Since the dawn of time, the coast of the province of El Jadida has seen a number of sailors and shipping companies from all countries of the world. This also led to maritime events such as shipwrecks and maritime incidents. History has preserved indelible traces of these tragedies that occurred at sea.
Thursday January 9, 2025, a press release from the National Center for Studies and Research on Underwater Heritage in Morocco announced the discovery of the wrecks of two archaeological ships off the coast of the town of El Jadida. These are metal wrecks, one near the town beach and the other near the port entrance.
According to the first descriptions of the wrecks, “these ships probably date from the second half of the 19th century”, the peak period of the activities of the ancient port of El Jadida, considered at the time as one of the main commercial ports. from Morocco.
It must be said that the presence of wrecks from famous shipwrecks near the port of El Jadida, the beach and along the coast of the province was always known thanks to the archives of European countries, particularly French and Spanish. But it is the discovery of places which is the essential element in this new announcement. Because in fact, wrecks are always subject to destruction, degradation and sliding with the currents,…
For my part, as a researcher on the history of the city of El Jadida and its region, I have addressed this aspect of maritime incidents, which occurred in this region, in some of my work.
Already in 2008 I published my book “The port of El Jadida, a little-known story” which is the one and only work of its kind on this emblematic port which was once the second Moroccan port after Tangier. I devoted six pages to it on “The perils of navigation” addressing the famous shipwrecks in this area: the Alcyone in 1839, the Papin in 1845, the Morocco in 1871, the Marne in 1901, the Amazon, the M ‘sella, the steamer Brake in 1904 and the trawler José Carmen in 1945 struck by the submarine Orphée. This work was the subject of a review in the liaison bulletin of the members of the Paris Geographical Society in June 2008.
In a second book “Secret Chronicles of Mazagan”I also devoted a column to this subject entitled “The famous shipwrecks in Mazagan in the 19th and 20th centuries”. It must be said that cargo ships, at that time, crisscrossed the coast of Morocco in both directions and sometimes they were shipwrecked. Certain incidents were therefore recorded but others are still unknown in maritime annals and navigators’ accounts.
In my book “Bibliography on the history of El Jadida”, published in 1993, I devoted a bibliographical section to the maps and plans published at the end of the 19th and beginnings of the 20th century and which mentioned the different locations of the wrecks still visible at low tide at this time near the port of El Jadida. For example, the map of Mazagan surveyed by Captain Nestor Larras in 1899 indicates the locations of three wrecks: the Amazon, the Marne and Morocco.
The first two near the port, the third near the beach. According to Jean-Pierre Guilabert, president of the Mazagan Elders’ Association, two wrecks remained partially visible at low tide until the years 1958-60, such as the wreck of the ship Azemmour stranded between the bottom of the road Sidi Bouafi lighthouse and the dunes of Sidi Bouzid. For various reasons these wrecks are no longer visible today and this is the case in many places around the world.
-My other works having concerned shipwrecks and wrecks still on this coast have been published in the Moroccan history magazine Zamane in the form of articles illustrated with photos in this case: the submarine Méduse at Jorf Lasfar dating from the Second World War (in the May 2023 issue) and the sinking of the Nemos known as Titanic by Haouzia (in the August 2023 issue).
When it comes to commercial ships disappearing on the coast or at the entrance to the port generally these incidents were recorded in reports filed with the chambers of commerce or insurance companies. Each disappearance of a ship has, in general, left traces in the archives since the 17th century. Some copies of reports are available in my documentary collection handed over (and searchable) to the Archives of Morocco in Rabat since 2022.
In general, the search for wrecks is very complex, we can classify the discoveries into three parts: certain wrecks are discovered by chance, by divers discovering by chance traces of a shipwreck on the seabed, the use of magnetometers to detect ferrous masses (for example during work at sea by Of Shore companies or companies laying cables or new wind farms), and finally through archives in each country.
Max Guérout, founding member of the Naval Archeology Research Group (GRAN) in France explains: “In general we speak of a wreck when the structures of the ship are identifiable and of a shipwreck site when only archaeological “furniture” remains marking the site of a shipwreck. In both cases it may be possible to identify the original vessel by cross-referencing historical and archaeological data (email dated January 11, 2025).
The press release from the National Center for Studies and Research on Underwater Heritage in Morocco indicates, in its last paragraph, that “These accidents are mainly due to the difficulty of access to the port, in particular before the construction of the breakwaters, as well as “than unfavorable weather conditions”, other reasons must also be added: the dilapidation of the building (case of the Papin), human error (case of the Brake), war (case of the submarine Méduse) etc.
Obviously it is important to remember that the wrecks of buildings and ships stranded in past centuries do not all appear in the statistics and that this underwater research initiative launched by the National Center for Studies and Research on Underwater Heritage in Morocco must be greatly praised.
Pending the completion of the operation to identify these wrecks in order to give them a name and know their entire history and thus enrich our cultural heritage.
*Author-editor of Cahiers d’El Jadida
