Museum

Welcome to the Museum Page. Here you will be able to view various antique porcelain and English Staffordshire pottery,and civil war era shipwreck antiques and collectibles. All the artifacts were recovered fully intact from the 1866 shipwreck “Baltic” which sunk in the great Bahamian hurricane of October 1st 1866 loaded with antique porcelain and English Staffordshire pottery while enroute from Europe and New York to Galveston Texas at the end of the Civil war.

Our research indicates that the majority of the cargo loaded onto the brig Baltic was ordered by a Mr. Lent Munson Hitchcock, owner of the Tremont Hotel on the corner of Post Office and Tremont Streets in Galveston. The Tremont was considered to be the most impressive and distinguished hotel in the Republic of Texas at the time. Some of the guests included Texas President Anson Jones and various dignitaries from Europe including foreign ministers. Sam Huston gave his last public speech during the Civil War at the Tremont Hotel.

Many wounded Confederate soldiers were quartered in the Tremont until a fire destroyed the Hotel and much of the Strand District on June 21^st of 1865.

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The Baltic cargo included all the necessary supplies for rebuilding and restocking the Tremont Hotel and Mr. Hitchcock’s general store and ships chandlery such as a portable saw mill, a large consignment of window plate glass, shoe shine kits, food stuffs, medical supplies and equipment, Staffordshire china and porcelain dinnerware, a large array of glassware, Cathedral pickle bottles and snuff jars and luxury items including ornate porcelain inkwells from Germany. Also included were hand made Reed Stem Clay Smoking Pipes manufactured in Pamplin Depot,Virginia as well as Enemas and Vaginal Syringes marked as patented by Goodyear in 1851 and Bleeder hoses marked as patented by Davidsons 1n 1857.

After the loss of the Baltic in the great Bahamas hurricane of 1866, Galveston was struck by another hurricane in 1867 which further delayed the rebuilding of the Tremont Hotel.  Mr. Hitchcock passed away in 1869 and it was not until 1870 that a group of fellow Galveston businessmen decided to continue with the rebuilding. The new Tremont Hotel opened its’ doors in 1872 a full seven years after the great fire.

Twenty four American, English Staffordshire, and German manufacturers have been identified dating from early 1845 through late 1865  including William Adams IV, Jacob Furnival, John Maddock, Meakin, Edward Clarke, Bridgewood & Clarke, Hughes & Bennett, T&R Boote, Old Hall Earthenware, Wooliscroft, William Cookworthy, William Ridgway and Pinder,Bourne & Co.

Also included in the recovered cargo were porcelain inkwell figurines which had the numbers relating to the Ducal Real Porcelain Factory owned by Duke Carl Eugen Von Wurttemberg established in 1758.  In 1816 his successor sold the molds to Edward Kick in Amberg, Bavaria where they were called Kronenburg porcelain.

We have also identified several American manufacturers including Morrison and Carr New York of the New York City Pottery, several glass manufacturers including the Cohansey Glass Works and  F&JN. Bodine of Bridgeton New Jersey, and The Cape Cod Glass Co. of  Sandwich, Massachusetts, and J.J. Mapes of 61 Front Street New York.