Mary Celeste, often mistakenly called Marie Celeste, was a ship built in Canada and registered in the United States. It was found floating without anyone on board in the Atlantic Ocean near the Azores on December 4, 1872.
The Canadian ship Dei Gratia discovered Mary Celeste in a messy but still usable condition, with some sails and no lifeboat. The last entry in Mary Celeste’s log was dated 10 days earlier. The ship had left New York City for Genoa on November 7 and still had enough supplies when found. Its alcohol cargo was undamaged, and the captain’s and crew’s personal items were untouched. No one who had been on board was ever seen again.
Mary Celeste was built in Spencer’s Island, Nova Scotia, and first named Amazon under British ownership in 1861. In 1868, it was renamed Mary Celeste and registered in the United States. It sailed without major problems until its 1872 voyage. After the ship was recovered, legal meetings in Gibraltar considered possible causes, such as mutiny by Mary Celeste’s crew, piracy by others, or fraud. No clear evidence supported these ideas, and the case remained unsolved.
The lack of answers led to many guesses about what happened to the crew. Some theories included alcohol fumes from the cargo, underwater earthquakes, waterspouts, attacks by giant squid, or supernatural events.
After the legal meetings, Mary Celeste continued to be used by new owners. In 1885, its captain intentionally wrecked it off Haiti as part of a fraud scheme. The mystery of its 1872 abandonment has been told many times in books, films, and plays. In 1884, Arthur Conan Doyle wrote a short story based on the event, which helped popularize the name "Mary Celeste" over its original spelling.
Early history
The keel of the future Mary Celeste was placed in late 1860 at the shipyard of Joshua Dewis in the village of Spencer's Island, on the shores of the Bay of Fundy in Nova Scotia. The ship was built using locally cut wood, had two masts, and was rigged as a brigantine. It was carvel-built, meaning the planks of the hull fit together smoothly without overlapping. The ship was launched on May 18, 1861, and named Amazon. It was registered at nearby Parrsboro on June 10, 1861. The registration documents stated the ship was 99.3 feet (30.3 meters) long, 25.5 feet (7.8 meters) wide, 11.7 feet (3.6 meters) deep, and had a gross tonnage of 198.42. The ship was owned by a group of nine local people, led by Dewis, and included Robert McLellan, who was the ship's first captain.
For its first voyage in June 1861, Amazon traveled to Five Islands, Nova Scotia, to load timber for transport across the Atlantic to London. After overseeing the loading, Captain McLellan became ill, and his condition worsened. The ship returned to Spencer's Island, where McLellan died on June 19. John Nutting Parker became the new captain and continued the voyage to London. During this trip, Amazon faced additional problems, including colliding with fishing equipment near Eastport, Maine, and later sinking a brig in the English Channel after leaving London.
Parker remained in command for two years, during which Amazon primarily worked in the West Indies trade. In November 1861, the ship crossed the Atlantic to France, and in Marseille, it was painted, possibly by Honoré de Pellegrin, a famous maritime artist from the Marseilles School. In 1863, Parker was replaced by William Thompson, who stayed in command until 1867. These years were described as quiet, with the ship’s mate later recalling, "We went to the West Indies, England, and the Mediterranean—what we call the foreign trade. Not a thing unusual happened." In October 1867, a storm near Cape Breton Island drove Amazon ashore, causing severe damage. Her owners then abandoned the ship as a wreck. On October 15, the wreck was purchased by Alexander McBean of Glace Bay, Nova Scotia.
Within a month, McBean sold the wreck to a local businessman, who later sold it in November 1868 to Richard W. Haines, an American mariner from New York. Haines paid $1,750 for the wreck and spent $8,825 to restore it. He became the ship’s captain and registered it in December 1868 as an American vessel under its new name, Mary Celeste.
In October 1869, the ship was seized by Haines’ creditors and sold to a New York group led by James H. Winchester. Over the next three years, the group’s members changed several times, though Winchester always kept at least half of the ownership. No records of Mary Celeste’s activities during this time have been found. In early 1872, the ship underwent major repairs costing $10,000, which made it larger. Its length became 103 feet (31 meters), its width 25.7 feet (7.8 meters), and its depth 16.2 feet (4.9 meters). Structural changes included adding a second deck, extending the poop deck, and replacing many timbers. These repairs increased the ship’s weight to 282.28 tonnes. On October 29, 1872, the group included Winchester with six shares, two minor investors with one share each, and the remaining four shares held by the ship’s new captain, Benjamin Spooner Briggs.
