Seven of history's most disturbing ghost ship stories that will haunt your dreams

While it sounds like the stuff of legend – and fuel for seafarers’ nightmares – ghost ships are real nautical phenomena. They have inspired horror-infused stories and wild theories alike, and their names can send shivers down the spine.

Here, from the golden age of piracy to 20th century tales, explore some of the most famous and mysterious ghost ships throughout history, each with its own chilling tale.

The most famous ghost ships in history

● Mary Celeste
● SS Baychimo
● Flying Dutchman
● MV Joyita
● Carroll A. Deering
● Ourang Medan
● Jian Seng

Mary Celeste

The most famous ghost ship of them all has to be the Mary Celeste. Having left New York in early November 1872, bound for Italy, the merchant brigantine was spotted drifting alone in the Atlantic Ocean on 5 December.

The abandoned ship was found by the Dei Gratia off the Azores, but there was no trace of Captain Benjamin Briggs, his wife, their two-year-old daughter, or his small crew of seven. While the cargo and crew’s personal belongings were undisturbed, the sails had been only partially set, a log entry had not been made in the last 10 days, and a lifeboat was missing.

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What’s more, although there was water in the hold, the Mary Celeste was at no risk of sinking. So, what caused Briggs and the crew to desert a seaworthy ship? And what were their fates?

There have been many theories. Despite a lack of evidence, some were suspicious of mutiny, piracy or an elaborate fraud. In the years since, natural phenomena like waterspouts (essentially, a tornado at sea) or fears that the gases leaking from the alcohol in the hold could explode have also been mooted.

While no conclusive explanation has ever been uncovered, the leading hypothesis suggests that Briggs believed the ship to be sinking, incorrectly. It was taking on water and one of the pumps seemed to be broken, which may have led the crew to carry out a hasty and premature evacuation.

Ultimately, the reason for Mary Celeste’s abandonment remains one of maritime history’s greatest mysteries, as is the fate of its crew.

SS Baychimo

For ten years from 1921, when it came under the ownership of the Hudson's Bay Company, the cargo ship SS Baychimo traversed the fraught northern waters of the Arctic Circle, carrying furs and other goods to and from trading posts on Canada’s north coast.

In October 1931, it became trapped in pack ice off the coast of Alaska. Completely stuck and with no prospect of breaking free before the ice crushed the ship, the all but skeleton crew of 15 were evacuated by plane.

The men who stayed hoped to wait out the winter by living in a wooden shelter near the stricken Baychimo. But after bunkering down for several days during a blizzard, they emerged to find the ship had disappeared.

They assumed it had sunk; in fact, the Baychimo remained afloat and had broken free of the ice after all. After being corrected by seal hunters who had spotted it floating free, the sailors tracked it down, retrieved some of its cargo and then abandoned it once more.

Over the next few decades, the Baychimo was spotted numerous times in Arctic waters. Attempts were made to board or salvage the vessel, but the ice and weather conditions meant it always eluded capture.

The last confirmed sighting of the crewless ghost ship was in 1969. That said, there have been sporadic reported sightings since. Is it possible that its voyage continues?

Flying Dutchman

A name that can strike fear in a sailor’s heart, the Flying Dutchman puts the ‘ghost’ in ‘ghost ship’. Unlike the real vessels on this list, this ship is based on myth and legend: a ghoulish warship unable to make port, so doomed to sail the oceans for eternity. And to see it is a portent of disaster.

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First mentioned in literature in the late-1700s, supposed sightings of the Flying Dutchman, often through thick veils of mist and fog, have been reported for centuries. The future George V and his brother Prince Albert Victor apparently spotted the ship off the coast of Australia in 1881. Yet no evidence exists that the Flying Dutchman was ever real.

Instead, it occupies a more archetypal place in the lore of naval history. The Flying Dutchman has inspired poems and stories, an opera by Richard Wagner, and, most recently, the terrifying ship captained by Davy Jones in the Pirates of the Caribbean movies.

MV Joyita

Few maritime mysteries are as perplexing as that of the MV Joyita, a luxury yacht-turned-commercial vessel that disappeared in the South Pacific in 1955. It had set sail from Samoa on 3 October with 25 passengers and crew aboard bound for the Tokelau Islands just over 300 miles away.

It never reached its destination. But five and a half weeks later, the Joyita was discovered more than 600 miles off course, still afloat yet partially submerged.

All 25 people were missing, along with four tons of cargo, the ship's logbook and navigational equipment. Adding to the confusion, the radio had been tuned to the international distress signal but no SOS call had ever been received.

The ensuing investigation brought no clear answers to what befell the ship. Since then, theories have ranged from piracy and botched abandonment after a mechanical failure, to kidnapping by a Soviet submarine and murder by a Japanese fishing fleet.

Carroll A. Deering

In late January 1921, the Carroll A Deering – a five-masted schooner built for speed and capacity in the post-First World War shipping boom – was spotted off the coast of North Carolina. It was heading right for Diamond Shoals: the so-called ‘Graveyard of the Atlantic’.

It would take several days before anyone was able to board the ship, which had indeed run aground on the notorious shoals, but the 12-strong crew and lifeboats were missing. No sign of them has ever been found since.

There was damage to the steering equipment, and an earlier communication with the ship revealed that the anchors had been lost, but the cause for the desertion has never been ascertained. Could it have collided with another vessel or had there been a misjudged mutiny? The captain had complained of the crew being difficult.

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Other theories have suggested the Deering was hijacked by Prohibition-era rum runners or Russian saboteurs. And, of course, with a mystery like this it wouldn’t be long before the Bermuda Triangle was mentioned.

An intriguing clue to the ship’s fate emerged in April 1921, when a message in a bottle washed up claiming it had been captured by an “oil-burning boat”. The note, however, was found to be a hoax by a local fisherman.

But further investigation of the Deering was impossible – in March, the wreck had been destroyed as part of efforts to remove hazards from the shoals.

SS Ourang Medan

The tale of the SS Ourang Medan is shrouded in mystery, marked by a significant lack of evidence and conflicting reports. In fact, that’s all it might be: a tale, an urban legend. After all, no ship of that name ever appeared on official records and shipping registers.

According to the story, the Dutch ship was passing through the Strait of Malacca, off Indonesia, in the 1940s when its radio operator sent out a frantic SOS claiming the officers were dead, and that remainder of the crew probably were too, before transmitting one final, chilling message: “I die”.

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A rescue ship rushed to the scene, but all that was found was the Ourang Medan adrift with no sign of life. The bodies of the crew were strewn everywhere, fixed with expressions of terror despite no visible injuries or clear cause of death.

Before the ship could be investigated further, a fire reportedly broke out and the rescuers had to get clear of the ship before it exploded, sending the wreck into the depths.

Theories have swirled around the fate of the Ourang Medan – as has the question of whether it truly existed. Regardless, it remains one of the most haunting ghost ship legends out there.

Jian Seng

Not only is the fate of Jian Seng’s crew unknown, but the ship’s very origins are too. In 2006, the 80-metre tanker was spotted from the air drifting off the coast of Queensland, Australia. It was both abandoned and damaged beyond use.

Where the ship came from, who its crew was, and what it was doing in that part of the ocean has never been determined.

The tanker bore no identifying marks. As the Jian Seng was not reported missing, and authorities could not track its ownership, it was suspected that the ship had been used for illegal activity, such as drug smuggling or forbidden fishing operations.

The Jian Seng was eventually towed out to sea and scuttled. Still, its sudden appearance and the complete mystery about its past have made it a modern symbol of the chilling allure of ghost ships.