The treasure ship "Nuestra Senora De Atocha" is the largest treasure that sank in the sea. Galleon "Nuestra Señora de Atocha": unimagined adventures of treasure hunters Search operations of the Spanish fleet

23.02.2022

This day in history: (many letters)

Probably, if you add up in your mind all the legendary treasures allegedly hidden in the ocean depths, then their total weight will far exceed the weight of gold mined on Earth in the entire history of mankind. But, despite the fantastic nature of many testimonies about underwater treasures, they continue to be searched for. And - find. Probably the loudest find of the 20th century was the treasure of the Spanish galleon Nuestra Señora de Atocha, which sank in 1622 off the coast of Florida.

Once Mel Fisher - the famous American treasure hunter, who received the title of "king of treasure hunters" - was incredibly lucky. In 1963, at the head of a group of submariners from Treasurs Salvors Incorporated, he found valuables from a Spanish ship that sank off the Florida peninsula. The valuables raised from the day of the sea were pulled by several million dollars. But the treasure hunters did not calm down. Mel Fisher's attention was drawn to the fate of another Spanish galleon, the Nuestra Señora de Atocha.

The last voyage of the Atocha tragically ended on September 6, 1622. A huge ship crashed on the reefs off the coast of Florida, taking 264 lives with it. Only five managed to escape. From the open belly of the galleon spilled 47 tons of gold and silver coins and ingots. They dotted the sea floor for over 50 miles...

Strange coincidence: Mel Fisher was also born on September 6th. Only almost 300 years after the death of Atocha. Later they will talk about some kind of mystical connection that connected the legendary diver and the no less legendary ship. Be that as it may, Mel Fisher has been obsessed with the dream of finding the treasures of the "golden galleon" for almost two decades. All his previous dives, searches, successes and failures served only as stages on the way to the cherished goal. He turned all his finds, including the treasures of Santa Margarita, into capital and invested this capital in a dream ...

On the way to the goal, not only sensitive failures awaited him, but also real tragedies. The biggest blow to Mel Fisher was the death of his son Dirk. Dirk's wife and another member of the team died with him. This happened on July 20, 1975, during search operations at the site of the death of Atocha.

Perhaps someone in Fischer's place would have given up. But the tireless seeker stubbornly continued to believe in his star. In essence, he had no choice: all the bridges were burned, and either the tragic fate of Dirk or ... "Atocha" awaited him ahead!

The famous General Archives of India in Seville is a treasure trove (for those who understand, of course). Forty thousand bundles of old documents, a million storage units tell in great detail about the history of the discovery and development of the New World by the Spaniards, about their 400-year colonial rule over vast territories across the ocean. In this sea of information, each grain of which has its own value, Mel Fisher had to find one single tiny drop: documents telling about the last voyage of the galleon "Nuestra Señora de Atocha" ...

In that summer of 1622 everything was the same as always. The Spanish fleet safely crossed the ocean and was divided into several detachments. Seven galleons guarding the convoy, including the Santa Margarita, remained in Porto Domingo (Haiti). Another detachment, led by the "Nuestra Señora de Atocha", went to the Isthmus of Panama and on May 24 anchored in the harbor of Portobello. Sixteen smaller ships went off to load in various Caribbean ports, and a third detachment of galleons moved to Cartagena (Colombia). Here the ships took on board a large cargo of gold and silver and on July 21 met with the second detachment in Portobello. On July 27, the galleons weighed anchor and headed for Cuba. By August 22, the entire flotilla had gathered in the port of Havana. The so-called “New Spain fleet” also came here from the coast of Mexico, delivering a cargo of Mexican silver to Havana.

The Spanish admirals were alarmed: rumors had reached Havana that a large Dutch fleet had appeared in the waters of the Caribbean Sea. The commander of the "New Spain Fleet" turned to the chief commander, the Marquis Karderey, with a request to allow him to immediately go to Spain. The marquis gave such permission, but on the condition that most of the ingots and coins remain in Havana: they will be reloaded onto galleons, and thus the treasures will be under more reliable protection.

The "New Spain Fleet" left, and the Marquis of Cardereith remained in Havana, waiting for the arrival of the last ships. Soon the whole flotilla was available, and on the morning of September 4, 28 heavily loaded ships lined up on the harbor road, preparing to set off on a long and dangerous voyage. The Marquis of Carderate raised his flag on the lead ship, the galleon of the captain of the Nuestra Señora Candelaria. The main part of the Mexican silver and gold was loaded onto the galleons "Santa Margarita" and "Nuestra Señora de Atocha". Armed with 20 huge bronze cannons, the Atocha sailed as the trailing galleon, following the tail of the slow merchant ships.

The next day, September 5, the weather deteriorated noticeably, the sky was covered with low clouds. By the middle of the day, a real storm broke out. Huge shafts rolled along the sea, the marshals could hardly see the ships ahead through the veil of rain. The waves tossed the clumsy galleons from side to side like splinters. In front of the entire crew and passengers of the Atocha, the Nuestra Señora de Consoliacion, which was ahead, suddenly capsized and disappeared into the depths of the sea ...

At night, the wind changed direction and carried the Spanish fleet north to the shores of Florida. Before dawn, the Candelaria and 20 other ships in the convoy passed the western coast of the Dry Torgugas Islands. Four ships that broke away from the main group, including the Atocha and the Santa Margarita, were thrown by the storm to the east, to the Florida Keys chain of islands. Dawn caught them at some low coral atoll overgrown with mangrove trees. Huge waves of 5 meters high, like a toy, threw the Santa Margarita over the coral reef. From the Margarita, Captain Don Bernardino Lugo watched with helpless despair as the crew of the Atocha struggled to save the ship.

The sailors dropped anchor, hoping to catch on to the reef, but a huge wave unexpectedly lifted the ship and threw it right onto the reef with all its might. There was a terrifying crack, the mainmast collapsed. At the same moment, another wave easily removed the half-wrecked ship from the reef and carried it to the depths. Water gushed into huge holes, and the Atocha sank in the blink of an eye. From the side of the Margarita, it was visible how three Spanish sailors and two black slaves, convulsively clinging to a fragment of the mainmast dangling on the waves, were trying to escape from the embrace of death ... They were picked up only the next morning by the ship "Santa Cruz".

