john chatterton
Hi Everyone! I’m so excited to share this interview with explorer, History Channel host, and real life main character of 2 NYT best selling books, John Chatterton. This was such a fun conversation and it centers around Chatterton’s love of history, finding a WW2 U-Boat off the coast of New Jersey, and other dives including the Titanic and finding one of the only known Golden Age Pirate Ships. For further reading, I would highly recommend Shadow Divers and Pirate Hunters this summer! I hope you enjoy this conversation as much as I did!
Chatterton diving to Titanic. Photo Credit: johnchatterton.com
Getting ready to depart and go 2.5 miles below the North Atlantic Ocean. Photo Credit: johnchatterton.com
Diving to the Titanic. Photo Credit: johnchatterton.com
Ashley: Hi John! Thanks so much for taking some time out of your schedule to talk with Exploring-Time. I'm excited to hear more about some of your stories. I know there's a lot of adventure in there, a lot of diving, a lot of history, which I think is going to appeal to a lot of our readers. So thanks for taking the time to meet with us.
John: Oh, it's my pleasure. My pleasure.
Ashley: You said as we were talking just a minute ago, that it's getting kind of hot in South Florida. Is it a busy season for you? I'm guessing this is your main season for diving in the summer months?
John: You know, in spring and fall I am usually really busy. Summer is somewhat busy, but I get to kick back in the winter time and do some of the things that I just want to do for myself. And, you know, I get some time off, but generally speaking, I'm busy all year long. Thankfully. You know, that's good.
Ashley: That's a good thing!
John: I'm very fortunate to have had all of the projects that have come my way and I am extraordinarily appreciative.
Ashley: In your diving career there's been a lot of adventure and then in both shadow divers and pirate hunters, which we'll dive into a little later, there's kind of a thread of history and a passion for history that’s revealed. Can you talk a little bit about that? It just seems like history is a very important piece of your enjoyment of diving.
John: You know, the thing that draws me to wreck diving and shipwrecks is the complexity. And it's like, you know, there are so many different facets to any given wreck. And the history is a big deal. I mean, a lot of what the history side is about is personal connections. When I lived in New Jersey, I went looking for a shipwreck called the Carolina. It was sunk in World War One by the U. 151, a German U-boat right after the United States entered into the war. The Kaiser sent five submarines across the Atlantic to impress upon America that even though there's an ocean between us, if you want to if you want in on this or this war, you're not going to do it without getting bloody. And then in a single day, the U-151 sank six ships. And the last one was a passenger liner called the SS Carolina which was part of the New York and Puerto Rico Steamship Line. It was running from Havana to New York, and it was sunk 70 miles off the coast of New Jersey at 7:00 at night. There were ten lifeboats, one of them overturned, and there were 13 people who lost their lives. The rest of the survivors were picked up by the other lifeboats. But that night and the next morning, nine of the lifeboats drifted and eight were picked up and one was not. Actually, for two days the 9th board was adrift. And eventually it came ashore in Atlantic City, New Jersey.
John: I went looking for the wreck. I went looking for the ship. I found it. And at one point I found the purser's safe and I wanted to bring it up. So I went to court to get the legal rights to the wreck and arrest it and all the things that admiralty law requires. And in the process, met Judge Joseph Rodriguez, the first Hispanic federal court judge in the state of New Jersey, who was known throughout the court system for telling the story of how his father had come to America as an immigrant on a steamship that was attacked by a German U-boat at the beginning of World War One. And he spent two days in a lifeboat and first set foot on American soil. He got out of a lifeboat on the beach in Atlantic City. The judge's father had been on the ship that I found. Those are the kind of human connections that you never see and, you know, happen. I won't say they happen all the time, but when you're really involved in history, it's the history of people. And you kind of never know where it's all going to end up. But that side of diving wrecks is absolutely fascinating. We as divers, we really want to know what's the story? What was the human experience? Every wreck is unique. Every story is different. And it's all fascinating.
Mapping a wreck site.
Ashley: In that passion, with the history and the history of the wrecks, what crosses your mind when you realize you've been so successful in bringing these stories to life? Even in the Robert Kurson books (Pirate Hunters and Shadow Divers), you are the main character in these two New York Times best sellers. In Shadow Divers, you kind of rewrite a page of history there. So what is that like to see the fruit of your passion for diving and history on this scale?
