New Jersey Scuba Diving

Type:

shipwreck, liner, USA

Built:

1897, Chester PA USA

Specs:

( 350 x 42 ft ) 3629 gross tons

Sunk:

February 6, 1920; ran aground in storm - no casualties

Depth:

20 ft

The Princess Anne was built in Chester, Pennsylvania. Constructed in 1897 for the Old Dominion Line, the single screw steamship was 350 feet long by 42 feet wide and had a displacement of 3,629 gross tons.

On February 6, 1930, with 74 crew members and 32 passengers on board, Captain Frank Seay missed the entrance to New York Harbor and stranded his ship on Rockaway Shoals. At 2:00 AM, the stranded ship was seen from the Life-Saving Service watchtower at Rockaway Point. Because of severe weather and six-foot snow drifts, it was impossible for anyone to reach her immediately. At 5:00 AM the next morning, a lifeboat was finally able to heave its way through the somewhat reduced surf; it succeeded in taking all passengers to safety. The crew, however, refused to leave without their luggage which could not fit in the lifeboat.

On February 15, nine days after she ran aground, the ship, still carrying 74 stubborn crew members, started to break apart. Rivets popped and steel plates slid into the sea. With this, the crew raised a distress signal and were hauled to safety. Later that day, the big ship broke into two.

Although the Princess Anne protruded from the water for many years, the constant pounding of the sea and shifting sands have all but buried her under Rockaway Beach. The wreck, which most people refer to as the Princess Anne, is really an unidentified wood wreck which sits in 20 feet of water just east of Rockaway Point.

-- Capt. Dan Berg