MIST: The interesting thing about our line of work is how you can find little mysteries while in pursuit of large ones. Such was the case of the Peter Iredale, a famous shipwreck that occurred near Seaside, Oregon, in 1906 and is today a popular tourist spot. We did not originally plan to do any kind of feature on the ship, as there were no haunting legends or mysterious phenomenon associated with the vessel. But as I searched for information on the local phantom known as "Bandage Man," I found myself reading more and more about the Peter Iredale. And I made a strange discovery about the ship: it appears to have wrecked twice in approximately the same area almost exactly thirteen years apart. But little is written about the first wreck. In fact, I could only find one mention of it online. But let me start at the beginning...

The Peter Iredale was built and owned by an English shipbuilder named, uh, Peter Iredale. Iredale (the man, not the ship) began his shipping career in 1864 and within a decade had added over a dozen more vessels to his fleet. The ship bearing his name was constructed in 1890 and spent sixteen years in active service, primarily transporting grain from the United States to the United Kingdom. It was a four-masted barque built with steel plates bolted onto an iron frame. It was captained by two men, G.A. Brown and H. Lawrence. It was the latter who would have commanded the vessel during both of its wrecks.

The wreck of 1906, which ultimately resulted in the ship's destruction, is the famous one. According to the records, the Peter Iredale was bound to Portland after making a port-of-call in Salina Cruz, Mexico. Apparently the voyage up the western coast of North America was unremarkable. On October 25, Captain Lawrence sighted the Tillamook Rock Lighthouse and adjusted his course to enter the mouth of the Columbia River. The visibility was poor. A strong wind, rising tides and thick fog all conspired to drive the barque ashore where it stuck firm in the deep sands of Clatsop Spit, just below Fort Stevens. Life-saving boats were dispatched from the town of Hammond and everyone onboard the Peter Iredale was safely evacuated and taken to the military fort for temporary housing and care. A few months later, a British naval court cleared Captain Lawrence of any wrong-doing. The ship was scavenged for scrap until all that remained was the bow's iron skeleton, a couple of masts and a few ribs. Various newspaper articles appeared on the wreck at the time, including this one from the Winnipeg Free Press in Canada on October 26, 1906:

Peter Iredale on the Rocks Off Oregon Coast.
Astoria, Ore., Oct. 25 - A telephone message from Fort Stevens reports a four-masted vessel ashore near the old Point Adams lighthouse.
The life-saving crew and soldiers from Fort Stevens have gone to the scene... the vessel ashore near the mouth of the Columbia river,
is the four-masted British Barque, Peter Iredale, from Salinas Cruz, Mexico, to Portland, to load wheat for the United Kingdom.

The thing that I found very curious however, is that in 1893 there were also numerous newspaper articles from all over the United States noting that the Peter Iredale been driven ashore near Astoria. The descriptions of the incident were brief, but virtually identical to the reports that would follow years later. For example:

A Wheat-Laden Bark Driven Ashore.
San Francisco, Oct 13 - The British bark [sic] Peter Iredale, heavily loaded with wheat, was driven ashore during a gale at Astoria, Ore.
-Decatur Daily Republican, Oct. 13, 1893

Here's another from a day later and a different state:

The British bark [sic], Peter Iredale, laden with wheat, has been driven ashore during a gale at Astoria, Ore.
-Cedar Rapids Evening Gazette, Oct. 14, 1893

At first, I thought maybe the "official date" of the wreck was wrong. Perhaps it had occurred in 1893 rather than 1906? But as I did more research, it became clear that this ship apparently befell the same fate twice in almost the same place, during the same month, under similar circumstances and while under command of the same man. There were thirteen years between the first wreck and the second, although I wouldn't encourage anyone to read anything into that number. Just as strange, however, is that there's no mention of the first wreck in the Peter Iredale's official record. According to the timelines I found on the ship, nothing of importance happened to the ship between the date of its commission and the date of its abandonment in 1906. The wreck makes the news again in 1942, when a Japanese submarine surfaces offshore from Fort Stevens and lobs some explosive shells onto the beach near the derelict. The rusted hull is not damaged.

Not being a statistician, I would not even try to estimate the odds of these two wrecks happening under the circumstances reported. I assume the odds would be very small. But as I thought about it, I also had to wonder if this might be an example of synchronicity - or meaningful coincidence. Did Captain Lawrence and the Peter Iredale escape their fate in 1893 only to relive it, for some unknown reason, in 1906?

I wasn't able to trace what happened to Capt. Lawrence following the naval inquiry that cleared his name. I assume he returned to command some other vessel, but surely the barque he had piloted for so many years must have haunted him, as its metal frame rusted on a lonely Oregon beach. Reports say that Capt. Lawrence made a final toast to the Peter Iredale before leaving it behind for good.

"May God bless you, and may your bones bleach in the sands," he said.

Today, those bones are still there for us to see and wonder about. What I will wonder about most is what force along the Oregon coast called the ship to die here... and apparently wouldn't take no for an answer.