Bermuda Triangle - Special Ships

List of ships available as **Special Offer** during the Bermuda Triangle event in **2019** (Apr 30th - May 28th).

## USS Pickering I

USS Pickering was a schooner of the U.S. Navy, launched in 1798. She served in the Quasi-War with France. Pickering was one of the first victims of the Bermuda Triangle in September of 1800, likely lost in a storm. The exact cause of Pickering's disappearance remains a mystery.

## USS Wild Cat I

USS Wildcat was a two-masted schooner of the U.S. Navy, launched in 1822. She was part of the West Indies Squadron, the U.S. Navy fleet that sailed to the Caribbean to subdue pirate raids on merchant ships. She was lost in a gale in October 1824 with 31 crewmembers, sailing from Cuba to Thompson's Island.

## James Chester I

James B. Chester was a schooner discovered by the merchant ship Marathon out in the Atlantic Ocean with no crew aboard. Marathon sent out a prized crew and reclaimed it, but no one knows what happened to the original crew. Theories about James B. Chester's crew range from pirates or mutiny all the way to a giant octopus and aliens.

## Spray I

Spray was an old fishing boat rebuilt by Joshua Slocum, the first man to sail solo around the world. Slocum's sea prowess is what makes his disappearance while sailing Spray so shocking. Spray set sail from the East Coast to Grand Cayman for the winter, but he was never heard or seen from again.

## HMS Vixen I

HMS Vixen was an armored gunboat of the Royal Navy, launched in 1865. She was built as an experimental vessel with twin screw propellers. Together with her sister ships Viper and Waterwitch, she conducted comparative trials in the Stokes Bay. In 1868 Vixen and Viper were towed to Bermuda and served there as floating defensive batteries. In 1895, Vixen was sold to a local scrap merchant. A year later she was sunk in the channel to prevent a torpedo boat attack.

## SS Malabar I

SS Malabar was a mail steamship owned by the Peninsular and Oriental Steam Navigation Company. The ship was wrecked in Point de Galle harbor in Sri Lanka. All passengers and crew were evacuated in time, but the Â£300,000 cargo mostly made up of bullion and opium was lost.

## USS Piscataqua I

USS Piscataqua was a screw steamer launched by Portsmouth Navy Yard in 1866. She served as flagship for the Asiatic Squadron of the U.S. Navy, protecting the lives of American citizens and American interests during the Japanese Civil War from 1868 to 1869. Piscataqua was decommissioned in 1870 and remained in the New York Navy Yard until sinking in 1876. She was raised and sold for scrap 1877.

## USS Chattanooga I

USS Chattanooga was a screw steamer constructed in Philadelphia in 1864, towards the end of the Civil War. She was not commissioned as the Union had already essentially won the war. She was placed into reserve and then sunk by ice without ever entering action.

## RMS Lucania I

RMS Lucania was a British ocean liner owned by the Cunard Steamship Line Shipping Company. She was the largest passenger liner afloat when entered service in 1893 and won her the prestigious Blue Riband to become the fastest passenger liner afloat. Lucania was damaged by fire at Liverpool in 1909. She was scrapped afterward.

## SS Cotopaxi I

SS Cotopaxi was a tramp steamer owned by the Clinchfield Navigation Company. She departed Charleston, South Carolina carrying coal on what would be her final voyage. Cotopaxi was headed to Cuba, but sent out a distress call, reporting the ship was taking on water in a tropical storm. The sinking of SS Cotopaxi is a part of the Bermuda Triangle legend.

## USS Nereus I

USS Nereus was a collier built for the U.S. Navy in 1913. She was a sister ship to Cyclops and Proteus. She served in both World Wars but did not survive the second one. However, Nereus was not sunk in combat but rather disappeared in the Bermuda Triangle carrying ore from the Virgin Islands along the same route where USS Cyclops disappeared. No wreckage or debris was ever found from USS Nereus.

## MS Kungshold I

MS Kungsholm was a passenger liner, launched in 1928. She was owned and operated by the Swedish American Line from 1928 to 1941 on transatlantic services from Gothenburg to New York City. In 1941 Kungsholm was requisitioned by the U.S. Government for the Second World War to transport troops to New Caledonia. She was scrapped in 1965.

## MS Chrobry I

MS Chrobry was a Polish ocean-going passenger ship, built for the Poland - South America Line in 1938. She was named after the Polish king Boleslaw I Chrobry. The ship was in the middle of its maiden passenger voyage to South America when the Second World War broke out. The ship was used as a troop transporter, serving with British ships. In May 1940, Chrobry was transporting British troops to Norway when she was attacked by German dive bombers. HMS Wolverine and HMS Stork saved the survivors from Chrobry. The ship was abandoned as she was beyond saving.

## Bloemfontein I

MV Bloemfontein Castle was a passenger liner built in Belfast in 1949 to serve on the Union-Castle Line, transporting passengers to South and East Africa. She was named after Bloemfontein, the capital of the Orange Free State, an independent Boer sovereign republic that existed in Southern Africa in the late 19th century. Bloemfontein Castle served on the line for 9 years before she was sold to Greece.

