► The Mary Rose
was a carrack-type warship of the English Tudor navy of King Henry
VIII. After serving for 33 years in several wars against France,
Scotland, and Brittany and after being substantially rebuilt in 1536,
she saw her last action on 19 July 1545. While leading the attack on the
galleys of a French invasion fleet, she sank in the Solent, the straits
north of the Isle of Wight. The wreck of the Mary Rose was rediscovered
in 1971 and salvaged in 1982 by the Mary Rose Trust in one of the most
complex and expensive projects in the history of maritime archaeology.
The surviving section of the ship and thousands of recovered artefacts
are of immeasurable value as a Tudor-era time capsule. The excavation
and salvage of the Mary Rose was a milestone in the field of maritime
archaeology, comparable in complexity and cost only to the raising of
the Swedish 17th-century warship Vasa in 1961. The finds include
weapons, sailing equipment, naval supplies and a wide array of objects
used by the crew. Many of the artefacts are unique to the Mary Rose and
have provided insights into topics ranging from naval warfare to the
history of musical instruments. Since the mid-1980s, while undergoing
conservation, the remains of the hull have been on display at the
Portsmouth Historic Dockyard. An extensive collection of well-preserved
artefacts is on display at the nearby Mary Rose Museum.
► The
Mary Rose had no known career as a merchant vessel. She was one of the
largest ships in the English navy throughout more than three decades of
intermittent war and was one of the earliest examples of a purpose-built
sailing warship. She was armed with new types of heavy guns that could
fire through the recently invented gun-ports. After being substantially
rebuilt in 1536, she was also one of the earliest ships that could fire a
broadside, although the line of battle tactics that employed it had not
yet been developed. Several theories have sought to explain the demise
of the Mary Rose, based on historical records, knowledge of 16th-century
shipbuilding and modern experiments. The precise cause of her sinking
is still unclear, because of conflicting testimonies and a lack of
conclusive physical evidence.
Historical Context
|
Painting of Henry VIII in 1509 |
► By the late 15th century, England was a relatively insignificant state
on the periphery of Europe. The great victories against France in the
Hundred Years' War were in the past; only the small enclave of Calais in
northern France remained as a remnant of the vast continental holdings
of the English kings. The War of the Roses—the civil war between the
houses of York and Lancaster—had ended with Henry VII's establishment of
the House of Tudor, the new ruling dynasty of England. The ambitious
naval policies of Henry V were not matched by his successors, and from
1422 to 1509 only six ships were built for the crown. The marriage
alliance between Anne of Brittany and Charles VIII of France in 1491,
and his successor Louis XII in 1499, left England with a worsened
strategic position on its southern flank. Despite this, Henry VII
managed to maintain a comparatively long period of peace and a small but
powerful core of a navy.
► At the onset of the early modern
period, the great European powers were France, the Holy Roman Empire and
Spain. All three became involved in the War of the League of Cambrai in
1508. The conflict was initially aimed at the Republic of Venice but
eventually turned against France. Through the Spanish possessions in the
Low Countries, England had close economic ties with the Spanish
Habsburgs, and it was the young Henry VIII's ambition to repeat the
glorious martial endeavours of his predecessors. In 1509, six weeks into
his reign, Henry married the Spanish princess Catherine of Aragon and
joined the League, intent on certifying his historical claim as king of
both England and France. By 1511 Henry was part of an anti-French
alliance that also included Ferdinand II of Aragon, Pope Julius II and
Holy Roman emperor Maximilian.
►The small navy that Henry VIII
inherited from his father had only two sizeable ships, the carracks
Regent and Sovereign. Just months after his accession, two large ships
were ordered: the Mary Rose and the Peter Pomegranate (later known as
the Peter after being rebuilt in 1536) of about 500 and 450 tons
respectively. Which king ordered the building of the Mary Rose is
unclear; although construction began during Henry VIII's reign, the
plans for naval expansion could have been in the making earlier.
Nevertheless, it was Henry VIII who oversaw the project and he who
ordered additional large ships to be built, most notably the Henry Grace
a Dieu ("Henry Grace of God"), or Great Harry at more than 1000 tons
burthen. By the 1520s the English state had established a de facto
permanent "Navy Royal", the organizational ancestor of the modern Royal
Navy.
Construction
► The construction of the Mary Rose began in 1510 in Portsmouth and she
was launched in July 1511. She was then towed to London and fitted with
rigging and decking, and supplied with armaments. Other than the
structural details needed to sail, stock and arm the Mary Rose, she was
also equipped with flags, banners and streamers (extremely elongated
flags that were flown from the top of the masts) that were either
painted or gilded.
► Constructing a warship of the size of the
Mary Rose was a major undertaking, requiring vast quantities of
high-quality material. In the case of building a state-of-the-art
warship, these materials were primarily oak. The total amount of timber
needed for the construction can only be roughly calculated since only
about one third of the ship still exists. One estimate for the number of
trees is around 600 mostly large oaks, representing about 16 hectares
(40 acres) of woodland. The huge trees that had been common in Europe
and the British Isles in previous centuries were by the 16th century
quite rare, which meant that timbers were brought in from all over
southern England. The largest timbers used in the construction were of
roughly the same size as those used in the roofs of the largest
cathedrals in the high Middle Ages. An unworked hull plank would have
weighed over 300 kg (660 lb), and one of the main deck beams would have
weighed close to three-quarters of a tonne.
Naming
►The
common explanation for the ship's name was that it was inspired by Henry
VIII's favourite sister, Mary Tudor, and the rose as the emblem of the
Tudors. According to historians David Childs, David Loades and Peter
Marsden, no direct evidence of naming the ship after the King's sister
exists. It was far more common at the time to give ships pious Christian
names, a long-standing tradition in Western Europe, or to associate
them with their royal patrons. Names like Grace Dieu (Grace of God) and
Holighost (Holy Spirit) had been common since the 15th century and other
Tudor navy ships had names like the Regent and Three Ostrich Feathers
(referring to the crest of the Prince of Wales). The Virgin Mary is a
more likely candidate for a namesake, and she was also associated with
the mystic rose. The name of the sister ship of the Mary Rose, the Peter
Pomegranate, is believed to have been named in honour of Saint Peter,
and the badge of the Queen Catharine of Aragon, a pomegranate. According
to Childs, Loades and Marsden, the two ships, which were built around
the same time, were named in honour of the king and queen respectively.
Design
|
The Mary Rose as depicted in the Anthony Roll. |
► The Mary Rose was substantially rebuilt in 1536. The 1536 rebuilding
turned a ship of 500 tons into one of 700 tons, and added an entire
extra tier of broadside guns to the old carrack-style structure. By
consequence, modern research is based mostly on interpretations of the
concrete physical evidence of this version of the Mary Rose. The
construction of the original design from 1509 is less known.
► The Mary Rose was built according to the carrack-style with high
"castles" in the bow and stern with a low waist of open decking in the
middle. The shape of the hull has a so-called tumblehome form and
reflected the use of the ship as a platform for heavy guns. Above the
waterline, the hull gradually narrows to compensate for the weight of
the guns and to make boarding more difficult. Since only part of the
hull has survived, it is not possible to determine many of the basic
dimensions with any great accuracy. The moulded breadth, the widest
point of the ship roughly above the waterline, was about 12 metres (39
ft) and the keel about 32 metres (105 ft), although the ship's overall
length is uncertain.
► The hull had four levels separated by
three decks. The terminology for these in the 16th century was still not
standardised so the terms used here are those that were applied by the
Mary Rose Trust. The hold lay furthest down in the ship, right above the
bottom planking below the waterline. This is where the kitchen, or
galley, was situated and the food was cooked. Directly aft of the galley
was the mast step, a rebate in the centre-most timber of the keelson,
right above the keel, which supported the main mast, and next to it the
main bilge pump. To increase the stability of the ship, the hold was
where the ballast was placed and much of the supplies were kept. Right
above the hold was the orlop, the lowest deck. Like the hold it was
partitioned and was also used as a storage area for everything from food
to spare sails.
