Legends 3: Ghost Ships

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Welcome to Lore Legends, a subset of lore episodes that explore the strange tales we whisper in the dark, even if they can't always be proven by the history books.

So, if you're ready, let's begin.

The ocean is a mysterious place.

It never stops moving, or changing, or drawing us in.

For as long as humans have been around on this planet, we've been pulled to those waves like a siren song, and no distance has been close enough.

For thousands of years, sailors have braved those dangerous waters in search of the new, new lands, new creatures, and new civilizations.

It's almost a primal urge to go and see, to learn, to discover.

And as we've done that, we've improved our methods.

One of the biggest reasons for that was safety.

Along with being mysterious, the ocean is also deadly, which made it important for those vessels to keep their lives on board safe from harm.

And for the most part, it worked.

But you can't read much about the history of sailing vessels before encountering a frightening truth.

Not all ships survive their journey.

And while, yes, advances in technology have lessened those losses over time, The pages of history are littered with examples of promising voyages that failed to deliver.

You see, as long as there have been ships, there have been the ghosts of the ones who failed, specters of the sea that arrive when we least expect it.

Folks believe they come to foretell impending doom, while others see them as an echo of dark tragedy.

Most, though, serve to remind us of what once was and what was lost.

And at the core of all those stories is a more frightening truth, one that few people can wrestle with.

Most things that are lost are gone forever.

But when it comes to the sea, some ships refuse to go quietly.

I'm Aaron Mankey, and this is Lore Legends.

The 1600s saw Puritans travel from England to America for some much-needed religious freedom.

The most famous of these journeys involved the arrival of the ship the Mayflower, which landed at Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1620.

18 years later though, a separate group of Puritans came and established the colony of New Haven throughout New England.

The New Haven colony was founded by Minister John Davenport, who had left England for Holland to escape religious persecution from the crown.

He then fled to Boston before eventually founding New Haven.

It wasn't clear what compelled Davenport to found his own colony instead of joining one of the already established settlements.

Perhaps he'd been part of certain religious disagreements in Boston, or he might have believed it was easier to prosper in a new location rather than compete with Boston merchants.

There was also the matter of the Antinomian controversy, also known as the Free Grace Controversy.

It was a conflict within the Massachusetts Bay Colony that had started in 1636 and continued until 1638.

Antinomians believed that Christians didn't have to obey Mosaic law like the Ten Commandments.

They had the Holy Spirit on their side, which contradicted the beliefs of most of the others within the colony.

So Davenport set out to start his own settlement called New Haven along the Connecticut River.

He and his fellow colonists dug cellar-like homes into hillsides with a plan to trade various goods, such as furs, with Boston and Manhattan, then known as New Amsterdam.

Those goods would then make their way back to England and new supplies would be sent back to America.

In 1644, a minister by the name of William Hooke joined Davenport's new colony.

He was a firm believer in fasting and prayer, which he believed would not only bring them closer to God, but would practically guarantee their success.

Unfortunately, no amount of fasting or prayer could help them get their trade routes off the ground.

New Haven started to lose money and the colonists were getting desperate.

The merchants decided that a great ship should be built to take goods to England directly, bypassing Massachusetts Bay and providing New Haven with the means to get their much-needed supplies.

And so a ship was commissioned.

It was to be built in Rhode Island and measured 80 feet long, weighing somewhere between 100 and 150 tons.

And tied to its masts were massive sails to catch the wind and propel the colony toward victory.

But large sails weren't what made ships good.

Good shipbuilders were, and the great ship didn't exactly live up to its namesake.

According to its captain, George Lamberton, it was a cranky vessel, prone to capsizing if the right wave hit it.

It didn't help that the bottom of the ship had been loaded with light items while heavier goods were being stored up top.

The unbalanced weight made the ship difficult to control.

It bobbed in the water like a cork.

However, despite its shortcomings, it had no choice but to get the job done for the sake of the colony.

The vessel was loaded up with furs, lumber, peas, and wheat, along with copies of Davenport's sermons.

He wanted them printed back in England.

The great ship was launched from New Haven Colony in January of 1646 to much fanfare.