Benjamin Briggs was born on April 24, 1835, in Wareham, Massachusetts, one of five sons of sea captain Nathan Briggs. Four of his brothers became sailors, and two became captains. Briggs was a devout Christian who read the Bible regularly and shared his faith at prayer meetings. In 1862, he married his cousin Sarah Elizabeth Cobb and had a Mediterranean honeymoon on his schooner Forest King. Their children were Arthur, born in September 1865, and Sophia Matilda, born in October 1870.
By the time Sophia was born, Briggs had gained respect in his profession. He considered retiring to start a business with his brother Oliver, who also wanted to leave the sea. Though they did not proceed with this plan, both invested in shares of ships: Oliver in Julia A. Hallock and Benjamin in Mary Celeste. In October 1872, Benjamin took command of Mary Celeste for its first voyage after its major repairs in New York. The voyage was to Genoa, Italy. He arranged for his wife and infant daughter to join him, while his school-aged son stayed home with his grandmother.
Briggs carefully selected the crew for this trip. First mate Albert G. Richardson was married to a niece of Winchester and had sailed with Briggs before. Second mate Andrew Gilling, about 25 years old, was born in New York and had Danish ancestry. The steward, Edward William Head, was newly married and recommended by Winchester. The four general seamen were Germans from the Frisian Islands (brothers Volkert and Boz Lorenzen), Arian Martens, and Gottlieb Goudschaal. A later report described them as "peaceable and first-class sailors." In a letter to his mother before the voyage, Briggs expressed confidence in the ship and crew. Sarah Briggs told her mother the crew seemed "quietly capable… if they continue as they have begun."
Abandonment
On October 20, 1872, Briggs arrived at Pier 50 on the East River in New York City to help load the ship’s cargo of 1,701 barrels of alcohol. His wife and infant daughter joined him a week later. On Sunday, November 3, Briggs wrote to his mother to say he planned to leave on Tuesday. He added, “our vessel is in beautiful trim and I hope we shall have a fine passage.”
On the morning of Tuesday, November 5, the ship Mary Celeste left Pier 50 with Briggs, his wife and daughter, and seven crew members. It entered New York Harbor. The weather was uncertain, so Briggs decided to wait for better conditions. He anchored the ship near Staten Island. During the delay, Sarah, Briggs’ wife, sent a final letter to her mother-in-law. She wrote, “Tell Arthur, I make great dependence on the letters I shall get from him, and will try to remember anything that happens on the voyage which he would be pleased to hear.” Two days later, the weather improved, and Mary Celeste left the harbor and entered the Atlantic.
At the same time, the Canadian brigantine Dei Gratia was nearby in Hoboken, New Jersey, waiting for a cargo of petroleum destined for Genoa via Gibraltar. Captain David Morehouse and first mate Oliver Deveau were Nova Scotians, both experienced and respected seamen. Captains Briggs and Morehouse shared common interests, and some writers believe they may have known each other, though casually. Some accounts say they were close friends who dined together the evening before Mary Celeste’s departure, but this is based only on a recollection by Morehouse’s widow 50 years later. Dei Gratia departed for Gibraltar on November 15, following the same general route eight days after Mary Celeste.
On Wednesday, December 4, 1872, Dei Gratia reached a position midway between the Azores and the coast of Portugal, around 1 p.m. (Thursday, December 5, sea time). Captain Morehouse saw a ship heading unsteadily toward Dei Gratia about six miles away. The ship’s movements and sails appeared strange, leading Morehouse to suspect something was wrong. As the vessel approached, no one was on deck, and there was no response to his signals. He sent Deveau and second mate John Wright in a boat to investigate. They identified the ship as Mary Celeste by the name on its stern. Upon boarding, they found the ship empty. The sails were partly set but in poor condition, some missing, and much of the rigging was damaged. The main hatch cover was secure, but the fore and lazarette hatches were open, with their covers on the deck. The ship’s single lifeboat was missing, though it had been stored across the main hatch. The compass housing was broken, and about three and a half feet of water were in the hold. A makeshift sounding rod (a tool for measuring water in the hold) was found abandoned on the deck.
