IN THE mid-1500s, a merchant ship laden with wares set sail across the Atlantic headed for one of Spain鈥檚 Caribbean colonies. In its hull were hundreds upon hundreds of pewter cups, plates and flagons, silver coins, gold rings and at least one piggy bank. The ship crossed the ocean only to fall foul of shallow reefs off the eastern coast of what is now the Dominican Republic. As the wooden hull was ripped apart, its riches spilled out over the reef and sandy ocean floor.
They remained there for 450 years, becoming dull and encrusted in hard calcium carbonate. For a time, they seemed destined to be permanently encased in the local reefs. Then, in 2010, a ship passing overhead registered a large magnetic disturbance on the sea floor. Divers working for a private company were sent down to hunt for metal objects, which they found in their thousands. The Punta Cana Pewter Wreck became one of the oldest known shipwrecks in the Americas. Its load remains the largest cache of pewter ever discovered.
鈥淭his is one of the most interesting and important shipwrecks that I have ever seen,鈥� says Charles Beeker of Indiana University鈥檚 Office of Underwater Science in Bloomington.
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Beeker, 63, is a formidable man with a no-nonsense mien and a workaholic鈥檚 approach to life. He has dedicated his career as a marine archaeologist to salvaging historic shipwrecks in the US and Caribbean. It鈥檚 a job that has repeatedly put him at loggerheads with another brand of shipwreck diver: the professional treasure hunter.
Their relationship is ambivalent, to say the least. Beeker isn鈥檛 averse to collaborating with treasure hunters, but his goal is squarely in opposition to theirs. When Beeker works on a wreck, he seeks to leave it as undisturbed as possible 鈥� to study it underwater, then turn it into a submerged museum for divers. The treasure hunters are principally after its valuable contents, which they sell at auction.
An early calling
Beeker鈥檚 fascination for submerged wrecks began early. As a child, he would visit family in the Florida Keys, where looting shipwrecks was legal, even glamorous. He started diving at a young age and was struck by the damage this was doing to wrecks.
After a stint studying botany at Indiana University, he turned his attentions back to the oceans, eventually becoming director of the university鈥檚 academic diving programme. He obtained grants to excavate historic wrecks in Florida and the Great Lakes. In the mid-1980s, Beeker advised the federal government as it drafted the Abandoned Shipwrecks Act. Enacted in 1988, it declared wrecks found on the US sea floor the property of the state government, protecting them from treasure hunters and making it possible to turn them into museums.
One way of doing this is to raise them from the deep and exhibit them on land. But this is neither easy nor cheap, especially for fragile wood and metal that have been submerged for centuries. As a result, Beeker and other archaeologists began advocating for bringing visitors to the wrecks instead.
In 1989, Beeker helped turn this vision into reality at , which lies 5 metres beneath the waves off the coast of Florida. Visitors can snorkel or dive on a Spanish wreck that was sunk by a hurricane in 1733, rediscovered in the 1960s and looted for its silver treasure before the state turned its remains into a museum, complete with replica cannons, an anchor and a commemorative plaque. On the back of this success, Beeker helped establish a dozen similar reserves in Florida and California.
Faced with tricky US legislation, the professional treasure hunters headed to the Caribbean, where the wrecks were plentiful and many conservation laws more lax. Undeterred, Beeker followed, promoting underwater museums as a way for countries to reclaim their maritime heritage and still generate revenue. 鈥淎s an archaeologist in America, I鈥檓 appalled that these American companies can own these foreign shipwrecks,鈥� he says. 鈥淵ou can only sell a shipwreck once as a treasure hunt, but you can sell an underwater museum forever.鈥� In fact, the 鈥渕useums鈥� don鈥檛 charge for admission. The idea is they generate profit for the region by boosting diving and snorkelling tourism.
Beeker soon found himself in the Dominican Republic, in waters that are rich in centuries-old wrecks. Many still hold goods that were either being brought back to Europe from the colonies, or, like the Punta Cana, carried overseas from the Old World.
Anchor Research and Salvage, the company that discovered the Punta Cana in 2010, is a division of Florida-based Global Marine Exploration (GME). In a deal typical for the Dominican Republic, the firm obtained a government permit, excavated the wreck and took half the treasure. It sold more than 200 pewter plates and bowls at auction in 2013 for $400,000.
Unfinished business
Beeker examined the site in 2014. From the anchors and cannons he concluded that the ship dates from the first half of the 16th century, one of just 10 wrecks of this era to have been found in the Americas. He sees it as a prime candidate for an underwater museum. 鈥淭his site is begging to be protected,鈥� he says. Aside from pewter wares, ceramics, mortars and pestles used to grind medicines and foods, medical equipment, early firearms and crossbows were also found. Beeker says they are important witnesses to the colonisation of the Americas.
But GME says it has unfinished business at the wreck. In 2013, the Dominican Republic stopped giving it access to the area, which GME鈥檚 CEO Robert Pritchett claims is a breach of their agreement. As a result, in 2014, his firm filed a lawsuit against the government. The case is on-going. Pritchett says GME will not shy away from what it sees as its legal right. About Beeker鈥檚 desires to preserve the wreck as an underwater museum, he says: 鈥淚 have warned Charlie Beeker once about this issue, as well as the university he works for.鈥� If Beeker carries out work on GME shipwrecks, Pritchett told New 杏吧原创, GME will sue him and the University of Indiana.