► Above the orlop lay the main deck which housed
the heaviest guns. The side of the hull on the main deck level had seven
gunports on each side fitted with heavy lids that would have been
watertight when closed. This was also the highest deck that was caulked
and waterproof. Along the sides of the main deck there were cabins under
the forecastle and sterncastle which have been identified as belonging
to the carpenter, barber-surgeon, pilot and possibly also the master
gunner and some of the officers. The top deck in the hull structure was
the upper deck (or weather deck) which was exposed to the elements in
the waist. It was a dedicated fighting deck without any known partitions
and a mix of heavy and light guns. Over the open waist the upper deck
was entirely covered with a coarse netting as a defence measure against
boarding. Though very little of the upper deck has survived, it has been
suggested that it housed the main living quarters of the crew
underneath the sterncastle. A drainage located in this area has been
identified as a possible "piss-dale", a general urinal to complement the
regular toilets that would probably have been located in the bow.
|
The remains of the Mary Rose's hull |
►
The castles of the Mary Rose had additional decks, but since virtually
nothing of them survives, their design has had to be reconstructed from
historical records. Contemporary ships of equal size were consistently
listed as having three decks in both castles. Although speculative, this
layout is supported by the illustration in the Anthony Roll and the gun
inventories.
► During the early stages of excavation of the
wreck, it was believed that the ship had originally been built with
clinker (or clench) planking, a technique where the hull consisted of
overlapping planks that bore the structural strength of the ship.
Cutting gunports into a clinker-built hull would have meant weakening
the ship's structural integrity, and it was assumed that she was later
rebuilt to accommodate a hull with carvel edge-to-edge planking with a
skeletal structure to support a hull perforated with gunports. Later
examination indicates that the clinker planking is not present
throughout the ship; only the outer structure of the sterncastle is
built with overlapping planking, though not with a true clinker
technique.
Sails and rigging
►
Although only the lower fittings of the rigging survives, a 1514
inventory and the only known contemporary depiction of the ship from the
Anthony Roll have been used to determine how the propulsion system of
the Mary Rose was designed. Nine, or possibly ten, sails were flown from
four masts and a bowsprit: the foremast and mainmast had two and three
square sails respectively; the mizzen mast had a lateen sail and a small
square sail and the bonaventure mizzen had at least one lateen sail,
and possibly also a square sail, and the bowsprit flew a small square
spritsail. According to the Anthony Roll illustration (see top of this
section), the yards (the spars from which the sails were set) on the
foremast and mainmast were also equipped with sheerhooks, twin curved
blades sharpened on the inside, that were intended to cut an enemy
ship's rigging during boarding actions.
►The sailing
capabilities of the Mary Rose were commented on by her contemporaries
and were once even put to the test. In March 1513 a contest was arranged
off The Downs, west of Kent, in which she raced against nine other
ships. She won the contest, and Admiral Edward Howard described her
enthusiastically as "the noblest ship of sayle [of any] gret ship, at
this howr, that I trow [believe] be in Cristendom". Several years later,
while sailing between Dover and The Downs, Vice-Admiral William
Fitzwilliam noted that both the Henry Grace à Dieu and the Mary Rose
performed very well, riding steadily in rough seas and that it would
have been a "hard chose" between the two. Modern experts have been more
sceptical to her sailing qualities, believing that ships at this time
were almost incapable of sailing close against the wind, and describing
the handling of the Mary Rose as being like "a wet haystack".
Armament
► The Mary Rose represented a transitional ship design in naval warfare.
Since ancient times, war at sea had been fought much like that on land:
with melee weapons and bows and arrows, but on floating wooden platforms
rather than battlefields. Though the introduction of guns was a
significant change, it only slowly changed the dynamics of ship-to-ship
combat. As guns became heavier and able to take more powerful gunpowder
charges, they needed to be placed lower in the ship, closer to the water
line. Gunports cut in the hull of ships had been introduced as early as
1501, only about a decade before the Mary Rose was built. This made
broadsides, coordinated volleys from all the guns on one side of a ship,
possible for the first time in history, at least in theory. Naval
tactics throughout the 16th century and well into the 17th century
focused on countering the oar-powered galleys that were armed with heavy
guns in the bow, facing forwards, which were aimed by turning the
entire ship against its target. Combined with inefficient gunpowder and
the difficulties inherent in firing accurately from moving platforms,
this meant that boarding remained the primary tactic for decisive
victory throughout the 16th century.
Bronze and iron guns
►
As the Mary Rose was built and served during a period of rapid
development of heavy artillery, her armament was a mix of old designs
and innovations. The heavy armament was a mix of older-type wrought iron
and cast bronze guns, which differed considerably in size, range and
design. The large iron guns were made up of staves or bars welded into
cylinders and then reinforced by shrinking iron hoops and breech loaded,
from the back, and equipped with simpler gun-carriages made from
hollowed-out elm logs with only one pair of wheels, or without wheels
entirely. The bronze guns were cast in one piece and rested on
four-wheel carriages which were essentially the same as those used until
the 19th century. The breech-loaders were cheaper to produce and both
easier and faster to reload, but could take less powerful charges than
cast bronze guns. Generally, the bronze guns used cast iron shot and
were more suited to penetrate hull sides while the iron guns used stone
shot that would shatter on impact and leave large, jagged holes, but
both could also fire a variety of ammunition intended to destroy rigging
and light structure or injure enemy personnel.
► The majority
of the guns were small iron guns with short range that could be aimed
and fired by a single person. The two most common are the bases,
breech-loading swivel guns, most likely placed in the castles, and
hailshot pieces, small muzzle-loaders with rectangular bores and
fin-like protrusions that were used to support the guns against the
railing and allow the ship structure to take the force of the recoil.
Though the design is unknown, there were two top pieces in a 1546
inventory (finished after the sinking) which was probably similar to a
base, but placed in one or more of the fighting tops.
Distribution and range of guns at sinking
Gun type |
Main deck |
Upper deck |
Castle decks |
Fighting tops |
Range in metres/feet |
Port pieces |
12 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
130+ / 425+ |
Culverins and demi-culverins |
2 |
4 |
2 |
0 |
299–413 / 980–1355 |
Cannons and demi-cannons |
4 |
0 |
0 |
0 |
c. 225 / 740 |
Sakers |
0 |
2 |
0 |
0 |
219–323 / 718–1060 |
Fowlers |
0 |
6 |
0 |
0 |
"short" |
Falcon |
? |
? |
? |
0 |
144–287 / 472–940 |
Slings |
0 |
6 |
0 |
0 |
"medium" |
Bases |
0 |
0 |
30 |
0 |
"close" |
Hailshot pieces |
0 |
0 |
20 |
0 |
"close" |
Top pieces |
0 |
0 |
0 |
2 |
"close" |
►The
ship went through several changes in her armament throughout her career,
most significantly accompanying her "rebuilding" in 1536 (see below),
when the number of anti-personnel guns was reduced and a second tier of
carriage-mounted long guns fitted. There are three inventories that list
her guns, dating to 1514, 1540 and 1546. Together with records from the
armoury at the Tower of London, these show how the configuration of
guns changed as gun-making technology evolved and new classifications
were invented. In 1514, the armament consisted mostly of anti-personnel
guns like the larger breech-loading iron murderers and the small
serpentines, demi-slings and stone guns. Only a handful of guns in the
first inventory were powerful enough to hole enemy ships, and most would
have been supported by the ship's structure rather than resting on
carriages.
►The inventories of both the Mary Rose and the Tower had
changed radically by 1540. There were now the new cast bronze cannons,
demi-cannons, culverins and sakers and the wrought iron port pieces (a
name that indicated they fired through ports), all of which required
carriages, had longer range and were capable of doing serious damage to
other ships. The analysis of the 1514 inventory combined with hints of
structural changes in the ship both indicate that the gunports on the
main deck were indeed a later addition.