The hurricane that swept the Spanish fleet caused a lot of trouble: 8 of the 28 ships of the transatlantic convoy sank, 550 people died, and an invaluable cargo worth more than two million pesos was lost. For comparison, we note that for the entire period 1503-1660, Spain exported precious metals from America in the amount of 448 million pesos, that is, about 2.8 million pesos per year. Thus, it was about losing almost the entire annual income of the kingdom!

The surviving ships hurried back to Havana. When the seas calmed down, the Marquis of Cardereita sent Captain Gaspar Vargas with five ships to save the Atocha and the Santa Margarita. The Atocha was found quickly: the galleon sank at a depth of 55 feet, and her mizzen mast was still sticking out of the water. From the sunken ship, the Spaniards managed to remove only two small iron cannons that were on the upper deck. The mighty bronze guns remained on the battery deck. The gun ports were closed, and the guns themselves were firmly fixed in anticipation of a storm ... There were no traces of the Santa Margarita at all. However, a small group of sailors managed to escape from this ship - Vargas picked them up on the shores of Loggerhead Bay. The galleon Nuestra Señora de Rosario, badly battered by the storm, also stood there. Having removed the cargo from it, Vargas ordered to burn the useless ship.

In early October, Vargas returned to the Gulf of Florida again in the hope of saving the treasures of the Atocha. However, this time the Spaniards could not even find the place of the ship's death - apparently, another hurricane that had swept shortly before that finally buried the ship at the bottom of the sea. Vargas and his men searched the bottom in vain with hooks...

In February of the following year, the Marquis of Cardereit himself joined the search for "Atocha" and "Margarita". He knew perfectly well what fury would cause in Madrid the news of the loss of the entire annual output of the Mexican silver mines and what awaited him in this regard. At the cost of great effort, several silver ingots were raised from the bottom, but where the hulls of both lost ships disappeared remained a mystery. In August, the fruitless search was abandoned. Cardereita and Vargas returned to Spain. Before their departure, the geographer Nicolas Cardona drew a detailed map of the area of the shipwreck.

The death of the "golden galleons" in 1622 was a real disaster for the royal treasury. In order to finance the ongoing hostilities, Spain was forced to increase foreign loans. Several battle galleons were sold to compensate for at least part of the losses, but this was not enough. The king ordered: the treasures of "Margarita" and "Atocha" by all means must be found!

In 1624, a search party led by Captain Francisco Nunez Melian arrived at the crash site of the "golden galleons". For two years, she used a 680-pound copper diving bell to find the missing treasure. Luck smiled at the searchers only in June 1626: a diver, a slave named Juan Bagnon, first lifted a silver ingot from the Santa Margarita from the bottom.

Hurricanes, then raids by English and Dutch pirates made their own adjustments to the search program every now and then. Nevertheless, over the next four years, Nunez Melian's team managed to extract 380 silver bars, 67 thousand silver coins and 8 bronze cannons from Santa Margarita from the depths of the sea. But no trace of "Atocha" was ever found.

For his services, Melian was appointed governor of Venezuela. Further work to search for underwater treasures was sporadically sung until 1641, but they did not bring any significant results. The events of subsequent years marked the decline of the former power of Spain. The Dutch, the British, the French gradually ousted her from the leading positions in Europe and took control of a number of the former Caribbean possessions of Spain. In 1817, Florida was bought by the United States of America. The mystery of the missing treasures of the Atocha and many other "gold galleons" was forgotten for many years. Once again, only the tireless seeker Mel Fisher returned to this exciting riddle.

I turned out to have more patience, methodicalness and ... luck, Fischer later said. - When I hear about all sorts of secrets there, for which simpletons get crazy money, I feel sorry for these naive people to tears. I want to warn everyone who wants to get rich quick by going scuba diving to warm seas. The life of a treasure hunter has nothing to do with the halo of mystery, romance and other nonsense. At least take me. In total, I spent more than one month underwater. The hours there stretch endlessly, the work is monotonous and boring, and thirty-five divers are always dissatisfied with the beggarly salary and my endless promises. After long months of unsuccessful searches, at best, you are convinced that gold does not at all glow with seductive witch fire at the bottom of the sea. The treasure rolled out and scattered for miles. If a recorder were to draw the life of an underwater treasure hunter on a tape, an endless, slightly wavy line with rare bursts would turn out. Well, the high peaks on it can be counted on the fingers of one hand.

The future "king of treasure hunters" was born in the Midwest, graduated from a technical college and settled in California, where he opened a school for scuba divers, and with it a diving equipment store. But this business, while lucrative, could not satisfy Mal's romantic, adventurous nature. To begin with, he took part in an underwater expedition that went to the coast of Central America in search of treasures. This expedition, although not crowned with particular success, determined the fate of Fischer: he decided to devote himself to the search for underwater treasures.

In 1963, Fisher sold his property in California and moved to the East Coast with his wife, Dolores, and four sons. With the proceeds, he founded Treasures Salvors Incorporated, headquartered in Key West, on the southern tip of the Florida Keys. His companion was Kip Wagner, a romantic, as obsessed with the passion for treasure hunting as Fisher. They agreed that he would work for free for a year or until the treasure was found.

Alas, this turned out to be much more difficult than they expected. The main obstacle was the sand. The flat bottom covered with it would be ideal if it were a question of searching for the skeletons of sunken galleons. But over the centuries, storms and storms have swept away their debris without a trace. Therefore, the divers decided to bet on the values that were on the Spanish ships. And then an unpleasant surprise awaited them: it was almost impossible to get to the hard bottom, where heavy objects could lie. During the night, a thick layer of shifting sand covered the trenches dug during the day.

Fischer's technical ingenuity came to the rescue. He came up with an original device, which he called a "letter box", which made it relatively easy to carry out underwater excavations over a large area. It was a curved cylinder that was attached under the propellers of the boat and directed the stream of water vertically downwards. With such a water cannon, a hole thirty feet wide and ten feet deep was washed out in ten minutes. Where the sand layer was thinner, the "mailbox", like a giant broom, swept it from the selected area of the bottom. After his inspection, the boat moved a little further, and the operation was repeated.

