On August 11, 1718, Lieutenant Governor William Keith had two pressing matters to bring before the Pennsylvania Provincial Council meeting in Philadelphia: (1) what to do with a captured pirate ship and its inventory, and (2) what to do about the increasing pirate harassment of shipping trade in the area.

The first matter was resolved quickly. The ship's arms and ammunition would be used "in the Defense of this Colony" and the rest, except for the "Sailors Cloaths and Necessaries" would be "appraised, and then sold at Publick Vendue to the highest Bidder". The items to be sold were, for the most part, what would usually be found on ships of that time: sails, tools, doctor's chest, planks, barrels of beef and pork, etc., and a particularly interesting item we would have enjoyed seeing, "1 old piece of junk". The munitions to be kept included 10 great guns and carriages, 30 musketts, 5 pistols, 7 cutlasses, 53 hand Granadoes, 200 great shot, 2 Powder Horns, 4 Spunges, 3 Pateraroes, and 4 Caggs of Patridge.

We have a couple of questions concerning those last three items: (1) what were "4 spunges" and why would they be listed as munitions, and, (2) what were "Pateraroes" and "Caggs of Patridge"? The answers can be found in the next Queen's Report. Stay tuned!

The second pressing matter before the Provincial Council took longer, and the minutes of this meeting, printed in Harrisburg, Pennsylvania in 1840 by Theophilus Fenn, indicate Lieutenant Governor Keith's concern for "the great losses that this Colony has already sustained beyond any of its Neighbors, by our trade being Blocked up & Infested with Pirates at the capes of this river & Bay has Given me much uneasiness, and Racks my thoughts at this Present time which way to Contrive some Expedient for Relief".

Keith discusses the efforts he is making to meet the problem, remarking that "not only we of this Province, but also the Colonies in the West Indies, who in this season of Drowth among them Depended upon Bread & provision from us, & even the merchants of Great Britain themselves have been & are Daily more & more Likely to be Great Sufferers."

And then he mentions a specific name. "Upon an Informacon that one Teach, a noted pirate, who has done the Greatest mischief of any to this place, has been Lurking for some Days in and about this Town, I have Granted a Provincial warrant for his being apprehended, if possible to be found." Teach, of course, was Blackbeard. He was a pain for North Carolina, harassing communities along our shores and ships in our waters. And he did have the dubious honor to have his head sliced off here. But the Lieutenant Governor of Pennsylvania thought the pirate had inflicted them with the "Greatest mischief of any". The fact of it is that Blackbeard was a pain everywhere he went from the Caribbean to New England. And he played no favorites. He harassed everybody.[For full transcript see: State of Pennsylvania, Minutes of the Provincial Council of Pennsylvania,from the Organization to the Termination of the Proprietary Government, Volume III, Philadelphia, 1852, reprinted by AMS Press, New York, 1968.]

Labs and Artifacts Being Moved to Greenville

The former Voice of America (VOA) facility, near Greenville, N.C., once a broadcasting station for the United States Information Agency (USIA), has a new tenant. In March Sarah Watkins-Kenney, just arrived from England, moved in as lead conservator for the Queen Anne's Revenge (QAR) Shipwreck Project and began setting up offices and laboratories in preparation for the transfer of artifacts from Morehead City and Fort Fisher. In July Archaeologist Wendy Welsh came on board from Fort Fisher to serve as laboratory manager, and conservation assistant Eric Nordgren joined the team in September. Eric's most recent work was with the Institute of Nautical Archaeology in Alexandria, Egypt focused on treatment of marine archaeological material from an 18th C. Ottoman ship excavated in the Red Sea. Assisting the QAR conservation staff this fall are Dave Krop and Danielle LaFleur, graduate assistants from East Carolina University's Program in Maritime Studies.

It is appropriate that an important segment of the QAR Shipwreck Project, with its international influences, is located in a facility that once had 98 antennas that broadcast 24 hours daily in 52 languages to 86 million listeners around the world. The USIA opened the VOA program in 1963, closed it in 1995, and donated the buildings and the 644-acre site to Pitt County and the City of Greenville. Later the two governments gave it back so that it could be given to East Carolina University. The University named it the West Research Campus and housed the N.C. Agromedicine Center and the Southern Coastal Agromedicine Center there, in collaboration with N.C.A&T State University and N.C. State University.