►Various types of
ammunition could be used for different purposes: plain spherical shot of
stone or iron smashed hulls, spiked bar shot and shot linked with
chains would tear sails or damage rigging, and canister shot packed with
sharp flints produced a devastating shotgun effect. Trials made with
replicas of culverins and port pieces showed that they could penetrate
wood the same thickness of the Mary Rose's hull planking, indicating a
stand-off range of at least 90 m (295 ft). The port pieces proved
particularly efficient at smashing large holes in wood when firing stone
shot and were a devastating anti-personnel weapon when loaded with
flakes or pebbles.
Type of guns
Date |
Total |
Carriage-mounted |
Ship-supported |
Anti-ship |
Anti-personnel |
1514 |
78 |
20–21 |
57–58 |
5–9 |
64–73 |
1540 |
96 |
36 |
60 |
17–22 |
74–79 |
1545 |
91 |
39 |
52 |
24 |
67 |
Hand-held weapons
|
The bollock daggers found on board the Mary Rose |
►
To defend against being boarded, Mary Rose carried large stocks of melee
weapons, including pikes and bills; 150 of each kind were stocked on
the ship according to the Anthony Roll, a figure confirmed roughly by
the excavations. Swords and daggers were personal possessions and not
listed in the inventories, but the remains of both have been found in
great quantities, including the earliest dated example of a British
basket-hilted sword.
► A total of 250 longbows were carried on
board, and 172 of these have so far been found, as well as almost 4000
arrows, bracers (arm guards) and other archery-related equipment.
Longbow archery in Tudor England was mandatory for all able adult men,
and despite the introduction of field artillery and handguns, they were
used alongside new missile weapons in great quantities. On the Mary
Rose, the longbows could only have been drawn and shot properly from
behind protective panels in the open waist or from the top of the
castles as the lower decks lacked sufficient headroom. There were
several types of bows of various size and range. Lighter bows would have
been used as "sniper" bows, while the heavier design could possibly
have been used to shoot fire arrows.
►The inventories of both
1514 and 1546 also list several hundred heavy darts and lime pots that
were designed to be thrown onto the deck of enemy ships from the
fighting tops, although no physical evidence of either of these weapon
types has been identified. Of the 50 handguns listed in the Anthony
Roll, the complete stocks of five matchlock muskets and fragments of
another eleven have been found. They had been manufactured mainly in
Italy, with some originating from Germany. Found in storage were several
gunshields, a rare type of firearm consisting of a wooden shield with a
small gun fixed in the middle.
Crew
|
Vice-Admiral George Carew, who perished with the Mary Rose |
►Throughout her 33-year career, the crew of the Mary Rose changed several
times and varied considerably in size. It would have a minimal skeleton
crew of 17 men or fewer in peace time and when she was "in ordinary"
(in reserve).The average wartime manning would have been about 185
soldiers, 200 sailors, 20–30 gunners and an assortment of other
specialists such as surgeons, trumpeters and members of the admiral's
staff for a total of 400–450 men. When taking part in land invasions or
raids, such as in the summer of 1512, the number of soldiers could have
swelled to just over 400 for a combined total of more than 700. Even
with the normal crew size of around 400, the ship was quite crowded, and
with additional soldiers would have been extremely cramped.
►Very little is known of the identity of the men who served on the Mary
Rose, even when it comes to the names of the officers, who would have
belonged to the gentry. Two admirals and four captains (including Edward
and Thomas Howard, who served both positions) are known through
records, as well as a few ship masters, pursers, master gunners and
other specialists. Of the vast majority of the crewmen, soldiers,
sailors and gunners alike, nothing has been recorded. The only source of
information for these men has been through osteological analysis of the
human bones found at the wrecksite. An approximate composition of some
of the crew has been conjectured based on contemporary records. The Mary
Rose would have carried a captain, a master responsible for navigation,
and deck crew. There would also have been a purser responsible for
handling payments, a boatswain, the captain's second in command, at
least one carpenter, a pilot in charge of navigation, and a cook, all of
whom had one or more assistants (mates). The ship was also staffed by a
barber-surgeon who tended to the sick and wounded along with an
apprentice or mate and possibly also a junior surgeon. The only
positively identified person who went down with the ship was
Vice-Admiral George Carew. McKee, Stirland and several other authors
have also named Roger Grenville, father of Richard Grenville of the
Elizabethan-era Revenge, captain during the final battle, although the
accuracy of the sourcing for this has been disputed by maritime
archaeologist Peter Marsden.
Crew
Date |
Soldiers |
Mariners |
Gunners |
Others |
Total |
Summer 1512 |
411 |
206 |
120 |
22 |
759 |
October 1512 |
? |
120 |
20 |
20 |
160 |
1513 |
? |
200 |
? |
? |
200 |
1513 |
? |
102 |
6 |
? |
108 |
1522 |
126 |
244 |
30 |
2 |
402 |
1524 |
185 |
200 |
20 |
? |
405 |
1545/46 |
185 |
200 |
30 |
? |
415 |
►The bones of a total of 179
people were found during the excavations of the Mary Rose, including 92
"fairly complete skeletons", more or less complete collections of bones
associated with specific individuals. Analysis of these has shown that
crew members were all male, most of them young adults. Some were no more
than 11–13 years old, and the majority (81%) under 30. They were mainly
of English origin and according to archaeologist Julie Gardiner they
most likely came from the West Country, many following their
aristocratic masters into maritime service. There were also a few people
from continental Europe. An eyewitness testimony right after the
sinking refers to a survivor who was a Fleming, and the pilot may very
well have been French. Analysis of oxygen isotopes in teeth indicates
that some were also of southern European origin. In general they were
strong, well-fed men, and many of their bones have tell-tale signs of
childhood diseases and a life of grinding toil. The bones also showed
traces of numerous healed fractures, probably the result of on-board
accidents.
►There are no extant written records of the make-up
of the broader categories of soldiers and sailors, but since the Mary
Rose carried some 300 longbows and several thousand arrows there had to
be a considerable proportion of longbow archers. Examination of the
skeletal remains has found that there was a disproportionate number of
men with a condition known as os acromiale, affecting their shoulder
blades. This condition is known among modern elite archery athletes and
is caused by placing considerable stress on the arm and shoulder
muscles, particularly of the left arm that is used to hold the bow to
brace against the pull on the bowstring. Among the men who died on the
ship it was likely that some had practised using the longbow since
childhood, and served on board as specialist archers.
►A group
of six skeletons were found grouped close to one of the 2-tonne bronze
culverins on the main deck near the bow. All but one of these crewmen
(possibly a "powder monkey" not involved in heavy work) were strong,
well-muscled men. They had all engaged in heavy pulling and pushing,
indicated by fusing of parts of the spine and ossification, the growth
of new bone, on several vertebrae. These have been tentatively
classified as members of a complete gun crew and all died at their
battle station.
Military career
First French War
►The Mary Rose first saw battle in 1512, in a joint naval operation with
the Spanish against the French. The English were to meet the French and
Breton fleets in the English Channel while the Spanish attacked them in
the Bay of Biscay and then attack Gascony. The 35-year-old Sir Edward
Howard was appointed Lord High Admiral in April and chose the Mary Rose
as his flagship. His first mission was to clear the seas of French naval
forces between England to the northern coast of Spain to allow for the
landing of supporting troops near the French border at Fuenterrabia. The
fleet consisted of 18 ships, among them the large ships the Regent and
the Peter Pomegranate, carrying over 5,000 men. Howard's expedition led
to the capture of twelve Breton ships and a four-day raiding tour of
Brittany where English forces successfully fought against local forces
and burned numerous settlements.
►The fleet returned to
Southampton in June where it was visited by King Henry. In August the
fleet sailed for Brest where it encountered a joint, but
ill-coordinated, French-Breton fleet at the battle of St. Mathieu. The
English with one of the great ships in the lead (according to Marsden
the Mary Rose) battered the French ships with heavy gunfire and forced
them to retreat. The Breton flagship Cordelière put up a fight and was
boarded by the 1,000-ton Regent. By accident or through the
unwillingness of the Breton crew to surrender, the powder magazine of
the Cordelière caught fire and blew up in a violent explosion, setting
fire to the Regent and eventually sinking her. About 180 English crew
members saved themselves by throwing themselves into the sea and only a
handful of Bretons survived, only to be captured. The captain of the
Regent, 600 soldiers and sailors, the High Admiral of France and the
steward of the town of Morlaix were killed in the incident, making it
the focal point of several contemporary chronicles and reports. On 11
August, the English burnt 27 French ships, captured another five and
landed forces near Brest to raid and take prisoners, but storms forced
the fleet back to Dartmouth in Devon and then to Southampton for
repairs.