Well, once the three-mile-long ice blockage was cleared out of the harbor.

But once it was free, the ship was towed backward into Long Island Sound, which the sailors viewed as an ill omen of what was to come.

Along with the various goods for trade, the great ship carried 70 passengers and crew on board who were responsible for keeping her upright and pointed toward England.

And once they had cleared the initial hurdles getting out of the harbor, it seemed like things were looking up.

Davenport, however, had a worried look on his face as the ship disappeared into the smothering sea fog.

It said that he was heard uttering the prayer, Lord, if it be thy pleasure to bury these our friends in the bottom of the sea, they are thine.

Save them.

Months passed with no word from the great ship.

It had been expected that any trip back to England would have taken about two months to complete, but so much time had already passed and the remaining New Haven colonists were getting worried.

But they didn't have much time to dwell on the what-ifs surrounding the vessel.

In June of 1647, a massive thunderstorm struck the New Haven colony.

It cleared out by early evening and in its wake, left a beautiful, clear view of the New Haven harbor.

The sun's descent behind the horizon wouldn't begin for another hour, and as residents ventured out to assess the damage, they looked out into the distance.

And there it was.

Some said it came down directly from the sky, a detail wielded by UFO enthusiasts today as proof that aliens have been coming to Earth for centuries.

Others from the colony claim to have seen Captain Lambert himself on deck with his sword pointed straight ahead.

However, the closer the ship got to home port, the clearer it became that it was in bad shape.

The Reverend James Pierpont chronicled its return half a century later, in which he wrote, Her main top seemed to be blown off, but left hanging in the shrouds, then her mizzen top, then all her masting seemed blown away by the board.

Spectators on shore were shocked and horrified to see what they believed to be the great ship in ruins.

And as the crowd watched, the vessel careened to one side and tipped over, disappearing in a cloud of smoke.

When the haze finally cleared, the great ship was gone, never to be seen again.

Its crew and passengers were lost, and to this day, no trace of the wreck has ever been found.

John Davenport believed that the ship that he had seen that day was a vision sent by God as an answer to their prayers asking what had happened to their great ship.

And it may also have been a sign of what was to eventually befall New Haven.

The staggering loss of life and property sent the colony spiraling, and by 1662, it had dissolved entirely.

Over the years, the apparition of the great ship has been immortalized in art and verse by many writers and poets, including a poem by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow called The Phantom Ship.

And every once in a while, it can still be seen bounding toward the harbor where New Haven once stood, trying its best to deliver those supplies.

About a thousand miles north of New Haven resides Chalour Bay, which sits within a lobster claw-like piece of land and separates the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec.

The bay is a hotbed of fishing activity, but only for the bravest fishermen in Canada.

The tall cliffs along its shores tend to draw in harsh weather and winds that whip against the ships like angry spirits.

In fact, for centuries, there have been sightings of a ghostly ship that haunts the bay, its three masts and hull being devoured by hungry flames.

Its origins are as vague and shadowy as the briny deep, but several stories have persisted over the centuries to explain it.

One holds that two Portuguese explorers named Gaspar and Miguel Correal had kidnapped a group of native peoples back in the year 1501.

The captives were then sold into slavery, but the relatives never forgot.

When Gaspar returned the following year, the mothers, fathers, siblings, aunts, and uncles of those he had taken were waiting.

They chained him to a rock in the bay at low tide and watched as the water slowly overtook his body, drowning him as they enjoyed a picnic nearby.

Miguel eventually came looking for his brother, but found only his ship.

He climbed aboard to have a look around, unaware that he had company waiting for him.

Without warning, the native peoples ambushed him.

Miguel tried to escape and, in the process, set the ship aflame.

As the fire consumed the vessel, Miguel used his final words to curse the people of the Bay of Shalor, vowing to haunt them for a thousand years.

The brothers were never heard from again, and a rescue effort conducted the following year by yet another of their brothers, Vasco Inez, proved unsuccessful.

However, one of their ships did return to Portugal, with 50 captured members of the local indigenous people.

Some claim that the inscription on Massachusetts Dighton Rock proves that Miguel and his men sailed the New England coastline for many years, rendered lost by dense fog and a lack of knowledge of the area.

