United Kingdom Shipwreck Map
159 wrecks across 20 regions. Recorded depths range from 3 m to 108 m. View on map
Anglesey(2)
SS Cork
Two torpedoes, five minutes, twelve dead. On 26 January 1918 the SS Cork, built for the City of Dublin Steam Packet Company's cross-channel trade, was on her way across the Irish Sea from Dublin to Liverpool with sheep, horses and cattle aboard when SM U-103 attacked. One torpedo struck her engine room. A second hit close to the foremast and wrecked a lifeboat, taking away any margin for escape. Barely five minutes after she was hit she had gone, nine nautical miles northeast of Point Lynas, Anglesey, and seven passengers and five crew went with her. She lies upright and largely intact in the Irish Sea at 48 metres, a well-preserved record of cross-channel commerce in the early 20th century.
SS Missouri
Of all the ships lost close to the shore along Anglesey's west coast, none was bigger than the Missouri. A Warren Line steamer rigged as a barque, she was driven onto the beach at Porth Dafarch by a blizzard in March 1886, laden with a cargo as varied as a Victorian general store's stock: live cattle, thousands of bales of cotton, sacks of flour, hides and palm oil. She lies in two main sections spread across the bay, the forward part in the middle and the stern pressed hard against the cliffs on the western side, none of it deeper than 14 metres. Around them is the debris field of a ship of more than 5,000 tons.
Argyll(7)
MV Akka
Built in wartime Gothenburg in 1942, this Swedish motor vessel was undone not by conflict but by a mundane steering failure in April 1956 that put her hard onto the rocks. The Firth of Clyde location means she is reachable from multiple launch points, and she provides a welcome alternative to the west-coast circuit centred on the Sound of Mull.
MV Tapti
Reaching the Tapti takes commitment — a 35-nautical-mile boat ride from Lochaline through some of Scotland's most scenic coastal waters — but those who make the journey find a wreck that rewards the effort handsomely. Built on the Clyde in 1945, this cargo motor vessel met her end in January 1953 when a storm drove her onto the rocks of Gunna Sound between Coll and Tiree. She broke into four distinct sections, and today the bow piece is the star of the show, lying on its port side and towering 15 metres off the seabed. Devonshire cup corals, soft corals and plumose anemones smother every surface, while the boiler, mast and winches remain clearly identifiable. The site is exposed and weather-dependent, giving it an adventurous quality that the more sheltered Mull wrecks lack.
SS Breda
Bombed by a Luftwaffe Heinkel in the Firth of Lorn in December 1940, this Dutch cargo steamer was beached in Ardmucknish Bay — only for winter gales to drag her back into deeper water where she settled upright on the seabed. The superstructure sits between 11 and 19 metres, with the seabed at around 30. Marine growth is lush, with dahlia anemones, soft corals and shoals of pollack patrolling the companionways.
SS Hispania
In December 1954 the Swedish cargo steamer Hispania ran onto Sgeir Mor reef in the Sound of Mull, and she came to rest upright with hardly any list, just inshore of the channel marker. More than sixty years under water have turned her into a garden of marine growth: plumose anemones, dead-man's fingers and bright, jewel-like tunicates cover every surface of her. Her holds still stand open, with what is left of her cargo of sheet metal and rubber lying inside, and her engine room survives.
SS Rondo
There is nothing quite like dropping onto the Rondo for the first time. This former wartime standard cargo ship — originally launched as War Wonder — sank in a January storm in 1935 and came to rest on a steep cliff face at an angle of roughly 35 degrees. Descending along her hull feels like walking down a tilted skyscraper draped in white plumose anemones and orange soft corals. Every surface pulses with life. Normally buoyed, she is the showpiece of any Sound of Mull trip.
SS Shuna
Built in Holland in 1909 for a Scandinavian owner, she was carrying coal and iron from Glasgow to Gothenburg when she struck Grey Rock in a storm. Sitting upright less than 200 metres from shore, her position in a small mainland bay shields her from the worst of the Sound of Mull's notorious tidal streams, making her a more relaxed proposition than many neighbouring wrecks. Non-ferrous salvage in the years after her rediscovery opened up the structure, but there is still plenty to see between 16 and 32 metres: deck fittings, coal remnants in the holds, and a resident population of wrasse and conger eels that have made her framework their home.
