Vernian obscura et Trivia et footnotes 10
Quentin R. Skrabec Ph.D.
Nemo’s Estuary and Graveyard of the St. Lawrence Found
The Nautilus explored, through its windows, the famous Atlantic graveyard off the Massachusetts coast, noting many lost wrecks of the 1850s. Verne noted, “amid those fogs so dreaded by sailors. What accidents are due to these thick fogs!” One of them was the French steamship Le Lyonnais, which sank in 1856 as Verne stated “the Artic and [ see Chapter XX -From (at) Latitude 47° 24′ To (and) Longitude 17° 28′ --20000 Leagues—published 1871] On November 2, 1856, while returning from New York to France, the Lyonnais collided with the American sailing vessel Adriatic off the coast of Nantucket due to heavy fog.
A team of divers from the Atlantic Wreck Salvage Company discovered this August 2024 the long-lost wreck of the Le Lyonnais. The ship’s identity was proved by examining its distinctive engine cylinder, a rare model that matched Le Lyonnais’ engine size data from Laird & Sons of Birkenhead. The Lyonnais was built at Verne’s shipyard Laird & Sons of Birkenhead, which Verne used for his many fictional ships.
Note: Verne’s coordinates are wrong in Mercier translations – see Miller translation.