The first year of searching was already at an end when Fisher's perseverance finally paid off. In May 1964, a real carpet of jewels was opened on another “swept” area near Fort Pierce. Gold and silver coins littered the bottom. In two days, Fischer raised 1933 gold doubloons. In total, this season, rescuers collected 2,500 doubloons, which cost a fortune. For more than a year Treasurers Salvors has been working near Fort Pierce. When the stream of coins coming from the bottom turned into a miserable stream, the rescuers left the happy place not without regret.

Now Fisher decided to look for the legendary galleons "Nuestra Señora de Atocha" and "Santa Margarita". The historian Eugene Lyons came to his aid, having done gigantic work in the I Sviel General Archives of India. He sought out reports on the last voyage of the Atocha, on the underwater work of Francisco Nunez Melian and on the treasures he rescued from sunken galleons, studied many old maps of the Florida Keys from the 16th century. However, these searches by no means solved all the problems. Chief among them - how to comb hundreds of thousands of square miles of the seabed? Although the Tragers Salvors had 35 scuba divers on staff, even for such a large team, this was unrealistic. The only way out is to use boats towing magnetometers on a cable. But the galleons sank in the open sea, where there are no fixed landmarks. This means that it is possible that during the search some areas may remain unexplored. To prevent this from happening, Fisher proposed an original method: to put two navigation towers in the sea at a distance of three miles from one another. Rising 10 to 15 feet above the water, they sent out microwave signals that the boats accurately determined their location. In this way it could be guaranteed that every inch of the seabed would be covered.

Fisher even risked additional, very significant expenses, ordering images of the search area from space, equipment for molecular analysis of water samples, and even thought about acquiring dolphins to train them to find gold and silver objects at the bottom. Upon completion of all the preparatory work in 1970, Mel Fisher and his team arrived at the crash site of Atocha and San ga Margarita. Alas, despite the excellent equipment, for many months the extraction of treasure hunters was limited only to rusty cans, barrels and scraps of metal gear. But Mel Fisher continued to firmly believe in success: "The more area we plow for nothing, the closer our hour!"

By the summer of 1971, the size of the surveyed area amounted to 120,000 square miles. And at this time the first finds appeared. It began with the fact that the magnetometer on one of the search boats registered a weak surge. After some hesitation, the scuba diver on duty returned to this place and jumped into the water. Visibility at a depth of six meters was excellent, and he immediately saw the barrel of an ancient musket lying on the sand. A little further - a boarding saber and a second musket. Having placed a buoy over this place, the diver decided to inspect the neighboring sections of the bottom, and, as it turned out, not in vain: thirty meters away a large anchor stuck out of the sand.

Returning to the boat, the scuba diver fired a flare. From the "Fearless" - the headquarters ship of the expedition - immediately rushed photographer Don Kinkaid, who was instructed to take pictures of all the finds. Having captured on film a saber and muskets, he sank to the bottom to choose the best angle for filming the anchor. And... in surprise, he almost dropped the box with the camera: right in front of him on the sand, several rings of a massive gold chain were clearly visible... Still not believing in luck, Kinkaid pulled the entire chain out of the sand by the end. Yes, what a chain - two and a half meters long!

In the weeks that followed, Fisher's team uncovered many silver coins, inlaid spoons and plates, a boatswain's whistle, a working bronze astrolabe, and a dozen small gold bars. There was no doubt that they were on the trail of the Spanish ship. But what? Fischer was at a loss. None of the finds could shed light on this. The crudely cast ingots bore neither the hallmark of the Spanish tax office nor numbers indicating their weight. In addition, ingots of this kind were not listed in the cargo manifest of any of the sunken galleons. Therefore, it was contraband, which could equally well be on board the Atocha and on board the Santa Margarita. However, Fisher believed that, in the end, it does not make much difference which galleon traces they found. More importantly, now it is possible to restore the overall picture of the shipwreck.

The ship, apparently, ran into a reef, near which Fisher and his comrades found an anchor. Moreover, having damaged the hull, it did not sink immediately, but drifted with the wind for some time, gradually falling apart and losing cargo over an area of several square miles. Consequently, the main wreckage of the ship is further southeast at greater depths.

The 1972 season brought nothing new. With the advent of the following spring, scuba divers resumed their search. “First, silver coins flowed in a thin stream, then this stream turned into a stream, and, finally, divers discovered whole deposits of silver. There were so many coins that the search engines jokingly dubbed this place the “Spanish Bank”.

On July 4, Fisher's youngest son, 14-year-old Kane, saw some strange object at the bottom, similar, in his words, to "a loaf of bread." When the “loaf” was taken out, it turned out to be a silver ingot with the numbers 569 on it. The historian Eugene Lyons accompanying the expedition took up copies of documents from the Seville archive: the Atocha cargo manifest did indeed contain an ingot with that number! His weight was also indicated there - 28 kilograms. That's how much the find weighed. So, everything fell into place: "Atocha" was found!

But to extract from the bottom of the sea treasures scattered over a large area and, moreover, covered with a thick layer of bottom sediments, turned out to be far from easy. In the end, Fischer came to the conclusion: it is necessary to make large-sized "letter boxes" that would give strong jets to erode the soil. For this purpose, he acquired two powerful tugboats with huge propellers (They were called the "North Wind" and "South Wind"). Using these tugs with improved "letterboxes" that not only moved tons of sand, but also greatly improved underwater visibility, rescuers followed the trail of finds to the southeast of the location of the galleon's anchor. At first they came across cockleshells, sabers, lead cannonballs overgrown with shells. Then came the scattering. silver coins.

One day, Dirk Fischer surfaced next to the South Wind, clutching a round object in his hands. It was a navigational astrolabe that had lain at the bottom for several centuries. Nevertheless, it was preserved so well that it could well be used today. Subsequent research showed that the astrolabe was made in Lessbon by a certain Lopu Omen around 1560. The next day, scuba divers picked up two gold bars and a gold disc weighing four and a half pounds. And on July 4, Bluff McHaley, a diver exploring the edges of the Spanish Bank, stumbled upon a small rosary of coral and gold.

The search for the treasures of the Atocha was fraught with considerable difficulties: financial problems, the dangers inevitable in spearfishing, a huge search area ... Once, while the South Wind was clearing the bottom, an uninvited guest suddenly appeared in the sea from the stern. A ten-year-old boy was hit by propellers before anyone could stop him. He was rushed to Key West by helicopter, but died in the hospital.

