Ghost ship
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- For other uses, see Ghost ship (disambiguation).
A ghost ship, in fiction, is a ship crewed by the not-living. The term may also refer to a real ship that was reported to have been seen – often as an apparition – after sinking, or to a ship found floating with no crew on board.
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[edit] Ghost ships in fiction
By far the most famous fictional ghost ship is The Flying Dutchman. The ship has become synonymous with the phenomenon so that "Flying Dutchman" is often used as a generic term for any apparition-type ghost ship. Another fictional ghost ship is from the first Pirates of the Caribbean. It's called the Black Pearl. It's a ship that few sailors see that say "It's a ship with black sails crewed by the crew of the damned and commanded by a man so evil Hell itself spat him back out." They say in pillages of the Black Pearl nobody lives to tell the tale. Another Ghost Ship in called the Blood Skull which was rumored to the city of Homosassa in Florida. It's a ship few claim to see in the Homosassa River and Chassowitzka River. Also the ship's captain, Jhonathan Jones is rumored to be haunting people who wander the river by night. People say you here "Dead Man Tell No Tales." Similar to one from the Pirates of the Caribbean ride, then you hear a man saying "You've trespassed in pirate waters mates. Now ye must suffer my rage!" Then you hear a boy singing "One you're going to be gone, two Jhonny's coming for you, 3 he's gotten me 4 you'd best let him gain more..." As the boy continues the voice fades into the mysterious darkness. Later the people saw a pirate galleon with a flag of a bleeding skull. That's what a man experienced when he thought no such things existed until that time.
[edit] Ghost ships in reality
Perhaps the most famous of the real ghost ship is the Mary Celeste, a ship that was found abandoned between Portugal (mainland) and Portugal's Azores archipelago in 1872. It was devoid of all crew, but was completely intact. While Arthur Conan Doyle's story "J. Habakuk Jephson's Statement" based on this ship added some strange phenomena to the tale (such as that the tea found in the mess hall was still hot), the fact remained that the last log entry was 11 days prior to the discovery of the ship.[1]
Another of this type of ghost ship was the MV Joyita discovered abandoned in the Pacific in 1955. In 1990 the freighter Fisah Ketsi was discovered drifting East of Brazil without any crew and with its cargo hatch open.
Sailors have reported seeing the sunken steamship SS Valencia floating off the coast of Vancouver Island, often as an apparition that followed them as they sailed down the coast. Her #5 lifeboat was also found floating nearby, unmanned and in remarkably good condition, 27 years after the ship sank.[citation needed]
The Baychimo was abandoned in the Arctic Ocean in 1931 when it became trapped in pack ice and was thought doomed to sink, but remained afloat and was sighted numerous times over the next 38 years without ever being salvaged. Similarly, the Octavius, an English trading ship returning from China, was found drifting off the coast of Greenland in 1775. The captain's log showed that the ship had attempted the Northwest Passage, which had never been successfully traversed, in 1762. The ship and the bodies of her frozen crew apparently completely the Northwest Passage after drifting among the pack ice for 13 years.
In 2006, the Jian Seng was found off the coast of Australia, and as of 26 March little is known of its origin, or reason for being here.
In August of 2006, the "Bel Amica" (which is one "L" short of the modern Italian spelling of "Good Friend") was discovered off the coast of Sardinia. The Coast Guard crew that discovered the ship found half eaten meals, Egyptian artifacts, French maps of North African seas, and a flag of Luxembourg on board. The age of the ship, maps, flag, and other things have not been disclosed.[2] This sort of schooner that appears to be of the late 19th century, according to Italian sources has never been registered in the country by this name or any other. The ship has been compared to the Mary Celeste in its appearance.[3]
[edit] Ghost ships in English literature
Well-known examples of ghost ships in English literature include:
- The Rime of the Ancient Mariner (1797-1798) by Samuel Taylor Coleridge
- Rokeby (1813) by Sir Walter Scott.
- The Demeter, featured in Dracula (1897) by Bram Stoker whose captain's corpse was tied to the steering wheel and entered the harbor surprisingly undamaged.
- Ampoliros, the legendary "Flying Dutchman" of space, mentioned in Dune (1965) by Frank Herbert.
