- NEWPORT, R.I. (UPI) - A noted marine archaeologist believes the wreck of the
HMS Endeavour, the ship that carried Capt. James Cook on his voyage of
discovery around the world in the 1700s, lies in 25 feet of water in Newport
Harbor, R.I.
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- Kathy Abbass, head of the Rhode Island
Marine Archaeology Project, says documents she has examined proves that
one of the most important ships in British naval history may have been
scuttled by the British in Newport Harbor in 1778.
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- Abbass tells the Boston Herald that she's
convinced one of three vessels scuttled by the British off Navy pier is
the Endeavour. She said that to most people it looks like "a pile
of rocks with a piece of wood sticking out of it," but to her, "that
pile of junk has a one-in-three chance of being the ship that was Endeavour."
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- Abbass said that through her research
she found that the Endeavour had been renamed Lord Sandwich and was used
as a troop transport during the early years of the American Revolution.
She traveled to Britain and found in the British Public Records office
documents that showed the Lord Sandwich was among the vessels scuttled
when the French navy approached Newport in 1778.
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- She says the measurements of the 97-foot
Endeavour and the Lord Sandwich match. Local legend has long placed the
Endeavour in Newport Harbor.
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- Abbass said that "when I found the
documents that proved she (Endeavour) was here, it was a thrill."
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- During Cook's expedition from 1768 to
1761, he discovered Australia and New Zealand. Cook on a subsequent voyage
aboard the HMS Resolution became the first European to set foot on Hawaii.
He was killed by Hawaiians in 1779.
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- The marine archaeologists this week obtained
a court order protecting the site for future exploration. Abbass said divers
will be exploring the wreckage this summer, and "we should know for
sure whether we have found Endeavour by August."
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