John: I like to think that I look ahead, not back. When you're involved in a project and you bring it to a successful conclusion, it's a wonderful feeling. But, you know, you can't help but think what's next. People ask me, they say, you know, what is your favorite shipwreck? And my answer is always the next one. Maybe the time will come where I just say, that part of my life is done. But that hasn't happened so far. Pirate Hunters is the story of Joseph Bannister and it's the story of the Golden Fleece. But, you know, it's really a story of the era as well. And, the colonial period is absolutely fascinating. And when you start to look at pirate culture, it’s absolutely fascinating. In the book, we talk about the San Miguel and other wrecks that we found down there. And with the politics, we lost our permit to work down there. So we want to get back. We want to llegally get in there and finish what we started. Hopefully that'll happen. I don't feel good with unfinished business like that. You know, every single time you go out and you work on something, it's not always successful. You don't necessarily find the name of the shipwreck or find the shipwreck that you're looking for or successfully salvage one thing or another. And, you know, I mean, that's what keeps it exciting.
Ashley: So not too much time spent on looking back, but kind of chiseling away at what's next, the next idea or the next opportunity.
John: I love Rob Kurson, Rob Kurson is a very good friend of mine. He's an unbelievably talented writer. We worked together on two book projects. And, you know, I almost feel that's like the adventure after the adventure. When we first started working with Rob, it was on Pirate Hunters, and Rob came to New Jersey and he talked to Richie Kohler and I. We sat down and literally talked about this story all day long. The entire day. And it's like dinner time. And he's like he's like, okay, I have to leave. And his wife, Amy, was pregnant and he brought her along and she wasn't feeling well. And Rob is like, I have to start writing now. And we're like, oh, okay. Well, you know, it's also dinner time, so, you know, why don't we have dinner? And then he's like, No, no, no, no, no. I don't have to eat. I have to write. As a matter of fact, my head is too full of ideas. Amy, you have to drive. And it's like, I understand this guy. And he probably understands us. We're like, Oh, this is great. And it probably took about four months before he actually came to us and he was like, Listen, because we thought the book was going to be about the submarine. It was going to be about the U-boat Sailors. It was going to be about 1945 and young guys.
John: You know, leaving in these submarines and not coming back and guys on other submarines watching the boats go out and knowing that. They're not coming back. And then Rob was like, you know, that's not what the book is about. He said the book is about people. And we're like, okay, you know, that's good. You're the writer. Do what you want. And he's like, well, actually, the book is also about you guys and the diving and you and your relationships.. And we were, you know, I mean, we were not really sure. I mean, we were extraordinarily comfortable talking about German U-boats and talking about diving. Talking about the things that interested us. But talking about yourself, you know. Rob said the first thing I want to do is talk to your ex-wives. It's like, Oh, my God, what do we get into here? You really kind of crossed a line and, you know, but in that process, it was an entire adventure. A different experience. And you know, very much parallel to the story of U-869. It was a journey. And you know, at the end of it, there were a lot of things that II know I learned, but I, you know, I think Richie and I both learned working, working with Rob, working on the book, having somebody not just try and kind of figure out how not just what you did, but why you did it is an experience.
Ashley: So there's this deep current of perseverance in both of the books, but in, in shadow divers, you talk about going to look at the U-505 of the Chicago Museum of Science and Industry over and over. Just lapping through there so you can understand where your orientation is going to be, when you're on the U-869. Through multiple deaths on the wreck, when you went back and you read the book, did you have further revelation about what was driving you or was it all apparent at the time that you just really wanted to get that identification?
John: Well, you know, it definitely was not all apparent to me at the time. I mean, sometimes you don't think about something unless somebody asks you a question about it. And it's like that's just the way it is. When I was working as a hard hat diver in New York City, I went to a commercial dive school. And in commercial diving here's an expression. Don't do anything in water that you can do top side. Essentially, before the diver gets in the water. You need to be thoroughly prepared. Don't give the diver a bunch of small parts to put together on the bottom when you can put the parts together topside and then hand him something already assembled. Minimize the work that the diver has to do because the diver's time is limited and the diver's time is valuable. And that concept really kind of drives me in wreck diving. I mean, it's probably more true in wreck diving by the more I can do In research. The more I can do studying, learning. Well, number one, the greater the odds of success.
