S. N. Castle

Other Names: Date of Sinking: February 17, 1926
Rig/Type: Barkentine/Full rigged ship Cause of Sinking: Burned and sunk for the movie Old Ironsides
Length:Unknown Breadth:Unknown Tons:514 Cargo: None
Built:Hall Bros., Port Blakley, WA 1886 Location: Cat Harbor, Catalina
Hull Construction:Wood Depth:160' Visibility:10-25'

 

The S. N. Castle is shown as the Tripolitian pirate  vessel sunk by the USS Constitution for the 1926 movie Old Ironsides.

Above: dismasted, she catches fire and her crew abandons the sinking vessel (note Cat Head to the right).

Above right: the ship is burning while her crew is swimming away from the burning hulk in the foreground.

Right: The burned out hulk sinks to the bottom.


For video of the S.N. Castle burning and sinking in the 1926 movie Old Ironsides, click here 
(1.7M Windows media file) 

The S. N. Castle was three masted barkentine named after the treasurer of the Kohala Sugar Company.  Built  in 1886 by the Hall Bros of Port Blakely, Washington for L. H. Hubbard of San Francisco, she spent her early years sailing between Hawaii and the mainland engaged in the sugar trade.  Sold in 1905, she began a new career in the codfishing industry and in 1917, she was sold once again to the Alaska Codfish Co.  By then, she was rigged as a three masted schooner.  Her last commercial voyage was made in 1923-4 when sailed to Suva via Vancouver, returning to San Francisco Bay.  After being laid up, she was towed to Los Angeles in January 1926 and re-rigged as the full-rigged Tripolitian pirate ship in the movie, Old Ironsides and on February 17, 1926, she was burned and sunk at the entrance to Cat Harbor. 

A unknown shaft extends upward from the bottom, draped in nets.

Wreckage believed to be from the S. N. Castle is strewn across the bottom.

                 

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