Excavators working on the shipwreck found that a major portion of the hull was still intact, with much of the cargo preserved. Remarkably, many of the wooden barrels, casks, and boxes were still packed in the compartments, just as La Salle's crew had placed them some 300 years before. Here were the ingredients for creating a colony in the new world: tools to fell trees and construct buildings; food, dishes, clothing and other supplies for daily life; weaponry for defense and hunting; and small, glittering items intended for trade with the native peoples. The ship's hull itself carried a trove of clues, large and small, about shipbuilding and sailing in the 17th century. It was dismantled timber by timber to be brought to shore, reassembled, studied, and preserved. To the archeologists, La Belle was a treasure far more valuable than gold or silver. Explore the drawing above to see what the archeologists uncovered.
Cutaway view of La Belle, showing the aft compartment. Inset from painting by Charles Shaw.
Overview of aft hold. Cargo in this compartment lay jumbled apart and broken.
An intact wooden traders’ box, unique in North American archeology.
Looking inside one of the two trader’s boxes found in the aft hold. The wooden chest was still packed with hundreds of Jesuit rings, brass pins, combs, and mirrors. The items would have been used for bartering and boosting relations with Native peoples in the new land.
Thousands of Venetian glass “seed” beads—568,798 in all—were contained in this trader’s box, some piled in rows, others still strung on strands of thread, ready to be traded to the Indians. Still nailed shut when it was uncovered, the box contained bits of the straw packing that had been placed underneath and over the top of the beads to protect them.
Coils of rope and rigging parts.
Ceramic firepots, which were used somewhat like Molotov cocktails. The pottery containers originally held gunpowder, an iron ball, and a wick. When lit and hurled at an enemy, the pot would break on impact, causing the combustible materials to ignite and the iron ball to explode.
Wheel on wooden gun carriage, found outside the port side of the ship.
Wooden barrel with hoops and withy binding still intact. Of varying sizes, the barrels were used to store gunpowder, liquids, dry goods (such as foodstuffs and cloth), and trade goods. To the right is the portable grid used by the archeologists to help measure and document features and artifacts within each excavation unit. The white fabric shown at top was used to wrap large items, such as barrels and boxes, prior to jacketing them in plaster, a process which kept the objects intact as they were removed from the shipwreck.
Aft Hold
In this rear compartment, the archeologists made a remarkable discovery. Amid coils of rope and brass wire, ammunition, and other items, they found two wooden boxes filled with the items La Salle had hoped to use for bartering with native peoples in the New World. According to Principal Investigator James Bruseth, these small “trader” chests, brimming with diminutive objects of metal and glass, are unique in North American archeology. Packed inside the first box were hundreds of brass Jesuit rings tied together with string along with stacks of wooden combs, cans of small round mirrors, and dozens of knives. The second box contained some 600,000 glass beads—white, black, and cobalt blue—still strung on their original thread and wrapped around a piece of rope to bind them in place.
This treasure represented a substantial expenditure paid for personally by La Salle and his men, as the French king did not provide funds for trade goods.In addition to the two boxes, archeologists also uncovered 22 wooden barrels in the aft hold, along with rope and coils of brass wire, the “duct tape” of the time. After excavating and removing the jumbled cargo, archeologists found another layer of remains at the bottom of the aft hold: bricks from the cooking galley, empty wine bottles, animal bones, eating utensils, and game pieces. Crewmembers had gathered in this small, makeshift cooking galley to have meals, play games, and escape the cold, likely while the ship was anchored for months in Matagorda Bay.
Cutaway view of La Belle, showing the main compartment. Inset from painting by Charles Shaw.
Partial view of main hold, filled with casks, crates and rope.
Dozens of iron axe heads (shown with blades pointing downward) were tightly packed in this wooden barrel. Inset at bottom right shows individual axehead.
A wooden box loaded with flintlock muskets (right). Although the metal barrels were concreted together, the guns’ wooden stocks were in remarkably good condition. Nearby were stacks of swords.
Nested set of copper cooking pots, colander, and ladle. A pair of candlesticks is visible at bottom left.
