Tearing Ledge Wreck
Marker: recorded wreck position (Date not recorded).
Key facts
| Name | Tearing Ledge Wreck | Wikidata label |
|---|---|---|
| Ship type | shipwreck | Wikidata P31 instance of |
| Sea / ocean | North Atlantic Ocean | Natural Earth marine areas (public domain), point-in-polygon |
| Nearest coast | England | official dataset |
| Position | 49.8706, -6.4422 | Historic England Protected Wreck Sites, listed latitude/longitude (OGL v3) |
| Protected Wreck | List entry 1000063 | Historic England |
| Designated | 1975-02-12 | Historic England |
| Restricted area | 12.56 ha | Historic England |
| Grid reference | SV 80926 06177 | Historic England |
About the wreck
The Tearing Ledge Wreck consists of the remains of a ship, possibly one of the ships belonging to Admiral Cloudisley Shovell's fleet of 21 vessels returning from the Siege of Toulon via Gibraltar, that were found in 1969 on Tearing Ledge, Western Rocks, Isles of Scilly. The site was designated under the Protection of Wrecks Act on 12 February 1975. The wreck is a Protected Wreck managed by the National Heritage List for England.
Diving & visiting
This is a designated Protected Wreck under the Protection of Wrecks Act 1973. Under the Act, diving on or otherwise interfering with the wreck inside its restricted area requires a licence; see the Historic England list entry for details.
The site includes 65 iron guns, cannon balls, an anchor, a glass bottle and other glass fragments, and some lead scupper pipes. The ships bell dated to 1701, three lead containers, and some gold and silver coins were also recovered. The wreck sits on Tearing Ledge in a steep-sided gully.
Remains of the wreck were found in 1969 by local divers. Survey work was undertaken in 1974-76, and further assessment was conducted in 2007/2008. In 2016 Historic England commissioned Cornwall Archaeological Unit to produce a Conservation Statement and Management Plan.
Location
- Recorded position: 49.8706, -6.4422 (Historic England Protected Wreck Sites, listed latitude/longitude (OGL v3); may be approximate)
- Sea / ocean: North Atlantic Ocean
- Nearest coast: England
Wreck positions on this site are for interest only and are not for navigation. Many wrecks are war graves or legally protected: never disturb human remains or remove artefacts, and check local law before diving.
Text adapted from the Wikipedia article Tearing Ledge Wreck (revision 1213578087), licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Changes: excerpted from the article lead section and section(s) “The wreck”, “Discovery and investigation”; condensed by selecting paragraphs; citations and formatting removed. No text added. This excerpt is available under the same licence.
Protected Wreck data © Historic England 2026. Contains Ordnance Survey data © Crown copyright and database right 2026. Licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Wreck facts from Wikidata (CC0).
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Browse more: UK & Ireland wrecks · wrecks off England · North Atlantic Ocean