Blackbeard's Ship Confirmed off North Carolina

[Welsh Wench]

Looks like the weather is not cooperating this week.

They are trying to bring up one of the largest cannons. But a snag---it is surrounded by a kettle, wooden deadeyes, a pewter plate, cannonballs and a number of unidentified objects,
More stuff!

And it appears a shackled leg iron when it was  La Concorde!

As the article said, it is fascinating to wonder who last touched it. The Captain himself?

http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011/10/12/dive-to-rescue-blackbeards-pirate-ship-hits-snag/#ixzz1afwyBXoo-

[DonaCatalina]

I can imagine the cannoneer scraping a meal off beans and hard tack off the plate waiting for the ship to founder..........

[Welsh Wench]

One interesting artifact is this one--



It is believed to be Spanish from the inscription ANO DE 1705 IHS MARIA

http://nccultureblogger.wordpress.com/2011/05/04/the-bell-that-tolled-for-blackbeard/

As the article says, 'Was this bell part of pirate plunder, recovered from some raid of another ship or village?  Was it taken from a parish church?  Had it been part of the fabric of some small town life?  Did it signal to the mates at the approach to land, or an approaching storm?  Did this bell summon Blackbeard to dinner?  Had it ever summoned the "brother of the devil himself" to prayer?'

But what is really awesome is that you can click on the sound byte and actually hear what Blackbeard heard!

And I had no idea how huge that 3,000 lb anchor was!

[kcdcchef]

wow, that is one HUGE anchor!!!

fun anchor photo tidbit - there is an old photo of the anchor from the Titanic being pulled, taking like 24 horses to pull it to the ship, it's pretty cool!

[DonaCatalina]

The bell sound bit was really cool. Thanks for sharing that.

[kcdcchef]

for some reason i was expecting it to be more shrill, but still neat!

[Captain Jack Wolfe]

***RESEARCH UPDATE***

Additional research has revealed the name of the French surgeon.  Details to follow!

[kcdcchef]

I saw the footage of another cannon being lifted off the ocean floor yesterday!! WOW!

[Welsh Wench]

Hint:  I was in Beaufort NC yesterday. 

[Anna Iram]

I'm still unclear why you maintain there was only one french surgeon brought aboard when the QAR's own site that I referenced earlier quotes records showing three surgeons were brought aboard. Curious. Perhaps their research is wrong.

[DonaCatalina]

***RESEARCH UPDATE***

Additional research has revealed the name of the French surgeon.  Details to follow!

I AM SO EXCITED. My friend who teached fifth grade has been very interested in this. They are covering the slave trade and the history of La Concorde is making it come alive for those 88 students at least.
From me and her, thanks for keeping up wit this.

[Welsh Wench]

I just came back from the North Carolina Maritime Museum in Beaufort, NC.
And all I can say is.....WOW!
And this is what I found.

AT LEAST three surgeons are named. Which means more could have served him at any time.



I found the crew rote for Le Concorde dated 1717. This is the rote on the ill-fated trip of which Hornigold captured the ship and gave it over to Blackbeard.
I knew the French word for surgeon was chirurgien and there it was.

Jean Dubert and also F. Etienne Varzae-- (last letter is not clear).




Conclusion drawn--

Jean Dubert was definitely on Le Concorde when it was taken. He then served under Blackbeard.


And so we have the definite proof of the name of at least one of the surgeons.

[DonaCatalina]

F. Etienne Varzae

I think I can solve this one. Varzaez/Varzaes is a Portuguese surname derived from the town of Varzea.
The use of Z/S was pretty randomly interchangeable up until the twentieth century.

[Welsh Wench]

Queen Anne's Revenge was a mile out in Beaufort Inlet under 20' of water. Fishing lines and net were found snagged on it.

That means fishermen were cursing their broken lines and lost hooks, not knowing they were fishing over one of the best archaelogical finds!

[Welsh Wench]

In my eternal sleuthing, I found the documents naming all three surgeons.

The site won't let me copy/paste but here it is--

http://rdu.net/MRI/crew_doc_1.swf

As we can see, the three surgeons listed are--

Jean DuBois (possibly Jean Dubert?)
Mark Bourgeneuf
Claude De Shayes

I wonder if the number in front of their names are their ages.