LOT 2461

Framed HMS Association Shipwreck Carlos II (Mexico, 1680) Silver 8 Reales 'Piece of Eight'

SUNK 1707 A.D.

13 1/4 x 9 1/4 in. (557 grams total, 33.7 x 23.7 cm including frame).

The coin in a handwritten coin packet and displayed in a wooden glazed frame with a certificate of origin. [No Reserve]

Acquired on the UK art market.
Property of a London, UK, antiquarian.

In October 1707, the Association, commanded by Captain Edmund Loades, was returning from the Mediterranean with Shovell on board. The 21 ships in the squadron entered the mouth of the English Channel on the night of 22 October 1707 (Old Style). The Association struck the Outer Gilstone Rock off the Isles of Scilly, and was wrecked with the loss of her entire crew of about 800 men, along with three other ships (including HMS Eagle and HMS Romney). As a result of navigational errors, the ships were not where they were reckoned to be. It was largely as a result of this disaster that the Board of the Admiralty instituted a competition for a more precise method to determine longitude. The wreck site was rediscovered in 1964 by the Naval Air Command Sub Aqua Club. Members of the club recovered gold coins, a bronze cannon and many other artefacts from the Association site. More than 2,000 coins and other artefacts recovered from the wreck site were auctioned by Sotheby’s in July 1969.