October 23^rd, 2006

The anchor of the Utile site being more accessible Credit: Max Guérout

Yesterday hadn’t been a day off for everyone. Some divers had to go back to the wrecking site to check some measures.

In that morning, the sky was overcast and the wind was moderate. It was a favourable day for digging holes, because under normal circumstances, the heat of the sun makes us feel tired very quickly.

At sea, for the first time, our divers tried to reach the cannonballs and the anchor situated near the beach – which are not accessible under normal circumstances – by taking advantage of the two or three tides the new moon was offering us. Unfortunately, we broke a decametre and lost a dagger in the attempt. However, we were able to see a bit more than the palm emerging from the anchor and used to mark the wrecking site of the Utile.

The metal pin Credit: Max Guérout

On dry land, we went on probing a strip of land about 30 metres behind the beach, just above the wreck. We dug a hole every five metres hoping to find the castaways’ tracks. We had to dig about 1.1 metre deep if we wanted to discover possible gravestones.

By that time, no probing had given positive results, and the navvies were a bit disappointed. But in that morning, Jean-François Rebeyrotte discovered an iron nail, certainly coming from the ship, and a bit further, he found two other nails about 20 cm long. 
 
We got the metal detector and we sought between the probing sites. We found another framework nail, a small iron rod, and an iron pin about 80 cm long probably coming from the framework of the bottom of the ship.

All those things were found on a strip of land less than 5 metres wide, perpendicular to the shore. In the north and the south, we found nothing else.

We evidently found the way used by the castaways to go from the beach to the centre of the island, in order to bring back the supplies and the equipment they saved from the ship, as well as the wood they used to make their makeshift boat, which explained the presence of framework nails.  

Still, we were amazed not to have found any object yet, for example ceramics which are usually common on archaeological sites. However, it is important to say that these findings, as well as the ones on the oven area, were coherent and indicated that the 1761 soil lies between 40 and 50 cm under the current soil.

Jean-Marie de Bernardy de Sigoyer performing a first travelling as best as he can Credit: Max Guérout

We examined again the weight we had found on the previous week. We used quite a complicated method to determine its weight because the kitchen scales of the weather station was limited to 2 kilograms. Happily the cooker had got a measuring glass.

After we cut a plastic bottle in two, we filled it to the brim by using the measuring glass (640 millilitres). Then we placed the plumb weight into the container which overflew, and poured the remaining liquid into the measuring glass. It contained 425 millilitres, so the volume of the weight was 640-425 = 215 millilitres. Since the plumb density is 11.35, the weight weighed 2.44 kilograms, i.e. 5 pounds since a pound corresponded to 489 grams at that time.