The 1733 Treasure Fleet
Friday the Thirteenth and the Hurricane That Wrecked Spain’s Fleet
Compared with 1715, the shallow reefs of the Keys gave the crews a chance.
Florida’s heritage records say the Spanish flagship El Rubí, the Capitana of the 1733 fleet, had been leaking badly and that no one aboard expected to survive when she grounded just inside the reef line off the Upper Keys. Only three lives were lost aboard her. Compared with what had happened to the 1715 fleet on Florida’s east coast eighteen years earlier, that was a mercy. On Friday, July 13, 1733, a Spanish convoy of about twenty-two ships sailed from Havana bound for Spain. Within two days a hurricane had driven most of it onto the reefs and shoals of the Keys, a major maritime disaster in which, unlike 1715 (FLH-0125), most of the people aboard survived.
A Fleet Assembled
The 1733 fleet existed because of Spain’s system for moving New World wealth across the Atlantic: gather goods and treasure at Havana, form an escorted convoy and sail together. According to the National Park Service, the New Spain fleet under Don Rodrigo de Torres reached Veracruz in autumn 1732, was delayed there until the end of May 1733 and reached Havana by mid-June, where it was refitted and loaded. Modern accounts describe four armed escort galleons, headed by de Torres’s flagship El Rubí, and sixteen merchant ships, with two small vessels; the National Park Service counts seventeen or eighteen merchant ships. Its figure for the registered treasure is about 12 million pesos, and other accounts differ.
Into the Storm
The fleet sighted the Keys on July 14, and a change in the wind and sky warned of a hurricane. According to the National Park Service and NOAA, de Torres ordered a return to Havana, but the attempt failed. The storm struck by nightfall on July 15, and the ships were wrecked or driven aground along the Keys. The Park Service describes wrecks scattered over about eighty miles; other accounts give a shorter stretch. A few vessels escaped: shipwrecks.es reports that four merchant ships reached Havana and the galleon Africa continued to Spain.
A Different Kind of Disaster
The 1715 fleet was wrecked on the east coast, and more than a thousand people died, according to the Park Service. The 1733 fleet, caught among shallow reefs and sandbars, mostly grounded instead of breaking apart. No authoritative death toll is established here. The Capitana grounded northeast of Upper Matecumbe Key, according to Florida’s 1733 Galleon Trail, though some sources place it off Key Largo; that conflict is not resolved. Survivors came ashore, set up camps and salvaged supplies while waiting for help from Havana.
Salvage on a Large Scale
Ships and divers from Havana recovered survivors and cargo. Vessels that could sail were towed back, and galleons that could be neither refloated nor towed were set on fire so divers could reach their holds; the Park Service adds that burning also helped keep the wrecks from being found. Divers recovered all but seven boxes of coins from the Rubí, according to the Division of Historical Resources. The Park Service reports that within three months royal officials in Havana said all the registered treasure and some unregistered treasure had been recovered, which suggests that gold and silver had been carried aboard without being registered, a reasonable inference the surviving records do not fully document.
Rediscovery
The wrecks were largely forgotten for roughly two centuries. The Division of Historical Resources says that in 1938 a fisherman, Reggie Roberts, took the diver Art McKee to a site off Tavernier Key, the first of the 1733 wrecks rediscovered in modern times; the Park Service dates McKee’s first sighting of the Capitana’s ballast mound to 1937. The one-year difference is noted, not resolved. McKee opened a shipwreck museum in the Upper Keys in 1949. In later decades other wrecks were found and worked by treasure hunters, often with little regulation. The San Pedro, found in the 1960s off Indian Key, was heavily salvaged before state and federal protection, according to NOAA; it became a State of Florida Underwater Archaeological Preserve, dated 1988 or 1989 depending on the source, and visitors can see its ballast mound, cannons and replica anchors in about eighteen feet of water. The Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary was established in 1990.
Quick Facts
Departure
Havana, Friday, July 13, 1733
Commander
General Don Rodrigo de Torres, aboard the Capitana El Rubí
Fleet size
About 22 ships (NOAA, shipwrecks.es); the Park Service counts 17 or 18 merchant vessels
Registered treasure
About 12 million pesos (National Park Service); other accounts differ
The storm
Keys sighted July 14; hurricane struck by nightfall July 15
Extent of the wrecks
About 80 miles of the Keys (Park Service); a shorter stretch in other accounts
Contrast with 1715
Most ships grounded in shallow water; more than 1,000 died in 1715 (NPS)
Spanish salvage
Registered treasure reported recovered within about three months (NPS)
Rediscovery
Art McKee, 1937 or 1938 (sources differ); museum opened 1949
Protected site
San Pedro Underwater Archaeological Preserve, near Indian Key
Did You Know?
* The fleet sailed on Friday, July 13, 1733.
* Spanish crews set some stranded galleons on fire so divers could reach their holds.
* Officials reported recovering more treasure than was registered, which suggests unregistered cargo.
Vocabulary
Capitana: the flagship of a Spanish fleet, carrying its commander.
Ballast: heavy material, such as stone, carried low in a ship for stability.
Cochineal: a red dye made from insects, a valuable colonial export.
Discussion Questions
1. Why did most people survive in 1733 but not in 1715?
2. What can the conflicting dates for Art McKee’s discovery teach us about sources?
Related Articles
* FLH-0125 — The Lost Treasure Fleets of 1715
* FLH-0126 — Florida’s Forgotten Shipwreck Treasures
* FLH-0128 — The Treasure Hunters of the Treasure Coast
* FLH-0129 — The Atocha and Mel Fisher
Sources
NOAA Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary. Shipwreck Trail, “San Pedro.” floridakeys.noaa.gov
National Park Service. “The Spanish Treasure Fleets of 1715 and 1733” (teacher lesson, 2006). nps.gov (classroom summary, not a primary source)
Florida Division of Historical Resources. 1733 Spanish Galleon Trail, “Capitana” (El Rubí). info.flheritage.com
Shipwrecks.es. “Rodrigo de Torres’s Fleet (1733).” Journey Without Return: An Inventory of Spanish Shipwrecks off the Coasts of the United States and Bahamas (secondary compilation)
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