| Show fall storms uncover strange wreckage off coast of N carolina british fr frigates images spanish galleons Gal leons of century among romantic relics B by abill BILL SHARP once more september storms have lifted the curtain on hundreds of tragedies which were played out on the the lonely beaches of N carolinas outer banks in the last three centuries but as usual it is a fleeting ag show sand swept away by tides of the 1944 hurricane already is drifting back with mild southwest winds and before long most of the exposed wrecks will be hidden again some of the derelicts now on view all the way from nags head to ocracoke Ocra coke inlet are familiar and some are beyond the ken of the oldest coastguardsmen or their records so violently did last years hurricane erode the banks the ghost ship one of the most interesting is the ghost ship the carroll A peering deering out of bath me she was found on diamond shoals in 1921 undamaged with sails set with uneaten food on the table and on the stove but with only a cat to greet the th coastguard crew the deering had passed diamond lightship the day before but but that was the last seen of any of her crew and the cat kept her own counsel later she drifted onto ocra coke island sanded up and was lost to sight and almost to memory until the hurricane scoured out her hull up near nags head was uncovered again the tired ribs of the quaint warship believed by many to be a Crump ster of elizabethan days she was first revealed by a storm in 1939 and her primitive construction st and fittings aroused much local speculation within a few days the sand had claimed her until last september there is some justification fi for the romantic identification for ship shipwrecks antedated colonization of these shores the chroniclers of sir walter raleight Ra leighs roanoke island colony 1587 found the aborigines using crude iron tools which were believed fashioned from spikes taken from a shipwreck there is record of a spanish shipwreck at hatteras in 1558 1553 and some of its crew were preserved by the indians no Ship wreckers while it is probably true that for many years shipwrecks were the principal importation of the banks there appears no evid evidence e nee t to 0 support suppo rt the charge that long ago the bankers practiced shipwrecking ship wrecking and looting however some homes are p partly artly fashioned from the timber of old ships and many a house contains articles salvaged from doomed ships or bought at the in this connection is recalled the most popular legend of the village of straits in carteret county concerning a preacher for whom starr methodist church there is named during the severe winter of 1813 so the story goes the citizens of straits were starving after a crop killing drouth the previous summer frozen sounds prevented fishing and the napoleonic wars and a british blockade made commerce impossible parson starr thus resorted to prayer if it is predestined there be a wreck on the atlantic coast he pleaded please let it be thy will that it happen here in a few days a flour laden ship wrecked on core banks and famine was prevented |
