it is recognised that there is a wealth of hitherto unrecorded historical and cultural evidence beneath the sea, and only in recent times, technology has allowed us to peer into this unknown world. Using this equipment is like playing blind man's bluff without the handkerchief and these high definition images from HMS Gleaner of the seabed around the Filey Bay wooden wreck site  illustrate this.

The Filey Bay Initiative has been awarded a National Heritage Lottery Grant for carrying out investigations into an important eighteenth century shipwreck in Filey Bay. The wreck is believed to be the famed Bonhomme Richard commanded by Commodore John Paul Jones of the American Continental Navy, lost in the battle of Filey Bay in 1779. The Bonhomme Richard is the most sought after artefact of the American War for Independence.

The FBI team are surveying new areas of the seabed with electronic equipment looking for objects or artefacts lost from the wreck before she sank, and then proof diving and recording the targets.  It is also important to eliminate features present that are not connected with the site from the investigation.  So, what is a magnetometer?  A magnetometer is an electronic device that detects small variations in the earth's magnetic field.  Any ferrous object placed on, or below the surface of the earth or seabed will cause this variation in the earth's magnetic field and the magnetometer detects these when it passes near to, or over the object.  The larger the object, the greater the variation, and these variations are fed directly into a computer programme that analyses them and plots their position by means of Global Positioning Satellites.  Once the location of these objects are plotted, then the divers proof dive them and if possible, identify them.

The magnetometer purchased by the Initiative is the Proton 4 model manufactured by J W Fishers of Taunton, Maryland, USA, it is in the shape of a torpedo and is towed behind the survey boat at a specific depth.

It is known that before the Bonhomme Richard sank, Jones put many heavy items over the side, including cannons to lighten the ship. When the ship sank there would also be items that broke free from it and the these will help to prove the identity of the wreck.  The FBI team have acquired a magnetometer for this purpose, and they will be able to carry out surveys on other underwater sites of historical and cultural interest.  An area of about four and a half square miles to the south of the wreck site has already been identified as a promising area to search and has been called the "Filey Box".  The Box has been divided up into areas that will be surveyed in phases.  The first of these areas is around the wreck site and is about half a mile square, and is further divided up into "lanes".   The magnetometer will be towed along these lanes in a north west - south east line working with the tide.  These lanes are 300 feet apart and the magnetometer is towed along one lane to a "way point" or fixed location on the chart, and then back on the next lane overlapping the previous surveyed lane by 150 feet.  This overlap ensures that targets are not missed.  When the area has been surveyed, the next area of the Box is surveyed and gain, the survey areas within the box are overlapped and so on, to ensure that all the seabed is covered.  The Initiative Team are surveying other wrecks, including wrecks on the shoreline.

Another tool in the investigation has been provided by HMS Gleaner, a Royal Navy survey vessel, these include some high resolution survey images (not completed with the use of a magnetometer) that provide information on objects near to the wooden wreck site.  It is important to eliminate natural features in the area, such as large rocks that are present from the investigation, and the divers are using the information provided to dive and identify them.  The survey by HMS Gleaner provided some very important clues to what else is in Filey Bay and this is believed to extend to the possibility of a  river bed feature shown on both images.  This could be  evidence of a prehistoric submerged landscape that was last seen before the sea levels rose to flood the land bridge between England and the Continent forming the North Sea.  The Initiative is indebted to them for their hard work and generosity on behalf of the community.

“The Filey Bay Initiative team comprises a group of dedicated volunteers who provide diving, technical support, research and administration expertise and are ably assisted by the Friends of Filey Bay support group. The Initiative reaches out to a wide range of groups and ages and supports the Filey schools with its work, it also produces educational publications and more of this range work can be seen on the local website www.fileybay.com

Heritage has a crucial role to play in delivering sustainable communities.  For many people, it is heritage that provides their community with as sense of character, distinctiveness and identity and makes it somewhere they want to live.  In towns and cities, heritage has provided the starting point for imaginative and successful regeneration”. (Heritage Protection for the 21st Century, a document presented to Parliament by the Secretary for Culture, Media and Sport  in March 2007.)