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The mystery of the M1

The M1 was the pride of the British Navy. She was Britain's most advanced submarine, a 100 metres long and weighed 2,000 tons. It was fitted with its own massive artillery gun that could hit targets that were 20 miles away, a reminder to the world that Britain still ruled the waves.

However, in 1925, she went missing on a routine mission in the English Channel and the crew of 69 men were lost. Able Seaman Sales went ashore, just hours before she sailed, as he had just learned that his mother had died. He was the only 'survivor' of the M1 crew. In the Board of Inquiry that followed the disappearance, it was believed that the SS Vidar had been involved in a collision with the sub. There was unexplained damage to the bow of the ship and fragments of naval issue paint were also found there. However, the exact cause and location remained a mystery.

It is a mystery which has fascinated former Navy diver, Richard Larn. He has spent the last 15 years of his life searching for the wreck. It wasn't an easy task for there are more shipwrecks per square mile in the English Channel than anywhere else in the world. Last year, he finally pinpointed the M1 thanks to a sonar fish which bounces signals off the seabed. The M1 lay at a depth of more than 70 metres which is out of reach of most divers. Consequently, the diving team had to use a mixture of gases to survive the extreme pressures at this depth. They confirmed that the wreck was the M1 thanks to the distinctive footholes in the conning tower.

The investigation of the divers and, then later, a remote submersible, found that the gun had been ripped off the sub in the collision with the Vidar. The weight of the gun, hanging over the side of the sub, destabilised it and the sub went down to the seabed in freefall. The control areas of the sub were flooded which meant that the crew couldn't lift the sub off the seafloor. The great depth meant that there was no possibility of escape.

The M1 is an official War Grave and protected by the 'Military Remains Act' 1986. Divers may not enter such wrecks or, in any way, disturb them.

Pandora's bounty

Reconstructed face of a Pandora crewman  © On the 28th of August 1791, the HMS Pandora sank off the northern coast of Australia when she had hit a reef, keeled over and sank. She was on her way back to Britain with 14 prisoners but hadn't found any trace of the Bounty. Her mission had started two years previously when she left Britain with orders to arrest the mutineers and bring the Bounty home. In 1789, the first mate of the Bounty, Fletcher Christian, had cast Captain Bligh and 18 others adrift in an open boat. However, the boat wasn't large enough to take all the crew members who wanted no part of the mutiny. Captain Bligh had noted their innocence so these crewmembers greeted the Pandora when it arrived at the island of Tahiti.

However the Pandora captain quickly slapped them in irons. He then sent soldiers to capture the six mutineers who had fled into the mountains. After eighteen days, they were all captured and brought to the ship. The 14 prisoners, guilty and innocent alike, were then caged in a specially built eleven foot wooden cell on the top deck. It was nicknamed Pandora's box and it was like a sauna with only two tiny gratings supplying the only fresh air.

In it's search of the Bounty, the Pandora came within two days sailing of Pitcairn Island where the Bounty mutineers had settled. However the mutineers fate was only revealed to the outside world when they were discovered some fifteen years later. In the night that the Pandora sank, some thirty-five men lost their lives. The diving team discovered the remains of three men who had gone down with the ship. One of the skeletons was discovered in the Captain's cabin. His skull was intact and forensic anatomist Meiya Sutisno was able to reconstruct his face. It is believed that he was Robert Bowler who was the pursers steward.

The Pandora survivors managed to climb aboard tenders and reach the safety of a sand cay. After two days on the baking sand cay, the survivors climbed into four open boats and Captain Edwards took them to the Dutch island of Timor, a journey of some 1,000 miles. There, they purchased a larger ship and sailed back to England. It had been an epic journey of nearly 30,000 miles. Captain Edwards was court-martialled for the loss of his ship but acquitted. Of the prisoners, six were found guilty and two publicly hung. The remainder were acquitted or pardoned. Today, the descendants of the mutineers of the Bounty still live on Pitcairn Island.

Blackbeard's revenge

Reconstructed Blackbeard pirate flag  © Blackbeard the pirate is a figure who seems to belong more to legend than to fact. It is believed that he was English who may have come from Bristol. In order to frighten his enemies and crew, he was known for stuffing smoking fuses in his hair for dramatic effect. In one famous incident, he shot Isreal Hands, one of his most trusted men, in the knee. His excuse was that if he didn't kill one of his crew now and then, they would forget who he was. His ship, the Queen Anne's Revenge, was the most powerful warship and allowed him to rule the waves from the Caribbean to the North Carolina coast. However, this power was short-lived for he had the ship for less than a year before it sank.

According to an eyewitness, this was on the 10th of June 1718 at Beaufort Inlet, North Carolina. The ship had ran aground on a sandbar at the mouth of the inlet. It was obvious from the position of a ship anchor that Blackbeard had made strenuous efforts to pull the ship off but to no avail. It was then left to the elements. Blackbeard, promptly, abandoned some unwanted crewmembers on a barren island. They would have died if a ship hadn't passed by a few days later.

The 'Queen Anne's Revenge' was originally a French vessel called The Concorde. She was transporting African slaves to the Caribbean, when in 1717, Blackbeard had captured her off the island of Martinique. The pirate was fortunate because the Concorde crew were weakened with dysentery and the remaining healthy crewmembers were in no position to defeat the pirates after a long and tiring voyage.

