Scatters of pottery sherds are reported to remain on the seabed. The full character and extent of archaeological remains is presently unknown.

Event and Historical Information:
The CHARLES HOLMES was a wooden full-rigged ship (or barque - sources differ) built by Horrace Merriam and Ellis Andrews at Rockland, State of Maine, United States of America. The vessel was launched on 10 December 1851. Technical and configuration specifications are given as 886.7 tons; 154ft length x 29.3ft breadth x 21.1ft depth in hold; 2 decks and a poop; 3 masts; ship rigged with a standing bowspit, square stern, carvel built, scrollhead, framework and planking wood; official 1741. The ship's first owners included Merriam, Captain Robert Crocket, Captain Thomas R Pillsbury, Charles Holmes, William L Pitts, Captain William H Thorndike; Abel K Foster of New York, and Isaiah Atkins, Daniel R Stedman and George Stedman, all of Boston. Captains Crocket and Pillsbury are noted as completing voyages in command of the vessel in the Shipping Intelligence columns of the Liverpool Mercury - 2 August 1852, master Pillsbury, loading for Havana for J T Nickels; 2 November 1852, for New York, put back to Liverpool with loss of foremast; 13 January 1853, master Crockett, from Liverpool to New Orleans, at Queenstown with main mast sprung, loss of sails, leaky, been out for 43 days; and 11 November 1853, master Pillsburg, arrived Havana from Liverpool. In his memoirs published in a Rockland newspaper (Courier Gazette) in May 1900, Pillsbury wrote of this voyage from Havana to London in late 1853. The CHARLES HOLMES was carrying the largest cargo of sugar that had been carried up until that time. Pillsbury was 'on deck for 30 days and nights without ever setting foot into a berth and snatching slumber only at momentary intervals. One howling gale succeeded another; the vessel, with her tremendous cargo, was so deeply laden that the waves tumbled over her in gleeful abandon and the crew thought surely that every coming moment would be their last'. The London Standard suggests that the ship arrived there on 10 January 1854. Pillsbury sold the vessel in London and returned to Rockland with $50-60,000 in gold and $10,000 for the sugar freight for division amongst the owners.
The Shipping Intelligence columns of the London Standard reveal that the CHARLES HOLMES left there in March-April for New Orleans. By this time, the ship had been transferred to the port of Liverpool (125 in 1854) and the new owners were Thomas Chilton the younger, merchant (24 shares - shares he passed to his father, Thomas Chilton senior, in June 1858); John Thomas Nickel of Liverpool, merchant (16 shares); Robert Hutchinson of Liverpool, merchant (16 shares), and Charles Halket Bowlby of Austin Friars, London, master mariner (8). The ship returned to London in August of 1854 and, at the end of November, was at Mississippi.
The Liverpool Mercury includes brief details of further voyages with Bowlby in command - 23 February 1855, master Bowlby, arrived New Orleans; 12 April 1856, master Bowlby, sailed from Bombay; 4 June 1856, sailed from Helvoet for Liverpool; 28 October 1856, master Bowlby, at Havannah; 8 April 1857, at New York; 16 October 1857, at Bombay; 10 April 1858, master Bowlby, from Bombay at St Helens; 13 June 1858, master Bowlby, arrived Liverpool with loss of water; and 22 December 1858, sailed from Bombay.
One of the Liverpool owners, John Thomas Nickels (J T Nickels), appears to have had a connection with vessel going back to the ship's first transatlantic voyages (e.g. loading for Havana for J T Nickels in August 1852 above). He was born on 6 January 1816 and married into the Tetley family (Emmeline Rebecca Tetley) in 1846. Two of his sons, Walter and John, continued his shipping interests. At time of his death at Birkenhead in 1898, his estate was valued at £282,963.
