An international archaeological team in the Bahamas has discovered the Caribbean’s first pirate-era shipwrecks. The finds were made recently in Nassau harbour, on the island of New Providence, after the team received permission to dive in the harbour’s closed zone.

The expedition, co-led by a British marine archaeologist, found six wrecks, including three that could be traced to the region’s golden age of piracy. Among the remains were a charred wooden hull, swivel guns, an iron cannon, lead musket balls and other artefacts that have helped piece together how pirates lived and fought.

Nassau’s first pirate wreck find

Nassau had long been known as a pirate haven, but no pirate wreck had previously been found there. Between the 1690s and the 1720s, Blackbeard and Calico Jack Rackham were among the pirates who used the port as a hideout, where they planned attacks and divided up plunder before heading back to sea.

The team said the finds could help fill gaps in the record of Nassau’s pirate era and its later return to normal trade, and offer a record of how Nassau evolved after the pirate era ended.

What the divers found

The wrecks were found despite heavy dredging damage to the seabed. Archaeologists said the survival of any wooden structure in such conditions was surprising. One of the most striking finds was a charred hull, still weighed down by a stone ballast pile, with wooden treenails holding the timbers together.

The team also recovered swivel guns, which were pivot-mounted cannon used to fire across enemy decks and spread panic. They found an iron cannon, a pile of 25 lead musket balls, a grinding stone for sharpening swords, rigging, glass bottles and bricks from a ship’s cooking galley. They also uncovered 143 clay tobacco pipes, some still sticking out of the sand beside fragments of wooden shipping crates.

"These finds are the tip of the iceberg," said Dr Sean Kingsley, a British marine archaeologist and co-director of the project.

Kingsley said he had been shocked by the survival of the wooden hull. He said ships were the key tool of pirate terror and that seeing and touching the charred remains had been a once-in-a-lifetime moment. He added that there could be "dozens more shipwrecks in and around the harbour".

Hints of fire, trade and hidden cargo

Pirates were known to burn seized ships after raiding their cargo, cannon and fittings, in part to hide evidence from authorities. Dr Michael Pateman, the expedition’s co-director and ambassador for history, culture and museology in the Bahamas, said the Nassau hull showed signs of that kind of destruction. He said burning ships to the waterline had been an infamous tactic and that the wreck showed all the signs of pirate mischief.

Pateman said the heavily armed hull appeared to have carried swivel guns fitted to deck rails. He described the weapons as anti-personnel guns that raked devastating fire across enemy crews. The team also noted a possible link to Henry Avery’s 1695 heist, although the connection had not been established. The archaeologists said the hull raised the question of whether it might have been Avery’s pirate flagship, the Fancy, which had been burned down to the waterline.

The finds of glass bottles and decorated clay pipes also point to a later phase in Nassau’s history. The pipes, decorated with a unicorn, horse, crown and the royal crest of England, appear to have been made in London around the 1740s. Kingsley said the cargo suggested an English trader sailing to Nassau after the pirate threat had been crushed, and that the wreck helps show how the port returned to ordinary commerce.

A risky search with more to come

The expedition was carried out by the New Providence Pirates Expedition and Wreckwatch TV, with the project described as one devoted to science, education, entertainment and tourism in the Bahamas. The team were granted permission to dive in the harbour’s closed zone.

Chris Atkins, the expedition’s explorer and film-maker, said the work carried risk. He said tides pushed dangerous currents through the waters twice a day and that the area was home to packs of sharks. He described the search as risky and said there had been a high chance of finding nothing. Kingsley said the team had respected the sharks’ realm underwater and that the divers and sharks had not bothered one other.

Between dives, the researchers studied 300-year-old documents and old maps, and explored caves where pirates were said to have hidden treasure.

Kingsley, who has explored more than 350 shipwrecks over 30 years and founded Wreckwatch, said the team would continue exploring the harbour, the caves and archival documents. He said the discoveries made so far are only the beginning, and that further searches may identify more sites in and around Nassau harbour. The phase stage may reveal still more about the real-life pirates of the Caribbean.