In a quirky twist of events earlier this month, a gentleman stumbled upon a watery mystery that has the Neches River buzzing with curiosity. Picture this: a modern-day explorer on a Jet Ski, Bill Milner, had an unexpected encounter with the remnants of colossal wooden vessels lurking just below the river's surface. Now, before your imagination runs wild with tales of swashbuckling pirates, let's dive into the story.
The stage was set by the infamous Texan drought, casting its spotlight on an unusual find. Nestled just north of Beaumont, in the waters of the Neches River, lay the sunken secrets of history. At first glance, it seemed like an ordinary day of Jet Skiing, until Bill Milner stumbled upon a real-life treasure – the skeletal remains of what were once imposing boats. Initially suspected to be the remnants of river boats or old barges, these sunken treasures piqued the curiosity of the Ice House Museum in Silsbee.
Enter the Texas Historical Commission in Austin, the saviors of submerged stories. With Milner's photos in hand, they embarked on a mission to decode the aquatic enigma. And now, the pieces of the puzzle have come together like a well-crafted detective novel. Brace yourself for a time-traveling journey to World War I, where the waters of the Neches became an unintended graveyard for unfinished wooden ships crafted for the war effort. These wooden wonders, stretching up to a jaw-dropping 270 feet and weighing a whopping 3,500 tons, were destined to sail the seas of conflict.
But alas, the tides of war receded, and the shipyards in the city of Orange, Texas, silenced their saws. Left behind were more than a dozen half-finished hulls, unceremoniously consigned to the depths of the Neches and its neighboring Sabine River in the 1920s. The Historical Commission, ever vigilant, had previously captured the ghostly outlines of these sunken vessels, even snapping a sonar image of a submerged hull.
As the current drought continues to peel back the layers of time, who knows what other relics of the past lie beneath the river's cloak? With a history spanning over 400 miles from northeast Texas to the coastal embrace of Port Arthur, the Neches River was not only a resting place for these shipwrecked soldiers but a bustling thoroughfare for barges and ferry boats during the 1800s. So, as the river's waters recede and the past resurfaces, keep your eyes peeled – you might just stumble upon the next chapter of this aquatic saga.