COPENHAGEN, DENMARK—The Guardian reports that debris from the Danish flagship Dannebroge has been discovered at the bottom of Copenhagen Harbor. The 157-foot warship was commanded by Commodore Olfert Fischer and sunk by Admiral Horatio Nelson during the Battle of Copenhagen in 1801. Denmark’s navy had formed a blockade outside the harbor when Britain’s navy attacked. Cannonballs hit the Dannebroge’s upper deck before shelling set the vessel on fire and it eventually exploded. Morten Johansen of Denmark’s Viking Ship Museum and his colleagues have recovered two cannons, uniforms, insignia, shoes, bottles, and a human jaw from the bottom of the harbor. They also determined that the wooden ship parts they recovered match historic drawings of the Dannebroge, and dendrochronological dating of the wood fits with the year the Dannebroge was constructed. “[It was] a nightmare to be onboard one of these ships,” Johansen said. “When a cannonball hits a ship, it’s not the cannonball that does the most damage to the crew, it’s wooden splinters flying everywhere, very much like grenade debris,” he explained. Nineteen of Dannebroge’s crew members were never found, while thousands were killed in the battle. To read about seventeenth-century Danish explorers' activities in the northern latitudes, go to "Kidnapped in Copenhagen."
