The coastland times. [volume] (Mnateo [i.e. Manteo], N.C.) 1947-1959, 1954-05-14
MONITOR
Continued from Page One)

1t IS eSI1IndteQ tnat Ine wreck
of the Monitor is in about 80
feet of water, about 1000 yards
off shore, almost within the af-
ternoon shadow of the Cape Hat
teras Lighthouse. What can be
seen of the Monitor under salts
factory conditions is thought to
be about 20 feet of the bow pro-
truding above the sands which
have covered it for several de-
cades.
1T would be our intention"
Mr.. McMullen said, to take the
vessel into Norfolk after it is
raised for restoration. 1t will not
be decided until then what will
be done with it.
Around Is years ago, Ben Dix
on MacNeill, a North Carolinian
with a great interest in and love
for the preservation of its his
torical attractions, and Joe Rob
erts, now senior photographer
with the National Geographic So
ciety, located the wreck of the
Monitor. Their intentions were to
have it restored and preserved as
historical attraction and left on
Hatteras Island, but through the
years no funds have been appro-
priated for the magnanimous task
of restoring the vessel claimed
by the Graveyard of the Atlantic
on the last day of 1862.
A few years ago a group OF
men from Norfolk came down to
the Cape and offered Mr.. Mac
Neill ten crisp 500 bills for the
Monitor. Mr.. MacNeill claims
that the vessel is his property by
admiralty law and that it is not
for sale, nor should it be remov-
ed from the island which claimed
its life. This Norfolk group esti-
mated it would cost $4,000 to
raise the warship.
Mr.. MacNeill has, through the
years, pointed out the remains
some twenty times or more to
visitors who come to the Cape in
curing as to its whereabouts. He
is newspaperman serving as an
unpaid publicity agent for Hat
teras Island, and his stories about
the great sunken battleship have
been read far and wide.
The Monitor, designed by a
Swedish naval architect John Err
lesson, was one of the first iron
vessels in the American Navy.
The battle of the Monitor and
the Merrimac early in the year
1862, in which neither ship was
destroyed, proved the effective
ness of ironclad ships and opened
new era in naval construction.
The battle has gone down as one
of the most famous in naval his
tory. Although she was able to
withstand the shells from ten
inch guns, the Monitor could not
withstand the fury of an Atlantic
storm, and lost her life near the
point of Cape Hatteras in Deem
Der of the same year.
The Monitor was the first ship
of a line known as monitors lat
er used by the Federal navy
against the Confederacy, and
against which the Confederacy
always lost. The first Monitor had
an arnored deck less than two
feet above water, with a revolv-
ing turret rising from the CEN
ter, containing dual guns.
Aiding'Mr. McMullen in his ex-
petition is Frazier Peele, a Hat
teras native, who is providing a
boat and his knowledge of the
local sea conditions. The crew
will be on the Cape several days,
until they locate the Monitor, es-
innate the work needed to re-
lease it from the changing sands
and waters of turbulent Cape
Hatteras, and get underwater
pictures of that part of the ship
above the sands but in perhaps
more than seven fathoms of wat
er.
"A statement issued by Mac
Neill on Wednesday has cleared
up any question of his ownership
of the vessel. 1t does, however,
pose the question as to who is
the proper claimant of the prop
erty. His statement follows:
mot often in my lifetime have
/ been so greatly astonished as
on the day when I was asked to
sell my rights" to the hulk of
the USS Monitor to a corporation
being formed to salvage it. Until
that day it had never occurred
to me, in all the fifteen years that
/ had devoted to intermittent re-
search, that / might be consider
ed the owner.
IT did not, do not and will new
er think of it as being my per-
sonal property. 1t belongs to this
Hatteras Island and to all people
who have, or may come to have,
an affectionate interest in the
lore of this region.
II have transferred, in writing,
as of Nav 10, 1854, all interest or