The powerful nor’easter battering the East Coast has uncovered what could be the remains of a 19th-century shipwreck off the coast of Nantucket. Jason Graziadei, editor-in-chief of Nantucket Current, spotted the wooden remains on the southern shore of the Massachusetts island on Saturday and posted a video of them. He believes they probably came from Warren Sawyer, a wooden schooner that was wrecked near Miacomet Beach 142 years ago. 00:28 Nor’easter discovers century-old shipwreck in Massachusetts 00:0000:00 Fragments believed to be from the same ship first appeared in December 2022, when a Nantucket resident spotted them while bicycling along the island’s south coast. photographic, historical and archaeological evidence and concluded that the remains were “most likely” from the Warren Sawyer, according to a 2023 report by the Massachusetts Underwater Archaeological Resources Board. The three-masted schooner was wrecked there on Dec. 22, 1884, while traveling from New Orleans to Boston with 1,115 bales of cotton and 28 tons of scrap metal, according to the report. More wreckage believed to be from the schooner turned up in February 2023, about a half-mile west of the first find, according to the report. The wreck has resurfaced since 2022, early 2023,” Graziadei told NBC News on Sunday. “It’s certainly possible it could be from another shipwreck, but given the location and appearance, we said it’s most likely the Warren Sawyer.” Jascin N. Leonardo Finger, deputy director of the Maria Mitchell Association, which operates a natural history museum in Nantucket, said in an email Sunday that the newly exposed wreckage may be of the Warren Sawyer, but “more research is needed” to confirm its origin. The Massachusetts Underwater Archaeological Resources Board did not respond to requests for comment on Sunday. A team of experts and researchers identified parts of the shipwreck discovered in 2022 as “likely those of the three-masted schooner, Warren Sawyer,” lost at the same location in 1884. Jason Graziadei / Nantucket Current The Egan Maritime Institute, which works to preserve it. Nantucket’s maritime history and helped the board in previous efforts to identify Warren Sawyer’s remains, also did not respond to a request for comment. Shipwrecks near the island were not uncommon in Warren Sawyer’s time, Leonardo Finger told the New York Times on Saturday. Nantucket residents commonly scavenge for items washed ashore from shipwrecks, he said.