I went up and went diving in Oak Island a couple of years ago and they were like, we got to do something. And basically, we talked about the dive and it was two weeks away. And they're like, Can you get down there? I said, Listen, I can't tell you what's going to be down there. And I'm not sure where down there is. But nobody's going to get farther than I can get. If there's a reason I can't get any further, I will give you that reason. But from what you've told me, Yeah, I'll get down there. And I pretty muchI walked away from the conference call and I was like. Oh, crap. How am I going to make this? Two weeks. Well, it's what commercial divers do. You know, somebody says, hey, can you do the job? Of course I can do the job. Have you ever done that job before? Oh, yeah. We do it all the time. I had a similar job just last week. And then, you have to figure it out. But you figure it out. You figure it out between the time you take the job and the time you jump in the water. It doesn't happen after you get in the water. It really happens leading up to it. What are you going to do? Visualize the dive. What's going to happen? And then this is going to happen and this is going to happen. If you're in the water, every single element of the dive is like a big surprise. You're just not going to get anything done.
A golden age ship anchor.
Ashley: One of the things I wanted to ask you about in your career, it seems like you've just shown a lot of really good leadership skills, whether it's leading in a moment, leading in a decision or leading a team of people. And I know that some of your story is being a Vietnam vet. But if you had to say a mantra or something that's like a leadership lens that you kind of apply in a lot of different scenarios, is there a piece of wisdom there that seems to be a recurring thing for you in all of your all of your experience?
John: You know what? It's not my idea. But you got to lead from the front. You know, when I was working as a foreman on dive jobs in New York City, if a diver came up and said oh, I can't do this, I'd say, oh, okay. Take that guy's helmet off offline, put my helmet online, and I'd go and, you know, and they'd be like, what are you doing? I'm going to go in the water and get it done. And they're like, but I told you, I can't do it. That's right. You can't do it. So apparently I have to do it. There's nothing worse in the world for a guy…He wanted to not do it. Not have somebody else do it. If someone isn’t willing, I'm not afraid to come up there and take your spot if you can't do it. And and that motivates people. And certainly there are people who are more willing to listen to leadership ideas when they know you've got skin in the game, just like they do. And, I'm a hands-on guy. And, you know, I have to say, I've worked on projects and I've worked with guys and, you know, I didn't make any friends, but we got the job done. And I don't wake up in the morning, you know, and say, you know what, I think I'm going to go try and piss somebody off today. But at the same time, I don't wake up in the morning and go, you know, I think I'm just going to kind of just tell everybody what they want to hear and, you know, give it a halfhearted try.
Ashley: So a healthy amount of pressure can go a long way.
John: You know, I believe that. Yeah.
Ashley: That's good. So going back to U-869 for a minute, you and Richie Koehler rewrite this page of history, which is such an interesting thing. It's like you're bringing to light this new evidence. There wasn’t supposed to be a Uboat at that location. Was that a really gratifying moment for you guys when you reached the end and you realized we identified it and you and your friend rewrote something that had been in the book for a long time.
John: You know. Yes. You know, that that side of it is. It's incredibly humbling and gratifying, but I have to say, too, by the time we hit the end of that road, it was like oh, thank God. You know, it was like it was a huge weight off of my shoulders. And I think Richie's shoulders, too. You know, it was like we were not having fun with that. And it was, you know, it was one of those things where it wasn't so much that we wanted to continue as we were just simply not willing to give up. We weren't giving up till we were done. When we were done, the main emotion, I think, was probably just relief.
Ashley: Yeah, that makes sense. So about 2005, you led an expedition to the Titanic. I'm sure that was quite the operational undertaking with just the finance involved, and the people involved. I think the History Channel gets involved and there's just a lot of different things going on.What kind of operational challenge was that to get underway and get it going.
