ADMAT Press Articles

St Kitts Maritime Archaeological Project 2003-2008Phase 1: White House Bay Wreck

St. Kitts& Nevis Media Release- April 2003.

Shipwreck explored

Wednesday, April 30th, 2003 -- A special press session was held for journalists to get information about the White House Bay Marine Archaeological Discovery, yesterday.

The project dubbed the St. Kitts Maritime Archaeological Discovery Project is being undertaken by the Anglo-Danish Maritime Archaeological Discovery Team (ADMAT). The team is headed by Dr. Simon Spooner who is the President and Excavation Director for ADMAT. He explained that his organisation is non-profit and mainly benefits students since internationally there are limited opportunities for joining archaeological dives.

Dr. Spooner said that his team raises, recovers and sorts maritime artefacts. He said that due to the high expense of raising the ship at the White House Bay, his team was only able to photograph and document the lumber of ship. It then was covered back up. This particular project Dr. Spooner said, took two years.

The most significant find was described as French Bar Shot which was used in sea battles. The artefact was described as being a weapon that could be used to cut off the masts of ships thus disabling them.

Dr. Spooner said that the ship was probably one of the troop vessels involved in the Battle of Frigate Bay which involved some 60 ships of the line. He said approximately 300 artefacts were found and some would be handed over to the National Museum for display and preservation. Recovered artefacts included a wooden pulley rod, ballast stones, grenades, uniform buttons, partial bottles and trucker pins. It was interesting to note that Dr. Spooner said that as they continued to work on the sunken ship, more and more fish frequented the area.