In the mate’s cabin, they found the ship’s daily log, with the final entry dated November 25, nine days earlier. It recorded Mary Celeste’s position as near Santa Maria Island in the Azores, about 400 nautical miles from where Dei Gratia encountered her. Deveau noted that the cabin interiors were wet and untidy from water entering through doorways and skylights, but otherwise in reasonable order. He found personal items in Briggs’ cabin, including a sheathed sword under the bed, but most papers and navigational instruments were missing. There were no signs of fire or violence, suggesting the crew left the ship orderly, likely using the missing lifeboat.
Deveau returned to report these findings to Morehouse, who decided to bring Mary Celeste to Gibraltar, 600 nautical miles away. Under maritime law, a salvor could expect a share of the value of the rescued ship and cargo, depending on the danger involved. Morehouse divided his crew of eight between the two ships, sending Deveau and two experienced seamen to Mary Celeste, while four others and he remained on Dei Gratia. The journey to Gibraltar was slow due to being undermanned, though the weather was calm for most of the way. Dei Gratia arrived on December 12, and Mary Celeste reached Gibraltar the next morning after encountering fog. The ship was immediately seized by the vice admiralty court for salvage hearings. Deveau wrote to his wife that the effort to bring the ship in was difficult, but he was relieved to have arrived safely. He said, “I shall be well paid for the Mary Celeste.”
Gibraltar salvage hearings
The salvage court hearings for the Mary Celeste began in Gibraltar on December 17, 1872, under Sir James Cochrane, the chief justice of Gibraltar. Frederick Solly-Flood, the Attorney General of Gibraltar, led the hearing. He also served as Advocate-General and Proctor for the Queen in the Admiralty. A historian of the Mary Celeste affair described Flood as arrogant and proud, and noted that once he made a decision, he was unwilling to change it. The testimonies of Deveau and Wright convinced Flood that a crime had occurred. This belief was reported by the New York Shipping and Commercial List on December 21: "There is evidence of wrongdoing, possibly involving alcohol."
On December 23, Flood ordered an examination of the Mary Celeste, conducted by John Austin, the Surveyor of Shipping, with help from a diver named Ricardo Portunato. Austin found cuts on the ship’s bow, which he believed were made with a sharp tool. He also noticed possible blood on the captain’s sword. He noted that the ship did not appear to have been damaged by severe weather, pointing to a vial of sewing machine oil that remained upright in its place. Austin did not consider that the vial might have been replaced after the ship was abandoned, nor did the court raise this possibility. Portunato’s report on the hull showed no signs of a collision or running aground.
A group of Royal Naval captains later inspected the ship and agreed with Austin that the cuts on the bow were made intentionally. They also found possible bloodstains on a rail and a deep mark that might have been caused by an axe. These findings strengthened Flood’s belief that human actions, not natural disasters, caused the mystery. On January 22, 1873, Flood sent his reports to the Board of Trade in London, concluding that the crew had attacked the Briggs family and officers during a drunken episode. He believed they cut the bows to make it look like a collision, then fled in the ship’s small boat. Flood suspected that Morehouse and his crew were hiding the truth, such as the ship being abandoned in a different location or the ship’s log being altered. He could not accept that the Mary Celeste could have traveled so far without a crew.
James Winchester arrived in Gibraltar on January 15 to inquire about the ship’s release. Flood demanded a guarantee of $15,000, which Winchester did not have. Winchester later testified that Captain Briggs was a man of high character and would not have abandoned the ship unless forced to. Flood’s theories about mutiny and murder faced challenges when scientific tests showed the stains on the sword and ship were not blood. Another blow came when Captain Shufeldt of the U.S. Navy, commissioned by the American consul, concluded the marks on the bow were natural, not man-made.