The treasures found were the main source of funds for current expenses: "Atocha" has already given a rich "harvest". From the bottom of the sea, 11 gold and 6240 silver coins, ten gold chains, two rings, several gold ingots and discs, a gold wash bowl and a rare beauty silver jug were raised. In addition, scuba divers have collected a whole museum of antiques: pewter plates and navigational instruments, muskets, arquebuses, sabers, daggers. Archaeologist Duncan Mathewson recorded the location of each item. This shed new light on the circumstances of the shipwreck. Based on the collected facts, Mathewson put forward a new hypothesis about where the main cargo of the "golden galleon" lies.

With the advent of 1975, fate seemed to finally turn to face Mel Fisher. For him, this was already the sixth season of the search for Atocha. This time, the "Golden Galleon" gave the scuba divers a lot of 8 real coins and three gold bars. Then Dirk Fischer, guided by the assumptions of Mathewson, led the "North Wind" to the depth - behind the island of Quicksands. On July 13, 1975, he swam alone under water, inspecting the rocky ocean floor. Suddenly, a fantastic picture opened up before Dirk - a pile of green, log-like objects lying openly at the bottom, as if someone had previously cleared them of sediment. These were... five bronze cannons from the galleon "Nuestra Señora de Atocha"!

He flew to the surface with such a desperate, as it seemed to us, cry that we thought he was attacked by a shark, Dirk Fischer's wife Angel later recalled. - Then we heard the word "guns!" and they also yelled with joy.

Thirty meters from the first find, four more bronze cannons were found. Everyone was immensely happy: the treasures of the "golden" galleon are somewhere nearby. But instead of triumph, the most grievous of losses awaited them ahead...

On July 19, Dirk Fischer took the North Wind back to the Marquesas Keys, to the shipwreck. For the night they anchored southwest of the islands. Just before dawn, the tugboat suddenly leaked, lurched and suddenly capsized. Eight crew members were thrown into the sea, but three - Dirk and Angel Fisher, scuba diver Rick Gage - remained in the underdeck compartment and died. The cause of the tragedy could not be determined ...

This terrible blow did not break Mel Fisher. First of all, he ordered the protection of the cannons, which were extracted from the depths of centuries by his son. “Dirk really wanted them to get into museums,” he later explained to reporters. Fischer then got an even more powerful vessel ready to go: a 180-foot tender, which proved to be an immediate success. Thanks to its propellers, which were not inferior to aircraft propellers, the bottom clearing went much faster.

Only the beginning of winter storms forced Mel Fisher to announce another break in the search. This has already become a familiar schedule: three to four months of winter rest, and with the advent of spring, the resumption of work to lift the precious cargo of Atocha. However, there were weeks and even months when the arrows of magnetometers showed no signs of life, and the divers returned empty-handed. And if it wasn't for Fisher's persistence, the Treasurers Salvors would have probably curtailed their operations. Moreover, the company entered another period of financial difficulties. The millions that Fisher raised from the bottom of the sea went to pay off loans and pay taxes. Sometimes he did not even have money to buy fuel for the search flotilla.

A long-awaited event occurred in the summer of 1980, when scuba divers attacked a promising trail a few miles east of the alleged sinking site of the Atocha. A strong surge of the magnetometer showed the presence of large metal objects at the bottom. They turned out to be another anchor and a copper boiler. Then a pile of ballast stones was found nearby, as well as ceramics and a scattering of coins. And then ... Further, a fantastic sight opened before the divers: a strip of the seabed four thousand feet long was literally covered with gold and silver. But - what an irony of fate - judging by the numbers on the ingots, it was not a cargo from the Atocha, but ... from another galleon that died that day, the Santa Margarita. The treasures of Atocha were yet to be found...

The cost of the treasures found was about $ 20 million, and this allowed Fisher to return to the search for Atocha again the next year. Archaeologist Mathewson, who recorded in his records every, even the smallest find, counting the trophies raised from the bottom of the sea and comparing them with the Atocha cargo manifest, came to the unequivocal conclusion that the bulk of the valuables had not yet been discovered.

Another five years have passed. And finally, in the spring of 1985, divers raised 414 silver doubloons, 16 brooches with emeralds and several gold bars from the bottom of the sea. The excitement knew no bounds. But for the next month and a half, no find was made at all! Mel Fisher was lost in doubt: maybe they are looking in the wrong place again? Maybe the drift line of the Atocha looked completely different and they deviated from it to the side?

On the morning of July 20, the magnetometer of the search boat registered the presence of a significant mass of metal underwater. Scuba divers Andy Matroski and Greg Wareham, who were on duty that day, immediately went under the water. At a depth of eighteen meters, Andy noticed dim light spots on the sand. Nearby rose a block overgrown with algae - downright underwater rock in miniature. "Where did she come from on a flat day?" Sailor was surprised. With signs, he called to a comrade who had a manual metal detector. As soon as Wareham brought the probe to the mysterious block, a piercing howl rang out in the headphones. From the expression on his face, Matroska guessed that the mysterious object was fraught with some kind of surprise. Just in case, he carefully scratched the "stone" with a knife. A narrow silver strip glittered against a brown-green background. What seemed to be a piece of rock was actually a heap of caked silver ingots...

With delight, Matroska and Wareham embraced each other right under the water. "We attacked a root vein!" - they shouted in one voice, emerging from the side of the "South Wind". This news had the effect of an exploding bomb. Everyone who was on the ship, snatching masks and scuba gear, fell into the water.

This time there was no doubt: here, forty miles from Key West and ten from the archipelago of small coral islands of the Marquesas Keys, lay the main part of the cargo of the Nuestra Señora de Atocha. Moreover, fate ordered that he be found exactly ten years later - to the day - after the tragic death of Dirk Fischer ...

On that day, no one else began to sink into the water. We once again prayed for people close to all of us who gave their lives to bring this success closer. Well, then the usual routine work began, - recalls Mel Fisher. - From morning to evening we raised silver ingots. There were so many of them that wire baskets borrowed from one of the Key West supermarkets had to be adapted for this. When later, already at the headquarters of our Treasurers Salvors, we counted the "catch", we ourselves could hardly believe the results: 3200 emeralds, one hundred and fifty thousand silver coins and over a thousand silver bars weighing an average of about forty kilograms each.