Others believe that the flaming ship is one that took part in the 1760 Battle of the Restigouche.

This was a 17-day naval naval conflict between French and British forces that took place during the Seven Years' War.

It was a fierce battle in which the French were forced to scuttle many of their own ships.

In fact, it was believed by some that the fire ship was actually the French vessel La Marquise de Malouz.

However, that vessel was never burned.

After it sunk, its hull was razed and preserved at a local monastery.

As a result of this battle, the French were eventually forced to surrender several months later.

Still, there are those who claim that the fire ship of Chalour Bay is actually the specter of the English vessel the Colborne, which met its end in 1838.

It had run aground while carrying a massive hull of gold.

It was October and the Colborne had been well off course for some time, with 55 crew and passengers on board.

Only 12 survived.

One of those survivors, a man named Joseph Jones Ackison, said, Half an hour after the ship first struck, she went on the rocks again, this time falling on her side, throwing passengers and crew into the sea.

The Colborne drifted for days until it was finally to shore, where many bodies were found amongst the wreckage.

Cargo from the ship, as well as additional victims, floated their way to land over the following days and weeks.

And true to the way legends like these tend to play out, the fishing families who lived in the area were said to have become rich after discovering gold from the Colborne that had washed ashore.

Yet another possible origin for the flaming ship is that of the notorious pirate Captain Craig.

Now, Craig primarily appears in stories about this vessel, which actually may be a twist on the local legend that the flaming ship had been a three-masted sailing ship called the John Craig.

It was said to have sunk off Shipagin Island around 1800.

The only survivor of the wreck had been a cabin boy, who swam to shore before passing away from exhaustion.

Among the tales surrounding Captain Craig's ghostly transport is one version in which a woman from the Mi'kma tribe was kidnapped and killed by the pirates.

With her dying breath, she choked out the words, For as long as the world is, may you burn on the bay.

Soon after her death, the crew discovered that their ship was set ablaze with no escape.

Their souls, and the vessel, were then cursed to sail along Shalour Bay for eternity.

Of course, there's never a shortage of skeptics to throw water on the idea of a burning ghost ship.

The flaming ship's existence has been described as a fate morgana or attributed to phosphorescent marine life in the water.

Those who have seen it though believe it defies scientific explanation.

Its presence can mean anything from an omen of bad luck to the impending arrival of a storm.

A witness named Peter Foyt told a reporter in 1951, usually it is a sailing vessel wrapped in flames.

It has also been a shapeless ball of fire, a ship's lantern, and once in 1906 it was a burning steamer.

The fire ship typically only appears at night, and if it's not sailing in the water itself, it's hovering several feet above the bay.

Its phantom crew is sometimes spotted on the decks or shimmying across the rigging, their pained screams echoing out over the water as the flames swallow the hull and masts.

And sometimes, the crew isn't there at all, just the once great ship burning endlessly, despite being surrounded surrounded by nothing but water.

The eastern coast of North America isn't home to just one flaming ship.

Another has haunted the waters off the coast of Rhode Island since 1738.

It was called the Princess Augusta, a majestic name for an aging 200-ton three-masted British vessel.

It had been built for both passengers and cargo, and it was captained by a man named George Long.

On December 27th, Captain Long was in the midst of his duties, steering his 14-man crew and several hundred German immigrants toward Philadelphia.

It was likely that the Germans, who hailed from the Palatinate region, intended to join a Pennsylvania Dutch community in America with members from their homeland.

The arduous journey took months and was plagued by difficulties.

Between the heavy storms and the dysentery, half the crew and at least 240 passengers had died.

It's possible that Captain Long also succumbed to the disease while at sea.

However, the details of the story vary depending on where the person telling it comes from.

Those who live on Block Island off the coast of Rhode Island claim that Captain Long didn't die from dysentery.

He was in fact murdered by the crew so that they could hold the passengers hostage.

The scoundrels withheld food and water until the Germans coughed up their money and belongings that they had brought with them.

Once the frightened immigrants had given up all they had, the crew abandoned the ship.