Beeker seems unfazed by the threat. It鈥檚 not the first time he鈥檚 tangled with treasure hunters. Some of the skirmishes have even got physical. In 2007, a snorkeller came across a pile of cannons in about 3 metres of water off the Dominican Republic鈥檚 south-east coast. Government officials asked Beeker if he could have a look. He and his colleagues eventually located 26 cannons, three anchor crowns, a section of the lower hull of a boat and other items, all of which helped them conclude these were the sought-after remains of the Quedagh Merchant 鈥� Captain Kidd鈥檚 ship, which had gone under in about 1698.
The site was officially declared an underwater museum on 23 May 2011, the 310th anniversary of Kidd鈥檚 hanging in London for piracy. This didn鈥檛 sit well with treasure hunters, who had been searching for Captain Kidd鈥檚 swag for years. Beeker was having a drink with colleagues at his favourite restaurant in the Dominican Republic one day, when an inebriated man staggered over, pointed to their Indiana University shirts and asked if they were the archaeologists who stole Captain Kidd鈥檚 shipwreck from him. The man 鈥渟tarted getting a little rowdy鈥�, Beeker recalls. There was pushing and shoving, overturned tables and broken glass. 鈥淭he guy had spent his savings and lost his marriage, and I guess he blamed me,鈥� says Beeker.
鈥淭hey concluded these were the remains of Captain Kidd鈥檚 ship鈥�
Despite the quarrels, he is willing to work with treasure hunters. Some of his peers flatly refuse to do this on ethical grounds, but Beeker believes archaeologists shouldn鈥檛 confine themselves to their ivory towers and may benefit from a carefully managed collaboration. In 2010, he invited treasure hunter Burt Webber to join his investigation of artefacts from the Nuestra Se帽ora de Bego帽a, an 18th-century Spanish ship in Dominican Republic waters. Beeker鈥檚 application for a government permit had been approved, but Webber鈥檚 was not. Beeker suggested they join forces.
The union was short-lived. In a letter to Beeker, Webber accused him of being a 鈥減lagiariser and exploiter of other people鈥檚 work鈥�. Webber says he found the Bego帽a in 2009. Beeker responds that only artefacts were discovered. 鈥淲ebber is upset I never announced the discovery of the shipwreck, which he wanted credit for,鈥� he says. 鈥淗ow can he be credited for finding a ship that has not been found?鈥� For Beeker, such clashes are just part of the job.
There are signs that his campaign for museums may have had some traction. 鈥淐harlie Beeker鈥檚 research provides an alternative to excavating and selling shipwreck artefacts,鈥� says Francis Soto, technical director of the Dominican Republic鈥檚 underwater heritage office. 鈥淢y government has not given new permits, and I hope we will instead look to make more parks to protect our maritime heritage.鈥�
One of the Dominican Republic鈥檚 museums, the 1724 Guadalupe Underwater Archaeological Preserve, is among the most visited shipwrecks in the country. 鈥淣ot only has this provided tremendous economic benefits through tourism, but it also helps tell the maritime history of my country and the importance of the Caribbean in the 15th to 18th centuries,鈥� says Soto.
Beeker is also trying to persuade officials from Haiti, Turks and Caicos, and Colombia to embrace underwater museums.
He visited the Punta Cana site last month to take stock of its condition. He says the scene looks like a war zone, with excavated objects lying about, including five large anchors, cannons and horse shoes. Beeker was most excited to find pieces of the wooden hull. Very little is known about how the ships of the time were built and what kind of technology they had on board. 鈥淸There is] tremendous potential to gain new insight into the construction and lives of early 16th century colonisation of the Americas less than 50 years [after] the Columbus voyages of discovery,鈥� says Beeker.
The threat of a lawsuit doesn鈥檛 deter him. 鈥淚鈥檝e been sued before,鈥� he says. 鈥淚鈥檒l take the heat.鈥�
Chasing the Saint
Identifying centuries-old wrecks is never straightforward. In 2014, Charles Beeker, a marine archaeologist at Indiana University in Bloomington, was called on by underwater explorer Barry Clifford. Clifford had found a wreck off the north coast of Haiti, and thought it was none other than Christopher Columbus鈥檚 flagship vessel, the Santa Maria, which sank in 1492. He had a permit to investigate it and sought out Beeker鈥檚 help to confirm its identity.
On first examination, Beeker said Clifford could be right. He proposed to the Haitian government that Indiana University carry out the studies. Instead, in October the same year, a team assembled by UNESCO did their own examination at the government鈥檚 request, and concluded that the ship hadn鈥檛 been part of Columbus鈥檚 fleet. Among other things, the team found fasteners typical of 17th- and 18th-century vessels, which suggests the wreck was too young.
Beeker dismisses the UNESCO study as inconclusive, and says it didn鈥檛 analyse the wreck鈥檚 wood, ballast or datable ceramics. According to Beeker, politics were behind the decision to reject his proposal. He claims UNESCO wouldn鈥檛 let him back on the wreck if he was working with Clifford.
UNESCO denies the decision was political. In an email written shortly after the organisation reached its conclusion, Ulrike Gu茅rin, responsible for underwater cultural heritage matters at UNESCO, acknowledged that the organisation frowned on Clifford鈥檚 presence because of his 鈥渃ommercial exploitation contract with the preceding government of Haiti鈥�. But she said that didn鈥檛 influence their investigation.
鈥淚 understand that Mr. Beeker and Mr. Clifford are frustrated that their find is not the Santa Maria,鈥� wrote Guerin, 鈥渂ut our work in this matter was absolutely neutral and purely in response of the Haitian government鈥檚 request. If the site would have been the Santa Maria, we would have said so, please be assured of this.鈥�
This article appeared in print under the headline 鈥淏ooty patrol鈥�
