The First Discoveries

From early 1931 Ted Wright and his brother kept up a continuous search the foreshore at North Ferriby. The peat and clay bank of the River Humber yielded bones and antlers, plant and insect remains and later some worked wood. In 1937 Ted saw the ends of three great oak planks protruding from the estuarine clay and immediately recognised them as part of an ancient boat. In that and the next year, four exploratory digs were undertaken and the find was identified as the bottom of a boat the remains of which were over 43 feet (13.17m) long and 5.6 feet (1.7m) wide. One end of the boat was nearly complete and the other end, together with most of the sides was missing. These remains came to be called Ferriby Boat 1 or F1 for short.

On leave from the Army in 1940, Ted found the end of another boat-plank some 60 yards upstream from F1. This (F2) proved to be most of a centre-strake of two planks which were joined amidships.