►In the spring of 1513, the Mary Rose was once more
chosen by Howard as the flagship for an expedition against the French.
Before seeing action, she took part in a race against other ships where
she was deemed to be one of the most nimble and the fastest of the great
ships in the fleet (see details under "Sails and rigging"). On 11
April, Howard's force arrived off Brest only to see a small enemy force
join with the larger force in the safety of Brest harbour and its
fortifications. The French had recently been reinforced by a force of
galleys from the Mediterranean, which sank one English ship and
seriously damaged another. Howard landed forces near Brest, but made no
headway against the town and was by now getting low on supplies.
Attempting to force a victory, he took a small force of small oared
vessels on a daring frontal attack on the French galleys on 25 April.
Howard himself managed to reach the ship of French admiral, Prégent de
Bidoux, and led a small party to board it. The French fought back
fiercely and cut the cables that attached the two ships, separating
Howard from his men. It left him at the mercy of the soldiers aboard the
galley, who instantly killed him.
► Demoralised by the loss of
its admiral and seriously short of food, the fleet returned to
Plymouth. Thomas Howard, elder brother of Edward, was assigned the new
Lord Admiral, and was set to the task of arranging another attack on
Brittany. The fleet was not able to mount the planned attack because of
adverse winds and great difficulties in supplying the ships adequately
and the Mary Rose took up winter quarters in Southampton. In August the
Scots joined France in war against England, but were dealt a crushing
defeat at the Battle of Flodden on 9 September 1513.
►A follow-up attack
in early 1514 was supported by a naval force that included the Mary
Rose, but without any known engagements. The French and English mounted
raids on each other throughout that summer, but achieved little, and
both sides were by then exhausted. By autumn the war was over and a
peace treaty was sealed by the marriage of Henry's sister, Mary, to
French king Louis XII.
► After the peace Mary Rose was placed
in the reserves, "in ordinary". She was laid up for maintenance along
with her sister ship the Peter Pomegranate in July 1514. In 1518 she
received a routine repair and caulking, waterproofing with tar and oakum
(old rope fibres) and was then assigned a small skeleton crew who lived
on board the ship until 1522. She served briefly on a mission with
other warships to "scour the seas" in preparation for Henry VIII's
journey across the Channel to the summit with the French king Francis I
at the Field of the Cloth of Gold in June 1520.
Second French War
►
In 1522, England was once again at war with France because of a treaty
with the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V. The plan was for an attack on two
fronts with an English thrust in northern France. The Mary Rose
participated in the escort transport of troops in June 1522, and by 1
July the Breton port of Morlaix was captured. The fleet sailed home and
the Mary Rose berthed for the winter in Dartmouth. The war raged on
until 1525 and saw the Scots join the French side. Though Charles
Brandon came close to capturing Paris in 1523, there was little gained
either against France or Scotland throughout the war. With the defeat of
the French army and capture of Francis I by Charles V's forces at the
Battle of Pavia on 24 February 1525, the war was effectively over
without any major gains or major victories for the English side.
Maintenance and "in ordinary"
►
The Mary Rose was kept in reserve from 1522 to 1545. She was once more
caulked and repaired in 1527 in a newly dug dock at Portsmouth and her
longboat was repaired and trimmed. Little documentation about what
happened to the Mary Rose between 1528 and 1539 exists. A document
written by Thomas Cromwell in 1536 specifies that the Mary Rose and six
other ships were "made new" during his service under the king, though it
is unclear which years he was referring to and what "made new" actually
meant. A later document from January 1536 by an anonymous author states
that the Mary Rose and other ships were "new made", and dating of
timbers from the ship confirms some type of repair being done in 1535 or
1536. This would have coincided with the controversial dissolution of
the monasteries that resulted in a major influx of funds into the royal
treasury. The nature and extent of this repair is unknown. Many experts,
including Margaret Rule, the project leader for the raising of the Mary
Rose, have assumed that it meant a complete rebuilding from clinker
planking to carvel planking, and that it was only after 1536 that the
ship took on the form that it had when it sank and that was eventually
recovered in the 20th century. Marsden has speculated that it could even
mean that the Mary Rose was originally built in a style that was closer
to 15th-century ships, with a rounded, rather than square, stern and
without the main deck gunports.
Third French War
|
Drawing of the French admiral, Claude d'Annebault |
► Henry's complicated marital situation and his high-handed dissolution
of the monasteries angered the Pope and Catholic rulers throughout
Europe, which increased England's diplomatic isolation. In 1544 Henry
had agreed to attack France together with Emperor Charles V, and English
forces captured Boulogne at great cost in September, but soon England
was left in the lurch after Charles had achieved his objectives and
brokered a separate peace.
►In May 1545, the French had
assembled a large fleet in the estuary of the Seine with the intent to
land troops on English soil. The estimates of the size of the fleet
varied considerably; between 123 and 300 vessels according to French
sources; and up to 226 sailing ships and galleys according to the
chronicler Edward Hall. In addition to the massive fleet, 50,000 troops
were assembled at Havre de Grâce (modern-day Le Havre). An English force
of 160 ships and 12,000 troops under Viscount Lisle was ready at
Portsmouth by early June, before the French were ready to set sail, and
an ineffective pre-emptive strike was made in the middle of the month.
In early July the huge French force under the command of Admiral Claude
d'Annebault set sail for England and entered the Solent unopposed with
128 ships on 16 July. The English had around 80 ships with which to
oppose the French, including the flagship Mary Rose. But since they had
virtually no heavy galleys, the vessels that were at their best in
sheltered waters like the Solent, the English fleet promptly retreated
into Portsmouth harbour.
Battle of the Solent
►
The English were becalmed in port and unable to manoeuvre. On 19 July
1545, the French galleys advanced on the immobilised English fleet, and
initially threatened to destroy a force of 13 small galleys, or
"rowbarges", the only ships that were able to move against them without a
wind. The wind picked up and the sailing ships were able to go on the
offensive before the oared vessels were overwhelmed. Two of the largest
ships, the Henry Grace Dieu and the Mary Rose, led the attack on the
French galleys in the Solent.
► Early in the battle something
went wrong. While engaging the French galleys the Mary Rose suddenly
heeled (leaned) heavily over to her starboard (right) side and water
rushed in through the open gunports. The crew was powerless to correct
the sudden imbalance, and could only scramble for the safety of the
upper deck as the ship began to sink rapidly. As she leaned over,
equipment, ammunition, supplies and storage containers shifted and came
loose, adding to the general chaos. The massive port side brick oven in
the galley collapsed completely and the huge 360-litre (90 gallon)
copper cauldron was thrown onto the orlop deck above. Heavy guns came
free and slammed into the opposite side, impeding escape or crushing men
beneath them.
► For those who were not injured or killed
outright by moving objects, there was little time to reach safety,
especially for the men who were manning the guns on the main deck or
fetching ammunition and supplies in the hold. The companionways that
connected the decks with one another would have become bottlenecks for
fleeing men, something indicated by the positioning of many of the
skeletons recovered from the wreck. What turned the sinking into a major
tragedy in terms of lives lost was the anti-boarding netting that
covered the upper decks in the waist (the midsection of the ship) and
the sterncastle. With the exception of the men who were stationed in the
tops in the masts, most of those who managed to get up from below deck
were trapped under the netting; they would have been in view of the
surface, and their colleagues above, but with little or no chance to
break through, and were dragged down with the ship. Out of a crew of at
least 400, fewer than 35 escaped, a catastrophic casualty rate of over
90%.
