ECU maritime studies field school students explore unique ship inside a ship
This summer, East Carolina University graduate students got their feet wet and explored something quite uncommon at one of two shipwreck sites during their field school in maritime history and underwater archaeology.
Dr. Nathan Richards, professor in the Department of History and the Program in Maritime Studies, led the course and guided students during their on-site field work May 19-June 13. While visiting the site of the U.S.S. Picket (1861-1862, located in the lower Tar River), Richards and students were able to more thoroughly examine previously unexposed sections of the wooden-built vessel, which is wrapped around its earlier iteration of an iron ship known as the Robert F. Winslow (1845?-1861).
In the 1970s, archaeologists diving at the site for artifact recovery knew that the Picket’s structure had been an iron ship built in New York for the canal system, but most of the ship was still buried by sediment. Richards said the Picket is often described as the most intact and maybe only surviving example of a United States Army craft in the world.
Maritime Studies graduate student Liam O’Brien and Dr. Nathan Richards discuss the construction features of the Picket. (Photo by Rebecca Kelley)
“While we haven’t made a big discovery in revealing for the first time that this is two different types of ship, we are the first group of researchers to see it exposed to this extent, and we were able to get access to information that they didn’t have in the 1970s and ’80s,” Richards said. “Now that it is scoured out, you see an intact iron hull that is sitting inside a wooden hull. You get to see how two ships of this type were being built.”
Richards said that current research suggests that it is very uncommon, and perhaps rare, to see this type of ship modification. Often, ships’ lengths were shortened or lengthened, but it was typically done using the same materials and specifications.
“In this particular case, it is strange, because it almost looks like you have a shipwreck inside a shipwreck,” he said.
He said studying the Picket has significance because it shows its role as a combatant in the Civil War and its part in historical events in American history. On a broader level, Richards said the Picket holds clues to a story about American naval power, American technological power and becoming an industrialized nation.
“A lot of these shipwrecks are right under our noses,” Richards said. “The example of the Picket is a site we go to a lot. It has a pretty incredible heritage. It is worth studying, and it is worth protecting.”
The summer field school is a core class in the maritime studies curriculum. Faculty and students travel to at least one location each summer to conduct field work.
Seven students — Harley Drange, Rebecca Kelley, Keegan Maxheimer, Liam O’Brien, Krysta Rogers, Jacob Thomas and Ethan Whiten — gained valuable experience in various archaeological techniques during the field school. They worked at two sites, focusing on the remains of U.S.-built wooden- and steel-hulled watercraft dating from the 19th century (Picket) and into the 20th century (U.S.S. PC-1084, 1942-unknown, located in the upper Cape Fear River).
Graduate student Krysta Rodgers about to dive Picket (Nathan Richards/ECU)
The sites were partially selected out of Richards’ interest in the era of the ships’ development, but also for their educational purposes.
“I’m generally interested in the 19th and 20th centuries because it is such a period of accelerated industrial and technological development,” he said. “There are a lot of very rapid changes, especially in maritime technology.”
As this is often the first field school most of the maritime graduate students participate in, Richards said he also chose these sites for their educational suitability for the students. The PC-1084 sticks out of the water, giving students land-based skills, and has a diving component with restricted visibility. ECU is known for training divers to record data in limited visibility and dark-water environments. The Picket is submerged and provides students with more of a challenge.
During the field school, students acquired skills in diving, snorkeling and shore-side tasks in exposed, shallow water areas. Non-disturbance recording of the sites included using tape measures, slates and photogrammetry — a technique of taking photos from a site and uploading them into computer software used to re-create a three-dimensional model. Another skill learned involved the use of remote sensing technologies.
Drange and Kelley are using the work they conducted over the summer for their master’s theses topics. Drange is using research from the PC-1084, and Kelley is using research from the Picket.
While at the two sites, Richards also collected data for other colleagues at ECU. He provided samples of microbial information from the shipwrecks for a human pathogen study conducted by Dr. Erin Field, associate professor in the Department of Biology, and her mentee, Sarah Kate Childs, a student in the interdisciplinary doctoral program in biology, biomedicine and chemistry (IDPBBC).
The maritime studies program also offers a more advanced fall field school experience. This September, 14 students, including those who participated in Richards’ summer field school, will travel to Finland and work with ECU’s Dr. Lynn Harris, professor in the Department of History and maritime studies program, and Dr. David Stewart, associate professor in history and maritime studies. Along with local divers, they will survey the maritime cultural landscape of Finland by examining older infrastructures and shipwrecks in ancient Finnish harbors and deeper water.