5 Ghost Stories From the Sea

the seas and oceans present the source of great mystery for people the vast waters of the planets have given rise to many stories of pirates and monsters including the epic tales of Treasure Island and Moby Dick in addition to the exciting fictional accounts found throughout media there are many historical stories that can be found as well the Queen Mary is a very well known haunted ship The Flying Dutchman has generated many of its own stories even into the present day and the Changi Beach in Singapore is reported to have been unable to forget the gruesome massacres that occurred there during the second world war so for this video I'll be looking at five other ghost stories tied to the waters of the world cruises are an exciting time for many people they are often some much-needed time off or even a relaxing adventure the Carnival conquest sails the Caribbean including the Bahamas and Bermuda it has a crew capacity of just over 1,100 a passenger capacity of just under 3,000 and cruise lengths varying from two to nine days with that many people passing through the ship it is no surprise that death might occur to some of the occupants while there is no official number for annual cruise ship deaths some estimate that 200 people died worldwide while on a cruise each year Carnival conquest already has some published deaths in the news including a worker killed in an unfortunate accident and an intoxicated passenger who suffered a fatal fall there are rumors of a woman who suffered a heart attack while out at sea with these instances happening it is somewhat unsurprising to find ghost stories mentioned in passing as well one such story is about a woman who claims to be hard of hearing getting ready for a night with her husband on board the ship in cabin six for one - as she was checking herself in the mirror she heard a voice say you look beautiful tonight she was shocked because her husband was on the balcony with the door closed and she ruled out the TV because it was on the menu channel while she was confused by the situation she figured it was possible she heard someone passing by in the hallway however when she returned her attention to the mirror she heard it again this terrified her and she went to her husband on the balcony to tell him what had happened there are other stories involving couples being awoken in the middle of the night on one occasion a figure in a trenchcoat brandishing what looked like a weapon was seen at the foot of a bed in a panic the couple in question turned on the lights only to find that the figure had disappeared as soon as the cabin had lit up they found the balcony and the doors of the room to be locked from the inside and there were no signs of the intruder anywhere another couple reported strange happenings with a steward of the ship while it was dark and they were enjoying each other's company on the last night of the cruise they reported that a white uniform steward entered the room then opened and slammed the door to the cabinet and safe they said that when they turned on the lights the steward had vanished again the door to the balcony was logs and they say he couldn't have left through the main door because it was still blocked by the open cabinet and safe when explaining their experience they said that they had not had any trouble in the past with the safe and cabinet opening on their own during the voyage and were happy to leave the ship the next day when the cruise ended this next sighting comes not from the cabin or deck of a ship but from beneath the surface of the Caribbean Sea this account was originally put to paper by journalist Stephen ware and they appeared in the 2007 Christmas edition of the Toronto Sun it tells the story of an event involving the dive boats by the name of the wind dancer which in 2007 began offering week-long scuba diving trips from Grenada to pequea the boat offered night and day diving experiences in waters seldom before explored covering coral reefs shipwrecks and underwater volcano events in 2007 at the beginning of the wind dancers winter season eleven passengers and 10 crew boarded the hundred and thirty one foot or 40 meter boats in Grenada setting sail for Bequia the wind dancer was anchored in the tobago cays when eleven eager divers entered the water to explore the depths when they returned to the cruiser it was usual for the divers to gather round speak about what they had seen and compare notes sea turtles small sharks eels and lobster were commonly seen in the area and was the main subject of conversation this is until a Canadian diver asked the rest of the party if they'd seen the visiting diver he wore a white t-shirt and a scuba tank he waved at me he said the ship's crew immediately took a headcount no one was missing no one was wearing a white shirt and there were no other boats in sight nor was there any sign of life on the nearby island they never did solve the mystery of the unknown diver was it actually one of the divers present a trick of this guess underwater light or was it the spectre of a diver long since dead the Palatine light is a good example of a historical event being turned into a legend the princess Augusta was a ship carrying German Palatine immigrants to the American colonies in 1738 there were 240 immigrants 12 crew members and an enormous amount of bad luck that followed the ship the water supply on the ship was contaminated killing 90 of the passengers and a crew members among the crew members killed included captain George long the first mate Andrew Brooke took over as captain of the ship after the death of long supplies were running low as they had been blown off course for the last three months so he began charging the passengers for the remaining rations the ship itself was also badly damaged and leaking as they finally began approaching the colonies the weather made a turn for the worse there were strong winds that made the sea rough so to reduce a stress on the already damaged ship the third mast was cut down before they had a chance to recover from the winds a strong blizzard occurred unable to see well captain Brooke tried to steer the ship between Block Island and Long Island Sound towards their destination of Philadelphia on December 26th 17:38 the ship ran aground at the north point of Block Island it's at this point that variations in the story begin according to one version Brooke refused to let anyone leave the ship leaving it could be repaired and eventually freed when it became apparent that this would not happen Brooke and the crew abandoned the ship and wrote to shore leaving the passengers on board to perish after reaching the shore the residents of Block Island managed to persuade them to return and retrieve the passengers when they did the residents took care of the passengers in their homes eventually helping them retrieve their belongings from the ship at around 20 of the passengers perished and had to be buried at Block Island the mass grave was marked as the Palatine grave by the locals the captain and crew were also accused of purposefully running the ship aground in an attempt to kill the passengers and to cover up their mistreatment the ship itself did later break free but was destroyed when she drifted into rocks another version of the story says the locals of Block Island caused the ship to crash it was known that there were people who lived on the island that looted wrecked ships in the area and some assumed that the residents would help cause shipwrecks or standing on the beach with lanterns to lure them in the wrong direction when the weather was bad this is the version told by John Greenleaf Whittier