Scuba instructor Phoebe Eggar describes herself as a nosey person, which could explain why she often makes discoveries while diving around Bermuda.

This month, only three weeks after the season started for her employer, Blue Water Divers and Watersports, she found a wedding ring.

“It was out at Western Blue Cut,” she said.

Western Blue Cut is an opening in the reef on the North Shore about an hour’s journey by boat from the mainland.

“There are a few wrecks around there,” Ms Eggar said.

Last week, she was there exploring the remains of the Montana, a paddle steamer that sank in December 1863. The vessel was a Civil War blockade runner transporting supplies from London to the Confederacy in North Carolina.

“It is one of my favourite dive sites,” Ms Eggar said. “It is covered with old bottles and other cool stuff to find.”

When it went down, the ship was carrying concrete blocks, plates, mugs and medical supplies including many tiny vials of morphine.

“Many older people in Bermuda have these little bottles in their homes,” Ms Eggar said. “Some still have morphine in them.”

The popular dive site inspired Peter Benchley’s novel and movie adaptation The Deep (1977).

“It is a good dive site, and its association with the movie makes it popular with our clients,” Ms Eggar said. “We get a lot of people who really want to see it because of The Deep. I have not seen the movie but I really like going out there. I look at everything really closely.”

Ms Eggar was diving near the stern of the Montana, when she noticed something glinting on the rocks below. She swam in to take a closer look and spotted a wedding ring.

“When I first picked it up, it had a bit of iron oxidation on it,” she said. “There is quite a lot of rusted metal around the Montana. Some of the rust had rubbed off on the ring. It must have been there a fair while.”

She and her team often find snorkels dropped on the wreck, and return them to the dive operation they came from. They also try to collect any trash they spot in the water and throw it out on land.

Looking closer, Ms Eggar found an inscription on the ring, the names “Kevin and Janice” and a wedding date.

“It looks silver but says 14K,” she said. “I think the ring is white gold. It is definitely a man’s ring, and looks like it has been worn. I think Kevin wore it faithfully.”

She has deduced that the ring had to have been dropped at some point in the past 15 years, probably by people snorkelling or diving.

Ms Eggar, and the team at Blue Water Divers and Watersports hope to reunite the ring with its rightful owners. If someone does come forward to claim the item, they will have to give the date of their wedding and the rest of the inscription.

Blue Water Divers and Watersports “splashed” their boat into the water only three weeks ago.

“We had a lot of engine troubles over the winter,” she said. “We have only just started running charters again, and it is proving to be busy. It is picking up as the cruise ships are coming in.”

Eleven months ago, she was at the same dive spot when she found a message in a bottle.

She first noticed it after a dive but was not immediately sure what she saw.

“I surfaced and saw something floating by,” she said. “I thought it was an old tin can.”

It was a choppy day and she was tired, but still swam after it, intending to throw it in the garbage.

It was not a can but a large bottle containing a slightly damp piece of paper. When she got back on the boat, she found that it read: “This bottle is part of a marine water currents project. Please send an e-mail with the date and location of where you found it. Next, please put this bottle back in the water and relaunch it.”

Included was a reference number comprising the date it was sent and an e-mail with the username BottletrackerVA.

The find catapulted her to 30 seconds of fame. After being featured in The Royal Gazette, the story was picked up by the American press, and was then featured on a Virginia news television programme.

“I was on television for one minute,” Ms Eggar said. “My favourite thing was when I went to the grocery store, two of the cashiers recognised me from the newspaper. They used to try to get me to come to them so they could ask me about it.”

So far there has been no response to the story. Ms Eggar is a little disappointed by that but still lives in hope.

“There was a university near to where the bottle was dropped in the water in Virginia,” she said. “I have a powerful mind to contact the university to see if they have any answers.”

• If you have information about the bottle or the ring, e-mail phoebe.eggar.pe@gmail.com