Now let’s consider looking for these shipwrecks.
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[FONT=&quot]Where they Spanish or possibly even Portuguese ships?
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[FONT=&quot]Were these ships built on the Baltic? It seems there is a good possibility for that.
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[FONT=&quot]Ballast from Portugal or Spain is different from ballast from the Baltic.
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[FONT=&quot]Dutch shipwrecks of that time period often had galley stoves built of yellow bricks.
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[FONT=&quot]Spain and Portugal used red bricks.
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[FONT=&quot]Spain and Portugal used Olive Jars.
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[FONT=&quot]Dutch used Bellarmine Jars, I never saw an olive jar on a Dutch shipwreck.
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[Blak bart]

Well thats very interesting and I do have some experience with the Bella marine jugs !! But again there is much to discuss....first let me try and find a pic of one of several bellamarine jugs found here at one location in the keys...these have so far all been found whole, and intact. Now at a second location I've found fragments and pieces. Both locations would have been known to heyn I believe. In both areas ancient water wells exsited and were used by sailing vessels. So the first site has signs of a wreck and is being surveyed with a magnetometer in a lease area from the state of florida....permitted lease box. So of coarse we are always wondering and researching the Dutch presence in the keys....there is the faintest foot prints of a Dutch presence here in certain areas. Im almost certain that heyn and other Dutch at least watered here on there passages by. Could there be a Dutch wreck of heyns in the keys !!?? Well I also think at certain times bellamarine jugs would have been inter mixed in trading at times of peace, and times of strong Dutch power in the carribean...certainly pirates and buccaneers would have taken and used all manor of goods. In the keys we just can't rule out anything being a possibility as all types of vessels and every nation scraped bottom on our reefs...from the lowliest wreckers, pirates, turtelers, and fisherman....to the most royal of treasure galleons !! I must break for church and come back to this later...I will find pics of the BART MAN jugs(bellamarine). I like that they are also called bartman jugs...sounds like I invented them or something...haaa haaa ha lol !! Be back later.

 

[WRECKING]

Well thats very interesting and I do have some experience with the Bella marine jugs !! But again there is much to discuss....first let me try and find a pic of one of several bellamarine jugs found here at one location in the keys...these have so far all been found whole, and intact. Now at a second location I've found fragments and pieces. Both locations would have been known to heyn I believe. In both areas ancient water wells exsited and were used by sailing vessels. So the first site has signs of a wreck and is being surveyed with a magnetometer in a lease area from the state of florida....permitted lease box. So of coarse we are always wondering and researching the Dutch presence in the keys....there is the faintest foot prints of a Dutch presence here in certain areas. Im almost certain that heyn and other Dutch at least watered here on there passages by. Could there be a Dutch wreck of heyns in the keys !!?? Well I also think at certain times bellamarine jugs would have been inter mixed in trading at times of peace, and times of strong Dutch power in the carribean...certainly pirates and buccaneers would have taken and used all manor of goods. In the keys we just can't rule out anything being a possibility as all types of vessels and every nation scraped bottom on our reefs...from the lowliest wreckers, pirates, turtelers, and fisherman....to the most royal of treasure galleons !! I must break for church and come back to this later...I will find pics of the BART MAN jugs(bellamarine). I like that they are also called bartman jugs...sounds like I invented them or something...haaa haaa ha lol !! Be back later.

Any yellow bricks in the area?

 

[Blak bart]

Nice! I like this kind of decorations for my beach house. Where is that shop?

This is some of my own artwork...I make furniture and other art from the pieces I find while beachcombing. The top porthole came from a 1950s fishing boat wreck in Spanish wells bahamas, the middle porthole I dove up off islamorada, and the bottom porthole came from keywest harbor while diving bottles up !! Its my own type of adventure art....there is a story of discovery behind all my art !! Working on a comission right now...a pottery mosaic piece with all spanish wells bahamamas material !!

 

[Blak bart]

Here is a mosaic and a native wood shelf...all these pottery shards were collected at harbor island bahamas, and the bottles on the shelf come from the keys and bahamas !! Adventure art...everything has a story behind it....this is wrecking/recycling for me....I make it all into art pieces !!

 

[Blak bart]

Well thats very interesting and I do have some experience with the Bella marine jugs !! But again there is much to discuss....first let me try and find a pic of one of several bellamarine jugs found here at one location in the keys...these have so far all been found whole, and intact. Now at a second location I've found fragments and pieces. Both locations would have been known to heyn I believe. In both areas ancient water wells exsited and were used by sailing vessels. So the first site has signs of a wreck and is being surveyed with a magnetometer in a lease area from the state of florida....permitted lease box. So of coarse we are always wondering and researching the Dutch presence in the keys....there is the faintest foot prints of a Dutch presence here in certain areas. Im almost certain that heyn and other Dutch at least watered here on there passages by. Could there be a Dutch wreck of heyns in the keys !!?? Well I also think at certain times bellamarine jugs would have been inter mixed in trading at times of peace, and times of strong Dutch power in the carribean...certainly pirates and buccaneers would have taken and used all manor of goods. In the keys we just can't rule out anything being a possibility as all types of vessels and every nation scraped bottom on our reefs...from the lowliest wreckers, pirates, turtelers, and fisherman....to the most royal of treasure galleons !! I must break for church and come back to this later...I will find pics of the BART MAN jugs(bellamarine). I like that they are also called bartman jugs...sounds like I invented them or something...haaa haaa ha lol !! Be back later.