The ship's last master, Charles Halket Bowlby (master's certificate 50746), was the son of Captain Thomas Bowlby RN of Bishopwearmouth, Co Durham. He appears to have been a thorough seaman, being commended for his metrological observations in The Mercantile Navy List of 1858.
On its last fateful voyage, the CHARLES HOLMES was outward bound from Liverpool to Mobile with a general cargo consisting of coal, iron, tools, clothing, crockery and meat. The vessel was blown ashore at Aberbach during the Royal Charter gale on 25 October 1859. Potter's Electric News printed at report on 2 November stating 'the greater part large ship from 1,000 to 1,500 tons burthen, came in Abermawr, one body was washed ashore about same time. A quantity of cloth and blankets has be picked up, and more are to be seen floating.... the sea, today, between Dinas Head and Strumble is covered with wreck, human bodies, and valuable things from the different vessels lost'. Contemporary accounts suggest that it was dismasted at sea, became unmangeable and was probabaly capsized. The crew of 28 and a passenger were all drowned. Nine bodies were recovered from Aberbach, Abermawr and Llanverran. These were buried 'names unknown' at Granston and Llanwda. The obituaries column in the Liverpool Mercury reported the loss of Mr John Cross, chief officer and Mr John O'Brien, carpenter aged 26 years. The obituary pages of the Mercantile Navy List of 1860 noted that seaman David Kennedy had also been drowned. The single tombstone errected at Granston is dedicated to both master and crew.
In the aftermath of the gale, a notice of an auction at Abermawr/Aberbach on 3 November appeared referring to 'oak and other timbers, masts, yards, cordage, blocks, metal, and iron work, boat and all tackle apparael and furniture, saved from the wreck, as they now lie, in and about the Crreks afreosaid. Also a quantity of blanketing and damged tweed, etc' by the Lloyds Agents at Fishguard (Captain J M Cawkitt and David Vaughan). The Dewlands Petty Sessions held at Mathry, 5 December 1859, notes cases against J Roberts and William James for stealing part of the cargo on 9th November 1869. Roberts was fined 1s and costs. The case against James was adjourned. Also in mid December, 'a person from Falmouth inspected the spot where this unfortunate vessel was lost, for the purpose of placing divers to work'. By May 1860, 'a party of divers' had ' for sometime past, been actively and successfully enagaged in rasing portions of the cargo... About 50 tons of iron, chiefly rods of a superior quality have been recovered'. A sale of the recovered items was held at Aberbach in October 1860 by local auctioneer, Levi James. The goods included 'a variety of dinner, breakfast, tea and coffee services, dinner sets, tart and pudding dishes, chamber ware, etc, etc, some hundreds of frying pans together with a variety of hard ware, (brass and steel), fire irons, boxes of carpenter's tools, brass and iron chains, tons of rigging, etc, etc'.

Sources include:
BSAC Wreck Register 1988, Addendum 2 to Vol 1 and 3, 50 (293)
Board of Trade Wreck Return 1859, Table 19, pg26, House of Commons Parliamentary Papers Online, document 2623
Larn and Larn Shipwreck Database 2002
Liverpool Mercury and London Standard, Shipping Intelligence columns, various dates (British Library:19th century British Newspapers Online)
Mercantile Navy List 1858, pg332 (online source Google Books)
Parish Burial Registers for Granston (entries 141-44) and Llandwa (entry 481) for 1859, Pembrokeshire Record Office
Port of Liverpool Shipping Register 1853-1854 (10 Nov 1853 - 27 Feb 1854), Merseyside Maritime Museum, 125 in 1854
Port of Liverpool Shipping Register Transactions Book 3, Merseyside Maritime Museum, folio 215
Pembokeshire Herald, 16 December 1859, 11 May 1860, 14 Sept 1860, Welsh Newspapers Online
Potter's Electric News, 2 November 1859 and 7 December 1859, Welsh Newspapers Online
Snow, Betram G, 2005, The Main Beam: An Informal History of Documented Vessels Built at Rockland, Maine, from 1795 to 2005, pg77-78

Maritime Officer, RCAHMW, December 2013.