Tell us a bit about what you do…
I’m in charge of underwater marine heritage in Bermuda. I manage the shipwrecks and the system of buoys that show where wrecks are. An anthropologist by training, I focus on telling the stories of the wrecks, to make people care about them. The wrecks explain why Bermuda is so cosmopolitan, far more than an island nation of 60k should be. It’s evidence of this constant connection with the outside world and an incredible world heritage that we happen to have right here on the shores of our small paradise.
What’s been your most fascinating find on a shipwreck dive?
We found the wine and perfume in the Mary Celeste, which was pretty amazing. After storms and hurricanes, certain wrecks become cleared of lots of sand and things get exposed, which is what happened here. I had heard that the Celeste had previously revealed stuff in the bow, and this time we ended up spotting a corked bottle of wine and a case and had it recovered. After a two week excavation on the head of the bow, we had 6 bottles of wine (5 in the case) a bottle of perfume as well as ladies shoes, buttons and a bottle of Florida Water. We sent thee bottle of wine to Bordeaux to the top analyst. The perfume was also analyzed and we found out Piesse designed the notation system that everyone uses in perfumery today. Find this perfume gave us a chance to retell this story.