Submerged

I lived in Brighton until I was about 24, and in all those years we never had a shipwreck, in spite of seeing loads of ships sailing back and forth on the horizon. There once was a dead whale washed up near the West Pier (now burned down) which drove

Many ships have fallen foul of the Lizard with its dense fog and treacherous seas, and in 1907 the White Star liner Suevic joined that infamous club when it was wrecked on rocks just yards from the Lizard lifeboat station. The wrecking was notable for

Simon was the ships cat on H.M.S. Amethyst.For his outstanding behaviour in keeping morale up, and the rats down, during Amethysts troubles, even though he was wounded by shellfire, he was awarded the Dickinson medal. This is the equivilent of the animal

I am extremely grateful to Mrs Marlene Horton for allowing me to post her son's letter, and for lending me the photos and video footage below Sydney Horton joined the Royal Navy on 15th July 1947 as a Boy Seaman. He did his basic training at H.M.S.Ganges

Film Poster It is hard to believe that after all the Amethyst had done that she should end up being scrapped alongside one of Plymouths most popular pubs, the China House. But all ships eventually have to die, only their story lives on and what a story

By 10-30 hours no attempt had been made to board the ship, but the shelling and small arms fire carried on unabated. Lt.Com. Weston decided to evacuate as many of the crew as he could to the opposite bank of the river which was controlled by the Kuomintang.

On the 29th March 1930, the submarine L 1 came adrift from its tow and drifted without fuss onto the rocks at Penanwell Cove, near Porth Nanven in Cornwall. The submarine, a veteran of the First World War, had been launched by Vickers at Barrow in 1917

I have always had a soft spot for Prawle Point, because it has a wild and beautiful seascape. This wildness, had been the cause of many, many shipwrecks (see Prawle Point and Dimitrios) over the ages, and so I have often tramped over its cliffs and

In 1942 the Allies mounted a disastrous raid on Dieppe to see if it was feasible to capture an enemy held port to help with the invasion. Among the many lessons learned was the fact that the German defences around the Channel ports, the so called Atlantic

This is one of the first shipwrecks that I saw on the Cornish coast. It is on the beach over towards Polhawn Cove on the Rame Head side of the Bay. There is a convenient car park, and the path down to the beach is easy to find and not too steep. It is

Twelve miles North West of Hartland Point and the North Devon coast lies the rugged granite island of Lundy. Just three miles long, this little island of volcanic origin lies right at the entrance to the Bristol Channel, directly in the path of what once

Whitsands Bay, stretching from Rame Head to Looe is one of the great Cornish seascapes. Rugged two hundred foot high cliffs overlooking miles of sandy beaches provide an ideal setting for surfer's, sailors, walkers, and divers. Towards

Rame Head with its little chapel guards the entrance to the Bay. The chapel dates back to 600AD and has been used as a church and a lookout. It was from here that a beacon was lit to warn Drake of the approach of the Spanish

Mizzen mast of the Great Britain Designed by Isambard Kingdom Brunel, the Great Britain was launched at Bristol in July 19 1843, and was the largest ship afloat in the world at that time. She arrived storm damaged

The Jhelum is a 128 ft boat built in 1849 at Liverpool. Her name comes from a tributary of the Indus river in India. She left Calloa for Dunkirk on the 13 July 1870 overloaded, and rounded Cape Horn with great difficulty.

In 2007 I was lucky enough to go down to the Antarctic on M.V. Discovery. On the way we stopped at the Falkland Islands where, amongst all the wonderful wildlife, they also have lots of abandoned clipper ships and other vessels. M.V.

Named after one of the Falkland islands most common penguins, the Gentoo came to the Falklands in 1927 and then spent many years carrying supplies and wool for the farming company Dean Brothers. She later passed into

The Falkland Islands have a total land area half the size of Wales and are made up of two main large islands, and over seven hundred small ones. The islands are basically very hilly, barren and windswept rather like Dartmoor

The Lady Elizabeth was a three masted barque, 223 ft long,1208 tonnes built in Sunderland by R. Thompson in 1879. her hulk now lies in Whalebone Cove to the east of Stanley harbour and is one of the best preserved wrecks

Montevideo was founded by the Spanish in the early 18th century as a military stronghold. Its natural harbour soon developed into a commercial center competing with the Argentine capital of Buenos Aires. The River Plate is the esturary

Montivideo is the largest city, capital and chief port of Uruguay. Its harbour is one of the most important in the America's. Surrounded by beautiful sandy beaches the city of Montivideo is a mix of historic old buildings

As you come up the River Plate to Montevideo you can see the mast of the Highland Chieftain sticking out of the water from miles away. The un-initiated on the ship thought that this was the remains of the Graff Spee. No

HMS Agamemnon was a Royal Navy third-rate ship of the line with an armament of 64 guns.She was 160 feet long,44 feet in the beam and had a crew of 490 officers and men. She was laid down at Bucklers Hard on the Beaulieu

Albatross: This ship was 210 tons and 107 ft long, and was built in Svelvik, Norway in 1921 as a whale catcher, but was later converted to sealing. Albatross Dias: This boat is an historically important vessel. She was built

Whalecatcher Petrel The whale catcher Petrel (245 tons and 115 ft) was built in Oslo, Norway in 1928. She was one of the first whale catchers to have a catwalk so that the gunner could run from the bridge to the harpoon

Gritviken (the word is Swedish for Pot Cove) is the principle settlement in the UK territory of South Georgia in the South Atlantic. It was so named by a 1902 Swedish surveyor who found four old English try pots used to render

I have always wanted to go to Gritviken, as it is were the great Polar explorer, Shackleton is buried (see my article about him in the Tombstones section.) Also the abandoned whaling station is very evocative of those (not

Actually this is now resting on the bottom but shows quite clearly. The dock was built in 1928. The idea was that she went out to the whale catchers in the bay and they towed the whale carcasses onto the partly submerged

Crackington Haven is a small village on the North Cornish coast situated between Bude and Boscastle, and easily reached from the A39. Once it was a small port importing limestone and coal and exporting slate and local produce.

If you drive from Rame Head back towards Tregantle you will come across Freathy and a large car park. Now don't go down the path opposite because at the bottom are some steep rocks that block your entrance to the bit

For many people, divng is not an option. But many love wreck stories, and as I have said many times in this website, our bit of coast is littered with the rusting remains of hundreds of shipwrecks, many of which you

Talland Bay in Cornwall, is just between Looe and Pollpero and is very popular in the summer. There is not much sand, but the rocks are easy to walk on. There is a nice little cafe and the swimming is very good. Just

If you take a train ride from Plymouth to London the train slows right down as it approaches Dawlish and runs along the coast for a few miles, and then enters the Exe estuary. It's all very scenic, but in the winter

The Kantoeng, at the time she was launched on 22nd of December 1936, was the largest bucket tin dredger in the world. She was built in Schiedam in Holland by A.F.Smulders for a Dutch mining company operating out of

iIn 1758 William Hutchison became the Dock Master of the Old Dock at Liverpool. As a former ship's captain he was well aware of what could happen if you misjudged the tides, and so when he swapped his life as a ship's