Causes of sinking
Contemporary Accounts
►
Several accounts of the sinking have been preserved that describe the
incident but the only confirmed eyewitness account is the testimony of a
surviving Flemish crewman written down by the Holy Roman Emperor's
ambassador François van der Delft in a letter dated 24 July. According
to the unnamed Fleming, the ship had fired all of its guns of one side
and was turning to present the guns on the other side to the enemy ship,
when she was caught in a strong gust of wind, heeled and took in water
through the open gunports. In a letter to William Paget dated 23 July
former Lord High Admiral John Russel claimed that the ship had been lost
because of "rechenes and great negligence". Three years after the
sinking, the Hall's Chronicle gave the reason for the sinking as being
caused by "to[o] much foly ... for she was laden with much ordinaunce,
and the portes left open, which were low, & the great ordinaunce
unbreached, so that when the ship should turne, the water entered, and
sodainly she sanke."
► Later accounts repeat the explanation
that the ship heeled over while going about and that the ship was
brought down because of the open gunports. A biography of Peter Carew,
brother of George Carew, written by John Hooker sometime after 1575,
gives the same reason for the sinking, but adds that insubordination
among the crew was to blame. The biography claims that George Carew
noted that the Mary Rose showed signs of instability as soon as her
sails were raised. George's uncle Gawen Carew had passed by with his own
ship the Matthew Gonson during the battle to inquire about the
situation of his nephew's ship. In reply he was told "that he had a
sorte of knaves whom he could not rule". Contrary to all other accounts,
Martin du Bellay, a French cavalry officer who was present at the
battle, stated that the Mary Rose had been sunk by French guns.
Modern Theories
►
The most common explanation for the sinking among modern historians is
that the ship was unstable for a number of reasons. When a strong gust
of wind hit the sails at a critical moment, the open gunports proved
fatal, the ship flooded and quickly foundered. Coates offered a variant
of this hypothesis, which explains why a ship which served for several
decades without sinking, and which even fought in actions in the rough
seas off Brittany, unexpectedly foundered: the ship had accumulated
additional weight over the years in service and finally become
unseaworthy. That the ship was turning after firing all the cannons on
one side has been questioned by Marsden after examination of guns
recovered in both the 19th and 20th centuries; guns from both sides were
found still loaded. This has been interpreted to mean that something
else could have gone wrong since it is assumed that an experienced crew
would not have failed to secure the gunports before making a potentially
risky turn.
► The most recent surveys of the ship indicate
that the ship was modified late in her career and has lent support to
the idea that the Mary Rose was altered too much to be properly
seaworthy. Marsden has suggested that the weight of additional heavy
guns would have increased her draught so much that the waterline was
less than one metre (c. 3 feet) from the gunports on the main deck.
►
Peter Carew's claim of insubordination has been given support by James
Watt, former Medical Director-General of the Royal Navy, based on
records of an epidemic of dysentery in Portsmouth which could have
rendered the crew incapable of handling the ship properly, while
historian Richard Barker has suggested that the crew actually knew that
the ship was an accident waiting to happen, at which they balked and
refused to follow orders. Marsden has noted that the Carew biography is
in some details inconsistent with the sequence of events reported by
both French and English eyewitnesses. It also reports that there were
700 men on board, an unusually high number. The distance in time to the
event it describes may mean that it was embellished to add a dramatic
touch. The report of French galleys sinking the Mary Rose as stated by
Martin du Bellay has been described as "the account of a courtesan" by
naval historian Maurice de Brossard. Du Bellay and his two brothers were
close to king Francis I and du Bellay had much to gain from portraying
the sinking as a French victory. English sources, even if biased, would
have nothing to gain from portraying the sinking as the result of crew
incompetence rather than conceding to a victory to the much-feared gun
galleys.
► Dominic Fontana, a geographer at the University of
Portsmouth, has voiced support for du Bellay's version of the sinking
based on the battle as it is depicted in the Cowdray Engraving, and
modern GIS analysis of the modern scene of the battle. By plotting the
fleets and calculating the conjectured final manoeuvres of the Mary
Rose, Fontana reached the conclusion that the ship had been hit low in
the hull by the galleys and was destabilised after taking in water. He
has interpreted the final heading of the ship straight due north as a
failed attempt to reach the shallows at Spitbank only a few hundred
metres away. This theory has been given partial support by Alexzandra
Hildred, one of the experts who has worked with the Mary Rose, though
she has suggested that the close proximity to Spitbank could also
indicate that the sinking occurred while trying to make a hard turn to
avoid running aground.
Experiments
► In 2000, the Channel 4
television programme What Sank the Mary Rose attempted to investigate
the causes suggested for her sinking by means of experiments with scale
models of the ship and metal weights to simulate the presence of troops
on the upper decks. Initial tests showed that the ship was able to make
the turn described by eyewitnesses without capsizing. In later tests, a
fan was used to create a breeze similar to the one reported to have
suddenly sprung up on the day of the sinking as the real Mary Rose went
to make the turn. As the model made the turn, the breeze in the upper
works forced it to heel more than at calm, forcing the main deck gun
ports below the waterline and foundering the model within a few seconds.
The sequence of events closely followed what eyewitnesses had reported,
particularly the suddenness with which the ship sank.
History as a shipwreck
►
A salvage attempt was ordered by Secretary of State William Paget only
days after the sinking, and Charles Brandon, the king's brother-in-law,
took charge of practical details. The operation followed the standard
procedure for raising ships in shallow waters: strong cables were
attached to the sunken ship and fastened to two empty ships, or hulks.
At low tide, the ropes were pulled taut with capstans. When the high
tide came in, the hulks rose and with them the wreck. It would then be
towed into shallower water and the procedure repeated until the whole
ship could be raised completely.
► A list of necessary
equipment was compiled by 1 August and included, among other things,
massive cables, capstans, pulleys, and 40 pounds of tallow for
lubrication. The proposed salvage team comprised 30 Venetian mariners
and a Venetian carpenter with 60 English sailors to serve them. The two
ships to be used as hulks were the Jesus of Lübeck and Samson, each of
700 tons burthen and similar in size to the Mary Rose. Brandon was so
confident of success that he reassured the king that it would only be a
matter of days before they could raise the Mary Rose. The optimism
proved unfounded. Since the ship had settled at a 60-degree angle to
starboard much of it was stuck deep into the clay of the seabed. This
made it virtually impossible to pass cables under the hull and required
far more lifting power than if the ship had settled on a hard seabed. An
attempt to secure cables to the main mast appears only to have resulted
in its being snapped off.
►The
project was only successful in raising rigging, some guns and other
items. At least two other salvage teams in 1547 and 1549 received
payment for raising more guns from the wreck. Despite the failure of the
first salvage operation, there was still lingering belief in the
possibility of retrieving the Mary Rose at least until 1546, when she
was presented as part of the illustrated list of English warships called
the Anthony Roll. When all hope of raising the complete ship was
finally abandoned is not known. It could have been after Henry VIII's
death in January 1547 or even as late as 1549, when the last guns were
brought up. The Mary Rose was remembered well into the reign of
Elizabeth I, and according to one of the queen's admirals, William
Monson (1569–1643), the wreck was visible from the surface at low tide
in the late 16th century.
Deterioration
►
After the sinking, the partially buried wreck created a barrier at a
right angle against the currents of the Solent. Two scour pits, large
underwater ditches, formed on either side of the wreck while silt and
seaweed was deposited inside the ship. A deep but narrow pit formed on
the upward tilting port side, while a shallower, broader pit formed on
the starboard side, which had mostly been buried by the force of the
impact. The abrasive actions of sand and silt carried by the currents
and the activity of fungi, bacteria and wood-boring crustaceans and
molluscs, such as the teredo "shipworm", began to break down the
structure of the ship. Eventually the exposed wooden structure was
weakened and gradually collapsed. The timbers and contents of the port
side were deposited in the scour pits and the remaining ship structure,
or carried off by the currents. Following the collapse of the exposed
parts of the ship the site was levelled with the seabed and was
gradually covered by layers of sediment, concealing most of the
remaining structure. During the 16th century a hard layer of compacted
clay and crushed shells formed over the ship, stabilising the site and
sealing the Tudor-era deposits. Further layers of soft silt covered the
site during the 18th and 19th centuries, but frequent changes in the
tidal patterns and currents in the Solent occasionally exposed some of
the timbers, leading to its accidental rediscovery in 1836 and aided in
locating the wreck in 1971. After the ship had been salvaged it was
determined that about 40% of the original structure had survived.