A brass cannon, one of three found on board. These heavy weapons were packed deep in the main hold, serving as ballast for the ship.
Shot of various sizes was found spilling out from four wooden casks.
Cannon balls, concreted into a mass, were packed into the main hold.
Main Hold
The main, or forward, hold, contained a remarkably intact trove of cargo: 63 wooden casks and 7 crates, still tightly packed in place and filled with an array of items. From household materials and construction tools to glimmering trade goods, these were the supplies intended for the Mississippi River colony that La Salle had ordered loaded on board La Belle in 1685, shortly before the vessel was wrecked in the bay. Munitions also were laid in, including two bronze cannons, cannonballs, swords, flintlock muskets, and barrels containing hundreds of pounds of lead shot. The main hold also housed equipment critical to ship operations, such as pumps for removing water from the bilge.
Cutaway view of La Belle, showing the bow compartment. Inset from painting by Charles Shaw.
Overview photograph of bow compartment. Anchor rope, stored in the aft hold, was the final resting place for an unknown sailor.
The skeletal remains of “Individual Two,” one of two skeletons found in La Belle. Analysis of these remains indicate the sailor suffered from no mortal wounds or serious diseases. Rather, it is more likely he died of dehydration before the ship ran aground, as supplies onboard the ship ran out. Although land, with the promise of fresh water, was less than a mile away, this sailor and others remained stranded on board La Belle. European sailors of the 17th-century typically could not swim. According to the diary of La Salle’s officer, Henri Joutel, a number of people on board died of thirst. (During the excavations, a few bones from another individual were found in the Aft hold.) More information on the skeletal remains is provided in the section on analysis in the laboratory, Treasures of La Belle.
Wooden cask, probably filled originally with liquid.
Swivel gun, covered with concretions. Found outside the starboard side of the boat, the gun apparently fell from its mounting.
Rigging blocks found in bow.
Leather shoe from the bow area
Pewter wine-tasting cup bearing the name, “C. Barange.”
Leather wallet with two combs (shown after conservation), found near the skeleton. The comb on left has fine teeth for removing nits and head lice.
Bow Hold
The bow compartment of the ship was used by sailors as a place for rest, one of the few areas where they could escape the elements. When the opportunity arose, tired sailors crawled through the deck hatch into the cramped bow quarters, where hammocks or wooden bunks may have been positioned. It was in this forward hold that archeologists made their most poignant discovery. Atop a coiled mound of anchor rope, the skeletal remains of an unknown Frenchman lay sprawled face down, elbows splayed outward. Near him were a pewter salver, or wine-tasting cup, stamped with the name, "C. Barange", and a leather pouch containing two combs. A single leather shoe and a wooden cask, perhaps once containing water, lay close by. A Jesuit ring was found among the hand bones and nearby, several wooden beads. Despite a variety of attempts to discover the sailor's identity, we may never know whether the skeleton was an individual known as C. Barange, nor the circumstances of his death. Attempts to extract DNA from the remains were unsuccessful, largely because of destruction by marine creatures.
A reconstruction of his face, however, by a University of Michigan medical artist, provides us an idea of what he may have looked like. (See Treasures of La Belle section for photo and detail.) In "From a Watery Grave, The Discovery and Excavation of La Salle's Shipwreck, La Belle," authors James Bruseth and Toni Turner imagine what the end was like for him: "The archeological evidence portrays a miserable sailor desperately clinging to life, probably lying on one of the wooden bunks overlooking the anchor rope in the bottom of the bow. It is likely he died before the ship sank. After the wreck, his body was dislodged from the bunk and dropped to the bottom of the bow, settling directly on the coiled anchor rope, with his empty water cask falling next to him." Three-hundred years after his lonely passing, the unknown sailor has now gained a measure of respect and even notoriety. On February 3, 2004, his remains were buried with honor at the state cemetery in Austin.Officials from Texas, the United States and France were in attendance, along with a cadre of archeologists who helped recover his remains from the sea. (For more on the sailor's burial, see the Texas Historical Commission's Photo Album