As a result of many years of work, Fisher's expedition raised jewels worth $250 million from the seabed. The approximate amount of the Atocha treasures still remaining under water is estimated at no less than $100 million.

"Santa Margarita" and "Nuestra Señora de Atocha" (September 6, 1622)

The Spanish galleons "Santa Margarita" and "Nuestra Señora de Atocha", which sank during a hurricane off the coast of the Strait of Florida, claimed the lives of more than 500 people.

1622 was a critical year for Spain. young king Philip IV inherited a vast, but already losing influence, empire. Spain's support for the Catholic German states plunged it into the last and bloodiest of religious conflicts, the Thirty Years' War.

In 1622 the war for Spain was successful, but at a high cost. And when the twelve-year truce ended with Holland, a horde of enemy ships rushed into Castilian West Indies.

Despite the fact that the Spanish claims in North America contested by the British, French and Dutch, her wealthy colonies in Central and South America were still intact. The only link between Spain and West Indies were its maritime communications, through which the fleets transported merchant goods and royal income, weapons and soldiers, as well as passengers.

Philip IV forced his merchants to pay for the protection of their ships by imposing a tax on trade with West Indies. In 1622 Spain built with this money eight powerful military galleons and staffed them with two thousand soldiers and sailors. This security flotilla escorted merchants and led the flagships of the merchant fleet, " Captain" and " Almirantu”, to South American ships sailing from Portobelo and Cartagena with treasure New World.

The security flotilla went to West Indies at the end of April, having lost two galleons before the shores Spain out of sight. The convoy included Santa Margarita", a beautiful new galleon, bought specifically for this trip, and performing the same functions as " Almiranta", and " Nuestra Señora de Atocha"- a ship, shortly before built in Havana for the king. " Atocha”, a six-hundred-ton gallion, got its name in honor of one of the famous Madrid chapels dedicated to the Virgin.

The departing fleet carried wine, textiles, metalwork, books, and papal indulgences that bestow heavenly bliss on whoever purchases them, as well as half a million pounds of mercury, the Crown's monopoly metal used to extract silver and gold from rich ores. Potosi.

fleet commander, Lope Diaz de Armendariz, Marquis of Cadereita, safely brought his ship to Isthmus of Panama. There, at the big fair in Portobelo, European goods were exchanged for Upper silver Peru. Worn-out porters filled the holds of ships heading home while their owners wrote things down and ingots on their cargo manifests.

AT Portobelo the marquis learned that off the coast Venezuela recently saw thirty-six Dutch ships, and prudently added another galleon to his squadron, " Nuestra Señora de Rosario". On July 27 the flotilla reached Cartagena, where gold from the mines was loaded onto ships Nueva Granada and tons of royal tobacco. A huge amount of silver in bullion and coins was intended to be transferred to its owners in Seville. The flotilla then left for Havana, your last destination port in West Indies.

Tensions rose as ships were forced to drift in the days of sudden dead calm. On August 22, when it was still far from the terrifying hurricane season, they entered the harbor Havana. The new Spanish fleet, which sailed between Veracruz and Spain, already gone.

Sailors Atochi” cursed the suffocating heat, dragging five hundred bales of tobacco from the hold to load hundreds of copper ingots into it. On the " Atoche"there were fifteen tons of Cuban copper shipped to Malaga for casting bronze cannons to defend the empire. At last the tobacco was piled up with a load of Honduran indigo. gallion captain Jacob de Vreder also entered a large amount of gold, silver and silverware on the cargo manifest. But now it has become clear that the ships will not be able to leave on August 28, as he had hoped Marquis of Cadereita.

The captains decided to weigh anchor with the onset of the new moon. At that time, sailors believed that favorable weather conditions during the period of the new moon would last at least a few days. ( In recent times, science has proven that their belief was to some extent justified.) Thus, if the weather is good on September 5, the day of the full moon, it should remain so long enough to allow the flotilla to safely reach the infamous coast Florida. However, the Spaniards could not know that at this very moment a small but intensifying storm moving from the northeast reached Cuba.

Sunday morning September 4, 1622 came, as the Marquis noted, “ with a cloudless and clear sky and a pleasant breeze". Twenty-eight ships with wind-filled sails, waving flags and pennants solemnly passed by Castillo del Morro into the open sea. Each ship was Castile in miniature, the bearer of culture, wealth and power Spain.

« Atocha”was a floating fortress carrying twenty bronze cannons, sixty muskets and large stocks of gunpowder and cannonballs. In addition to the crew, there were eighty-two soldiers on board under the command of Captain Bartolome de Nodal , famous traveler. The team consisted of 133 people, including eighteen gunners. From his cabin Vice Admiral of the Fleet Pedro Pasquier de Esparza supervised the actions of the ships entrusted to him.

All free space on Atoche» was full of treasures West Indies. Chests and boxes, filled with gold and silver bars and eight real silver coins, were the result of numerous commercial transactions; one shipment contained 133 silver bars, some of the crown silver mined and smelted in Potosi thousands of people in the colony.

The holds also contained twenty thousand pesos for the heirs. Christopher Columbus , a tidy sum obtained from the sale of papal indulgences, and the money of the royal treasury received for those sold in Cartagena black slaves. Together with copper, indigo and tobacco " Atocha"carried huge treasures - nine hundred and one silver bars, one hundred and sixty-one gold bars or discs and about 255 thousand silver coins.

Forty-eight passengers were accommodated in small cabins at the stern - a social cross section of society Castile and West Indies. Dignitary Royal Envoy to Peru, father Pedro de la Madriz , shared his dwelling with three other Augustinian brothers. AT Portobelo boarded Don Diego de Guezman , governor Cusco , and wealthy Peruvian merchants Lorenzo de Arriola and Michel de Munibe , as well as clerk of the Peruvian Court of Appeal Martin de Salgado with his wife and three servants.

Although " Santa Margarita"carried half as many precious ingots as" Atocha”, the passengers on it were just as crowded, not excluding the governor of the Spanish Venezuela, don Francisco de la Josa. On each ship there were passengers who were not mentioned by name in the ship lists - slaves and servants, the so-called " people who don't matter».