Rediscovery in 19th century
► In the summer of 1836, a group of five fishermen caught their nets on
timbers protruding from the bottom of the Solent. They contacted a diver
to help them remove the hindrance, and on 10 June, Henry Abbinett
became the first person to see the Mary Rose in almost 300 years. Later,
two other professional divers, John Deane and William Edwards, were
employed to deal with the problem. Using a recently invented rubber suit
and metal diving helmet, Deane and Edwards began to examine the wreck
and salvage items from it. Along with an assortment of timbers and
wooden objects, including several longbows, they brought up several
bronze and iron guns, which were sold to the Board of Ordnance for over
£220. Initially, this caused a dispute between Deane (who had also
brought in his brother Charles into the project), Abbinett and the
fishermen who had hired them. The matter was eventually settled by
allowing the fishermen a share of the proceeds from the sale of the
first salvaged guns, while Deane received exclusive salvage rights at
the expense of Abbinett. The wreck was soon identified as the Mary Rose
from the inscriptions of one of the bronze guns manufactured in 1537.
►The identification of the ship led to significant public interest in
the salvage operation, and caused a great demand for the objects which
were brought up. Though many of the objects could not be properly
conserved at the time and subsequently deteriorated, many were
documented with pencil sketches and watercolour drawings which survive
to this day. John Deane ceased working on the wreck in 1836, but
returned in 1840 with new, more destructive methods. With the help of
condemned bomb shells filled with gunpowder acquired from the Ordnance
Board he blasted his way into parts of the wreck. Fragments of bombs and
traces of blasting craters were found during the modern excavations,
but there was no evidence that Deane managed to penetrate the hard layer
that had sealed off the Tudor levels. Deane reported retrieving a bilge
pump and the lower part of the main mast, both of which would have been
located inside the ship. The recovery of small wooden objects like
longbows, suggest that Deane did manage to penetrate the Tudor levels at
some point, though this has been disputed by the excavation project
leader Margaret Rule. Newspaper reports on Deane's diving operations in
October 1840 report that the ship was clinker built, but since the
sterncastle is the only part of the ship with this feature, an
alternative explanation has been suggested: Deane did not penetrate the
hard shelly layer that covered most of the ship, but only managed to get
into remains of the sterncastle that today no longer exist. Despite the
rough handling by Deane the Mary Rose escaped the wholesale destruction
by giant rakes and explosives that was the fate of other wrecks in the
Solent.
Modern Rediscovery
►The modern search for the Mary
Rose was initiated by the Southsea branch of the British Sub-Aqua Club
in 1965 as part of a project to locate shipwrecks in the Solent. The
project was under the leadership of historian, journalist and amateur
diver Alexander McKee. Another group led by Lieutenant-Commander Alan
Bax of the Royal Navy, sponsored by the Committee for Nautical
Archaeology in London, also formed a search team. Initially the two
teams had differing views on where to find the wreck, but eventually
joined forces. In February 1966 a chart from 1841 was found that marked
the positions of the Mary Rose and several other wrecks. The charted
position coincided with a trench (one of the scour pits) that had
already been located by McKee's team, and a definite location was
finally established at a position 3 km (1.9 mi) south of the entrance to
Portsmouth Harbour (50°46′N 1°06′W) in water with a depth of 11 m (36
feet) at low tide. Diving on the site began in 1966 and a sonar scan by
Harold Edgerton in 1967–68 revealed some type of buried feature. In 1970
a loose timber was located and on 5 May 1971, the first structural
details of the buried hull were identified after they were partially
uncovered by winter storms.
►A major problem for the team from
the start was that wrecksites in the UK lacked any legal protection
from plunderers and treasure hunters. Sunken ships, once being moving
objects, were legally treated as chattel and were awarded to those who
could first raise them. The Merchant Shipping Act of 1894 also
stipulated that any objects raised from a wreck should be auctioned off
to finance the salvage operations, and there was nothing preventing
anyone from "stealing" the wreck and making a profit. The problem was
handled by forming an organisation, the Mary Rose Committee, aiming "to
find, excavate, raise and preserve for all time such remains of the ship
Mary Rose as may be of historical or archaeological interest".
► To keep intruders at bay, the Committee arranged a lease of the seabed
where the wreck lay from the Portsmouth authorities, thereby
discouraging anyone from trespassing on the underwater property. In
hindsight this was only a legalistic charade which had little chance of
holding up in a court of law. In combination with secrecy as to the
exact location of the wreck, it saved the project from interference. It
was not until the passing of the Protection of Wrecks Act on 5 February
1973 that the Mary Rose was declared to be of national historic interest
that enjoyed full legal protection from any disturbance by commercial
salvage teams. Despite this, years after the passing of the 1973 act and
the excavation of the ship, lingering conflicts with salvage
legislation remained a threat to the Mary Rose project as "personal"
finds such as chests, clothing and cooking utensils risked being
confiscated and auctioned off.
Survey and excavation
►Following the discovery of the wreck in 1971, the project became known
to the general public and received increasing media attention. This
helped bring in more donations and equipment, primarily from private
sources. By 1974 the Committee had representatives from the National
Maritime Museum, the Royal Navy, the BBC and local organisations. In
1974 the project received royal patronage from Prince Charles, who
participated in dives on the site. This attracted yet more publicity,
and also more funding and assistance. The initial aims of the Mary Rose
Committee were now more officially and definitely confirmed. The
Committee had become a registered charity in 1974, which made it easier
to raise funds, and the application for excavation and salvage had been
officially approved by the UK government.
►By 1978 the initial
excavation work had uncovered a complete and coherent site with an
intact ship structure and the orientation of the hull had been
positively identified as being on an almost straight northerly heading
with a 60-degree heel to starboard and a slight downward tilt towards
the bow. As no records of English shipbuilding techniques used in
vessels like the Mary Rose survive, excavation of the ship would allow
for a detailed survey of her design and shed new light on the
construction of ships of the era. A full excavation also meant removing
the protective layers of silt that prevented the remaining ship
structure from being destroyed through biological decay and the scouring
of the currents; the operation had to be completed within a
predetermined timespan of a few years or it risked irreversible damage.
It was also considered desirable to recover and preserve the remains of
the hull if possible. For the first time, the project was faced with the
practical difficulties of actually raising, conserving and preparing
the hull for public display.
►To handle this new, considerably
more complex and expensive task, it was decided that a new organisation
was needed. The Mary Rose Trust, a limited charitable trust, with
representatives from many organisations would handle the need for a
larger operation and a large infusion of funds. In 1979 a new diving
vessel was purchased to replace the previous 12 m (40 ft) catamaran
Roger Greenville which had been used from 1971. The choice fell on the
salvage vessel Sleipner, the same craft that had been used as a platform
for diving operations on the Vasa. The project went from a team of only
twelve volunteers working four months a year to over 50 individuals
working almost around the clock nine months a year. In addition there
were over 500 volunteer divers and a laboratory staff of about 70 that
ran the shore base and conservation facilities. During the four diving
seasons from 1979 to 1982 over 22,000 diving hours was spent on the
site, an effort that amounted to 11.8-man years.
Salvage
|
Mary Rose Salvation |
► Raising the Mary Rose meant overcoming a number of delicate problems
that had never been encountered before. The salvage of the Swedish
warship Vasa 1959–61 was the only comparable precedent, but it had been a
relatively straightforward operation since the hull was completely
intact and rested upright on the seabed. It had been raised with
basically the same methods as were in use in Tudor England: cables were
slung under the hull and attached to two pontoons on either side of the
ship which was then gradually raised and towed into shallower waters.
