An expedition 30 miles from Cadiz, Spain, recovered a bronze cannon and eleven more pieces of the ship Nuestra Senora de las Mercedes, sunk on October 5, 1804, said the Spanish Minister of Education and Culture, Onigo Mendez de Vigo.
The recovered objects were chosen by the danger of their disappearance and because they allow documenting aspects of life aboard the frigate sunk 1,136 meters deep.
No remains of wooden boat, but 21 very rusty iron cannons, 148 of the 800 tin ingots two culverins (old piece of artillery) and three anchors were discovered, among other items.
The expedition, which began last August 18, deposited in place a bronze plaque in memory of the victims of that battle in which 249 sailors died.
The minister said that the success of this expedition will serve to initiate other missions to find wreckage that have not been plundered by US company Odyssey treasure hunters. This company discovered the ship in 2007, and drew much of their treasure. And the Spanish authorities demanded the United States to defend the property of the plundered, considering that it was the Spanish frigate Nuestra Señora de las Mercedes.
In 2009, the US court in Tampa, manager case, ruled that the objects should be returned to Spain, considering that the wreck belonged undoubtedly to the Spanish frigate, which sailed the then viceroy of Peru and was sunk on October 5, 1804 off the coast of the Algarve (Portugal) by British ships.
The treasure consists of more than 500,000 gold and silver coins, some textiles, metal fragments and cannonballs, arrived in Spain in 2012. In its finding, Odyssey damaged part of the boat, especially when using large iron shovels with which they swept the ocean floor to drag all the coins looted the fund.
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