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A shipwreck sits at the bottom of the water near Green Island, showing parts of the ship covered in sand.

Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources

Henley Wollak had just one wish for the weekend before her fifth birthday.

She wanted to swim at Green Island, her favorite spot near her home in Peshtigo, Wis., where the waves washed up rocks and pebbles that she often pored over, searching for glimmering sea glass.

But on Aug. 13, Henley found something far more rare.

While fishing that day, she and her father, Tim Wollak, happened upon a shipwreck that wasn’t marked on the map they’d been using for navigation. The wreck was in a well-known area, and, when he couldn’t find it on the map, Wollak figured that it “must not be anything important.” But what they probably uncovered were remnants of the George L. Newman, a 122-foot-long ship that was abandoned during the 1871 Peshtigo fire, one of the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-environment/2023/08/11/maui-fire-death-toll-compared-us-wildfires/" target=_blank>deadliest wildfires</a> in U.S. history. The wreck’s location and data match those of the ship, the Wisconsin Historical Society <a href="https://www.facebook.com/wisconsinhistoricalsociety/posts/pfbid0T3Rzt5EM4vnwHPnfubt1NNahoNhCGEunHBMzyzmFhay9Riq55BK7afkSwvey5Gzfl" target=_blank>announced</a> last week.

“It literally never crossed my mind that it was some type of significant shipwreck,” Wollak, 36, told The Washington Post after researchers investigated their discovery.

He and Henley have been exploring the lakes and rivers of the Midwest together “from the beginning,” Wollak said, as her first boat ride was at just two weeks old.

‘The night America burned’: The deadliest — and most overlooked — fire in U.S. history

And they’d found random objects lurking beneath the surface before. Earlier this year, while Wollak and Henley were out on the Boundary Waters in Minnesota, they came across a bay where they could see tires piled at the bottom of the lake. They’d also found vestiges of small boats and ice shacks while out fishing.

But they’d never seen a shipwreck until August, Wollak said.

As they drove their boat along a shoal at Green Island, Wollak saw something come into view on his fish finder, a sonar imaging tool that helps locate fish. It looked man-made, with straight lines jutting out from it. Wollak immediately knew it was a shipwreck.

But to 4-year-old Henley, the lines resembled tentacles.

“I think it’s an octopus,” Wollak recalled her saying.

After taking a few more pictures of the shipwreck on the fish finder, Wollak and Henley went on their way.

But over the next few days, Wollak kept wondering about the ship they’d seen. He did some searching online and eventually joined a <a href="https://www.facebook.com/groups/333827440359540" target=_blank>Facebook group</a> called “Forgotten Wisconsin,” where users posted about state history. In October, Wollak shared photos of the shipwreck with the group.

Shortly after, a researcher at the Wisconsin Historical Society contacted Wollak with questions about the wreck. The organization’s maritime archaeologists believed it was one that had not yet been recorded, Wollack said.

He sent them photos and the coordinates. From there, the Wisconsin Historical Society and the state’s Department of Natural Resources began to investigate. They took their own sonar images of the wreck and compared the information with a shipwreck database the historical society runs with the University of Wisconsin’s Sea Grant Institute, said Tamara Thomsen, a Wisconsin Historical Society maritime archaeologist.

The shipwreck’s three masts, length and location all matched those of the George L. Newman, Thomsen said.

Built in 1855, the barkentine was carrying a load of lumber on Oct. 8, 1871, through the dense smoke from the Peshtigo fire — a blaze that burned more than a million acres and killed as many as 2,500 people.

After salvaging what they could after the fire, the crew abandoned the George L. Newman, the Wisconsin Historical Society said. After it sank, it became covered with sand, and no one seemed to have spotted it until Wollak and Henley in August, according to the organization.

If its identity is confirmed, the shipwreck will become one of about 250 known sites in the state, which has recorded more than 780 shipwrecks, Thomsen said. Every year, the Wisconsin Historical Society receives reports of about three to four new shipwreck discoveries.

While the finds aren’t extremely rare, Thomsen said, Wollak and Henley’s brings a unique tie to the Peshtigo fire, which itself is often forgotten as it occurred on the same day as the Great Chicago Fire. In the spring, researchers will survey the shipwreck to confirm its identity and examine whether it could be listed on the National Register of Historic Places.

In the meantime, Thomsen and other Wisconsin researchers will continue to investigate shipwreck discoveries.

“I want to find more,” she told The Post.

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, BA in journalism, BA in biology

Praveena Somasundaram is a reporter on The Washington Post's General Assignment desk. She started at The Post as an intern in 2022 and has previously reported at the Dallas Morning News and the Charlotte Observer.

Praveena Somasundaram

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A 4-year-old went fishing with her dad. They found a shipwreck from 1871.

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