THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, July 18, 1996 TAG: 9607180315
SECTION: LOCAL PAGE: B1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY MARY REID BARROW, STAFF WRITER
DATELINE: VIRGINIA BEACH LENGTH: 67 lines
Ever since Hurricane Bertha's departure last weekend, the Old Coast Guard Station has been getting reports from beachcombers who found pieces of an old shipwreck on the beach.
Bertha's gifts of big oak timbers, complete with wooden pegs called ``treenails,'' have been washing up from 32nd Street to Fort Story all week.
``I call it Bertha's bounty,'' said Fielding Tyler, executive director of the oceanfront museum.
Tyler was on the beach at Fort Story on Wednesday, measuring and tagging a 6 1/2-foot-long piece of wood - one of six found that morning by a Virginia Beach policeman patrolling the area.
Tyler said the timbers, part of aship's ribs, appear to be all from the same vessel, probably a post-Civil War sailing ship that carried commercial goods up and down the East Coast.
``You can see the beginning of the curve where the rib bends toward the top,'' Tyler said.
The ship probably went down south of the Virginia Beach resort, and when it sank, 10 to 15 percent of the hull went to the bottom, Tyler said. The timbers probably came from that portion of the hull because they were preserved by the sand, he said.
Two of the heavy, waterlogged rib pieces are back at the Old Coast Guard Station Museum, formerly the Life-Saving Museum of Virginia, on public display. Most of the pieces will be left on the beach unless they are a hazard, Tyler said.
``The tide will come in, and she'll be covered up,'' he added. ``And the next hurricane will probably take it on up to the Duck-In.''
The Duck-In restaurant is northwest of Fort Story, and currents generally go from south to north, which is also why Tyler figured the ship went down south of the resort strip many years ago.
Since even historic shipwrecks must be left on the beach because there is no way to store them, the Old Coast Guard Station has begun a wreck-documentation program to keep track of what washes up.
Every reported piece of shipwreck with some historical value is given two identical, round, yellow tags marked with an identification number and instructions to call or write the museum if found. The tags are nailed into the wood with galvanized nails that won't rust.
Tyler doesn't have any idea what ship the wreckage is from. The kind of wood and shape of the treenails will help him determine possibly where the ship was built. Examining the currents and determining the rate of a shipwreck's movement also may offer clues to where the vessel went down.
``We'll try to find out a little more,'' he said, ``and probably narrow it down to a number of shipwrecks offshore.'' ILLUSTRATION: Color photo
D. KEVIN ELLIOTT/The Virginian-Pilot
Fielding Tyler, executive director of the Old Coast Guard Station,
examines and tags a timber from an old shipwreck that washed up at
Virginia Beach. Ever since Hurricane Bertha departed last weekend,
beachcombers have been finding pieces of the old wreck on the city's
beach. Tyler calls it ``Bertha's bounty.''
Graphic
IF YOU FIND ANYTHING...
The Old Coast Guard Station, formerly the Life-Saving Museum of
Virginia, is at 24th Street and Atlantic Avenue. The hours are 10
a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Saturday and noon to 5 p.m. Sunday. If
you see any timbers of a historic nature on the beach, call
422-1587. by CNB