DARE COUNTY, N.C. (WGHP) — A weathered object sticking out of the ocean in North Carolina has many people puzzled.
It’s not the long-lost remains of the fictional city of Atlantis or a submarine periscope.
If you’ve taken a vacation to the beach at Dare County this summer or visited the Pea Island Wildlife Refuge, you may have seen the boiler and smokestack of the steamer Oriental sticking out of the water.
Oriental was built as a merchant ship in 1861 but rented to the Army as a troop transport instead, according to Cape Hatteras National Seashore officials.
During a storm on May 16, 1862, she ran aground near Bodie Island.
Everyone on board survived, but the ship and all her cargo were lost in the storm.
Click here to learn more about shipwrecks in NC.