The Mystery of the “Dunkirk Schooner”
In the early fall of 2004, I was visiting my dear friend, admiralty attorney Peter Hess, in Wilmington, Delaware, for a couple of days. After a late night meeting and a driving tour of Wilmington, we stopped at his office as he wanted to show me his brass Marks V diving helmet and some dishes he recovered from the Italian luxury liner, Andrea Doria. He then played some underwater footage of one of the most spectacular shipwrecks I had ever seen.
Even though the water was dark, visibility was phenomenal. I was astonished to see a fully intact, two-masted schooner resting upright in the lake I dived every weekend. As the video cruised over the very low railing, I paused the footage when an anchor resting on the port side deck appeared. I could not believe what my eyes were seeing. I told him I had never seen that wreck before. He said no one had. I stared at Peter in disbelief and said, “What wreck is that?” He just smiled and said, “An old one.”
The previous year, one of Hess’ clients, Richard Kullberg, purchased five sets of “numbers” from the world’s preeminent side-scan sonar specialist, Garry Kozak, and one set of numbers was for this intact schooner. The wreck would become known as the “Dunkirk Schooner” due to its proximity to Dunkirk, New York. She was also known as “Schooner G” and would quickly become the most controversial shipwreck in Lake Erie. This unknown schooner has garnered more headlines, hate, and animosity than any other wreck in recent memory.
