Kingstonian to be part of team that will explore local waters

The Whig Standard

Jonathan Moore is continuing work that started a century ago, when Kingstonians first became interested in what rests beneath the surface of Lake Ontario.

An underwater archeologist with Parks Canada, Moore, who is from Kingston, will be here next year as part of a federal government expedition to determine what ship lies out in the waters just off Kingston - a ship that the local dive community knows simply at "Guenter's wreck."

Some believe it is HMS Montreal, an War of 1812 ship.

"That's a potential identity," said Moore.

"We have no real archeological evidence that it is HMS Montreal."

The final resting place of the Montreal has never been found.

The survey next year, which will involve local volunteer divers, could answer that question, or at least identify the wreck that Parks Canada first started investigating in 2002.

Yesterday, Moore talked about the wreck and Parks Canada's plans to survey it during a talk he gave at the Marine Museum of the Great Lakes. The talk coincided with the launch of a new book on shipwrecks from the War of 1812 that Moore wrote and published

with the Cataraqui Archaeological Research Foundation.

The book describes the history of the warships built in Kingston during the War of 1812 and details their underwater remains, with pictures and graphics for divers and non-divers alike.

"What we'd like to be able to do as underwater archeologists is to pull the water away," Moore said. more