HMS Mary (1650)

Speaker was a 50-gun third-rate frigate and the name ship of the Speaker-class frigate, built for the navy of the Commonwealth of England by Christopher Pett at Woolwich Dockyard and launched in 1650. At the Restoration she was renamed HMS Mary. By 1677 her armament had been increased to 62 guns.

In 1688 Mary was rebuilt by Thomas Shish at Woolwich Dockyard as a 62-gun third-rate ship of the line. Mary was wrecked on the Goodwin Sands in the Great Storm of 1703.

Wreck site
Local divers found the wreck site in 1980. The initial designation was of 50 around what is now known as the South Mound; the North Mound was discovered in 1999 and the area was amended under Statutory Instrument number 2004/2395 as a 300 m radius around 51° 15.6302' N, 01° 30.0262' E.

It is believed that the Mary lies under the South Mound and the North Mound is the third rate HMS Restoration wrecked in the same storm, but this is not known for certain. The site lies 100 m to the west of the Goodwin Sands off Deal, between the wrecks of HMS Stirling Castle and HMS Northumberland, which also sank in the storm.

The site was investigated by Wessex Archaeology on 25 June 2006. The South Mound measures 28 m x 12 m but has not been studied in detail.