SS Thesis
Small but full of surprises, the Thesis has a story unlike any other wreck in the Sound of Mull. This iron screw steamer went down in October 1889 carrying pig iron, and for decades she lay forgotten on a sloping shingle seabed. In the 1970s, salvors arrived not for treasure but for her hull plates — pre-nuclear iron, free from the background radiation that contaminated all steel produced after the first atomic tests. That salvage stripped her bare, but in doing so it created an unusually open wreck where framework ribs, deck beams and cargo holds are all exposed to exploration. The pig iron remains scattered throughout.
City of Edinburgh(1)
Cornwall(5)
SS Armenian
The sinking of the SS Armenian on 28 June 1915 had significant repercussions, particularly in the United States. The loss of 29 lives, including American citizens, heightened tensions between the US and Germany, following the earlier sinking of the RMS Lusitania. The Armenian, a British freighter, was torpedoed by a German submarine in the Celtic Sea, off the coast of Cornwall. At the time, she was transporting mules for the French Army. Despite efforts to escape, she was shelled and eventually torpedoed, leading to her swift sinking. Today, the wreck of the SS Armenian lies in the Celtic Sea, with notable features such as cargo remains and guns. The wreck was identified in 2008, sitting upright on the seabed, and is marked by the presence of animal bones, a reminder of her final cargo.
SS Mohegan
She was barely six months old when she ploughed onto Vase Rock in October 1898, killing 106 passengers and crew on what should have been a routine Atlantic crossing. No one has ever convincingly explained why the ship was so far off course. Today her boilers rise from 22 metres as the centrepiece of a richly colonised underwater landscape, while the skeletal hull frames create a striking grid that draws photographers from across the UK.
SS Torrey Canyon
No shipwreck in British waters had a greater impact on environmental policy than the Torrey Canyon. When this Liberian-flagged supertanker struck Pollard's Rock on the Seven Stones reef in March 1967, about 120,000 tons of her crude cargo poured out, and Britain had never suffered a worse spill. The government's desperate response included RAF bombing runs with napalm to incinerate the remaining cargo, an operation watched by millions on television. The disaster rewrote international maritime law and birthed the modern framework for oil pollution response. Her scattered wreckage lies across the reef, fifteen miles west of Land's End, overgrown with marine life, the steel slowly yielding to the ocean that made the Torrey Canyon a household name.
SS Volnay
If there is a gateway wreck on the Lizard Peninsula, the Volnay is it. A German mine from UC-64 ended her war service in December 1917 while she carried Canadian ammunition south past the Manacles. Her two great boilers now anchor the site, rising from silty sand that conceals wooden ammunition boxes, scattered bollards, and chain. Pink sea fans have colonised the higher wreckage, adding unexpected colour to a scene that might otherwise be all rust and silt.
Spyridion Vagliano
A Greek steamer laden with Black Sea grain, the Spyridion Vagliano met the same fate as so many vessels on the Manacles — a navigational miscalculation that put her squarely onto Maen Voes on a February night in 1890. Fourteen of her twenty-two crew were lost to the freezing water. She now lies close to the more famous Mohegan, reachable by following a south-west compass bearing from that wreck down to around 18 metres. What sets her apart is the boiler: with its outer casing long since rotted away, the internal tube structure is exposed in unusual detail, offering a cross-section lesson in Victorian marine engineering. In summer the wreckage disappears under dense kelp, so spring and autumn visits tend to reward with clearer views.
Devon(4)
Flying Enterprise
The loss of the Flying Enterprise in 1952 had significant repercussions, captivating both British and American audiences with its dramatic tale of endurance and heroism. Commanded by Captain Henrik Kurt Carlsen, the ship faced a severe storm that led to a perilous list and ultimately her sinking in the English Channel. Despite efforts to save her, including a daring rescue operation by the tug Turmoil, the vessel was lost, resulting in one casualty. Today, the wreck of the Flying Enterprise lies in the English Channel off the coast of Devon, at a depth of 85 metres. Notable features such as her boilers remain visible.
HMS Scylla
The last Royal Navy frigate built at Devonport Dockyard, she had served with distinction from 1970 until her 1993 decommissioning as the final Leander-class vessel on active duty. Cleaned of contaminants and prepared for her new role, she now sits upright on sand between 9 and 26 metres, her 113-metre hull colonised by a rapidly developing ecosystem of anemones, sponges and fish that marine biologists continue to study.