Only one third of the Mary Rose was intact and she lay deeply embedded
in mud. If the hull were raised in the traditional way, there was no
guarantee that it would have enough structural strength to hold together
out of water. Many suggestions for salvage were discarded, including
the construction of a cofferdam around the wreck site, filling the ship
with small buoyant objects (such as ping pong balls) or even pumping
brine into the seabed and freezing it so that it would float and take
the hull with it. After lengthy discussions it was decided in February
1980 that the hull would first be emptied of all its contents and
strengthened with steel braces and frames. It would then be lifted to
the surface with floating sheerlegs attached to nylon strops passing
under the hull and transferred to a cradle. It was also decided that the
ship would be recovered before the end of the diving season in 1982. If
the wreck stayed uncovered any longer it risked irreversible damage
from biological decay and tidal scouring.
|
Mary Rose Remain |
► During the last
year of the operation, the massive scope of full excavation and salvage
was beginning to take its toll on those closely involved in the project.
In May 1981 Alexander McKee voiced concerns about the method chosen for
the salvage and openly questioned Margaret Rule's position as
excavation leader. McKee felt ignored in what he viewed as a project
where he had always played a central role, both as the initiator of the
search for the Mary Rose and other ships in the Solent, and as an active
member throughout the diving operations. He had several supporters who
all pointed to the risk of the project's turning into an embarrassing
failure if the ship were damaged during salvage. To address these
concerns it was suggested that the hull should be placed on top of a
supporting steel cradle underwater. This would avoid the inherent risks
of damaging the wooden structure if it were lifted out of the water
without appropriate support. The idea of using nylon strops was also
discarded in favour of drilling holes through the hull at 170 points and
passing iron bolts through them to allow the attachment of wires
connected to a lifting frame.
►In the spring of 1982, after
three intense seasons of archaeological underwater work, preparations
began for the salvage. The operation soon ran into problems: early on
there were difficulties with the custom-made lifting equipment; divers
on the project belonging to the Royal Engineers had to be pulled because
of the outbreak of the Falklands War; and the method of lifting the
hull had to be considerably altered as late as June. After the frame was
properly attached to the hull it was slowly jacked up on four legs
straddling the wreck site to pull the ship off the seabed. The massive
crane of the barge Tog Mor was then used to lift the frame and hull on
to the specially designed cradle which was padded with water-filled
bags. On the morning of 11 October 1982, the final lift of the entire
package of cradle, hull and lifting frame began. At 9:03 the first
timbers of the Mary Rose broke the surface in the presence of the
salvaging team, Prince Charles and curious spectators on boats circling
the site. A second set of bags under the hull was inflated with air to
cushion the waterlogged wood and finally the whole package was
transferred to the barge that would take the hull ashore. Though
eventually successful, the salvage operation was close to floundering on
two occasions; first when one of the supporting legs of the lifting
frame was bent and had to be removed and later when a corner of the
frame, with "an unforgettable crunch", slipped more than a metre (3
feet) and came close to crushing part of the hull.
Archaeology
► As one of the most ambitious and expensive projects in the history of
maritime archaeology, the Mary Rose project broke new ground within this
field in the UK. Besides becoming one of the first wrecks to be
protected under the new Protection of Wrecks Act in 1973 it also created
several new precedents. It was the first time that a British privately
funded project was able to apply modern scientific standards fully and
without having to auction off part of the findings to finance its
activities; where previous projects often had to settle for just a
partial recovery of finds, everything found in connection with the Mary
Rose was recovered and recorded. The salvage made it possible to
establish the first historic shipwreck museum in the UK to receive
government accreditation and funding. The excavation of the Mary Rose
wrecksite proved that it was possible to achieve a level of exactness in
underwater excavations comparable to those on dry land.
►
Throughout the 1970s, the Mary Rose was meticulously surveyed, excavated
and recorded with the latest methods within the field of maritime
archaeology. Working in an underwater environment meant that principles
of land-based archaeology did not always apply. Mechanical excavators,
airlifts and suction dredges were used in the process of locating the
wreck, but as soon as it began to be uncovered in earnest, more delicate
techniques were employed. Many objects from the Mary Rose had been well
preserved in form and shape, but many were quite delicate, requiring
careful handling. Artefacts of all sizes were supported with soft
packing material, such as old plastic ice cream containers, and some of
the arrows that were "soft like cream cheese" had to be brought up in
special styrofoam containers. The airlifts that sucked up clay, sand and
dirt off-site or to the surface were still used, but with much greater
precision since they could potentially disrupt the site. The many layers
of sediment that had accumulated on the site could be used to date
artefacts in which they were found, and had to be recorded properly. The
various types of accretions and remnants of chemicals with artefacts
were essential clues to objects that had long since broken down and
disappeared, and needed to be treated with considerable care.
►
The excavation and salvage in the 1970s and early '80s meant that
diving operations ceased, even though modern scaffolding and part of the
bow were left on the seabed. The pressure on conservators to treat tens
of thousands of artefacts and the high costs of conserving, storing and
displaying the finds and the ship meant that there were no funds
available for diving. In 2002, the UK Ministry of Defence announced
plans to build two new aircraft carriers. Because of the massive size of
the new vessels, the outlet from Portsmouth needed to be surveyed to
make sure that they could sail no matter the tide. The planned route for
the underwater channel ran close to the Mary Rose wrecksite, which
meant that funding was supplied to survey and excavate the site once
more. Even though the planned carriers were down-sized enough to not
require alteration of Portsmouth outlet, the excavations had already
exposed timbers and were completed in 2005. Among the most important
finds was the ten-metre (32 feet) stem, the forward continuation of the
keel, which provided more exact details about the original profile of
the ship.
Finds
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Mary Rose Carpentry Tools |
►
Over 26,000 artefacts and pieces of timber were salvaged along with
remains of about half the crew members, The faces of some crew members
have been reconstructed. Analysis of the crew skeletons shows many had
suffered malnutrition, evidence of rickets, scurvy, and other deficiency
diseases was found. Crew members also developed arthritis through the
stresses on their joints from heavy lifting and maritime life generally
and suffered bone fractures. As the ship was intended to function as a
floating, self-contained community, it was stocked with victuals (food
and drink) that could sustain its inhabitants for extended periods of
time. The casks used for storage on the Mary Rose have been compared
with those from a wreck of a trade vessel from the 1560s and have
revealed that they were of better quality, more robust and reliable, an
indication that supplies for the Tudor navy were given high priority and
set a high standard for cask manufacturing at the time. As a miniature
society at sea, the wreck of the Mary Rose contained objects that
belonged to individual crew members. This included clothing, games,
various items for spiritual or recreation use, or objects related to
mundane everyday tasks such as personal hygiene, fishing and sewing. The
master carpenter's chest for example contained a backgammon set, a
book, three plates, a sundial, and a tankard suggesting he was
relatively wealthy.
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Mary Rose Rosaries |
► The ship carried several skilled
craftsmen and was equipped for handling both routine maintenance and
repairing extensive battle damage. In and around one of the cabins on
the main deck under the sterncastle archaeologists found a "collection
of woodworking tools ... unprecedented in its range and size",
consisting of eight chests of carpentry tools. Along with loose mallets
and tar pots used for caulking this variety of tools belonged to one or
several of the carpenters employed on the Mary Rose.
► Many of
the cannons and other weapons from the Mary Rose have provided
invaluable physical evidence about 16th century weapon technology. The
surviving gunshields are almost all from the Mary Rose and the four
small cast iron hailshot pieces are the only known examples of this type
of weapon.
► Animal remains have been found in the wreck of
the Mary Rose. These include the skeletons of a rat, a frog and a dog.
The dog, a mongrel between eighteen months and two years in age, was
found near the hatch to the ship's carpenter's cabin and is thought to
have been brought aboard as a ratter. Nine barrels have been found to
contain bones of cattle, indicating that they contained pieces of beef
butchered and stored as ship's rations. In addition the bones of pigs
and fish, stored in baskets, have also been found.
