Someone Paid $95,000 For This Pair Of Jeans Salvaged From The 1857 Shipwreck

Enlarge / Would you pay $95,000 for these jeans? They were salvaged from the wreck of the SS Central America, which sank in 1857. Holabird Western Americana Collections

A pair of men's jeans salvaged from the wreckage of a 19th century steamer fetched $95,000 at auction last week. According to the auction house's description, these are the earliest known pair of sturdy five-button fly work trousers, most likely made by or for Levi Strauss & Company in the 1850s. with the SS Central America off the Carolina coast during a hurricane in September 1857 and is remarkably well preserved, thanks to the anaerobic environment in which it was found. Previously, the oldest known pair of Levi's were found in an abandoned mine shaft and dated back to the 1880s, auctioning off earlier this year for $87,400.

The SS Central America was a 280-foot steamer operating between Central America and the east coast of the United States in the 1850s. On her ill-fated last voyage, she carried 587 passengers and crew, many of whom had traveled from San Francisco to Panama via another steamer. (This was before the construction of the Panama Canal.) Among its cargo were thousands of freshly minted 1857 Double Eagle coins, as well as older gold coins and bullion (gold bricks) - hence its nickname, the "Golden Ship".

The voyage started well enough, but on September 9, 1857, a Category 2 hurricane hit, shredding the ship's sails. Two days later it took on water and the water wheels and boiler failed. The sharp drop in steam pressure also shut down both bilge pumps, so passengers and crew worked tirelessly as part of a bucket brigade to combat the rising waters. There was a brief calm, but the crew was unable to restart the boilers, and soon the hurricane came back in full force.

On the morning of September 12, two nearby ships were spotted and 153 passengers, mostly women and children, were put into lifeboats and rescued. But continued strong winds pulled Central America and her remaining passengers and crew farther. It sank at 8 p.m., killing 425 people still on board. The captain, William Lewis Herndon, sank nobly with his ship. About 50 people were later rescued from the waters, including a man named Ansel Easton, who was on honeymoon with his new wife, Adeline. (Fortunately, she had been placed on one of the lifeboats and also survived.) All the gold also sank with the ship, and the sinking was at least partially responsible for the Panic of 1857. Several banks in New York on the verge of failing badly needed this influx of money, which never came.

Enlarge / Painting depicting the sinking of the SS Central America. Public domain

Central America languished on the ocean floor until 1988, when treasure hunter Tommy Gregory Thompson led an expedition to locate the wreck and recover gold and other artifacts using remote control vehicles (ROVs). The recovered gold was valued at between $100 million and $150 million, and the largest piece - an 80-pound brick of gold dubbed "Eureka" - was recovered