A team of researchers excavating a 19th-century shipwreck in the Gulf of Mexico—the deepest wreck currently under excavation in U.S. waters—has found more than they had hoped for, including two other ships that appear to have been sunk at the same time.

Artifacts such as eyeglasses, navigational equipment, and telescopes indicate that no one made it off the copper-clad ship—dubbed the "Monterey Shipwreck," noted James Delgado, director of maritime heritage with the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA's) Office of Marine Sanctuaries. (See pictures from the wreck.)

"If you were in the midst of abandoning ship and getting into a lifeboat [and trying to] navigate your way home, you would grab your navigational instruments, your telescope. Those were all lying there," he said.

"You look at all of that and it hits you—nobody made it off this ship alive because all of their stuff is there."

The physical connection of interacting with artifacts was something that touched all of us, said Frederick Hanselmann, an underwater archaeologist with the Meadows Center for Water and the Environment at Texas State University in San Marcos. The Center organized the expedition and provided much of the funding.

We read about history in school, Hanselmann said, but what makes archaeology so special is that the history—in the form of artifacts—is tangible.

The Shell Oil Company initially discovered the wreck about 170 miles (274 kilometers) southeast of Galveston, Texas, in 2011 during a survey of potential drilling sites. The downed vessel had come to rest in 4,300 feet (1,300 meters) of water.