John: Well we literally put that all together. Contracted the Keldysh and the Mir submersibles. We wired money to a Swiss bank account for the Russians. And, you know, I mean, we were doing it before History Channel got involved. We went to them and we said, this is what we're doing. We were all in. One way or another we were going to Titanic. The History Channel asked how's it going to turn out? You know, we couldn't even tell the History Channel that. Um, in retrospect, we are probably the luckiest guys that, you know, I mean, certainly the luckiest guys that ever went to Titanic. But, that quite literally could have been nothing. And what we wanted to do our our goals. We're not to go to Titanic just to visit Titanic and go, Wow, Titanic. You know, it looks just like it does in person as the pictures. We wanted to make a difference in history. And the story of Titanic. There's so many questions. But even today there’s still unanswered questions about Titanic.. We wanted to say, you know what? We want to contribute something. And se have a certain skill set. So we thought we could do it and we put it all on the line and you know, it took all of the skills that we had and somehow, some way we found the pieces that we were looking for that hadn’t been found yet.
John: The hole right where the ship broke in two. And the wreckage that we found told a story. The story was essentially what the engineers talked about. About tension and stress and how things bend and twist and all that kind of thing. The evidence of how the ship broke up tells the story about the human experience. It’s certainly not the story that you know we have necessarily seen on TV and that's the thing that's the thing that's you know that's the thing that remains totally fascinating is, you know, what was the human experience like and and you know, if I was on Titanic. Where would I be? You know, they had 750 empty seats in lifeboats. Where and how would I have perceived the events as they were? Developing on that night. And it's fascinating. It’s very challenging to put yourself in that kind of situation and say, how would I have acted? And, you know, that's part of the fun. That's what diving is all about.
Ashley: So it takes, what? Two hours or 2.5 hours to get to the bottom?
John: About 2.5 hours down and about 2.5 hours back up.
Ashley: So what are you thinking during that time, especially during the first time you're going down, you know, you're going two and a half miles down to the ocean bottom. What are you thinking about? Like, are you thinking about the depth? Are you excited about the wreck? You know, what's going on?
John: You know, for the first, few hundred feet, you're looking. You're looking through the porthole. You're looking out of the submersible at the water and you're just thinking, this is it. And then that gets boring after a couple of minutes and you're like, we got a lot of stuff going on. I got a lot of stuff in my head. And when you're on the bottom, your currency is electric power. So on the drop, you turn off everything. Maybe you got a light running from your iPod or something like that, but that's about it. You've got some instrument lights, but you turn off everything you possibly could turn off. To conserve power. So there's not much to do. You're sitting there, there's not much conversation. It's very quiet. And, you know, you just kind of put yourself in a cocoon for a couple of hours and as soon as you start getting near the bottom it's like okay, lights are coming on and you're testing equipment. Let's move the cameras and all that. Where's our location? What's the information we're getting from the transponders and, you know, I mean, you're down there somewhere between 5 and 6 hours on the bottom. And it goes by like nothing.
Ashley: Wow.
John: But then, you know, the ride to the surface, you're thinking what an awesome dive. All the things that you've seen and that kind of thing. You get so amped on the mission and on what you're doing. When you start out when you get into the mir sub, they're charging everything up, it's hot. When you get in there, it's like 90 degrees.. You strip off your clothes, you're basically sitting there in a t- shirt and your underpants. And it's like then when you start dropping, it's like, okay, when you get down to the bottom outside the sphere, it's, you know, like 31 degrees. It's really cold water. So, you know, things start cooling down. And, you know, by the time you get back to the surface, you're wearing two hats and uggs and extra socks and a parka and all kinds because there's no heat in the Mir sub. Heat would only be another power drain.
Ashley: Somewhere I read a story that they were talking to Richie Kohler about the pressure of the water outside the sub and what would happen if a stream came through and someone, someone, took a squirt gun and sprayed him on the descent.
John: So that was Ralph White. And, you know, outside, if you're a scuba diver, they pump aluminum scuba tanks up to like 3000 psi. And obviously in an aluminum cylinder, that's a lot of pressure. Then it's like,, on the bottom, on Titanic, it's like 6000 psi. It's like double that pressure. And so, you know, they'd had a conversation and, you know, Ralph White was the cinematographer who was diving with Ritchie on Ritchie's first dive. And he tells Ritchie, well, you know what happens if we spring a leak. And he's like it’s 6000 psi outside there. If you have water come in, it's going to be catastrophic. It’ll be an implosion. But just literally as the Mir is coming down and they're coming up on the bow of Titanic and the bow of Titanic is coming into view, Ralph White pulls out of his pocket a little squirt gun and squirts Richie in the back of the head. And Richie turns around like, ahhh, you know. Too good.
