Scuba Diving magazine Readers Choice Awards consistently rank North Carolina as a top spot for U.S. wreck-diving. The coastal waters surrounding Wilmington and its island beaches afford a bevy of shipwrecks that interpret the region’s maritime heritage. In this two-part series, Dr. Gordon P. Watts, Jr. (N.C.’s first underwater archaeologist) takes us on a dive back in time to explore sunken blockade runners.