## USS Wasp I

USS Wasp was a sloop-of-war that served in the U.S. Navy during the War of 1812. She carried out two successful raiding voyages against British trade ships during the summer of 1814. After capturing Atalanta, USS Wasp set out for the Caribbean, but she did not make it out of the Bermuda Triangle.

## USS Epervier I

USS Epervier was an 18-gun brig-sloop originally built by the Royal Navy as HMS Epervier in 1812. She was captured by USS Peacock in 1814 and entered into the service of the U.S. Navy. USS Epervier disappeared likely within the Bermuda Triangle while delivering a treaty signed with the Dey of Algiers back to the United States.

## Ellen Austin I

Ellen Austin was an American schooner that regularly sailed between New York and London through the Bermuda Triangle. On a returning trip from London, Ellen Austin encountered an unmanned ship in the Bermuda Triangle, an occurrence without any logical explanation. The captain sent out a part of his crew to salvage the ship to bring it back to New York with them. However, the two got separated in a storm and the unnamed ship disappeared along with the crew, never to be seen again.

## Connemara I

Connemara IV was a pleasure yacht found adrift in the Atlantic south of Bermuda in September of 1955. It is said that the crew vanished while the yacht survived being at sea during three hurricanes, though no one will ever know for sure.

## USS Niagara I

USS Niagara was a screw frigate in the U.S. Navy launched in 1855. She was sent on voyages to Africa and Japan before serving in the Civil War, capturing the blockade runner CSS General Parkhill. Niagara was decommissioned from the Navy in 1865 and remained in the Boston Navy Yard until sold on 6 May 1885.

## USS Antietam I

USS Antietam was constructed during the final years of the U.S. Civil War but the war was winding down in the Union's favor, so the ship was not commissioned during the war. It ended up being used for storage and quartering in Pennsylvania.

## USS Minnetonka I

USS Minnetonka was a wooden steam frigate authorized by the U.S. Navy during the Civil War to provide a postwar general purpose fleet. She served briefly in the Pacific, but her hull was made of partially seasoned wood and deteriorated rapidly.

## SS Julnar I

SS Julnar was a river paddle steamer for the Euphrates and Tigris Steam Navigation Company, built in 1908. In 1916, she was sunk while attempting to steam upriver past Ottoman guns to re-supply British forces.

## SS Hilary I

SS Hilary was a combined passenger/cargo vessel owned by the Booth Steamship Company. She was requisitioned by the Royal Navy on the outbreak of the First World War and converted into an armed merchant cruiser. She was sunk by a German torpedo in 1917.

## USS Proteus I

USS Proteus was a collier of the U.S. Navy, launched in 1911. She transported coal, oil, and troops from the U.S. to Rio De Janeiro and Montevideo. Proteus was lost at sea due to an unknown cause in 1941 with 58 crewmembers on board. It was suspected she could have been torpedoed by a German U-boat, but they never claimed the attack. Proteus' sister ships Cyclops and Nereus also disappeared within the Bermuda Triangle without a trace.

## MS Gripsholm I

MS Gripsholm was an ocean liner built in 1924 for the Swedish American Line for use in the Gothenburg - New York City run. She was the first diesel-powered ship built for transatlantic express service, replacing steamships. Gripsholm was made available to the U.S. Navy by the Swedish for the Second World War, used for deportation of Japanese and German nationals out of the United States, as well as bringing Americans from those places back to the U.S. After the war, she was sold to Germany and was used for immigration voyages to Canada.

## MS Sobieski I

MS Sobieski was a Polish passenger ship built for the Polish Ocean Lines in 1938. The ship was used to transport troops during the Second World War, participating in the Allied evacuation of western France in 1940, the Battle of Dakar, and the campaign in Madagascar.

## MS Stockholm I

MS Stockholm was an ocean liner built for the Swedish American Line in 1941. However, she didn't enter their service, as she was sold to the Italian government upon completion in 1941. She served as a troopship in the Regia Marina and Kriegsmarine for the Axis powers during the Second World War under the name MS Sabaudia, until she was sunk outside of Trieste in 1944.

## Sulphur Queen I

SS Marine Sulphur Queen was a tanker converted to carry molten sulphur. She was built in Pennsylvania in 1944 to transport oil, originally named SS Esso New Haven. In 1960, she was renamed, converted, and sent to dock in Maryland. Marine Sulphur Queen's last voyage started in February 1963 out of Beaumont, Texas with a load of molten sulphur, sailing south. She disappeared and was declared missing on February 6th, and a search mission began in the Straits of Florida. The search was called off after 19 days, yielding only life jackets and bits of debris, no trace of the ship or the 39 men on the crew. Even though the disappearance of the ship was explained by its poor state, it is still included in the legend of the Bermuda Triangle.