Among the tantalizing items retrieved from the site: A leather-bound book that somehow survived for two centuries on the floor of the Gulf of Mexico. Mystery at sea: Shipwreck off Galveston probed in satellite salvage adventure 
 
 GALVESTON, Texas — A shipwreck undetected in the briny deep of the Gulf of Mexico for two centuries has been discovered off the coast of Texas, where archeologists using robotic submarines have launched a high-tech salvage operation. A variety of artifacts inside the ship's hull relates either to daily life on board or to the ship’s cargo. Scientists, archaeologists and students from Texas A&M University at Galveston have joined National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration experts investigating the wreck, which lies 4,300 deep about 150 miles from Galveston. Inside a control room on the campus of Texas A&M Galveston, a team of nautical archeologists and biologists are coordinating the exploration of the wreckage discovered by a Shell Oil survey crew about 150 miles off the coast. Below the surface: See the shipwreck off the coast of Galveston 
 
 Items found on the ship included anchors, navigational instruments, muskets, pistols, swords, cannons, glass bottles, ceramic plates and clothing, according to the agency and the universities. To help with the 24-hour recovery expedition, Texas A&M built an exploration command center on campus so agency and university scientists could monitor and help guide the expedition in real time, the university said in a news release Wednesday. Satellite video and audio signals keep them in communication with the crew staffing a vessel stationed above the debris field, which sits about 3000 feet below the surface of the water. Evidence retrieved so far suggests the vessel was a warship transporting arms and soldiers, possibly to support either Spain or Mexico in their war with each other.
– Insights into Texas' War for Independence may have just bubbled up from 4,300 feet below the surface of the Gulf of Mexico. A mystery shipwreck 150 miles off the coast of Galveston—found carrying muskets, swords, and cannons—may have been transporting weapons and soldiers to help in the battle, the AP reports. But while most artifacts from the 200-year-old wreck are from Spain and Mexico, some look British, and scientists aren't sure what type of ship it is and where exactly it came from, the Houston Chronicle reports. "It's really a mystery being put together," one of the salvagers told KHOU, calling the expedition, "a CSI adventure." Ceramic plates, anchors, clothing, glass bottles—including one sealed, full of yellow ginger—and even an intact leather-bound book were also recovered in the expedition by Texas A&M scientists using robot submarines. While it's also a mystery what sent the ship down, KHOU offers a clue: It hit the depths around the time that notorious pirate Jean Lafitte called Galveston home port.