in his poem the Palatine the story continues by saying that after the ship was wrecked the local townspeople boarded the ship and killed and terrorized everyone on board before looting the ship of its cargo to cover up their crime they set the ship on fire and freed it to sell before it sank completely now legend says that on the anniversary of its wreck a burning ship can be seen on the sea a phantom of the princess augusta the light is known as the Palatine lights in honor of the German immigrants who died on board the ship some say the screams of a woman can also be heard it is supposedly the sounds of mary van der Leyen who was driven mad by the events on the ship and refused to leave it said you can hear the horrific sounds of her screams as she died while the ship burned until the phantom spectacle fades from sight along with the image of the brown Lady of Raynham Hall this is one of the first alleged paranormal images I was ever shown as a child it's an old tale and a very well-known image but seeing a stories of human ghost sightings at sea are rare I've decided to include it here in late 1924 an oil tanker called the SS Watertown sailed from California to New Orleans and then New York by way of the Panama Canal during the voyage - if the crew men James Courtney and Michael Meehan were ordered to clean a cargo tank in the ship's hold it's unclear exactly how but fumes from the ship's hold overcame both the men and they died when their bodies were found their deaths were ruled accidental the two men were then buried at sea on December the 4th by order of the ship's captain Keith Tracy but that wasn't the last the crew would see of their former shipmates because the very next day one crew member reported seeing the faces of the dead men in the waters off the port side of the ship according to the witness the two apparitions could be seen for about 10 seconds before disappearing and this wasn't a one-off sighting for the next few days according to the crew the faces reappeared within the waves of the ocean on a number of occasions when the ship arrived at its first port of call New Orleans the shipping company listened to the captain's retelling of the story and they suggested that he tried to photograph the faces if they appeared again when the Watertown left New Orleans for its final stop in New York the faces of Courtenay and Meehan did indeed appear again on the ocean surface a crew member took six photographs of the seemingly enlarged faces before the camera film was safely locked away once in New York the captain saw to it that the film was developed five of the six exposures show nothing more than ocean waves but the sixth exposure is the one which has become so recognizable to most people with an interest in the paranormal described at the time as remarkably clear it showed the ghostly faces of two men men that the ship's crew all agreed looked just like James Courtney and Michael Meehan the story and the photo were first printed in service magazine a publication produced by city service company now known as Citgo who were the company who owned the SS Watertown it was printed again in 1934 when author and paranormal investigator Harry wood Carrington covered the story but it wasn't until almost 30 years later that the image gained worldwide recognition when writer and researcher Michael g-man wrote an article entitled ghosts that pursue a ship for fake magazine in December of 1963 man went to the shipping company who still held the original negatives the photograph was checked for fraud by New York's burns Detective Agency and according to them there were no signs of manipulation as the SS Watertown is no more a worthwhile investigation into possible fakery was unlikely but in 2010 a writer by the name of Blake Smith approached one of her sister ships the SS bold hill Blake Smith said that he knew the measurements of the SS Watertown well and could get a clearer idea using the bold hill as a stage it's pretty clear in the original image that the headlock visions are larger than life-size heads and this is what bothered Smith the most he assumed that the heads if that's what they were ought to be life-sized and following his attempt at recreating the image using a friend's face as a model he concluded that the heads in the image would have had to have been of significant proportions and not just somewhat larger than life as heroine Carrington had put it ultimately Blake Smith said that the photo had no value of evidence for ghosts but the question that lingers especially as the image wasn't widely published for years is why would the captain the crew or the shipping company want to fabricate the image Blake Smith also rightly raised the possibility of a trick of the lights or chance formation of the waves as a reason for the eerie formation this is of course possible maybe even likely today the whereabouts of the original negative is unknown portes Aaron sass is located in the Gulf of Mexico on the barrier island known as Mustang island in Texas today it is a resort town visited for the 80 miles of beaches and the fishing however it has a history that predates the European settlers and involves being a fort for the Spanish a Native American tribe called the karen cara pirates and ranchers have all lived in the area of this Beach at some point in the town's history during the second world war there was even a mandatory blackout preventing any light from being seen at night and the not Hillary gun was installed on a high June to watch for German u-boats with the wild history the town has seen it is little wonder that people report paranormal encounters one such encounter involved a woman camping on the beach with her boyfriend she claims to have witnessed a bloody battle on the beach between men with darker skin as she put it who were not wearing any clothing her boyfriend found her in a state of shock staring into the distance he took her to a motel for the remainder of the night there she began yelling and screaming to the point the police were called to investigate they found no evidence of wrongdoing on his part and she finally calmed down enough to tell him what she had witnessed she was sure it was not a dream it had been too real and vivid in her mind she was certain it was a long-forgotten battle that was so violent it left an echo into the present day while her boyfriend said he did not believe her he didn't go back to retrieve their belongings from the beach either another story says that a small boy in period clothing can be seen running down towards the beach on Saturday mornings he is excited and plays in the sand before disappearing 30 minutes later he will be seen again floating in the water and will disappear if anyone attempts to rescue him other people report that they will hear flocks of birds squawking their name only to learn that no one else can see or hear them some belief that these mysterious birds are not really ghosts banshees there are many other stories both benign and sinister to be found about the beach these include specters walking on the sand dark figure stalking people even following them home and a local hotel the TOC on in a structure built just after the American Civil War boasts many more ghost stories of its own

Channel: Curious World

Views: 445,009

Rating: 4.8110027 out of 5

Keywords: ghost stories, the palatine light, the princess augusta, ghost ships, ghosts from the sea, ss watertown, ss watertown faces, carnival conquest, queen mary haunted ship, changi beach, port aransas, haunted beach, haunted ocean, haunted sea, grenada, bequia

Id: wHbqQ81alSo

Length: 17min 26sec (1046 seconds)

Published: Sun Jan 14 2018