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Isabella
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The shipwrecked Hudsons Bay Company supply ship Isabellas largely intact hulk, which lies at the mouth of the Columbia River where she was lost in 1830, is a unique maritime archeological resource with considerable archeological integrity. The second vessel known to have been wrecked at the mouth of the Colombia (William and Ann wrecked there a year earlier), Isabella participated in British maritime trade and commerce from 1825 to 1829, when she was purchased to become the annual supply ship for the Hudsons Bay Companys Pacific Northwest fur trade operation.
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| In 1987 the SRC conducted a series of archeological assessment dives on the site. It was first brought to the attention of the NPS by Larry Gilmore, curator of the Columbia River Maritime Museum. He had obtained the services of Michael Montieth, Commanding officer of the Cape Disappointment Coast Guard Station and Jim White, local diver and amateur historian. All of these principals took part in the SRC operation along with Jim Delgado, then NPS Maritime Historian and NPS Supervisory Archeologist, Larry Nordby, both under the aegis of the SRC. Daniel Lenihan, Chief of SRC led the operation and Jim Thomson, NPS archeologist, provided regional coordination. Frank Geisel from Marine Telepresence brought a SHARPS or Sonic Highly Accurate Range Positioning System to test on the site. This project became one of the first successful uses of SHARPS in low visibility conditions. |
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The project was focused on confirming identity of the vessel. Towards this end, a series of hypotheses and test implications were developedessentially a series of stated expectations of the material record necessary to proving the ship was indeed Isabella. The hypotheses bore out during a week of intense diving operations and identification was confirmed. A series of long-term management recommendations were formulated as part of the site report. The SHARPS in the hands of diving archeologists proved an effective approach to assessing sites in low visibility and high currents.
The remains of Isabella lie on a hard sand bottom in thirty-five to forty feet of water. The most prominent feature at the site is the substantially intact starboard side of the ship, which rests at an angle, sloping into deeper water. Located on this starboard side are a series of six ports (these may be cargo or ballast ports but are not gun ports), paired, which run forward, ending at the point where the bow begins. Perhaps the most diagnostic feature found on Isabella was a nearly square hole cut into the hull below the tween deck level. Four auger holes form the corners of the hole, which was cut out with a saw. The hole would be that referred to in the ships log on May 9, 1830, as the crew worked to salvage the cargo. The ships carpenter Cut a hole in the side to let the water out, so that we could better get at the cargo.
A largely intact 1825 British brig, Isabella is the only known vessel of this type yet located in the United States, and as such, is of national significance. Isabella is an example of a once common but now vanished type of vessel that formed the backbone of early 19th century British trade with the Northwest coast, as well as trade with the United States. Because the remains of Isabella possess a high level of archeological integrity, with survival of 50 percent or more of the structure, and has not been subject to modern looting or salvage it offers the first maritime archeological insight into the supply and provisioning activities of the Hudsons Bay Company, as well as general aspects of the Pacific Northwest fur trade.
References:
- Lenihan, Daniel, 2002, Chapter 15: Isabella in Submerged: Adventures of Americas Most Elite Underwater Archeology Team. Newmarket Press, NY. Distributed by Best Publishing.
- Nordby, Larry V. 1988, Modeling Isabella: Behavioral Linkages Between Submerged and Terrestrial Sites in Underwater Archaeology Proceedings From the Society for Historical Archaeology, Reno, Nevada.
- Delgado, James P. 1995, The Brig Isabella: A Hudsons Bay Company Shipwreck of 1830. In American Neptune, Vol. 55, No. 4.
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