Scottish Chief Anchor

Scottish Chief Anchor. Hillsborough County Veterans Memorial Park. The Tampa Tribune published a story in 1982 about Calvin “Poppa” Taylor, a treasure hunter of sorts, who claimed to have gotten inside information from a descendant of McKay who revealed where to look for sunken treasure. The story includes a photo of Taylor posing with a steering wheel he says is from either the Kate Dale or the Scottish Chief. Taylor said he got the wheel during a dive he made in the 1960s and for years told everyone he had found the Scottish Chief. “You’ll find them out there, sunk deep in the mud and silt,” Taylor told the tribune at the time. “The hulls are still there, buried along the bank. But it’s too damn dirty to see.” Tom Wagner, spokesman for The Florida Aquarium, which is coordinating the funding for the archaeological project, said researchers were aware of Taylor’s claims and used that information, along with information from people living along the river, and data collected from sophisticated sonar equipment to pinpoint exactly where the ship’s wreckage lies. The Kate Dale and the Scottish Chief belonged to Capt. McKay, for whom McKay Bay is named, both were in the business of smuggling, most likely cotton, to help operate and provision the Confederacy, Morris said. Nobody knows for sure, but legend has it that the Scottish Chief was towed downriver to the bay where it’s steam engine was pulled and installed in another ship., This anchor and other items were believed to have been found and recovered by a local diver known as Calvin “Poppa” Taylor in the mid to late 1960s. He placed them at Rivercove Park in Tampa. The anchor was moved from Rivercove Park to its current location at the Veterans Memorial Park, around 2005.