The Manacles
Encyclopedia
Islet
An islet is a very small island.- Types :As suggested by its origin as islette, an Old French diminutive of "isle", use of the term implies small size, but little attention is given to drawing an upper limit on its applicability....
s off The Lizard
The Lizard
The Lizard is a peninsula in south Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. The most southerly point of the British mainland is near Lizard Point at ....
peninsula
Peninsula
A peninsula is a piece of land that is bordered by water on three sides but connected to mainland. In many Germanic and Celtic languages and also in Baltic, Slavic and Hungarian, peninsulas are called "half-islands"....
in Cornwall
Cornwall
Cornwall is a unitary authority and ceremonial county of England, within the United Kingdom. It is bordered to the north and west by the Celtic Sea, to the south by the English Channel, and to the east by the county of Devon, over the River Tamar. Cornwall has a population of , and covers an area of...
close to Porthoustock
Porthoustock
Porthoustock is a hamlet near St Keverne in Cornwall, United Kingdom, on the east coast of Lizard Peninsula. Aggregates are quarried nearby and Porthoustock beach is dominated by a large concrete stone mill. The mill was once used to crush stone but is now disused. Container ships of up to 82m can...
, which is a popular spot for diving due to the shipwreck
Shipwreck
A shipwreck is what remains of a ship that has wrecked, either sunk or beached. Whatever the cause, a sunken ship or a wrecked ship is a physical example of the event: this explains why the two concepts are often overlapping in English....
s around them. The name derives from the Cornish (men eglos) for 'church stone', the top of St Keverne
St Keverne
St Keverne is a civil parish and village on the Lizard Peninsula in Cornwall, United Kingdom.The Cornish Rebellion of 1497 started in St Keverne. The leader of the rebellion Michael An Gof was a blacksmith from St Keverne and is commemorated by a statue in the village...
church being visible from the area.
The rocks extend about 1 nautical mile
Nautical mile
The nautical mile is a unit of length that is about one minute of arc of latitude along any meridian, but is approximately one minute of arc of longitude only at the equator...
east and south east of Manacle Point. They consist of many submerged rocks and several groups of rocks that break the surface, although some only do so at low water. The Middle Manacles in the north consist of Maen Chynoweth (or Morah), Chyronos, Maen Gerrick and the Gwinges, the eastern group has Vase Rock and Pen Vin, the large group in the centre include the Minstrel Rock, Carn-dhu, Maen Voes (the Voices) and the Quants and Maen Land is in the south-west.
Many of the well-known wrecks are in the central group where depths are less than 6 metres for an area of 300 metres by 200 metres. These wrecks include:
- HMS PrimroseHMS Primrose (1807)HMS Primrose was a Royal Navy Cruizer class brig-sloop built by Thomas Nickells , at Fowey and launched in 1807. She was commissioned in November 1807 under Commander James Mein, who sailed her to the coast of Spain....
, an 18-gun Cruizer class brig-sloopCruizer class brig-sloopThe Cruizer class was an 18-gun class of brig-sloops of the Royal Navy. Brig-sloops were the same as ship-sloops except for their rigging...
, sank on 21 June 1809, with only 1 of the 126 on board surviving. - SS MoheganSS MoheganThe SS Mohegan was a steamer which sank off the coast of the Lizard Peninsula, Cornwall. She hit The Manacles on 14 October 1898.-Design and construction:...
sank on 14 October 1898 with 106 fatalities - Spyridon Vagliano, a Greek steamer carrying grain from Novorossijsk to FalmouthFalmouth, CornwallFalmouth is a town, civil parish and port on the River Fal on the south coast of Cornwall, England, United Kingdom. It has a total resident population of 21,635.Falmouth is the terminus of the A39, which begins some 200 miles away in Bath, Somerset....
sank on 8 February 1890 with the loss of 14 of the 22 crew.
The John carrying 263 emigrants to Canada
Canada
Canada is a North American country consisting of ten provinces and three territories. Located in the northern part of the continent, it extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the east to the Pacific Ocean in the west, and northward into the Arctic Ocean...
, sank on the Maen Land in May 1855, only 86 survived.