Ashley: He lived to tell the story haha.
John: The tale at least. Yeah, yeah. It's like, you know. Oh, my God, this is it!
Ashley: Good on Ralph White for taking the squirt gun. So kind of in line with the Titanic, you were the first person to go down to Britannic, Titanic's sister ship with a rebreather. And I read somewhere that you sort of had to, in true pioneer explorer spirit, get the soldering gun out and kind of get after and make a repair on your own. Because there were only a limited amount of resources. What was that like?
Chatterton salvaging a shipwreck.
John: Well, I was part of a British expedition. We were on the first technical diving expedition to Lusitania. That group was eight Brits and four Americans. And after Lusitania we said what do we do now? Why don't we go to Britannic? And we were all like, Oh, that's a great idea. You know, Lusitania is 300ft. Britannic is 400ft. So we start putting it all together and Britannic required a certain amount of permits. We had to deal with not just the Greek government, but we also had to deal with a guy who was the owner who had purchased the rights to the wreck by purchasing the chain of custody from the insurance company that paid off on the wreck when it sank. So the fact that it's protected in Greek waters, he doesn't really have any right to salvage the wreck. But he had to sign off on our expedition. So we had a meeting and he comes to the meeting and he says, well, I was talking to Dr. Robert Ballard, and we both agree that within the wreck there might be some areas of anaerobic activity in which the wreck might be totally preserved from the day the ship sank.
John: And I'm like, okay. I'm just like a diver. I'm not that smart. I'm not a scientist. There's no doctor in front of my name. But I know what anaerobic means. Anaerobic means no oxygen. So let's see. We got an area, a no oxygen area in the wreck, a no oxygen environment, you know, in the H2O. So, you know my bullshit alarm already went off. The guy says, so we have decided that no one should be allowed to dive inside the wreck. I'm totally offended. Like, you're going to tell me I can't. This guy's not even a diver, and you're going to tell me I can't go inside the wreck because there might be these areas of fantasyland that do not exist and never will exist.
John: And I'm thinking, his complaint is we can't go in the wreck because the divers bubbles could disturb these anaerobic environments and thereby cause damage to the wreck. So he's explaining it and I go, well, what about me? And he's like, What? I said, What about me? I don't make bubbles. He says you don't make bubbles? Why don't you make bubbles? I said, I dive a rebreather. He says, What's a rebreather? I said, It's a diving apparatus that recycles the diver's exhaled breath through a closed loop. It goes through a chemical absorbent that removes the CO2. It's analyzed by sensors that determine how much oxygen has been metabolized by the diver. And then minute amounts of oxygen are reintroduced to the loop to compensate for the oxygen that the diver's body has used. There are no bubbles. And he thinks for a minute and he's like, okay, we're going to amend the permit. John Chatterton is allowed inside the wreck, but nobody else is allowed inside the wreck. And so I leave the meeting and I'm going, Oh, crap, now I have to go get a rebreather!
Ashley: That's what you were saying earlier. You get the job and then you figure it out right after.
John: That's exactly it. I get permission first, then I'll figure out how to do it later. So I'm like, okay, now I’ve gotta go find a rebreather. Well, at the time there were only a couple of options. One company was in the UK. And they had maybe built five. And they were building another five but they told me they're already spoken for. And plus, you live in America and we don't have insurance for selling anything in America. There was a company called Biomarine and they were selling military rebreathers, but they were also selling to the civilian market. But, all of their creditors had basically shut down their production and they were on the verge of going out of business. So they were willing to accept that deposit from me. But there was never going to be a rebreather. And you know, I needed a rebreather in like six months. And so I found a guy that had a rebreather out on the West Coast. And I went out to Seattle, went out to Puget Sound. And I made a couple of dives and the rebreather had catastrophic loop failures on both dives. My total bottom time on two dives was about nine minutes. And, you know, the guy said to me, you know, I don't know what to tell you. And I said, Well, I'll just have to figure it out.