SS James Eagan Layne
This American Liberty ship was torpedoed by U-1195 off Eddystone Reef in March 1945 — one of the very last U-boat kills of the war — and sank in Whitsand Bay after an unsuccessful tow, mercifully without any loss of life. The structure teems with life: pollack shoal around the superstructure, conger eels lurk in the hull plating, and spider crabs carpet the decking in season.
SS Persier
Originally launched in the closing months of World War I as War Buffalo, the Persier spent her interwar years under the Belgian flag before the next conflict caught up with her. In February 1945, a torpedo struck her port side while she sailed in convoy just three miles from Eddystone. She limped into Bigbury Bay and grounded on a reef, where she remains today between 18 and 28 metres.
Dorset(6)
HMS M2
There is truly nothing else like HMS M2 anywhere in the world. Originally completed in 1919 as a submarine monitor carrying a massive 12-inch gun, she was converted in 1927 into the world's first undersea aircraft carrier, fitted with a watertight hangar and catapult for a tiny Parnall Peto floatplane. On 26 January 1932, during a routine exercise off Portland, water flooded through the hangar and she went down with all 60 hands. The salvage investigation found those hangar doors standing open — a haunting detail that has fuelled debate ever since. She rests upright and intact at around 33 metres in Lyme Bay, her 90-metre hull still unmistakably that of a submarine, the cylindrical hangar forward of the conning tower instantly recognisable.
MV Aeolian Sky
She was barely a year old when fog and misfortune conspired against her in November 1979: a collision with the German coaster Anna Knueppell off Guernsey, a desperate attempt to reach Portland, and then the storm that finished her five miles south of St Aldhelm's Head. Salvage charges reduced her height somewhat, but the intact sections retain an architectural quality that smaller wrecks simply cannot replicate.
SS Kyarra
Built on the Clyde in 1903 as a luxury liner for the Australian run, she carried 286 passengers in considerable comfort before the Great War requisitioned her as a hospital ship tasked with evacuating wounded troops. On 26 May 1918, heading for Plymouth to collect a thousand injured Australians, a torpedo from UB-57 struck amidships and sent her to the bottom a mile off Anvil Point. Six men died. The boilers, engine room and stern section are highlights, and the marine life — from nudibranchs to cuttlefish — is outstanding for a Channel wreck.
SS Moidart
The Moidart's story is one of the most harrowing of the U-boat war. On 9 June 1918, this schooner-rigged steamer was carrying 1,550 tons of Welsh coal and 80 tons of steel plates from Cardiff to Le Havre when UC-77's torpedo struck to starboard near the stern gun. She went down by the stern in less than sixty seconds — so violently fast that not a single lifeboat could be launched. Fifteen of her twenty-one crew perished, many trapped below or thrown into the water alongside the ship. Only six men survived.
Swash Channel Wreck
Dredging work in 1990 uncovered the Swash Channel Wreck outside Poole Harbour: an armed merchantman of the early 17th century, thought to be a Dutch vessel some 40 metres long, which had run aground on a sandbank. She is now an important archaeological site, with about 40% of her port side surviving. Lying in the English Channel off Dorset, she is protected for her historical importance. Part of her is still buried, and the uncovered sections are open to erosion and to wood-boring organisms. Bournemouth University and Wessex Archaeology have studied her in depth, and the finds include ornate carvings, ceramics and personal belongings that shed light on how she was built and on life aboard.
Valentine Tanks (Operation Smash)
Seven Valentine infantry tanks lie in the shallow waters of Studland Bay, left behind by the deadly rehearsals for D-Day. They went down in April 1944 during the top-secret Exercise "Operation Smash", when duplex-drive swimming modifications were on trial so that armour could float in to the Normandy beaches. The trials ended in tragedy: every one of the seven tanks sank, and six soldiers were killed. The tanks rest between 8 and 16 metres, crusted over with marine growth, and the sea life living around them has claimed them as its own. Two carry permanent buoys and are spaced roughly five metres apart. The site is a Scheduled Ancient Monument with strict legal protections, so nothing on it may be touched. These training relics belong to one of the lesser-known tragedies of the war.
Dumfries and Galloway(30)
Baron Glamis
Captain E. Manning, a seasoned master of sailing ships, was on his first trip down the Clyde in charge of a steamer when the Baron Glamis, a steel steamship launched at Port Glasgow in 1894, left Glasgow for Buenos Aires in January 1903 with coal, wood and bricks. In fog near Corsewall Point she struck the rocks by Laggan Beacon and held fast. The rocket brigade and the Portpatrick lifeboat came out, and her crew of twenty-five were taken off as the wind rose. Three days later she broke in two amidships and was lost. Her remains lie well broken north-east of the beacon on rock and sand, with the stern section the most complete part and cargo remains among the wreckage.