Musical instruments
►
Two fiddles, a bow, a still shawm or doucaine, three three-hole pipes
and a tabor drum with a drumstick were found throughout the wreck. These
would have been used for the personal enjoyment of the crew and to
provide a rhythm to work on the rigging and turning the capstans on the
upper decks. The tabor drum is the earliest known example of its kind
and the drumstick of a previously unknown design. The tabor pipes are
considerably longer than any known examples from the period and their
discovery proved that contemporary illustrations, previously viewed with
some suspicion, were in fact accurate depictions of the actual
instruments. Before the discovery of the Mary Rose shawm, an early
predecessor to the oboe, instrument historians had been puzzled by
reference to "still shawms", or "soft" shawms, that were said to have a
sound that was less shrill than earlier shawms. The still shawm
disappeared from the musical scene some time in the 16th century and the
instrument found on the Mary Rose is the only surviving example. A
reproduction has been made and played. Combined with a pipe and tabor,
it provides a "very effective bass part" that would have produced "rich
and full sound, which would have provided excellent music for dancing on
board ship". Only a few other fiddle-type instruments from the 16th
century exist, but none of them of the type found on the Mary Rose.
Reproductions of both fiddles have been made, though less is known of
their design than the shawm since the neck and strings were missing.
Navigation Tools
►
In the remains of a small cabin in the bow of the ship and in a few
other locations around the wreck was found the earliest dated set of
navigation instruments in Europe found so far: compasses, divider
calipers, a stick used for charting, protractors, sounding leads, tide
calculators and a logreel, an instrument for calculating speed. Several
of these objects are not only unique in having such an early, definite
dating, but also because they pre-date written records of their use;
protractors would have reasonably been used to measure distance on maps,
but sea charts are not known to have been used by English navigators
during the first half of the 16th century, compasses were not depicted
on English ships until the 1560s, and the first mention of a logreel is
from 1574.
Barber-surgeon's cabin
►
The cabin located on the main deck underneath the sterncastle is
thought to have belonged to the barber-surgeon. He was a trained
professional who saw to the health and welfare of the crew and acted as
the medical expert on board. The most important of these finds were
found in an intact wooden chest which contained over 60 objects relating
to the barber-surgeon's medical practice: the wooden handles of a
complete set of surgical tools and several shaving razors (although none
of the steel blades had survived), a copper syringe for wound
irrigation and treatment of gonorrhoea, and even a skilfully crafted
feeding bottle for feeding incapacitated patients. More objects were
found around the cabin, such as earscoops, shaving bowls and combs. With
this wide selection of tools and medicaments the barber-surgeon, along
with one or more assistants, could set bone fractures, perform
amputations and deal with other acute injuries, treat a number of
diseases and provide crew members with a minimal standard of personal
hygiene.
Conservation
►
Preservation of the Mary Rose and her contents was an essential part of
the project from the start. Though many artefacts, especially those that
were buried in silt, had been preserved, the long exposure to an
underwater environment had rendered most of them sensitive to exposure
to air after recovery. Archaeologists and conservators had to work in
tandem from the start to prevent deterioration of the artefacts. After
recovery, finds were placed in so-called passive storage, which would
prevent any immediate deterioration before the active conservation which
would allow them to be stored in an open-air environment. Passive
storage depended on the type of material that the object was made of,
and could vary considerably. Smaller objects from the most common
material, wood, were sealed in polyethylene bags to preserve moisture.
Timbers and other objects that were too large to be wrapped were stored
in unsealed water tanks. Growth of fungi and microbes that could degrade
wood were controlled by various techniques, including low-temperature
storage, chemicals, and in the case of large objects, common pond snails
that consumed wood-degrading organisms but not the wood itself.
► Other organic materials such as leather, skin and textiles were treated
similarly, by keeping them moist in tanks or sealed plastic containers.
Bone and ivory was desalinated to prevent damage from salt
crystallisation, as was glass, ceramic and stone. Iron, copper and
copper alloy objects were kept moist in a sodium sesquicarbonate
solution to prevent oxidisation and reaction with the chlorides that had
penetrated the surface. Alloys of lead and pewter are inherently stable
in the atmosphere and generally require no special treatment. Silver
and gold were the only materials that required no special passive
storage.
► Conserving the hull of the Mary Rose was the most
complicated and expensive task for the project. In 2002 a donation of
£4.8 million from the Heritage Lottery Fund and equivalent monetary
support from the Portsmouth City and Hampshire County Councils was
needed to keep the work with conservation on schedule. During passive
conservation, the ship structure could for practical reasons not be
completely sealed, so instead it was regularly sprayed with filtered,
recycled water that was kept at a temperature of 2 to 5 °C (35 to 41 °F)
to keep it from drying out. Drying waterlogged wood that has been
submerged for several centuries without appropriate conservation causes
considerable shrinkage (20–50%) and leads to severe warping and cracking
as water evaporates from the cellular structure of the wood. The
substance polyethylene glycol (PEG) had been used before on
archaeological wood, and was during the 1980s being used to conserve the
Vasa. After almost ten years of small-scale trials on timbers, an
active three-phase conservation programme of the hull of the Mary Rose
began in 1994. During the first phase, which lasted from 1994 to 2003
the wood was sprayed with low-molecular-weight PEG to replace the water
in the cellular structure of the wood. From 2003 to 2010 a
higher-molecular-weight PEG was used to strengthen the mechanical
properties of the outer surface layers. The third phase will consist of a
controlled air drying that will last three to five years, giving a
final date of complete conservation of the Mary Rose no later than 2015.
Display
►
Since the decision to salvage the Mary Rose was taken, there had been
discussion of where she would eventually go on permanent display. The
east end of Portsea Island at Eastney emerged as an early alternative,
but was rejected because of parking problems and the distance from the
dockyard where she was originally built. Placing the ship next to the
famous flagship of Horatio Nelson, HMS Victory at Portsmouth Historic
Dockyard was proposed in July 1981. A group called the Maritime
Preservation Society even suggested Southsea Castle, where Henry VIII
had witnessed the sinking, as a final resting place and there was
widespread scepticism to the dockyard location. At one point a county
councillor even threatened to withdraw promised funds if the dockyard
site became more than an interim solution. As costs for the project
mounted, there was also a debate in the Council chamber and in the local
paper The News whether the money could be spent more appropriately.
Although author David Childs writes that in the early 1980s "the debate
was as a fiery one", the project was never seriously threatened because
of the great symbolic importance of the Mary Rose to the naval history
of both Portsmouth and England.
► Since the mid-1980s, the hull
of the Mary Rose has been kept in a covered dry dock while undergoing
conservation. Although the hull has been open to the public for viewing,
the need for keeping the ship saturated first with water and later a
polyethylene glycol (PEG) solution has meant that visitors have been
separated from the hull by a glass barrier. Despite this, the specially
built ship hall had been visited by over seven million visitors as of
2007, since it first opened on 4 October 1983, just under a year after
it was successfully salvaged.
► A separate Mary Rose Museum was
housed in a structure called No. 5 Boathouse near the ship hall and was
opened to the public on 9 July 1984. containing displays explaining the
history of the ship and a small number of conserved artefacts, from
entire bronze cannons to household items. In September 2009 the
temporary Mary Rose display hall was finally closed to visitors to
facilitate construction of the new £35 million museum building, which
opened to the public on 31 May 2013.
► The new Mary Rose Museum
was designed by architects Wilkinson Eyre, Pringle Brandon Perkins+Will
and built by construction firm Warings. The construction has been
challenging because the museum has been built over the ship in the dry
dock which is a listed monument. During construction of the museum
conservation of the hull continued inside a sealed "hotbox". In April
2013 the polyethylene glycol sprays were turned off and the process of
controlled airdrying began. By 2016 the "hotbox" will be removed and for
the first time since 1545 the ship will be revealed dry. This new
museum displays most of the artefacts recovered from within the ship in
context with the conserved hull. Since opening it has been visited by
over 500,000 people.
Paintings
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