03/03/2025

The Mary Rose by Margaret Rule

The Mary Rose by Margaret Rule – The Excavation and Raising of Henry VIII’s Flagship – is a book I wanted to read for my trip to Portsmouth where I went to see the ship. This is an old book, the second one that I received as part of a donation made on behalf of a former Oxonian who died prematurely. I am very grateful for the donation.

Margaret Rule was one of the people involved in the retrieving of the ship from the bottom of the sea. She worked on the project for years. Because of her personal connection with King Charles, then the Prince of Wales, he was happy to write the foreword to the book. King Charles was very interested in the shipwreck and the retrieving process that he dived to see it and he was there when it was lifted out of the water.

The book is rather long for the topic, 200+ pages, and it covers the discovery of the ship, as the exact location was lost after centuries in the water. There are plenty of pictures from the search, the retrieval of various artefacts, and, of course, there are pictures of how the ship was lifted out. It involved moving it, still under water, to a supporting frame, before lifting up the ship on the supporting frame. It was quite a feat of engineering. She explained why the ship was not lifted up in the 1500s, when it went down, and also covered the topic of how the artefacts were so well preserved. Because it was published in 1982 it doesn’t talk about the museum, but for anyone interested in the ship or on their way to the museum, it is definitely worth trying to get a copy of the book, either used or maybe from the library, if available.