🔒 Can 170-year-old bourbon be salvaged from sunken cargo ship in Lake Michigan?

A little over a decade ago, the Westmoreland was discovered. This ship sank to the bottom of Lake Michigan on Dec. 7, 1854, after being lost in a storm. This ship was carrying a lot of precious cargo, from gold to booze, there were many items that went down that winter night.

The Westmoreland has been a topic of conversation over the past couple of years. I was recently told about the shipwreck and how many are still on the hunt to retrieve the several barrels that were on the ship.

Ross Richardson, a historian and diver, found the shipwreck off Platte Bay on July 7, 2010. The historian wrote a book on the history of the shipwreck that killed 17 people. According to Richardson’s book. there were rumors that $10,000 in gold coins and 280 barrels of whiskey sunk with the ship during its wreck. The barrels on board were intended to be delivered to soldiers who were on Mackinac Island, according to Mirror.Co in the U.K.

Since the spirits are in wooden barrels, it is unknown how much is still preserved and what is the quality of the alcohol. But hypothetically, if there are still 280 barrels worth of the spirit, that equals to about 74,200 fifths bottles -- if each barrel fills up 265 fifths.

As of February, Richardson told the Mirror that there’s already a salvage project going on with the leftover whiskey. “We are in the beginning stages of discussing a salvage operation to recover the whiskey casks and possibly other artifacts,” said Richardson. He also mentioned that a regional distillery is extremely interested in salvaging the whiskey barrels for testing and selling. It is believed that the genetic makeup of the 1800s whiskey is to be made of corn.

Some of the regional distilleries in the area are Traverse City Whiskey Co., Grand Traverse Distillery, Mammoth Distilling and Iron Fish Distillery.

The whiskey will most likely be under the “sunken scotch” category. There are quite a few of these whiskies that were “lost at sea.” One of them reported is the SS Politician which was wrecked during World War II off the coast of Scotland. USA Today reported that a bottle of the blended Scottish whiskey from the SS Politician has a starting price of $12,000. There were 28,000 cases of malt whiskey that went down with the cargo ship as it was making its way to Jamaica and New Orleans in 1941.

Another shipwreck that was traveling with spirits is the SS Wallachia. According to scottishshipwrecks.com, the cargo steamer had whiskey, gin, beer and other materials on board. The steamer left Glasgow for Trinidad and only had one passenger on board. The cargo steamer was involved in a crash with a Norwegian steamer on Sept. 29, 1895. Wallachia sank to the bottom of the ocean and was rediscovered by divers in 1977.

Click here to see more shipwreck photos from photographer Chris Roxburgh.

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