View attachment 1930108
View attachment 1930109
Well heres a Dutch bellamarine that was recovered here in the keys. Now maybe its just an anomaly here, and was dropped overboard off shore or maybe just lost by a crew in a long boat hauling wood and water aboard an anchored ship...or discarded off said ship. 1 is an anomaly, 2 is a mystery, but 3 whole intact pieces might mean something else !! And then fragments at another key creates even more intrigue. Ill have to pick up the funnel of gold and reread about heyn, but I'm sure there's something about watering in the keys....he definitely was on station around the tortugas waiting on the fleet to pass. I would like to see that Baltic ballast....not sure what that might look like, and would like to learn to identify it. I will be more observant about the yellow brick....I think I might have seen some fragments of this...ill keep my eyes peeled. I did not know there was a difference until today !!
here's a fragment of spanish galleon fire brick...a corner brick, and I wish I would have kept some of the yellow brick..I remember which beach so I will look again...thank you for that piece of knowledge. If I was guessing on a resting place of heyns boats I would want to look north of the lucayan Beach wreck....maybe just north of westend...I think there's Indian cay ?? And sandy cay ?? There is alot of jumbled wrecks/wreckage in that area....wrecks that are intermixed with each other. I don't think as far as memory rock though. But of coarse thats just speculation and could be far from the reality of where these boats could be. I once tried to sink a 45 foot wooden boat for an artificial reef.....we filled this thing with parking stones and then cut holes in it with a chain saw. Im not sure if it ever hit bottom and it might have been in cape Canaveral before it did touch down....the Gulfstream is a strong force to challenge and chunks of buoyant wooden boats can float for miles. So many factors to think about !!??

 

[Oceanscience]

Nice thing about Bellarmines, is that they can be dated quite accurately.
The Dutch had a strong presence in the Caribbean. I never checked what their preferred sailing routes were.

 

[PetesPockets55]

This is some of my own artwork...I make furniture and other art from the pieces I find while beachcombing. The top porthole came from a 1950s fishing boat wreck in Spanish wells bahamas, the middle porthole I dove up off islamorada, and the bottom porthole came from keywest harbor while diving bottles up !! Its my own type of adventure art....there is a story of discovery behind all my art !! Working on a comission right now...a pottery mosaic piece with all spanish wells bahamamas material !!

I was looking forward to seeing your artwork. Did you forget to load the porthole images?

View attachment 1930108
View attachment 1930109
Well heres a Dutch bellamarine that was recovered here in the keys. Now maybe its just an anomaly here, and was dropped overboard off shore or maybe just lost by a crew in a long boat hauling wood and water aboard an anchored ship...or discarded off said ship. 1 is an anomaly, 2 is a mystery, but 3 whole intact pieces might mean something else !! And then fragments at another key creates even more intrigue. Ill have to pick up the funnel of gold and reread about heyn, but I'm sure there's something about watering in the keys....he definitely was on station around the tortugas waiting on the fleet to pass. I would like to see that Baltic ballast....not sure what that might look like, and would like to learn to identify it. I will be more observant about the yellow brick....I think I might have seen some fragments of this...ill keep my eyes peeled. I did not know there was a difference until today !!View attachment 1930127
View attachment 1930129 here's a fragment of spanish galleon fire brick...a corner brick, and I wish I would have kept some of the yellow brick..I remember which beach so I will look again...thank you for that piece of knowledge. If I was guessing on a resting place of heyns boats I would want to look north of the lucayan Beach wreck....maybe just north of westend...I think there's Indian cay ?? And sandy cay ?? There is alot of jumbled wrecks/wreckage in that area....wrecks that are intermixed with each other. I don't think as far as memory rock though. But of coarse thats just speculation and could be far from the reality of where these boats could be. I once tried to sink a 45 foot wooden boat for an artificial reef.....we filled this thing with parking stones and then cut holes in it with a chain saw. Im not sure if it ever hit bottom and it might have been in cape Canaveral before it did touch down....the Gulfstream is a strong force to challenge and chunks of buoyant wooden boats can float for miles. So many factors to think about !!??
View attachment 1930140
View attachment 1930141

Love your posts Bart and don't want to get greedy but the first two images of Dutch bellamarine aren't visible.

 

[Blak bart]

Pete i don't know whats up these days on t-net, but the pics shrunk and sometimes they just disappear!!

I only had 2 images of the bellamarine jug....all 4 were the same.

Hey pete....heres a mosaic getting done for a friend's father. All the potsherds collected from the old Town on spanish wells bahamas. A favorite destination of my friends father, and the frame was made from wood salvaged from the family home !! The piece will hang in a new bahimaian style cottage whose design was brought over from spanish wells !!