Through the Queen Anne's Revenge and his three other ships, Blackbeard captured some 23 ships and stripped them of anything of value. Just the sight of his flag, which shows a skeleton of the devil carrying a spear and an hourglass, made many ships surrender without a fight. The Royal Navy was helpless because they had just ten ships to police the entire American coastline. Later in 1718, Blackbeard sought shelter on the island of Ocracoke which is a hundred miles away to the north. On November 21st the pirates came ashore at Springer's Point. It is believed that they met up with other pirates and celebrated the night away. However, two vessels of the Royal Navy were lying in wait and attacked early the next day. Blackbeard fought furiously as he was determined never to surrender. He died after being shot five times and had 20 sword cuts.

The lost fleet

A surviving lost fleet cannon  © In 1678, a fleet of French warships were dispatched to capture the Dutch colony at Curacao. It was under the command of Vice Admiral Jean D'Estrees whose flagship was called Le Terrible. As his fleet approached the island of Las Aves, which is a hundred miles off the coast of Venezuela, they were decoyed onto the island's reef by a small force of three Dutch ships. When the Admiral's ship hit the reef, he fired cannons as a warning to the ships behind. However, this signal was interpreted by the following ships that the Admiral was under attack. The other ships came rushing to his aid and onto the waiting reefs.

On the 11th May 1678, the entire fleet of thirteen ships was lost because of the Admiral's eagerness to give battle. Five hundred sailors were drowned and over one thousand were marooned. The survivors found themselves on Las Aves where there was no fresh water. At the beginning, they were able to survive on barrels of wine and salted meats, but it wasn't long before their relief turned to despair and eventually death. The Admiral was one of the few to be rescued.

On the Admiral's map, the location of the large French warships and smaller vessels called Filibustiers are marked. Filibustiers is the French term for pirates. These pirates or buccaneers were part of the French fleet as Curacao would have been a rich prize for these pirates who were always on the lookout for rich pickings. The Admiral drew up a map of the wrecks and later returned to the scene to salvage the bronze cannons from the wrecks. Three hundred years later a team of divers went looking for the "Lost Fleet", using Admiral D'Estrees map. At the end of the search, they discovered the map is very accurate, but little remains of the vessels, only metal artefacts such as the cannons, lead shot and anchors have survived.

Cromwell's ship

Reconstruction of the Swan on the seabed  © In the summer of 1653, Oliver Cromwell sent a fleet of six vessels to finally crush the Royalist uprising in Scotland. One of these ships was the 'Swan' whose mission was to seize Duart Castle, a Royalist stronghold which overlooks the Sound of Mull. When the Swan arrived on the 5th of September 1653, the Royalists had already fled so the Castle put up no resistance.

The ship was sunk, eight days later, during a violent storm. Anchored in the bay, the ship was torn free and the wind drove her repeatedly against the rocks before she sank. She was to be lost for some 300 years before being discovered by a naval diver in 1979. The Swan had been built in 1641 and started life in the King's service. However in 1645, while their captain was away, the crew did a deal with the Parliamentarians. In a ritual handover, they surrendered their weapons in a pledge of loyalty for Cromwell. The Parliamentarian authorities then ceremonially returned their weapons and the crew sailed for the Parliamentarian cause. Oliver Cromwell sent a fleet of six vessels to finally crush the Royalist uprising in Scotland.

The wreck was identified as the Swan because of a wooden carving which had been raised from the wreck. On it, was the carved badge of the heir apparent to the throne. This proved that the ship had been under the command of Charles I. After sifting through the archives, a letter from the 1600's was discovered which helped pinpoint the wreck's identity. It was from the Scottish Parliamentarian Commander, Robert Lilburn to Oliver Cromwell. Robert Lilburn mentions three Parliamentarian ships including the Swan which were sunk in Scottish waters at this time. However, the Swan was the only one which had been 'captured' from the Royalists. Clearly the wreck must be the Swan.

Now, the wreck is the subject of painstaking research by leading marine archaeologist, Colin Martin, who has written our History of marine archaeology. In order to protect the fragile wreck, it has been designated as a protected wreck which means that there is a exclusion zone around it and no one can dive it without licence.

Find out more

Books

The Bounty: The True Story of the Mutiny on the Bounty by Caroline Alexander (Perennial, 2004)

Mutiny on the Bounty by Charles Nordhoff and James Norman Hall (Little Brown, 1989)

Mutiny on Board the H.M.S. Bounty (Great Illustrated Classics) by William Bligh (Abdo Publishing Company, 2002)

Blackbeard the Pirate: A Reappraisal of His Life and Times by Robert Earl Lee (John F Blair Publisher, 1992)

Blackbeard the Pirate by Victor G. Ambrus (Oxford University Press, 1982)

Oliver Cromwell (Heinemann Advanced History Series) by David Sharp (Heinemann Educational, 2003)

Old Ironsides: The Military Biography of Oliver Cromwell (Great Commanders Series) by General Sir Frank Kitson (Weidenfeld and Nicholson, 2004)

Encyclopedia of British Submarines 1901-1955 by Paul Akermann (Periscope Publishing, 2002)

British Built Submarines: The Inter-war Years by Peter Lawrence (Tempus Publishing, early 2006)

British Submarines in the Great War by Edwyn Gray (Pen and Sword Books, 2001)

The Dive Sites of Aruba, Bonaire and Curacao: Comprehensive Coverage of Diving and Snorkeling by Jack Jackson (McGraw-Hill, 2000)

History of the French Navy by Ernest Harold Jenkins (Macdonald, 1973)

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