The ship that carries Dracula to England in Bram Stoker’s novel is the Demeter. Dracula boards the vessel at Varna, carrying boxes of Transylvanian earth that he needs as resting places during his journey to England.
The voyage is told largely through the ship captain’s log. One by one, the crew disappears, and the captain records strange sightings and unexplained deaths. When the Demeter reaches Whitby, rescuers find the captain lashed to the helm, while Dracula escapes ashore in the form of a large dog.
The episode helped establish Dracula’s arrival as one of the novel’s most memorable Gothic set pieces. Stoker drew inspiration from Whitby’s real maritime history, including the wreck of the Russian cargo ship Dmitry, which ran aground there in 1885. The novel’s Demeter is sometimes confused with that real vessel, but they are not the same ship. Demeter is the fictional ship named in the novel.