Warwick

History

The Warwick was the 'magazine ship' of Sir Robert Rich, one of the backers of the young Bermuda colony - a supply vessel bringing out goods for the settlers. She reached Bermuda on 20 October 1619 and lay in Castle Harbour, intending to go on to Virginia.

In November 1619 a hurricane struck. Her cargo had been landed and her guns secured, and the crew rode out the storm at anchor, but the anchor dragged and she was thrown against the reefs at the foot of the limestone cliffs. Holed, she sank and rolled onto her starboard side, where harbour silt buried and preserved much of that side of the hull. Governor Nathaniel Butler recorded the loss.

Teddy Tucker and Mendel Peterson of the Smithsonian located the site by magnetometer in 1966-67, and a 1979 team uncovered a well-preserved hull. Between 2008 and 2012 the National Museum of Bermuda, the Institute of Nautical Archaeology and Texas A&M, with partners including the University of Southampton, excavated and recorded it in detail. It is one of the largest and most coherent surviving pieces of an early 17th-century English ship; finds include cannon, an iron grenade lodged in a hull plank and a merchant's lead weight.

Diving the wreck today

The Warwick is a protected archaeological site and closed to recreational diving. Bermuda 100 says finds are shown in the shipwreck gallery at the Bermuda Underwater Exploration Institute (BUEI).