Mystery as hundreds of Victorian shoes uncovered on UK beach | UK | News

Hundreds of leather shoes were found on a beach in Wales. Beach Academy is a volunteer-based company focused on removing marine litter and revitalizing natural rock pool environments.

The team found nearly 300 pieces while clearing debris from the shore on December 18, and many more have been found since then. More than 400 black leather shoes believed to date back to the Victorian Era were unearthed by the team, prompting a theory as to where they might have come from.

Emma Lamport, founder of Beach Academy, said: “The strongest theory is that the shoes come from the wreck of a ship called the Frolic, which hit the Tusker Rocker about 150 years ago. It was carrying shoes and cargo from Italy.”

“They have drifted into the Ogmore River and appear occasionally, especially when the riverbank is eroded.”

Tusker Rock, located about three kilometers south-east of Ogmore in the Bristol Channel, is known as the “ship graveyard” and is believed to have taken its name from Tuska, the Viking who colonized the Vale of Glamorgan.

According to historical records, around 80 people were killed when the Froclic steam pack crashed into a rock on its way from Haverfordwest, Wales, to Bristol. There were no survivors.

It is said that bodies washed ashore for months after the wreck.

Beach Academy has removed more than 12,000 items of rubbish from beaches, but despite all the work, Ms Lamport says the team “haven’t even begun to scratch the surface” of the clean-up mission.

He added: “We want to restore rock pool habitats to their original natural state by removing marine litter that has been there for a while, embedded in sediment or trapped in rocks.”