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Shipwreck · Never found

The General Grant

Wrecked 1866, Auckland Islands, subantarctic New Zealand
COLD TRAIL
Evidence status: Historical tradition. no documented source (historical tradition); legal status unknown (manual verification recommended). This account is presented as historical tradition, not verified fact. Manual verification recommended. Repository evidence: 0 sources · 0 timeline events · 0 media items · legal unknown · view on the Map Evidence on file: historical tradition

The General Grant: still unexplained.

Gold aboard, and likely more than the manifest admitted

The subject
developing the photograph…
The manifest
Gold aboard, and likely more than the manifest admitted
Last known, where the trail went cold
She drifted into a sea cave beneath the island's cliffs and went down by the bow; survivors watched the cave swallow her whole.
The account

A ship eaten by an island. The General Grant drifted becalmed into a cavern and the swell beat her under; ten survivors lived eighteen months on seal meat to tell it. A dozen expeditions have braved the cliffs since. The cave has never been conclusively found again.

Leads, where the trail points now
  • The site is documented at Auckland Islands, subantarctic New Zealand; the open questions now are access and what remains, not where it is.
  • Confirm the permit and ownership before any dive or visit, since sites like this are usually protected.
  • What is there: Gold aboard, and likely more than the manifest admitted.
What the record holds

What remains open

  • No period map of the site has surfaced.
  • No contemporary press coverage has been found.
What we know, and what we don't
Established

No documentary claim is yet established. The account rests on tradition.

Still open
  • No period map of the site has surfaced.
  • No contemporary press coverage has been found.
The evidence room

No documentary or visual exhibits have been located yet. The trail below and the open leads are where this dossier grows next — every exhibit that enters here carries a source.

Where the trail points now
  • The site is documented at Auckland Islands, subantarctic New Zealand; the open questions now are access and what remains, not where it is.
  • Confirm the permit and ownership before any dive or visit, since sites like this are usually protected.
  • What is there: Gold aboard, and likely more than the manifest admitted.
  • Search Library of Congress + DPLA (IIIF) for period cartography of the site.
  • Run Chronicling America for dated newspaper mentions.
  • Query NARA for archival records tied to the site.

Have a source, a map, or a clipping? Add a lead and it enters the record with its citation.

Start the hunt here
The first leads, so no one walks in cold.
Sources and the record
Related case files

The full hunt kit

Starting brief, what's known and disputed, evidence timeline, source list, map card, coordinate-confidence and legal-access summaries, and a field checklist, free with a Fellowship account.

Latest Word From the Newswire

Context, not proof. The dossier's own sources remain the evidence record.

Checking the wire…

Chart position -50.750°, 166.100° (approx.) View on the Map