Without clear evidence to support his claims, Flood released the Mary Celeste from the court’s control on February 25. Two weeks later, the ship left Gibraltar for Genoa with a new crew led by Captain George Blatchford from Massachusetts. The salvage payment was decided on April 8, with Cochrane announcing an award of £1,700, about one-fifth of the ship and cargo’s total value. This was much lower than expected, as some believed the payment should have been twice or three times higher due to the risks of bringing the abandoned ship to port. Cochrane criticized Morehouse for earlier decisions during the hearing, even though Morehouse had remained in Gibraltar to cooperate with the court. In his 2005 book, Ghost Ship: The Mysterious True Story of the Mary Celeste and Her Missing Crew, writer Brian Hicks noted that Cochrane’s comments implied wrongdoing, leaving Morehouse and his crew under public suspicion forever.
Proposed explanations
The evidence found in Gibraltar did not support Flood's ideas about murder or secret plans. However, people still thought something bad might have happened. Flood and some newspapers briefly thought that Winchester might have tried to get money from an insurance company because the ship Mary Celeste had a lot of insurance coverage. Winchester denied these claims, and no official investigation was done by the insurance companies. In 1931, an article in the Quarterly Review suggested that Morehouse might have waited for Mary Celeste, then lured Briggs and his crew onto Dei Gratia and killed them. Paul Begg said this idea ignores the fact that Dei Gratia was slower and could not have caught up with Mary Celeste before it reached Gibraltar.
Another idea is that Briggs and Morehouse worked together to share money from salvaging the ship, but there is no proof they were friends. Hicks said, "If they had planned this, they would not have made such a strange mystery." He also asked why Briggs would leave his son Arthur behind if he wanted to disappear forever.
Although pirates were active near Morocco in the 1870s, Charles Edey Fay said pirates would have taken things from the ship, but the captain and crew’s valuable items were not touched. In 1925, historian John Gilbert Lockhart thought Briggs might have killed everyone on board and then died from a religious fit. Later, he talked to Briggs’ family and changed his mind.
Briggs’ cousin, Oliver Cobb, thought the crew might have moved to the small boat for safety. He guessed that the ship’s main rope might have been used to tie the boat to Mary Celeste, so the crew could return later. However, if the rope had broken, the boat would have floated away with the people on it. Begg said it would not make sense to tie the boat to a ship that the crew thought was about to explode or sink. Macdonald Hastings said Briggs was an experienced captain who would not have left the ship in a panic. He wrote, "If Mary Celeste had exploded, it would still have been safer to stay on the ship than in the lifeboat."
Arthur N. Putman, an insurance expert, thought the ship’s lifeboat was the only one missing. He found the boat’s rope was cut, not untied, which suggests the crew left quickly. The ship’s log mentioned strange noises and small explosions from the hold. Alcohol cargo naturally produces gas that can cause explosions, but Putman thought a stronger explosion might have happened. He guessed a sailor might have used a flame or lit cigar to ignite the gas, causing a big explosion that damaged the hatch. Putman also thought the crew might have panicked, boarded the lifeboat, cut the rope, and left the ship.
Most experts agree that something unusual and frightening must have happened to make the crew abandon a seaworthy ship with enough supplies. Deveau thought the crew might have left after a false reading from a tool that checks water levels, suggesting the ship was taking on water. A storm might explain the water and damage to the ship. Low pressure from the storm could have pushed water into the pumps, making the crew think the ship was sinking.
Other ideas include a drifting iceberg, fear of hitting land, or an earthquake. Evidence suggests an iceberg far south was unlikely, and other ships would have seen it. Begg thought the ship might have drifted toward a reef when it was stuck without wind. He said Briggs might have feared the ship would run aground and sent the boat to reach land. However, if the ship had been stuck, the sails would have been set to catch any wind, but Mary Celeste was found with many sails folded.
An earthquake might have caused waves that damaged the ship’s cargo, releasing dangerous fumes. Briggs might have ordered the crew to leave if he feared an explosion. The New York World reported a similar case where a ship carrying alcohol exploded. In 1913, the newspaper said alcohol seeping from barrels might have caused gas that threatened an explosion. Oliver Cobb supported this idea, saying strange sounds, smells, and possible explosions could have caused Briggs to order the evacuation. He might have failed to secure the boat properly, and a sudden wind could have blown the ship away, leaving the boat’s occupants stranded. However, no explosion damage or burned cargo was found, which weakens this theory.
