After two decades of searching for La Salle's lost ship "La Belle," Texas Historical Commission (THC) divers in 1995 located a shipwreck containing historic artifacts of European origin in the silty bottom of Matagorda Bay, off the coast of Texas. The first cannon lifted from the waters bore late seventeenth-century French insignias. The ill-fated "La Belle" had been found.Under the direction of then-THC Archeology Division Director James Bruseth, the THC conducted a full excavation of the water-logged "La Belle." The conservation was subsequently completed at Texas A&M University's...