Boon Island

John Winthrop, the English Puritan lawyer and one of the leading figures in founding the Massachusetts Bay Colony, mentions passing Boon Island in the 1600s.

Fierce storms repeatedly scour Boon Island, which has an elevation of 14 feet (4.3 m) above sea level at its highest point.

Consequently, in 1854–1855 the tallest lighthouse in New England, Boon Island Light, was built — 133 feet (40 m) of massive granite blocks at a cost of US$25,000.

However, Celia Thaxter, a 19th-century American writer of poetry and stories, described the ironically named Boon Island as "the forlornest place that can be imagined."

The remaining ten crewmen managed to stay alive despite winter conditions with no food and no fire for twenty-four days, until finally rescued.

[1] A vigorous public relations battle ensued in London the following summer between the captain and members of his unhappy crew, which also helped make the story famous in its day.

The only non-fiction history of the event, "Boon Island: A True Story of Mutiny, Shipwreck and Cannibalism," by Andrew Vietze and Stephen Erickson, appeared in 2012.

It is said that after the Nottingham Galley disaster, local fishermen began leaving barrels of provisions on Boon Island in case of future wrecks.

The stern section, which included the ship's cargo holds, sank in approximately 260 feet (80 m) of water, one and one half miles (2–3 km) from the Island.

In August 1990, the United States Coast Guard became aware of the existence of a plan of stowage dating from 1944 for the ship indicating that 221 flasks (7,620 kg) of mercury may have been loaded onto the vessel.