John: I basically threw all the parts in a suitcase, took it home, put it on my kitchen table and basically made everything work. But I would say I probably had 40 catastrophic failures in the water before I had three dives in a row where nothing bad happened. And I'm leaving for Brittanic! You know, it's time to go. Anyway, I made a total of six dives. Three dives went well, Three dives I had to abort. Then I had a problem with the on board battery and the rebreather caught fire in the hotel room. I learned a lot about rebreathers. I just I just wanted to dive and you know, I got to do that. So I guess in the end it was all worth it. And then of course, I went back in 2006 and followed that same route and got into the boiler room and all that. So I felt like it was a continuation of the first time there.
Ashley: That's cool. I mean, talk about trusting your work. I mean, on something like a rebreather, that'd be a daunting or intimidating thing to approach on the kitchen table.
John: You know, it's funny I have a lot of friends on rebreathers, but rebreathers now are a lot more robust. They're a lot more reliable than they were back then. Guys train more procedurally, you know, if this happens, they do this, this happens, they do this. And then it's more like checklist stuff. if you were diving and rebreather, you really had to know quite a bit about the rebreather. And as a result, rebreathers got better.
Ashley: During your career, there's been a great evolution in diving gear. When you simplify things down a bit though,. how has something like a simple dive watch been a part of your kit of gear from way back when to actually time things and using a bezel to so.
John: Today it is continuing to evolve. All the time. I teach technical diving classes here in South Florida. But the classes I teach, the things I teach, the way I teach. The information. Current knowledge. Current thought. Continues to evolve. And that part is really interesting.I finished a class last week. It was absolutely nothing like a class I did a year ago, much less five years ago. The dive computer manufacturer just did an upgrade on their firmware like a month ago. And it's like, okay, you would think that, they're changing their firmware. You know, it's like a Microsoft update. No. There are new concept., The dive computer is now offering me data that wasn't even thought about a month ago. So you know the diving itself hasn't changed. But the way we are diving is changing because we have access to information. And a perspective on the dive that we didn't have before. And as a result, it does make it overall safer. But the gear, the equipment, the reliability increases. I'm very excited about new things, new concepts, new ways of looking at things and, you know, what causes decompression sickness.
John: Oh, is it bubbles? Well, maybe it's not bubbles. Maybe it's something else. The military for for decades has been using oxygen rebreathers where essentially it's a rebreather with no gas other than oxygen. So you are limited to like 20ft of depth. And the military, they lost a lot of guys who just never came back because of the issue of oxygen toxicity. Well, now the Department of Defense is experimenting with rodents, giving them exogenous ketones. You've heard of the ketone diet and ketones are something that help your body burn fat and all that kind of thing. Well, they're giving as opposed to having the rats develop ketones in their body naturally, they're giving them exogenous ketones. In other words, eat this or injections or a variety of methods. They've got rats that are not convulsing on oxygen at depths like 150ft. Which is unbelievable. So it's like, oh, okay. Well, wait a second. How come? Is this a diet thing? Is this body chemistry the secret? I have to eat a box of ho hos before I go diving. They continue to look at new and different things and you know, God only knows where it's all going to go.
Ashley: I know a lot of guys find the dive watch something that kind of has almost a romantic thing because it's kind of outdated in a sense of purpose, but they can wear it to the office and it's a reminder for adventure. Did you ever use a dive watch and are you a watch guy? Have you ever been reliant on that?
John: I don't wear any jewelry because, typically speaking, I'm hard on stuff. if I'm wearing a ring, I'm always afraid I'm going to smash my hand and they're going to have to cut it off at the emergency room. if it's a watch, it's going to get smacked around and broken. But, um, you know, when I, when I first started in the commercial dive industry, I was out with some guys that I work with and were at a bar someplace. And, you know, I started talking to this young lady and she goes, you can't be a diver. And I'm like, no, I'm a diver. And she's like, no, you can't be. You don't have the watch. And I was like, well, no, I don't have a watch. And my friend is like, I got a watch. Haha.
Ashley: There you go.
John: And so I thought that’s how you can prove that you're like a commercial diver. You got an eight year old Cadillac and a big watch.
Ashley: So outside the wrecks themselves and, with artifacts and with smaller items, what's the most interesting or compelling or fascinating thing you've actually found?
