Constellation

History

Launched in Maine in 1918 as the Sally Persis Noyes, this four-masted wooden schooner was bought and refitted in 1932 by Robert Royall of East Boothbay and renamed Constellation. The Second World War gave old sailing ships new work, and in July 1943 she left New York for Venezuela with a remarkable mixed cargo: bags of cement and building supplies, whisky, cosmetics, glassware, phonograph records, crockery and large quantities of medical drugs in glass ampoules, including morphine.

Within days she was leaking and turned for Bermuda. Waiting for a local pilot off the north-west reefs, she was carried by the current onto the reef at Western Blue Cut and sank in about 30 ft of water on 31 July 1943. All aboard were rescued. Some cargo was salvaged and auctioned, Bert Darrell recovered parts of the ship, and the US Navy is said to have retrieved hundreds of cases of whisky; much of the rest stayed on the seabed.

The drug ampoules gave Peter Benchley the idea for his novel The Deep, in which the ship becomes the Goliath. The 1977 film was shot largely in Bermuda, and the wreck became one of the island's most famous dives.

Diving the wreck today

An easy, shallow dive or snorkel in about 25-35 ft, right beside the paddle-steamer Montana, so both are usually seen on one trip. The wooden hull has mostly gone; the centre of the site is a large mound of cement bags that set solid on the seabed, with glassware, bottle fragments and other cargo scattered around. Small glass ampoules still turn up in the sand - nothing may be removed. Plenty of reef fish; suitable for all levels.