The chief pilot sent the flotilla into the Strait of Florida, trying to get into the most powerful stream. gulf stream near Florida Keys. But the growing wind of the storm, which then grew into a hurricane, was already approaching the strait. By Monday morning, September 5, a strong northeasterly wind raised waves.

Soon the situation worsened even more, and each ship became an isolated, fighting world. For people, the whistling wind and surging waves have become the only reality - this is also a hopeless struggle with seasickness and the fear of death. When the wind tore the sails, broke the masts and smashed the rudders, the ships turned into uncontrollable pieces of wood.

Subsequent events are described in an English account of the time: " As the waves roll one after another, so one misfortune followed another: first the wind turned to the south, then they began to fear that they would be carried into some mouth of the river or bay of the Florida coast ... And then there was no choice but to crash on the shallows or perish on the shore».

Eight unfortunate vessels were captured by a strong current of wind, including " Rosario», « Atochu" and " Santa Margarita". They were quickly carried north, towards the reefs. Gutierre de Espinosa , captain" Santa Margarita”, was in his cabin and was preparing for the crash. He had just ordered his adjutant to hide part of the cargo - several gold and silver bars, silverware and a bowler of chocolate - in his personal chest. Then Espinosa tied this chest tightly with a rope so that it could keep afloat. The rest of the people on board at that moment cared little for material values: kneeling around the priests, they prayed.

After dark" Santa Margarita"lost her foremast - the main sail on the foremast. Huge waves, rolling over her hull, demolished the mainmast and the helm. The ship was drifting north.

At dawn on September 6, Tuesday, the pilot made an entry in the ship's logbook about the decrease in depth; misfortune was near. Several brave sailors tried to put another foresail and, tacking, get away from danger, but it was blown away again.

When the ship was passing between the Florida reefs, they tried to drop the anchors, but they did not take the soil. Suddenly, the gallion ran aground and sat on it.

When it was completely dawn, the commander of the infantry on board, captain Bernadino de Lugo approached the bulwark " Santa Margarita". Then, as the commander of the fleet reports in accordance with the report de Lugo , « at seven o'clock in the morning the captain saw, one league east of his galleon, another galleon called the Nuestra Señora de Atocha, on which only the mizzen mast remained. While he was watching him, the galleon sank". Then his own ship began to sink. jumping overboard, de Lugo grabbed a wooden beam and swam. Another sixty-seven people found salvation on the wreckage " Santa Margarita". As recorded in the English report, " many passengers after the disappearance of the ship could not be saved, the sea did not give them such an opportunity". One hundred twenty-seven people drowned.

In the afternoon, the wind died down, and the high sun illuminated a sad picture: a surging sea, a hodgepodge of broken boxes and chests. By a lucky chance, that afternoon, a ship with Jamaica. The surviving people were taken aboard, where they met five survivors with " Atochi» - two cabin boys - Juan Munoz and F rancisco nunez , sailor Andres Lorenzo and two slaves. They told how Atocha hit a reef and quickly sank. The remaining two hundred and sixty people who were on it died.

A few days later, the captain of a small ship Santa Catalina» Bartolome Lopez saw the crash site; he noticed the corpus Atochi» with a fragment of a mizzen mast protruding from the water. His sailors fished out a chest floating nearby, broke it open and separated the silver and gold found inside. It was a chest Gutierre de Espinosa the drowned captain Santa Margarita».

When those who escaped Rosario» set foot on the land of the island Dry Tortugas, not far from their stranded galleon, they hardly believed that they had escaped death. The shipwrecks stretched more than forty miles to the east: first a small Portuguese slave trader, then a messenger ship of the fleet, then " Santa Margarita" and " Atocha". A little further on, a small Cuban patrol boat perished, somewhere not far from the shore, two more small “ merchant».

In total, the storm killed five hundred and fifty people and sank a cargo worth more than one and a half million ducats - at modern prices about two hundred and fifty million dollars.

After the disaster of 1622, the Spaniards had to explore a large area and move a lot of sand in order to find the lost ships. Finding out the location Atochi» from the records of the captains de Lugo and Lopez they found about Dry Tortugas run aground" Rosario». Marquis of Cadereita sent from Havana to rescue the cargo of the lost vessel of the captain Gaspar de Vargas . Captain Vargas first came to Atoche and found her intact at a depth of fifty-five feet. Vargas was able to raise only two guns, and then went to " Rosario". Meanwhile, another hurricane swept through the area. When the lifeguard returned to where she sank Atocha”, he found that the storm had broken her hull and scattered the wreckage.

Viceroy of New Spain sent Vargas an experienced engineer Nicholas de Cardono , with slave divers from Acapulco, and with Caribbean islands came the Indian pearl divers. Myself Marquis de Cadereita arrived at Florida to watch the work; the island where he was camped was named " El Cayo del Marques».

Several months of hard work followed. Vargas wrote: " Every day we left this island on two boats at four o'clock in the morning and reached the place only at seven ... We worked until two o'clock, and the rest of the time it took us to get to the land for the night».

The Spaniards found several wrecks at a depth " Atochi" and nothing more. Divers could only work for a short time at shallow depths, and Vargas it was not possible to move huge quantities of mobile sand from place to place. Because of this, he failed. The Spaniards spent more than a thousand pesos without finding any " Atochu', nor ' Santa Margarita».

The troubles that nullified the efforts of the Spaniards continued. Disappeared in 1625 Francisco del Luz and his entire crew, who set up buoys at shipwrecks. But now a man has appeared who partially atoned for the failure Gaspar de Vargas : some Francisco Nunez Melian who served on Cuba royal treasurer for religious offerings. Melian He was inventive, persistent and also a gambler.

Melian concluded with the king Philip rescue contract; he and the crown would each receive a third of the finds, and salvage costs would be paid from the remaining third. His accounts of these expenses gave us the first clue to the true whereabouts of the wrecked ships.

Melian invented a secret device for rescue work. According to him, with the help of this device, a person could discover hidden things. " This is something never seen before, in addition to being the first inventor of such a new and wonderful device, it requires incalculable money to bring it to perfection and successfully implement the results of these considerations ...»

His device was a 680-pound bronze bell fitted with a seat and windows, which Melian pissed in Havana. It was both a search vehicle and a diving station.

