page_title: Doom Bar
section_title: HMS Whiting
hierarchical_section_title: Doom Bar / Shipwrecks / HMS Whiting
caption_attribution_description: English: A lithograph of by the Padstow Harbour Association, showing the location of the HMS Whiting wreck
context_page_description: The Doom Bar is a sandbar at the mouth of the estuary of the River Camel, where it meets the Celtic Sea on the north coast of Cornwall, England. Like two other permanent sandbanks further up the estuary, the Doom Bar is composed mainly of marine sand that is continually being carried up from the seabed. More than 60 percent of the sand is derived from marine shells, making it an important source of agricultural lime, which has been collected for hundreds of years; an estimated 10 million tons of sand or more has been removed from the estuary since the early nineteenth century, mainly by dredging.
  The estuary mouth, exposed to the Atlantic Ocean, is a highly dynamic environment, and the sands have been prone to dramatic shifts during storms. According to tradition, the Doom Bar formed in the reign of Henry VIII, damaging the prosperity of the port of Padstow a mile up the estuary.
  Until the twentieth century, access to Padstow's harbour was via a narrow channel between the Doom Bar and the cliffs at Stepper Point, a difficult passage for sailing ships to navigate, especially in north-westerly gales when the cliffs would cut off the wind.
context_section_description: The only warship reported wrecked on the Doom Bar was HMS Whiting, a 12-gun schooner. The Whiting was originally a cargo ship named Arrow, which travelled from the United States to France; she was captured by the Royal Navy on 8 May 1812 and renamed. On 15 September 1816, she ran aground on the Doom Bar as the tide was ebbing and the wind was from an unfavourable direction offering little assistance. According to court-martial transcripts, an attempt to move her was made at the next high tide, but she was taking on water and it was impossible to save her.
  Whiting was abandoned over the next few days and the crew salvaged whatever they could. The officer in charge, Lieutenant John Jackson, lost one year's seniority for negligence, and three crewmen were given "50 lashes with nine tails" for desertion. The wreck was sold to salvors and, despite correspondence requesting salvage eleven years later, the navy took no further interest. The Royal Navy attempted to survey the wreck in June 1830, by which time the sandbank had covered most of it. In May 2010 a marine research and exploration group, ProMare, and the Nautical Archaeology Society, with the help of Padstow Primary School, mounted a search for the ship. The groups searched four sites on the Doom Bar, but have so far been unsuccessful.
caption: A lithograph of Stepper Point by the Padstow Harbour Association, showing the location of the HMS Whiting wreck
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