Sunken treasures in North Carolina found by three local teens

A treasure trove of history, the waters of North Carolina tell the stories of ancient Indians and swashbuckling pirates who once sailed the seas and walked the lands.

The notorious pirate Blackbeard and the Waccamaw Siouan Indians had nothing in common until a recent discovery.

An ancient canoe, that’s more than 1000 years old, was found in the waterways of North Carolina, close to where an 18th century French slave ship was recovered.

The ship, originally called La Concorde, was involved in many attacks from Africa to the Caribbean and settled in its watery graveyard off the coast of North Carolina, after it was grounded in the shallow waters by Edward Thatch, famously known as the ruthless pirate Blackbeard.

Renamed Queen Anne’s Revenge after it was captured by Blackbeard in 1717, the ship has been stuck since in May 1718, and when it was discovered in 1996, the wreck was brought to the surface with a bounty of artifacts, like the anchor and loaded canons of all sizes, retrieved.

The dugout canoe, pre-dating Queen’s Anne Revenge by hundreds of years, was pulled in April 2023 from the swampy waters of Lake Waccamaw, about two and a half hours southwest of Beaufort Inlet, where Blackbeard’s ship ran aground.

The canoe didn’t carry seafaring pirates battling the oceans for supremacy, but it is a priceless treasure to Waccamaw Siouan Indians of North Carolina.

According to Waccamaw Siouan Chief Michael Jacobs, “That canoe at 28 feet long would have carried many a brave.” Removed after it was found almost two years, Jacobs said the discovery of the canoe will help in understanding their past. “We feel like in our heart, it’s a history that we’re still exploring and understanding because this is the first time we’ve had access.”

The canoe was found in the summer of 2021 by three local teens, Eli Hill, Jackson Holcomb, and Creek Hyatt, who were swimming in the lake.

“I stepped on it and I thought it was a log,” said Hill. “I tried to pick it up and it never came up. So, we kept digging at it and it just kept going. And then the next day, we came back and we started digging some more and it just kept going.”