It was an ordinary day. Sometime back in 1848...and the news of the California Gold Rush had just begun to spread across not only the United States, but the entire world. And, to get to California to claim your pot of gold, you may have perhaps arrived by ship. And, while you began your search for the elusive pot of gold, your sea captain who brought you to San Francisco may have abandoned the ship to search for his own pot of gold. So...who was keeping watch over all those ships that sat tied up in the harbor? I recently read about a remarkable panorama taken in 1852 that showed what historians have described as a "forest of masts" in Yerba Buena Cove. One of these ships that seemed to have been abandoned while the crew searched for gold nuggets was known as the "Niantic". It was intentionally run aground in 1849 and used as a warehouse, saloon and hotel before it burned down in a huge fire in 1851 that claimed many other ships in the cove where it sat. The Niantic sat on the corner of Clay and Sansome Streets and eventually had another hotel built upon its ashes.
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| The many ships that sat in the harbor at one time. |
Some ships were sunk intentionally since at the time, you could claim the land under it if your ship sunk. Then landfill could cover the ship and you would have a place to build anew. One such ship which was intentionally sunk, the "Rome", was rediscovered in the 1990s when the city dug a tunnel to extend a streetcar line south of Market Street. Today the line passes through the forward hull of the ship. Pretty neat to head to work by passing through an old ship! Yerba Buena Cove was eventually filled in and people built piers out into it to reach ships moored in deeper water. More and more land was created with the dumping of just about anything that didn't float. Today there is an ongoing controversy over a sinking tilting skyscraper that was built on landfill near what was once the southern edge of Yerba Buena Cove. A shipwreck map was created by the San Francisco Maritime national Historical Park in 1963. Red circles on the map indicate sites that have been studied by archaeologists. One such site is a shipping yard at the south end of Yerba Buena Cove near the Bay Bridge. Seems that Charles Hare ran a salvage operation at the spot and employed close to 100 Chinese laborers to take apart old ships. He sold off the brass and bronze for use in new ships and buildings. Scrap wood was also claimed for use since at the time it was a valuable commodity. Then along came a devastating fire in 1851 that ended his business. Remnants of six ships were found at the site. One was the whaling vessel known as the "Candace" which carried gold prospectors to San Francisco. In 2006 a new development project nearby turned up bones that were suspected to be from Galapagos tortoises. Seems that during the gold rush many ships stopped in the Galapagos Islands and threw a few turtles in the hold as a source of fresh meat for the long voyage to California. Menus from back in that time show that turtle soup was a common offering in the area. Michale Warner has drawn a new map of the area that includes the "Maps of Discovery" from a mural painted by N.C. Wyeth in 1928 for the headquarters of the National Geographic Society.  |
| A new map is being prepared for sale showing the harbor with location of ships under the harbor. |
Mr. Warner is hoping to enhance the image of the buried ships and wharves, but is still discovering more details. Sometime in the near future you may be able to buy a map of the area to see for yourself what may have happened to all the ships that sat at one time under parts of what today is known as Yerba Buena Cove. It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.
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