Melian sailed to the shallows in May 1626 and set to work. The bell was slowly dragged underwater while the man inside surveyed the sandy bottom. June 6 Slave Diver Juan Bagnon rose to the surface with a silver ingot with " Santa Margarita and got freedom. The Spaniards then quickly found three hundred and fifty silver bars and thousands of coins, several bronze cannons, and many copper items.

Over the next four years Melian sent expeditions to the shallows in a variety of weather. His men fought off three Dutch raiders; they calmed the fury of the Indians with Florida Keys, bribing them with knives and sugar after they burned down their camp on Marquesas. Melian was rewarded for his work by gaining the office of governor Venezuela.

Meanwhile, cargo rescue Santa Margarita» and searches « Atochi continued. After death Meliana in 1644 these efforts began to wane. A Spanish report from 1688 notes that by this time " Nuestra Señora de Atocha was listed among the missing. Her vast treasures still lay beside the vast shoal to the west of Marquesas Keys or underneath...

...Mel Fisher was simply obsessed with the 1622 gallion hunt. He even built a semblance of an ancient autogyro - the forerunner of a helicopter - to tow an aviation magnetometer, but the device fell apart without even rising into the air. After a tedious fruitless search near the central islets Chalk returned to the northern shoals. But neither he nor any of the team found traces of the 1622 ships. Their whereabouts remained a mystery hidden for centuries.

Five years Fisher searched for ships that died in 1622. And only in 1973 luck smiled at him. Fifteen months later, the finds were finally divided. Collection in the public vault in Tallahassee amounted to 6240 silver coins of four colonial mints, 11 gold coins minted in Seville, 10 gold chains, 2 rings, 2 gold bars and discs, an astrolabe and 3 navigational compasses, 3 tin plates and 3 silver spoons, a rare silver wash jug, a golden cup and part of a copper ingot. Most of the finds were weapons - 34 muskets with matchlocks and arquebuses with lead bullets for them, fragments of 44 sabers and 15 daggers, 6 stone cannonballs and 120 lead ones.

treasure hunter's son Dirk Fischer found a pilot astrolabe that had lain for many years deep under the sand. Subsequent research showed that it was made in Lisbon some Lopu Omen around 1560. Perhaps this is the most valuable item discovered by underwater archaeologists...

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Most people believe that ships full of jewels sunk in the depths of the sea, as well as brave seekers of these treasures, are nothing more than a beautiful fiction, a place that belongs exclusively to books and films. Meanwhile, both the huge treasures hidden on numerous ships buried at the bottom of the ocean, and those thirsty for adventure and wealth people who spend years of their lives searching for them, this is a very real part of life. That life, in which there is, for example, the fascinating history of the galleon "Nuestra Señora de Atocha".

The sea as a financial risk factor

The history of the Spanish galleon "Nuestra Señora de Atocha" is quite common for the colonial era of the 16th-18th centuries. In those days, gold from the New World was the main and almost the only source of income for the Spanish crown. On the way from America to Spain, the "golden ships" faced many dangers, the main of which was the treacherous sea with its severe storms and pirates greedy for other people's goods. The Spaniards could not do anything with the sea, but they developed tactics against the pirates, sending gold not by single ships, but by convoys of dozens of ships, many of which performed a security rather than a transport function.

The galleon "Nuestra Señora de Atocha" became the main participant in one of these convoys, which was tasked with delivering gold from Cuba to Spain in 1622. Several factors turned out to be fatal for the galleon at once, since a convoy of 28 ships left the port of Havana at the wrong time and in the wrong direction.

The fact is that at the beginning of September in the Caribbean there are not the best climatic conditions for starting sailing to Europe: a strong wind that changes its direction, the danger of storms, and so on. Therefore, usually Spanish ships with gold sailed to ports on the continental coast, from where, after some time, after waiting out a dangerous period, they went to Spain. But in 1622, everything turned out differently: there were reports of the appearance of a large Dutch fleet nearby, in addition, the authorities in Spain were in a hurry to deliver the gold they needed to wage the Thirty Years' War. Therefore, on September 4, the convoy led by the Nuestra Señora de Atocha, on which the main part of the gold and silver was loaded, left Havana. The ships were caught in a severe storm, they were carried north to the coast of Florida. As a result, eight ships sank (in different places), sank near some coral reef with almost the entire crew (only five people survived) and the galleon Nuestra Señora de Atocha.

Those who seek will almost always find

Due to the fact that the wreck of the Nuestra Señora de Atocha was observed from other ships, and the selected crew members gave detailed testimony, the location of the treasure-packed ship was initially well known. The Spaniards for several years even tried to raise gold from the bottom. However, the depth, which was significant for diving operations of that time, did not allow this to be done, and soon tropical storms moved the galleon from its place and could no longer be found. So the treasure had to wait over four hundred years. Until the very moment when the most famous searcher for sunken "golden ships" American Mel Fisher became interested in him.

Putting the search for sunken Spanish ships on a professional basis, Fisher actively worked in the Spanish archives, where he searched for documents about sunken galleons with gold. In the mid-sixties, he found such a document about the Nuestra Señora de Atocha, and for four years unsuccessfully searched for a galleon off the coast of Florida. But in 1970, with the help of a Spanish scientist, he found out that the original document contained erroneous coordinates that were once entered by the archive staff. Having received the true information, Fisher began a search that dragged on for fifteen years. To do this, he used the most advanced technologies and methods, ordered satellite images of the search area, used the most sensitive location equipment, and designed powerful mechanisms for cleaning the bottom from sand. The search was difficult, sometimes tragic - in their course, in particular, one of Fisher's sons died along with his wife. However, the search was supported by the fact that the expedition gradually found things and valuables from other sunken galleons that were part of the same convoy with the Nuestra Señora de Atocha - which meant that the cherished ship itself had to be somewhere nearby. Since 1975, Fisher began to find items from Atocha, but the treasures were still not visible.

Treasures worth a billion dollars

Finally, in the summer of 1985, the first truly valuable find was discovered - a metal lump, which turned out to be a pile of silver bars “sintered” together. From that moment, the still unfinished operation began to search, clean up and lift the precious cargo of the Nuestra Señora de Atocha galleon. Mel Fisher, who died in 1998, did not live up to its completion, but the work was continued by his family treasure hunting company, one of the leaders of which is his son Sean.

