Welcome everyone to the third and final part of this three-part blog post on famous ghost ships. Please read Part 1 and Part 2 before reading this post, now let’s get into the last story involving the infamous Mary Celeste.

Beginning life in 1861 as the Amazon, the future Mary Celeste was launched on Spencer’s Island, Nova Scotia. However, even from the beginning, the ship seemed to be cursed. At her launch the ship wouldn’t budge, seemingly fixed in place by some invisible force. Then on her maiden voyage, her captain caught pneumonia and died shortly after.

The ship’s precedent of ill fortune seemed to follow her throughout her early career. She would go on to have several accidents until 1867 where she would ground in Cape Brennan causing so much damage that her owners would be forced to sell her. She would then go through a few owners after being fixed up and be renamed the Mary Celeste. Eventually, she would come to be owned by a New York shipping company and put under the captioniage of Benjamin Spooner Briggs.

On her first voyage under Briggs in November of 1872, the Mary Celeste was loaded with 1,700 barrels of alcohol and departed New York for Genoa. Besides Briggs, his wife, two-year-old daughter, and a seven-man crew were onboard. All seemed well until December 4^th when the Mary Celeste was spotted 400 miles east of the Azores by another vessel, the Degratia. However, when the Mary Celeste gave no signal back to the Degratia, a small group was sent to investigate.

Upon boarding the men searched the Mary Celeste but found her completely abandoned. Everything seemed in order on the ship and the crew of the Degratia noted that there was no damage that would cause an experienced sailor to abandon the vessel. The Celeste’s cargo was intact and undamaged except for nine empty barrels of alcohol and the ship’s pantry was still stocked with six months of food and water. The only apparent things missing from the ship were its lifeboat and navigational equipment. Furthermore, the ship’s log showed the last entry on November 25^th saying the ship was six miles off Santa Maria, the southernmost island of the Azores. It seemed as if the crew had abandoned a completely sound vessel, but why?

The Degratia’s crew sailed the Mary Celeste to Gibraltar to claim a salvage reward on the ship. Then after finding no explanation for the crew’s disappearance, the Mary Celeste was sold again. She would again be plagued by misfortune and accidents until January 3^rd, 1885 when she would be intentionally wrecked on a reef by her crew in an apparent insurance scam. Strangely, some of the crew on this last voyage were unaware of the insurance scam but went along with the plan to wreck the ship. When asked why many said that the ship was evil and needed to be destroyed.

Thus ended the story of the Mary Celeste. She was lost and wrecked on a reef where she slowly succumbed to the sea. Throughout her career, she was plagued by accidents and misfortune. However, she will always be most famously remembered for Brigg’s voyage and the disappearance of her crew. It’s likely we will never know the true reason why Brigg’s and his family and crew abandoned the seemingly sound Mary Celeste. Whether a storm, strange phenomenon, or supernatural occurrence, theories will always persist. Was she an unlucky ship or something more sinister? That’s for you to decide, but no matter how you look at it, her propensity to attract misfortune was odd to say the least.

Thanks for reading this three-part post! I hope you enjoyed it and as always if you have any comments about this post or the last two posts feel free to leave them below. A big thanks to Ocean Liner Designs and Big Old Boats for the information and inspiration needed to create these posts, definitely check out their YouTube channels if you like this type of content. Have a great week everyone!