John: You know, I mentioned the SS Carolina before and I brought up the. Purser's safe on that wreck from World War One. And, you know, it had gold coins. It had silver coins. There were diamond rings, sapphire rings, a ring from Tiffany's still in Tiffany's box with platinum setting, gold necklaces, gold, gold bracelets.. There was a solid gold rosary. Gold is always good. Gold is awesome. But, you know, I’ve gotta say, I was working the wreck called the Concepcion down in the Silver Bank off the Dominican Republic. And we were digging around with a dredge on the wreck site. Now the wreck site is spread out. I mean, really spread out. Spread out a lot.We we're digging, and we started finding silver beads. Now, they were in a geodesic sphere shape. So they had all of these angled cuts on them and they had a hole drilled through the middle. So it was either maybe a necklace or bracelet or something like that. And we found a bunch of the beads.
John: And so I go back to the spoil pile at the other end of the dredge where everything we're sucking up is getting kicked out to the back. And I'm just kind of knocking the pile down, pushing everything back. And I see something red. Like red red. Not typical. When you're digging in the sand, there's a lot of whites and grays and blacks. Not red. And so I stopped. And I pick it up and it is Ruby in the shape of the beads that we’d been pulling up. So it's a bead and it's got all these angles cut in and it's got a hole drilled in the side. Totally. Totally. You know, no way to pick it up with, like, a metal detector or anything like that. You never know what you're going to find when you're digging around on the rack. That's one of those things I could have so easily missed. And I just think it was one of those things.
Ashley: So from the book Pirate Hunters that chronicles Joseph Bannister and the Golden Fleece… discuss, if you don't mind, just a little bit of the idea of the pirate democracy. That interesting idea of pirates wanting to basically govern themselves and kind of that first taste, not being under the rule of the British crown.
John: Well, the whole thing to finding the Golden Fleece really revolved around Joseph Bannister, that that was the deal. I mean, we were looking where everybody else had been looking and we're like, it makes no sense. This guy was a pretty smart tactician. There's no way he would have careened his ship here. So, early on I was thinking and I was trying to get into Joseph Banister's head. Here's a relatively successful guy. He's a merchant ship captain. And he just says, to hell with it and becomes a pirate. Well, you know what? What would make a guy do that? And you have to take that man and put him into context in his time. Men are being pressed into service there. You know, there is slavery. There is injustice. The court system and debtors prisons. And, you know, there are just so many things, so many different ways that the common man was being oppressed by the colonial society, which essentially was an extension of European society.
On a pirate ship, the captain was voted in or voted out if he didn't do a good job. The men who were on board as crew were escaping slaves or at least certainly the institution of slavery. Maybe they were victims of a shipwreck. Maybe they were on the run. Perhaps they were criminals. These were men with very limited options. Most probably didn’t think - I'm going to be a pirate and I'm going to do the whole thing but they also didnt think I'm going to be a 30 year guy and then I'm going to retire. Piracy was like saying. You know what? I'm going to go out and make a big splash. And, you know, it was a very interesting culture back then that attracted men with little in the way of options.
Ashley: Was there any further development or aftermath with the Cultura and letting you salvage what was there at the wreck of the Golden Fleece?.
John: We're still working it. We're still trying. We're still trying to get permission to do what we want to do down there. We proposed a contract. And, it's being reviewed by them. We think we could go down there and do a good job and it would benefit them. It would certainly help them in developing exhibits and stuff for their own patrimony, which is very important to them. So hopefully, we'll be able to make something happen. It's been way too long, but it's also one of those things I hate to give up.
John: You know, the thing is we have a site. What are we going to find there? Well, you never know until you know.
Ashley: Do you still keep in touch with John Matera?
John: Oh yeah, all the time. I talked to him yesterday.
Ashley: Oh, wow.
Ashley: So the last question that I’d like to close out with is I have four young kids and I'm sure they'll get to go back and listen to these one day. If you're passing on something to the next generation, future pioneers and explorers, what's a piece of wisdom you would want to pass on to share with them?
John: Prepare and persevere. I think to a certain extent too many people are willing to give up or not put in the work to properly prepare for success. I think success is important and success is never guaranteed. So, you know, work hard, prepare as best you can, and if it's worth doing, then don't give up. Keep at it.
Ashley: Love it.. Thanks again for taking the time John. I really appreciate it!
John: My pleasure, man.
John Chatterton. Photo Credit: Kevin Morris.