In total, in more than 25 years of work to raise the treasures of the Spanish galleon, more than three thousand emeralds, one hundred and fifty thousand silver coins and about forty tons of silver ingots were raised - all this is estimated at $ 450 million (20% of the value of the treasures found goes to the state). At the same time, according to experts, the value of the jewelry remaining under a thick layer of sand is at least $ 500 million, because the seekers have not yet picked up all the emeralds and have not yet reached the gold of Nuestra Señora de Atocha. However, judging by the find of 2011, a unique gold ring with a 10 carat emerald, it is not so long to “dig” to gold…

Alexander Babitsky

On the day of September 6, 1622, when the Spanish galleon sank"Atocha", raided reefs off the south coast of Florida, after 300 years Mel Fisher is born.

Whether this is a coincidence or not, only the Almighty knows, but it is precisely Fisher found this gallion.

This most beautiful flagship of the Golden Fleetleft the port of Havana on September 4, 1622.

On board "Atochi"there were forty-seven tons of gold and silver, and the gallion was returning home to Spain.

The Spaniards took gold and silver from all the temples and did not disdain anything. Art objects, jewelry ... was in the holds"Atochi"and all this was obtained by robberies and robberies.

Probably the Almighty took pity on the victims, but passing through the strait teeming with reefs,

"Atocha"stumbled upon one of them and sank on September 6 at a depth of 15 meters with 250 passengers and crew members on board, and the subsequent storm scattered the remains of the galleon along the ocean floor for several miles.

And then one day, a successful chicken farmer, Mel Fisher decided to go to the bottom

ocean and wander along the bottom of the Strait of Florida.
And suddenly, oh my God, I found my first coin. Mel's delight knew no bounds.
Mel Fisher was fascinated by the idea of finding treasures buried under the water:

"An amazing feeling - to see pure gold, to hold it in your hands, knowing that the last person who touched it found his grave in the sea centuries ago. Or trying on an emerald ring on your finger. Or blowing aching notes from a golden boatswain's whistle, last heard on the deck of the Atocha..."

150 people worked for Fisher to find the treasure "Atochi".
Millions borrowed and spent on searches did not pay off.

Mel Fisher was on the verge of bankruptcy...

It was not possible to find the sunken jewels immediately. For 16 years, Mel and his crew scoured the bottom in search of treasure.

Skeptics laughed at Fischer, who managed only from time to time to find a few gold and silver coins. But still Fischer got lucky. He was able to find a sunken galleon!!!

But along with the finds, fate began to bring misfortune to the life of Mel Fisher.

Yes, here also the authorities of Florida began to claim the inheritance and endless courts began ...
On the night of July 20, 1975, a tug belonging to Fischer sank, and Fischer's son Dirk, his wife Angel and one of his crew members drowned with it.

That it was a diversion on the part of competitors or a curse, which is often believed to be imposed on treasures, is unknown.
Once started, he could not stop, the thirst for adventure was stronger than Mel.

And every time going out in search of Mel said:
"Today I'm definitely lucky"

And lucky!

A gold plate was found with a registration number corresponding to the preserved

in the Archives General of India inventory of the Nuestra señor de Atocha cargo.

In the spring of 1985, divers began to bring hoops from the barrels in which the Atocha cargo was once stored, and then the first jewels:

sixteen brooches with emeralds, several gold bars, more than four hundred silver doubloons, some of them worth $25,000.

The found grave of "Atocha" kept more than 200 gold and more than 1100 silver ingots (weighing from 15 to 37 kilograms each).

As well as jewelry - gold rings, chains, pendants, emerald brooches and an amazingly beautiful cross adorned with emeralds - all this was found by Fischer!

But only after going through hundreds of trials, all 9 judges proclaimed the desired verdict:

The found gold belongs to Mel Fisher.

As a result of his searches by Mel Fisher, he formed his own understanding of the rules for finding treasures,

which he outlined in 5 points:

1. Searching for treasures “for good luck”, according to the principle “what if I find it” is the lot of amateurs. The search must begin in the historical archives, trying to find out the place and causes of the death of the ship, to imagine the historical picture of the event. A whole team of one and a half hundred people worked for Fisher, most of whom analyzed trade reports and port books. Say, if a ship loaded with goods left point A and did not arrive at point B, this is a reason to ask if there were any naval battles or, possibly, hurricanes along its route.

2. Do not rely on luck - buy equipment. Experience shows that only well-equipped expeditions have a chance of success. Moreover, metal detectors have now become a hot commodity in Europe: in Germany, for example, about 2 million of them have been sold over the past ten years.

3. Familiarize yourself with the legal side of the issue. In different countries. For example, quite recently, on one of the islands off the coast of Chile, a group of searchers found a treasure buried by the pirate Esteban Echeverria, which is estimated at 10 billion dollars! And what do you think? The Chilean authorities declared what was found a national treasure and pushed the guys aside. No, that's not how we play. Where better to follow the laws of the United States: treasures found with the government should only be shared if you find them less than 24 miles from the coast. By the way, according to the Brussels Convention of 1910, treasures found in neutral waters belong entirely to the finder.

4. Fear the archaeologists! For some reason, these strange people are convinced that the place for all kinds of coins and figurines that you pull out on your hump from the bottom of the sea is in dusty museums. So keep all your research in the strictest confidence.5. Like all people whose earnings can be seriously affected by luck, treasure hunters are superstitious. Therefore, remember: never exchange for trifles. I found a trinket worth a hundred dollars - better not pick it up. You will scare away REAL luck. And do not forget about the popular opinion: the person who finds the Treasure is often unhappy, seriously ill and dies prematurely or goes crazy. Freebie rarely brings good luck.

Exciting results of Mel Fisher's long chase for sea treasures

can see at his museum in Key West where many of the gold and silver valuables,

rescued from timelessness, now lie in elegant shop windows,

and Fischer's business is continued by his grandson.
Nuestra Señora de Atocha was Mel Fisher's life's work.

The treasure ship "Nuestra Senora De Atocha" is the largest treasure that sank in the sea. Galleon "Nuestra Señora de Atocha": unimagined adventures of treasure hunters Search operations of the Spanish fleet

"Santa Margarita" and "Nuestra Señora de Atocha" (September 6, 1622)

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