A Campbell River commercial diver stumbled across something he believes may be of historic naval significance – and at least one historian believes he may be right.
Richard Hamer spotted an anchor in the waters off of Quadra Island on Tuesday and his thoughts immediately began leaning toward a Spanish Galleon.
"Right away I thought this anchor has got to be old. It’s definitely not something I’ve seen and the way it's sitting in the mud, it looks to me like it had been lost," Hamer said.
"When I see those Spanish Galleon wooden ships, it looks like the type of anchor they do use on those ships."
The anchor was located near an abandoned wharf on the island, where Hamer has pulled up other unique items.
Among them, he's found bottles dating back to 1907 and an English dinner plate he believes may be antique as well.
Hamer and his team raised the anchor on Thursday and he believes it may be of interest to a museum.
Naval historian Michael Layland agrees the find could be significant, but thinks it is likely off of an English vessel, possibly dating back to Captain George Vancouver's voyages around the islands.
"Finding an anchor like that, an artifact as old as that doesn’t happen every day," Layland said.
He says the anchor is unlikely to come from one of the main sailing ship explorers used in that time, but could easily have come off a smaller support vessel.
"They didn’t want to risk their main ships going through unknown waters and so they would find a safe anchorage and use the ship as a base station, and then go off exploring in various boats," Layland said.
Now that the anchor has been raised, Hamer is hoping a more thorough search can be made into its history.
