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To west of the Isles of Scilly lie the Western Rocks, one of the most treacherous areas for shipping around the British Isles and graveyard to countless wrecks. The whole area, it is said, is haunted with the ghosts of thousands of seafarers drowned over the centuries. The worst of these tragedies was the loss of four ships from Admiral Sir Clowdisley Shovell's fleet on the 22nd October 1707, drowning an estimated 1500 to 2000 souls. The flag ship HMS Association striking and sinking by the Outer Gilstone rock. During the early nineteenth century, following sustained pressure from the Navy and East India Company, Trinity House finally decided to build a lighthouse on the mitre shaped rock called the Bishop, at the western extremity of the Western Rocks, in an attempt to stop the heavy loss of shipping and life. During the building of what would be two light houses, due to the destruction of the first attempt, the tiny island called Rosevear, two miles to the East of the Bishop rock, was chosen to house the workmen. Legend has it that the workmen were not sorry to leave the island once the work was completed. Not only because of the harsh and exposed conditions, but the fact that they were convinced Rosevear was haunted. During construction of their dwellings and work areas they had found the bones of several individuals in the shallow soils of the island and, over the years they had been on the island, there had been several occasions where they had been convinced they could hear a haunting lullaby, sung by a young singer and actress, Ann Cargill (neé Ann Brown), to her young baby. Both of whom where known by them to have drowned on the shore of Rosevear, along with all the ship's company, in the wreck of the East India Company packet NANCY, on a stormy night at the end of February 1784. Also lost is this tragic shipwreck was Ann Cargill's partner Captain John Haldane and a prisoner called Sergeant Tooley who instigated the Garrison Mutiny on the Island of St Helena at the end of 1783 in Jamestown. John Haldane was recorded as being one of the unluckiest Captains / Commanders in the East India Company Maritime Service. "This lovely creature was found floating, in her chemise, as she had lain in her bed, and in her arms, inseparably clasping, the infant of which she had been delivered. The maternal instinct had not yielded even to death itself."
Now also launched as a book. Based on the 100% factual historical CD.
In
the
UK
the
Book
(ISBN:
978
09542104
5
8)
is
£10
+
£1.00
p&p.
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