It floated on until it finally ran aground at Sandy Point, a one and a half mile long sandbar off Block Island, known for causing shipwrecks.

The islanders took Germans in and helped them recover, setting the wreckage on fire to prevent it from being drawn back out to sea and becoming a problem for other passing ships.

Sadly though, one other passenger did not make it out alive.

Her name was Mary Vanderleyen, and the anxiety caused by the mutiny had caused her to seek refuge in the cargo hold.

She was unable to free herself after the Augusta was set ablaze and she perished in the fire.

But some say that the story that the mainlanders tell is much different and even more tragic.

The people on the island apparently lit their own signal fire.

Some say it was just a lantern hanging off the neck of an old mule, but others say that it was actual timber.

And when the ship's crew spotted it and approached, the island folk killed and robbed them.

And then, the Princess Augusta was lit on fire to hide the evidence.

More than likely though, the story is a product of a misunderstanding.

You see, it wasn't uncommon for Block Island residents to make their money by wrecking or salvaging items from a shipwreck on their shores.

However, those on the mainland misunderstood the practice as the islanders causing the wrecks in order to rob the people on board.

Most people though think that the islanders' tale of the murder and kidnapping by the crew is closer to the truth.

But some contemporary accounts claim that on December 29th, a storm ripped the ship apart and simply caused it to sink.

Whatever the case, it is generally agreed that in December of 1738, the Princess Augusta ran aground off the coast of Block Island.

Many of the 60 surviving passengers made their way to Philadelphia, where they settled into the colony as planned.

About 30, though, did not survive.

They were believed to have perished shortly after reaching Block Island.

And two women, known only as Shortkate and Long Kate, remained on the island for the rest of their lives.

Short Kate became a domestic servant and lived a fairly uneventful life following her ordeal on the Augusta.

But not Long Kate.

She married an enslaved man named Newport and became a fortune-teller to make ends meet.

She had a litany of paranormal skills and was no stranger to having visions or out-of-body experiences.

Long Kate often spoke about flying back to her homeland for quick visits, which entailed either entering a trance-like state behind a wall or a bush.

It took a lot out of her and it scared the islanders, who naturally viewed her as a witch.

But here's where things get interesting.

One year after short and long Kate had come to the island, a merchant vessel was spotted sailing through Block Island Sound.

According to its crew, they had caught sight of a giant ship on fire.

The men sailed closer, perhaps to get a better look or to help save anyone still on board.

But as they drew near, the ship, the Augusta, vanished.

There was nothing on the surface of the water, not a single body, living or otherwise.

There were no charred beams or planks from the ship either.

And of course, because the burning vessel had been seen on the one-year anniversary of the wreck, it was referred to forevermore as the Palatine Light, named for the region its German passengers had originally come from.

The Palatine Light has been seen countless times ever since.

In a letter to the Newport Mercury in 1878, a witness named Benjamin Congdon wrote about having seen it at least eight to ten times, if not more.

He wrote, Nobody doubted her being sent by an almighty power to punish those wicked men who murdered her passengers and crew.

After the last of these were dead, she was never more seen.

But that wasn't entirely true.

Sightings of the Princess Augusta up in flames continued well past the death of the final islander responsible.

It appeared to someone in 1963, the Coast Guard and Navy were sent to investigate a burning ship in the sound, but nothing was ever located.

Some accounts say that you can still hear the screams of Mary Vanderley, the passenger who is said to have died in the ship's hold, and islanders even got in on the booming spiritualism movement of the late 1800s to hold seances, attempting to reach out to the ship's spirit.

But perhaps the greatest testament to its existence happened on February 9th of 1880, when over 50 people claimed to have seen it all in one single evening.

One of those witnesses happened to be future U.S.

Senator Nathan F.

Dixon III.

A woman known only as Mrs.

Rose told the New York Times about her experience that night several years later.

She had seen the Princess Augusta through her windows, pushing ahead, its sails plump with wind.

And it was on fire, from the water's edge to her highest tail, she said.

And yet, despite the ship being engulfed in flames, it sailed onward as if it were unaware of its dire dire condition.

It disappeared 15 minutes later and left Mrs.

