A Brief History of Ghost Ships

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I’m like a crow with shiny objects. Only instead of bits of aluminum foil, dimes, and gum wrappers, I collect weird little obsessions. For example: The Titanic, abandoned amusement parks, bog mummies, and ghost ships.

Ghost ships, not to be confused with phantom ships like the infamous Flying Dutchman, are actual physical vessels, found adrift or sometimes even sailing themselves…with no one on board and often no easy explanation for what happened.

Imagine this:

You and a co-worker are both heading to a conference located several hours out of town. But you are driving separately—he’s bringing his wife and child to make a weekend out of it; you have a few other obligations to attend to before leaving.

Hours after his departure, with your obligations satisfied, you are on your way, safely ensconced in your own vehicle, playlist blaring and road trip snacks at the ready. You fully expect to meet up with your coworker at the conference hotel, where he and his family are already settled in by now.

So, consider your surprise when you see his vehicle on the side of the road. You pull over to check things out, make sure your co-worker and his family are okay.

It’s strange—the car is in park, with the engine still running. The radio is playing, the luggage is still in the back, with the remains of a Happy Meal spilled in the child’s safety seat. One of the tires is, perhaps, a little low, but nothing that would keep him from driving on it until the next service station, which is only a few miles down the road at the next exit.

But there’s no sign of your co-worker, his wife, or child. They’re just…gone. And they’re never heard from again.

The above is a modern take on the mystery of the Mary Celeste, perhaps the most famous of ghost ships. The Mary Celeste left New York on November 5, 1872 with a crew of seven, along with the captain’s wife and their young daughter. Their cargo was denatured alcohol (a solvent, not a beverage).

The Dei Gratia, a Canadian vessel following the same route, found the Mary Celeste adrift on December 4, 1872. No one was on board. The ship had taken on some water but not enough for sinking to be a concern. The cargo was mostly untouched. The last ship’s log entry was from nine days before on November 25 and made no mention of any difficulty. The remains of a recently prepared meal for a child were also found.

However, the small lifeboat was missing, as was some of the navigational equipment and paperwork. Theories about the fate of the Mary Celeste’s captain, his family, and crew abounded. In the controversial salvage hearings that followed, court officials proposed possibilities including a drunken mutiny by the crew (even though the alcohol in the cargo wasn’t drinkable), murder and piracy by the captain of the Dei Gratia (the man who found the Mary Celeste), murder/suicide by the captain of the Mary Celeste himself, and even an insurance scam cooked up by the two captains who were known—or suspected—to be friends.

The Smithsonian Channel has an excellent documentary about the mystery surrounding the Mary Celeste: The True Story of the Mary Celeste. It offers a solid theory as to what may have happened. But to this day, no one knows for certain what happened to the Mary Celeste’s captain, his family, and crew.

The first historically confirmed ghost ship was the SV Sea Brig in the mid 1700s. It beached itself in Rhode Island. Strangely, it seemed that the captain and crew had abandoned ship within sight of land, leaving coffee boiling in the galley, even.

Another ghost ship with a storied history is the HMS Resolute, which was sent in search of John Franklin and his lost expedition to find the Northwest Passage. The Resolute became trapped in the Arctic ice in August of 1854. Then, in September of 1855, an American ship, the George Henry, found the Resolute floating on her own over 1200 miles from where she’d been stuck. When the men from the George Henry boarded the Resolute, they found the captain’s teapot, liquor and glasses, and chair still in place, as if awaiting his imminent return.

Our fascination with ghost ships has been around pretty much as long as there have been ghost ships.

In this case, what happened isn’t a mystery. The Resolute’s captain and crew were ordered to abandon the ship when it became stuck. If you recognize the ship’s name but you’re not sure why, it’s likely because you’re familiar with the Resolute desk. The famous desk in the White House is made from wood taken from the (eventually) recovered ship. (The desk also plays a prominent part in National Treasure: Book of Secrets.)

(Side note: There’s a NOVA episode—Arctic Ghost Ship, available on Amazon Prime—where they go in search of the wrecks of Franklin’s vessels from the ill-fated expedition. They also find the graves of crew members who died and were buried in the ice. What’s super creepy is that when they excavate the graves, you get a good look at a deceased person from the 1800s who is still very much preserved. Skin, hair, eyeballs, clothing, you name it.)

One of my favorite ghost ships is the Baychimo. In 1931, the vessel became trapped in the ice—a common theme—and the crew temporarily abandoned it, seeking shelter in a nearby settlement. Eventually, it freed itself and the crew returned, but then it became stuck once more. Then a blizzard struck, and the ship vanished. The crew assumed it had sunk. However, they later learned it was adrift. After boarding the Baychimo, they retrieved their valuable cargo and left the ship behind, assuming it was no longer seaworthy.

But the Baychimo sailed on…for thirty-eight years. The last sighting was in 1969, when the Baychimo was frozen again in the pack ice. However, she hasn’t been seen since. And her wreck has never been found.

And finally, a more recent example, which also happens to be one of my favorites simply for the creep-factor. The Russian cruise ship, the Lyubov Orlova ran aground in Antarctica in 2006. Eventually, it was decommissioned in 2013 and due to be broken up for parts. However, various attempts to tow the vessel failed, and it ended up floating freely for two months. (Or longer—her wreck has never been found.)

I suspect that the ship had already been stripped of all her facets and fittings, but can you imagine if she hadn’t? A quiet stage, waiting on a performer that would never arrive, tattered curtains blowing in the breeze through broken-out windows? Silent dining rooms and cabins, with tables and chairs, beds and pillows, for passengers who would never visit again?

Our fascination with ghost ships has been around pretty much as long as there have been ghost ships. Arthur Conan Doyle—yep, that Sir Arthur Conan Doyle—wrote a short story in 1884, when he was just twenty-five years old, called “J. Habakuk Jephson’s Statement.” It involved a ghost ship called the Marie Celeste and used some of the details from the events surrounding the Mary Celeste. Over time, people have conflated the two, but one is real, and one is not.

Of course, in more recent years, we have movies like Triangle, Ghost Ship, Event Horizon, and books like Salvation Day by Kali Wallace and Hull Zero Three by Greg Bear, just to name a few.

Ghost ships capture the imagination because of the mystery, of course. But I think it’s more than that. Our fascination is also partly due to the desire understand the inexplicable, to control the uncontrollable. Though we like to think of ourselves as an advanced civilization, one who has conquered the seas—and is working on doing the same in outer space—the truth is, we are still very small in the grand scheme of things, whether we’re on the ocean or out among the stars. And any reminder of that is both chilling and entrancing.

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