In 2006, chemist Andrea Sella tested the explosion theory for a TV show. He built a model of the ship’s hold with paper boxes and used butane gas to create an explosion. The test made a big flame but no fire damage. Sella said, "The explosion created a wave of heat but no smoke or burning." This experiment showed that the explosion might not have caused fire, which changed some people’s views about the event.
Retellings and false histories
Fact and fiction became mixed together in the years after the Mary Celeste story. In June 1883, The Los Angeles Times shared the story with made-up details. It described sails set, the tiller tied tightly, the galley fire still burning, and dinner left untouched. In November 1906, Overland Monthly and Out West Magazine reported that the Mary Celeste drifted near the Cape Verde Islands, which is 1,400 nautical miles (2,600 km) south of where it actually was. This account included mistakes, such as naming the first mate "Briggs" and claiming live chickens were on board.
One of the most famous retellings was in the January 1884 issue of Cornhill Magazine. This story, written by Arthur Conan Doyle, a 25-year-old ship’s surgeon, changed many facts. Doyle renamed the ship Marie Celeste, gave the captain a new name, J. W. Tibbs, and set the voyage in 1873 from Boston to Lisbon. The story included passengers, such as the character Jephson, and a made-up plot about a man named Septimius Goring who ordered the crew to kill the captain and take the ship to Africa. Doyle did not expect his story to be taken seriously, but Sprague, who was still a U.S. consul in Gibraltar, was curious enough to ask if any part might be true.
In 1904, Chambers' Journal suggested that a giant octopus or squid took the entire crew of the Mary Celeste. The Natural History Museum notes that giant squid (Architeuthis dux) can grow up to 15 meters (49 feet) long and may attack ships. However, experts like Begg argue that such a creature could not have taken the ship’s small boat or the captain’s navigation tools.
In 1913, The Strand Magazine published a story claiming that Abel Fosdyk, a steward on the Mary Celeste, was the only survivor. It described a swimming contest where a platform collapsed, killing all but Fosdyk. This version had errors, such as misspelling names and incorrectly describing the crew. In the 1920s, Irish writer Laurence J. Keating created a fictional survivor’s story about John Pemberton, which included a complex tale of murder and betrayal. This story had basic mistakes, like using the ship’s incorrect name (Marie Celeste) and misnaming crew members. Despite these errors, The New York Herald Tribune believed the story was true in 1926.
In 1924, The Daily Express published a story by Captain R. Lucy, claiming the Mary Celeste’s former boatswain was the source. This tale said the crew abandoned the ship to take gold from a deserted steamer and flee to Spain. Experts like Hastings found this unlikely story widely believed for a time.
Other theories suggested supernatural causes, such as a connection to the Great Pyramid of Gizeh, Atlantis, or the British Israel Movement. The Bermuda Triangle was also linked to the story, though the Mary Celeste was abandoned in a different part of the Atlantic. Some people proposed alien abduction as an explanation, but these ideas are not supported by evidence.
Later career and final voyage
Mary Celeste departed Genoa on June 26, 1873, and reached New York on September 19. The Gibraltar hearings, which included newspaper reports about violence and murder, made the ship unpopular. Hastings wrote that the ship was "left on wharves where no one wanted her." In February 1874, a group of people sold the ship for a large loss to a group of New York businessmen.
Under new ownership, Mary Celeste mostly traveled on routes between the West Indies and the Indian Ocean, but she often lost money. Occasionally, news about her movements appeared in shipping reports. In February 1879, she was reported to be at the island of St. Helena, where she stopped to get medical help for her captain, Edgar Tuthill, who was sick. Tuthill died on the island, which strengthened the idea that the ship was cursed—he was the third captain to die early. In February 1880, the ship's owners sold Mary Celeste to a group of Bostonians led by Wesley Gove. A new captain, Thomas L. Fleming, stayed in the role until August 1884, when he was replaced by Gilman C. Parker. During these years, the ship's official port changed several times, eventually returning to Boston. No records of her voyages during this time are known, though Brian Hicks, who studied the ship, noted that Gove tried to make the ship successful.
