A Look Back
By Fred Miller
One hundred and twenty years ago, Dec. 15, 1901, the Sindia came ashore. The event was reported in the Dec. 19, 1901 issue of the Ocean City Sentinel under this headline: “Bark Sindia A Wreck.” The first paragraph told the story: “The four-masted bark Sindia, of London, England, owned by John D. Rockefeller, of the Standard Oil Company, and in command of Captain John MacKenzie, came ashore opposite Sixteenth street, this city, about 3 o’clock Sunday morning during a heavy storm, the wind blowing a gale from the southeast. The ill-fated craft sailed from Kobin, Japan, on July 9th last, bound for New York and was laden with a valuable cargo, consisting of 15,000 gallons of camphor oil, and soil, bamboo furniture, China and Japanese goods for the Christmas trade.”
The article reported how members of the U. S. Life Saving Service, under the command of Captain J. Mackey Corson, rescued the 33 sailors.
Ocean City officials quickly realized the attraction of the 329-foot ship aground just a few hundred feet from the beach. In 1902, Mayor Joseph G. Champion and councilmen William K. Williamson, George O. Adams, Arthur Barrows, Hiram Steelman, William S. Graham and George W. Lee, made sure all promotional literature mentioned the wreck of the Sindia.
The 1903 Ocean City guide book included a picture of the famous wreck and the following information: “The wreck of the bark Sindia, of London, which was such a great attraction last season, still forms a prominent object upon the beach. This fine, large ship, coming direct from Japan deeply laden with the ware of the Orient, ran upon this beach in December, 1901, in darkness of a foggy night. Much of the cargo, consisting largely of artistic pottery, has been removed, but the wreck still contains a fortune in goods now deeply buried in the sand. The Sindia was valued at $110,000. Her cargo was worth $215,000. The value of the goods thus far saved is $76,000.”
The publicity and mystery surrounding the Sindia made it Ocean City’s most famous shipwreck.
