The Spanish galleon Atocha is one of the richest shipwrecks ever found.
"Hidden History" is a diary series that explores forgotten and little-known areas of history.
When the Italian sailor Christopher Columbus accidentally found the New World while searching for a route to China in 1492, it came at a fortunate time for the Kingdom of Spain. King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella had just driven the last of the Muslim Moors out of the Iberian Peninsula, and Spain was now looking to expand its empire. Within a year the Pope in Rome issued a decree which divided the unexplored New World between Spain and Portugal, and by 1540 the Spanish conquistadores Cortes and Pizzaro had seized control of the Aztec and Inca empires, which became the core of the Spanish possessions in North and South America.
The aims of the Spanish Empire in the New World have been aptly summed up as “God, Glory, and Gold”. Of these, it was the “gold” which was most important. Spain soon grew rich on the gold, silver, and gemstones which were steadily flowing across the Atlantic, carried by fleets of treasure galleons. Of particular significance was the immense silver mine at Potosi in modern Bolivia.
The constant flow of treasure from South America to Spain made the conquerors the richest country in Europe. But not all of these treasure shipments made it to their destination. Such rich pickings attracted pirates and buccaneers, and the 17th century became the “Golden Age” of Caribbean piracy as famous names like Henry Morgan, Black Bart Roberts, and Calico Jack Rackham raided and plundered the Spanish galleons. Another difficulty was the weather. The Caribbean produced intense hurricanes which appeared without warning, and there was a steady toll of treasure ships who were wrecked on the area's many islands.
And one of these was the Atocha.
In 1622, a fleet of 28 Spanish galleons gathered in Havana Harbor. It had taken some two months to load all of them with an immense haul of silver, gold, copper, Spanish coins, pearls, tobacco, indigo, and anything else of value that the Spaniards could find. The fleet set sail for Europe on September 4, six weeks late.
The convoy had barely sailed for one day and had just reached the Florida Keys when a hurricane blew in. In the chaos, one of the galleons, named Santa Margarita, ran aground, and another, named Nuestra Señora de Atocha, sank. The 112-foot Atocha had been sailing as the fleet's rearguard, to protect against pirate attack, and had been armed with 20 cannons and a crew of 265 with muskets. Only five survived the sinking, by climbing to the top of the mizzen mast which remained sticking above the water.
As soon as the storms ended, local Spanish authorities tried their best to salvage what they could. Spain was in the midst of the Thirty Years War, and the money from the New World was badly needed to pay for it. The Spanish managed to recover most of the treasure and cannons from the Santa Margarita, which had broken up on shore. The Atocha had sunk in about 60 feet of water. Using teams of slaves and a crude brass diving bell, the Spanish tried to salvage the contents of the Atocha, but the water pressure at this depth was too much for divers to be able to open the hatches and enter the wreck. The attempt was ended, and a month later another hurricane passed through, smashed the sunken hulk, and scattered wreckage all over the seafloor.
Over the centuries, though, the Atocha became almost a legend. Although the approximate location of the wreck was known from the Spanish records and the accounts of the survivors, the ship (and the immense treasure that it carried—some 40 tons of gold, silver, coins, and emeralds worth an estimated $400 million) was a mystery.
In 1969, professional treasure hunter Mel Fisher, based in Key West, began a systematic search for the Atocha. In the 1970s he found three silver bars and some cannons from the ship, and then came upon pieces of the Santa Margarita, which told him he was in the right general area. Finally in July 1985, he stumbled upon the main wreck of the Atocha about 20 miles away from Key West. Divers quickly uncovered an immense cargo of silver bars and coins.
But Fisher's celebration did not last long. The wreck lay within the territorial waters of the US, and the State of Florida stepped in with a legal claim to the wreck and the treasure. Fisher sued in court, and after eight years of legal fights the Supreme Court ruled in 1992 that Fisher had sole legal rights to the wreck and all of its treasure.
Today, many of the artifacts recovered from the wreck of the Atocha are on display at the Maritime Heritage Society Museum in Key West, which is run by a nonprofit association set up by Fisher. The association has its own conservation lab and carries out archaeological research, including a dig at the old African cemetery in Key West.
NOTE: As some of you already know, all of my diaries here are draft chapters for a number of books I am working on. So I welcome any corrections you may have, whether it's typos or places that are unclear or factual errors. I think of y'all as my pre-publication editors and proofreaders. ;)