In November 1884, Parker worked with a group of Boston shippers to fill Mary Celeste with mostly worthless cargo. The cargo was listed on the ship's manifest as valuable goods, and the ship was insured for US$30,000 (equivalent to about $1,070,000 today). On December 16, Parker set sail for Port-au-Prince, the capital and main port of Haiti. On January 3, 1885, Mary Celeste approached the port through a channel between Gonâve Island and the mainland, where a large coral reef, the Rochelois Bank, was located. Parker intentionally ran the ship onto the reef, damaging it beyond repair. The crew and Parker then rowed to shore, where Parker sold the usable cargo for $500 to the American consul and claimed insurance for the supposed value of the goods.
When the consul reported that the cargo was nearly worthless, the ship's insurers began an investigation. The investigation uncovered that the cargo was over-insured. In July 1885, Parker and the shippers were tried in Boston for plotting insurance fraud. Parker was also charged with "wilfully casting away the ship," a crime called barratry, which at the time carried the death penalty. The conspiracy trial was held first, but on August 15, the jury could not reach a decision. Some jurors did not want to risk affecting Parker’s upcoming trial by finding him guilty. Instead of a retrial, the judge arranged for the defendants to withdraw their insurance claims and return all money received. The barratry charge against Parker was postponed, and he was allowed to go free. However, his professional reputation was ruined, and he died in poverty three months later. One of his co-defendants became mentally ill, and another took his own life. Begg wrote, "{I}f the court of man could not punish these men … the curse that had troubled the ship since her first skipper, Robert McLellan, who died on her maiden voyage, could reach beyond the vessel's watery grave and exact its own terrible retribution."
In August 2001, an expedition led by marine archaeologist and author Clive Cussler announced they had found the remains of a ship embedded in the Rochelois reef. Only a few pieces of wood and some metal items could be recovered, with the rest of the wreckage lost in the coral. Initial tests on the wood suggested it was the type used in New York shipyards during Mary Celeste’s 1872 refitting, which made it seem like the ship had been found. However, tree ring analysis by Scott St George of the Geological Survey of Canada showed the wood likely came from trees in the U.S. state of Georgia, which would still have been growing in 1894, about 10 years after Mary Celeste’s destruction.
Legacy and commemorations
The Mary Celeste was not the first ship found abandoned at sea. Rupert Gould, a naval officer who studied maritime mysteries, recorded other similar incidents between 1840 and 1855. Despite these earlier cases, the Mary Celeste remains the most famous. Its name, or the misspelled Marie Celeste, is now closely linked to the idea of unexplained desertion.
In October 1955, the MV Joyita, a 70-ton motor vessel, vanished in the South Pacific while traveling between Samoa and Tokelau with 25 people on board. A month later, the ship was discovered drifting 600 miles (970 km) off its planned route, near Vanua Levu. No one on board was ever seen again, and an official investigation could not determine why the ship was abandoned. David Wright, a historian who studied the case, called it "a classic marine mystery of Mary Celeste proportions."
The Mary Celeste story inspired two popular radio plays in the 1930s by L. Du Garde Peach and Tim Healey. A stage version of Peach’s play was performed in 1949. Many books have been written about the ship, usually offering natural explanations rather than supernatural ones. In 1935, the British film company Hammer Film Productions released The Mystery of the Mary Celeste (called Phantom Ship in the United States), featuring Bela Lugosi as a troubled sailor. The film was not a success, but some consider it a valuable example of its time. A 1938 short film titled The Ship That Died explored theories about the ship’s abandonment, including mutiny, fear of an explosion from alcohol fumes, or the supernatural.
In November 2007, the Smithsonian Channel aired a documentary titled The True Story of the Mary Celeste, which examined many aspects of the case without providing a clear answer. One theory suggested pump problems and faulty instruments. Before carrying alcohol, the Mary Celeste had transported coal, which produces dust. The ship’s pump was found broken on deck, suggesting the crew may have tried to fix it. The ship’s hull was full, making it hard for the captain to estimate how much water had entered during rough seas. The filmmakers suggested the ship’s clock was broken, leading the captain to believe they were near Santa Maria when they were actually 120 miles (190 km) farther west.
At Spencer’s Island, the Mary Celeste and her missing crew are honored with a monument at the site where the ship was built and a memorial outdoor cinema shaped like the ship’s hull. Postage stamps commemorating the incident have been issued by Gibraltar (twice) and the Maldives (twice, once with the misspelled name Marie Celeste).