GLOUCESTER, Mass. — The wreck of a schooner that sank off the coast of Gloucester 120 years ago while shipping granite blocks has joined Civil War battlefields and Mount Rushmore on a federal list of the nation’s historic icons.

The wreck of the Lamartine is now listed on the National Register of Historic Places. The 19th century schooner lies in Massachusetts bay, within the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Stellwagen Bank National Marine Sanctuary.

The 79-foot schooner was carrying granite sewer heads from Stonington, Maine, to New York City when it ran into a storm off Cape Ann. Its cargo shifted, causing the two-masted vessel to capsize in 1893.

One crewmember drowned, and the captain and mate were tossed into the ocean. A fishing schooner returning to Gloucester, Mass., saw the Lamartine sink, and rescued them, according to NOAA.

NOAA says historians consider the Lamartine as a representative vessel of New England’s granite trade from that era.


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