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National Geographic : 1960 Feb
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the air lift that the metal had gleamed so brightly when it first appeared. The silver studs had served the dual purpose of attach ing the leather to the case and forming the design on its back (pages 157 and 173). Bell Tower Site Now on Land While the diving was going on, Captain Weems was checking his chart of Port Royal ashore. He had run into difficulties in de termining the exact positions of various land marks of the old city, especially in the area reclaimed from the sea (map, pages 166-7). Most of these landmarks had long since dis appeared with the rebuilding of the town and with the establishment, soon after the earth quake, of a naval yard for the British West Indies Fleet, which had occupied almost the entire inner shore. I was walking through these grounds on my way to the Morgan's Harbour Beach Club one day, when I came upon the captain and an assortment of small boys with spades digging busily in an area southwest of the club. "Whatever are you doing?" I asked. Captain Weems pointed out some traces of brick walls which were beginning to appear beneath the sparse soil. "We're looking for the founda tions of the bell tower to St. Paul's Church," he said. "I think we've found them. See this corner sec tion, how thick it is? It must have been built to support a heavy structure like the bell tower, and Its Thunder Stilled, a Fort James Cannon Emerges Into Sunlight An electronic metal detector spotted the iron barrel on a 1956 reconnaissance trip to the site of Port Royal. Crowned rose insigne dates the gun as having been cast before the death of Queen Anne in 1714. Edwin Link inspects his find, which now rests in the Insti tute of Jamaica. Hauled aboard the barge, an other cannon lies in a bath of protective sea water, together with a 20-foot wooden spar (page 176). 181 it checks exactly with my calculations from the old map." It is to the Reverend Emanuel Heath, Rec tor of St. Paul's, that we are indebted for one of the most vivid accounts of the earthquake. In a letter written shortly after, he recalled that he was about to take a glass of wormwood wine with John White, Acting Governor of Jamaica, when the earth rolled and heaved under their feet. "Lord, Sir, what is this?" the Reverend Mr. Heath cried in alarm. "It is an earthquake; be not afraid, it will soon be over," replied Mr. White. Both men escaped, as if by a miracle, but. as Mr. Heath later wrote, "in the space of three minutes ... Port-Royal, the fairest town of all the English plantations, the best empo rium and mart of this part of the world, ex ceeding in its riches, plentiful of all good things, was shaken and shattered to pieces,
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