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The ''Mary Celeste'' was a Ship found abandoned off the coast of Portugal in 1872 . Why it had been abandoned remains unknown to this day. The ship and its desertion The ''Mary Celeste'' was a 103- Foot , 282- Ton Brigantine . Originally built as the ''Amazon'' in Spencer's Island , Nova Scotia in 1861 , the ship seemingly had bad luck and, due to numerous negative occurrences, had changed hands several times. It became the ''Mary Celeste'' in 1869 . On November 7 1872 , under the command of Captain Benjamin Briggs , the ship picked up a cargo of American alcohol (apparently for fortifying wine, although several sources state that the alcohol was denatured, industrial alcohol, and thus unfit for drinking) shipped by Meissner Ackermann & Coin in New York City and set sail for Genoa , Italy . In addition to the crew of seven, it carried two passengers: the Captain's wife, Sarah E. Briggs (née Cobb), and daughter, Sophia Matilda. On December 4 1872 (some reports give December 5 , due to a lack of standard time zones in the 1800s), the ''Mary Celeste'' was sighted by the ''Dei Gratia'', captained by a Captain Morehouse, who knew Captain Briggs. The ''Dei Gratia'' had left New York harbor only seven days after the ''Mary Celeste''. ''Dei Gratia'' The forehatch and the Lazarette were both open, the clock was not functioning and the compass was destroyed. The Sextant and Chronometer were missing, suggesting the ship had been deliberately abandoned. The only Lifeboat appeared to have been intentionally launched rather than torn away. Other accounts claim the lifeboat was still on the ship. The cargo of 1700 Barrels of Alcohol was intact, though when it was eventually unloaded in Genoa, nine barrels were noted as being empty. A six-month supply of Food and Water was aboard. All of the ship's papers except the captain's Logbook were missing. The last log entry was dated November 24 and placed her 100 Miles west of the Azores . The last entry on the ship's slate showed her as having reached the island of St Mary in the Azores on November 25th. The crew of the ''Dei Gratia'' split in two to sail the ''Mary Celeste'' to Gibraltar where, during a hearing, the judge praised the crew of the ''Dei Gratia'' for their courage and skill. However, the admiralty court officer Frederick Solly Flood turned the hearings from a simple salvage claim into almost a trial of the men of the ''Dei Gratia'', whom Flood suspected of foul play. In the end, the court did award prize money to the crew, but the sum was much less than it should have been, as "punishment" for wrongdoing which the court could not prove. The recovered ship was used for 12 years by a variety of owners before being loaded up with boots and cat food by her last captain who attempted to sink her, apparently to claim insurance money. The plan did not work as the ship refused to sink having been run up on the Rochelois Reef in Haiti . The remains of the ship were discovered on August 9 , 2001 , by an expedition headed by author Clive Cussler (representing the National Underwater And Marine Agency ) and Canadian film producer John Davis (president of ECO-NOVA Productions of Canada). The fate of the crew and passengers None of the ''Mary Celeste'' In early 1873 it was reported that two lifeboats landed off the shores of Spain , one containing a body and an American flag, the other containing five bodies. It was never investigated whether or not it could be the remains of the crew of the ''Mary Celeste''. Speculation and fiction on the ''Mary Celeste'' Dozens of theories have been proposed to explain the mystery of the vanished crew and passengers, ranging from the mundane to the fantastic. Some suggested there was a mutiny among the crew who murdered Briggs and his family then escaped in the lifeboat. However, Briggs was known as a very religious, just and fair man. He was not the kind of Captain to provoke his crew to mutiny. First Mate Albert Richardson had served in the American Civil War before going away to sea, and the rest of the crew also had excellent reputations. When all theories have been tabled, the answer to the mystery most probably lies with the barrels of raw alcohol. Alcohol fumes were known to be volatile, even explosive. A strict New England Puritan, Briggs had never hauled such a dangerous cargo and did not trust it. Nine barrels leaking would build up a lethal mixture of fumes in the hold. Historian Conrad Byer believes that after a few calm days at sea, Captain Briggs ordered the hold to be opened. There was a violent rush of fumes and then steam. Captain Briggs believed the ship was about to explode and ordered everyone into the lifeboat. In his haste, he failed to properly secure the lifeboat to the ship with a strong towline. The wind picked up and blew the ship away from them. The occupants of the lifeboat either drowned or drifted out to sea to die of hunger, thirst and exposure. Another theory is that the Mary Celeste got caught up in a Waterspout , a Tornado -like storm with a funnel cloud that occurs at sea. If the ship were caught up in a waterspout, the water surrounding the boat would have risen up the hull, letting the crew assume incorrectly that the Mary Celeste was Sinking . Other, more extreme speculation is common. Some authors posit the involvement of UFO s or Paranormal activity, such as a connection with the Bermuda Triangle , though the ship was far from it. Also some conspiracy theorists' and the like believe that a Giant Squid may have carried the crew off, but there is not any proof of that. In 1884 Arthur Conan Doyle published a story entitled '' J. Habakuk Jephson's Statement '', part of The Captain Of The Polestar . Doyle's story drew very heavily on the original incident but included a considerable amount of Fiction and called the ship the ''Marie Céleste''. Much of this story's fictional content, and the incorrect name, have come to dominate popular accounts of the incident, and were even published as fact by several newspapers. It was said that their tea was still warm and breakfast was cooking when the ship was discovered; these are fictional details from Doyle's story. The '' Doctor Who '' episode, '' The Chase (1965) '' suggested that the arrival of time-travelling Daleks caused the crew of the ship to jump overboard. In 1973 , Science fiction author, Philip José Farmer penned a novel, ''The Other Log Of Phileas Fogg'', in which he has two of Jules Verne’s most famous characters, Phileas Fogg and Captain Nemo square off against one another in a scene on board the Mary Celeste. The 1970s British Sci-Fi Serial Sapphire And Steel suggested that Steel had been forced to send the original ship and crew out of time (and presumably to their deaths), because an accident, caused by the crew, would have caused the end of time. He left behind a replica of the ship, but forgot to replicate the bodies. The 1990 horror film remake of Night Of The Living Dead , a plaque outside the front door of the farmhouse reads "M. Celeste." Director Tom Savini stated on the DVD's commentary that this is a reference to the Mary Celeste. Further details include scenes of still smoldering cigarettes in ashtrays and food still cooking on the stoves, but the residents missing. An episode of the 1996 series The Real Adventures Of Jonny Quest entitled 'In the Wake of the Mary Celeste' deals with the ship as well. In the 2001 Science Fiction Horror movie "She Creature" the Mary Celeste's later life was speculated upon; the story followed that a carnivorous mermaid killed and ate all by one of the passengers and crew during a recrewed 1901 voyage of the ship. In the 2002 film Ghost Ship , the Salvager captain refers to the Mary Celeste when the group finds the Antonia Graza abandoned. It is speculated in the film that the main protagonist made the Mary Celeste crew kill each other and then took their souls for the "management". Old Sailors sometimes claimed that they had been aboard the ''Mary Celeste''. Little credence is given to these stories. Timeline
Ship's manifest The crew and passengers are listed in the ships log as: Crew Passengers Image:Benjamin_Briggs_captain_of_Mary_Celeste.jpg|Captain Benjamin Briggs Image:Albert_Richardson_first_mate_Mary_Celeste.JPG|First mate Albert Richardson Image:Sarah_Briggs_wife_of_Benjamin.JPG|Sarah Briggs Image:Sophia_Briggs_daughter_of_Benjamin.JPG|Sophia Briggs References
New York Times
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