Rose overcome with a sense of foreboding.

She knew that something bad was on the horizon.

Four days later, a group of Block Island residents died in Newport Harbor.

They had been descendants of the islanders who were said to have caused the Augusta's wreck, all those years before.

While the the Princess Augusta was known for the precious cargo of human lives being carried to America, there was other cargo on board as well.

One of the loads being hauled was of lignum vitae, a hardwood from the West Indies.

It was known for its strength and density, which made it extremely valuable as shipbuilding material.

Much of the lignum vitae had survived the wreck and was repurposed by the people of Block Island into mortars for grinding corn.

They had been grinding it by hand for years after Mark Dodge, a local eccentric and opium eater, had burned down the only mill on the island, killing himself in the process.

One of those mortars, measuring 14 inches high and almost a foot in diameter, wound up in the home of one Simon Ray.

Ray had opened his home to many of the shipwrecked survivors and had allowed a number of the victims to be buried on his land.

The mortar remained in the house even after the Ray family moved away.

The new homeowners kept the Lignum Vitae mortar after moving in, but quickly noticed that something about it was off.

For one, it liked to dance.

It would move up and down as if pulled by a puppeteer in the ceiling, but there were no strings attached.

Other times, it would jump off the shelf and flop around the room like a freshly caught trout gasping for air.

It would then tip itself upright and rock back and forth before jumping up and down from the floor all the way up to the ceiling again.

After it was finished, the mortar would then be returned to its shelf where it stayed without incident for months at a time.

And unsurprisingly, after the dancing mortar's performance, it was said that the ghost ship would make an appearance in the sound.

So, what caused such a lively demonstration from a seemingly mundane piece of wood?

Well, according to 19th-century chronicler Samuel Livermore, it was none other than the spirit of that dead opium addict, the one who had burned down the mill, Mark Dodge.

Whether or not the story is true, it certainly illustrates the power that the wreck of the Princess Augusta has had over the people of Block Island, and how even if the vessel is no longer visible, it has never stopped doing what ghost ships are said to do best.

Haunt the open water and remind those of us on land of everything we've lost.

Sailing the high seas is something that humans have been very good at for a very long time, and for almost as long, those voyages have been accompanied by stories full of tragedy and shadow.

And naturally, we've only scratched the surface of tales to tell.

Which is why I've set aside one last tale of ghostly vessels to share with you.

Stick around through this brief sponsor break to hear all about it.

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Almost 20 years after the Princess Augusta was lost, the New York Gazette published an unusual letter.

A group of fishermen had asserted that on February 4th, 1754, they had seen a shocking apparition in nearby Gardner's Bay.

But it wasn't a ghost ship.

It was several.

The letter described a trio of ships full-rigged with their sails unfurled.

The men had seen smoke coming from the guns on all of the ships, but hadn't heard the the sounds of muskets or cannon fire.

The letter goes on, During their engagement, they put about several times, and the large ship hauled up her courses.

The whole was performed with the utmost dexterity, as if they were navigated by the most skillful mariners.

The letter went on to say that after 15 minutes, the ships disappeared and the water returned to normal.

Now, some speculated that this was in fact a ghostly pirate battle related to the notorious Captain Kidd, who had buried treasure on nearby islands.

It might also have been conducted by another ghost ship that was said to have been beset by pirates in the area.

In the mid-1600s, a merchant vessel carrying furs and lumber had been overtaken by pirates, but there was something else on board, a beautiful and valuable white stallion.

The pirates tied the crew and the horse to the masts before setting the ship on fire and then fleeing back to their own.

The flaming vessel continued to follow the pirates as it burned, its crew and the lone horse wailing in agony.

Over the years, the inflamed ship has been seen in the Long Island Sound.

Some say the crew is still searching for the pirates responsible.

Others have seen the men on board going about their duties, accompanied by passengers engaged in some form of gambling as the fire consumes the decks.

But despite the flames that rage and climb its masts, the ship makes no sound, save for the neighing of the white stallion crying out into the night.

This episode of Lore Legends was produced by me, Aaron Mankey, with writing by Harry Marks and research by Cassandra De Alba.

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