      

In addition to having offices and labs in the main building, QAR will house its larger artifacts, such as cannons and timbers, in a freestanding building nearby. It will be a welcome change from the crowded labs in Morehead City, but there are some challenges in the move. Probably the biggest will be managing the logistics problems when dealing with several state agencies in Morehead City, Wilmington, Greenville, and Raleigh. Watkins-Kenney says they are trying to stay flexible about everything since "we are not always sure what we want to do until we do it." Another challenge involves converting spaces designed for broadcasting into the necessary wet and dry labs needed for archaeological conservation.

Director's Report

The QAR staff is pleased to announce a joint expedition to the shipwreck this September with personnel from the National Undersea Research Center at the University of North Carolina - Wilmington and members of the NOAA's Monitor Marine Sanctuary. The focus of the venture is to record a detailed photo record using high-resolution photography and computer mosaic imaging. This work will help provide a baseline view of the exposed remains at the site and help QAR scientists track changes that occur there. For more detail see the project proposal prepared by QAR staff archaeologist and data manager Chris Southerly. We are pleased to have the support and expertise offered by these nationally recognized organizations.

QAR staff members are continuing to wrestle with the enormous task of managing field and artifact data. Individual photographs currently catalogued number well over 3,000 images and with 15,000 artifacts expected, our task has just begun. What's more sobering is the fact that less than 2% of the QAR shipwreck remains have been recovered so far. To handle the large volume of data a Microsoft Access database has been completed after several years of development and is currently being tested in the conservation laboratory. Work will soon begin on linking data about artifacts with site maps and specific locations (GIS). This, in turn, will allow archaeologists to begin interpreting the results of field excavation and recovery. This stage has been a long time in coming, but will be well worth the wait since distributional analysis will show where artifacts are concentrated and what types of artifact are grouped together. From this we can begin to unravel the story of how sailors aboard the ship lived.

Security at the QAR Site

We get questions about security measures at the Queen Anne's Revenge shipwreck site, usually about whether or not individuals can boat, swim, fish, or dive there. All abandoned shipwrecks and underwater archaeological artifacts recovered in North Carolina waters belong to the people of the state. In the case of QAR, which carries a high level of significance, an area 300 yards surrounding the site has been declared a protected area by the NC Department of Cultural Resources. This declaration preserves certain abandoned shipwrecks and underwater artifacts of primary scientific, archaeological, or historical value as set forth in North Carolina Administrative Code T07 04R.1009. The shipwreck site is managed, under the authority of General Statute121, Article 3, by the Underwater Archaeology Branch of the North Carolina Department of Archives and History (DAH). Activities, such as anchoring, diving, and trawling, are not allowed within this area to insure that valuable archaeological remains are not disturbed or removed.

The QAR site is currently under video and radar surveillance using much the same technology employed by security companies protecting storage facilities. As boats come into the restricted zone an alarm is set off and triggers recording and observation. If vessels are deemed to be violating the protected area, a series of steps are taken in response. In extreme cases, an intruder can expect to be confronted by law enforcement officers on the site.

Criminal penalties can be as much as a $2,000 fine and /or up to six months in jail, and civil penalties can be as high as a $5,000 assessment and forfeiture of vehicles and equipment used in any violation.

The shipwreck is best left to the professionals, who are working on your behalf to properly study and record the exciting archaeological remains associated with the QAR site. We appreciate your help in its protection. Instead we urge you take advantage of the numerous better places on the Crystal Coast for enjoying water sports: swimming, boating, diving, snorkeling, canoeing, kayaking, or whatever. For more information, go to the Crystal Coast website at http://www.sunnync.com/ and be sure to visit the N.C. Maritime Museum at Beaufort to see QAR artifacts and exhibits explaining the archaeologists' findings.

Contributions:

Many people continue to support the QAR project in many ways. We specifically want to recognize major contributors to the fall field project. Tom Bennett, Jr., Comfort Inn, Morehead City, is providing housing for the out-of-town scientists and Wachovia Foundation and Ted Haigler have provided funding to support this important work. Many thanks to them for making our work possible!

    

In the Morehead City/Beaufort/Cape Lookout area? Visit the North Carolina Maritime Museum at 315 Front Street, Beaufort, NC and see many of the actual artifacts from Queen Anne's Revenge.