Bathori
On 5th November 1897 the Bathori was found stranded in Larbrax Bay, short of Glasgow, where she had been heading with a general cargo loaded at Fiume. Built in 1892, the steamship belonged to the Royal Hungarian Sea Navigation Company. Three months of harsh weather battered her while the Glasgow Salvage Association lifted part of what she carried, a mix of sulphur, flour, dried fruit and almonds, and other steamers ferried it on to Glasgow. Refloating finally succeeded on 8th March 1898, and she was brought into Stranraer to be patched up. By 11th March she was in Glasgow, where the rest of her cargo came out and she went into dry dock for fuller repairs. Nothing of her is left in Larbrax Bay.
Ben May
The Ben May is notable for her final resting place in East Tarbet Bay, where she lies in a sheltered area at a depth of 20 metres. Originally built as the Ready, she underwent several ownership changes before being renamed Ben May by the Ramsey Steamship Co Ltd. On 14th November 1938, while transporting coal from Workington to Dundrum, the Ben May sprang a leak north of the Isle of Man. Despite the crew's efforts to manage the situation, the vessel was abandoned near the Mull of Galloway. The crew safely reached shore, aided by a motorboat from Drummore. Today, her remains lie well broken on a sandy seabed, with her anchor, mast and remnants of her cargo.
Ben Veg
The Ben Veg, a steel steamship built by Larne Shipbuilding Co Ltd in 1914, began her service with the Ramsey Steamship Co. Ltd. Registered in Ramsey, she carried out her duties in the Irish Sea, surviving the perils of World War One. Despite the renewed threat of U-boats during World War Two, Ben Veg met her end not from enemy action but through a collision. On 22nd May 1941, she was struck by the MV Brittany, a Royal Mail Lines ship, while en route to Whitehaven. Although her crew attempted to save her by diverting to the Isle of Man, rising water forced them to abandon ship. Today, the wreck of the Ben Veg rests upright on a stony seabed in the Solway Firth, with her hull intact but her superstructure missing. The collision damage is still evident on her starboard side.
Chindwin
The steam trawler Chindwin, built by Cook Welton & Gemmell of Hull, faced a harrowing ordeal in February 1895. Owned by George Beeching, she encountered severe weather while returning from Colonsay, leading to her stranding in Salt Pan Bay. The crew, trapped by waves, climbed into the rigging and later used a rope to reach the shore. Exhausted and suffering from frostbite, they struggled through snow-covered cliffs to Galdenoch Moor. They eventually found temporary shelter by a manure heap, where they lit a fire for warmth. A local shepherd discovered them the next morning and guided them to safety at Meikle Galdenoch Farm. The wreck was later purchased by Mr. Garscadden of Glasgow, though the success of any salvage operations remains unclear. The Chindwin's remains lie in the Solway Firth, in a region known for other shipwrecks.
Claremorris
Ordered by John Kelly Limited of Belfast and launched by Scott & Sons of Bowling in 1917, the 632-ton Claremorris was taken straight into Royal Navy service and handed back to her owners at the end of 1918. In peacetime she traded regularly between Northern Ireland and the coasts of south-west Scotland and northern England. Bound from Dundalk to Ardrossan in December 1924, she was driven ashore by heavy seas below Corsewall Point and wedged between rocks at March Point. Her lamp trimmer, James Thomson, climbed down to the rocks to fetch help and was swept away; his body came ashore days later and was taken home to Northern Ireland. Alerted by her horn, a farmer and his neighbours got a line aboard, and the ten other crew reached land. Her remains in Redstone Cove are heavily broken and cemented into the rocky seabed, engine room seaward and bow in the shallows.
Cragsman
The Cragsman, a small steamship built in 1903, was owned by John Kennedy and Sons Ltd and registered in Glasgow. On a voyage from Glasgow to Liverpool in November 1913, she faced a dire situation. After springing a leak off Portpatrick, the crew was unable to manage the incoming water, leading to the extinguishing of her boiler fire. As she drifted uncontrollably in stormy conditions, the eight crew members abandoned ship and successfully rowed to safety at West Tarbet Bay. The Cragsman, left partially submerged near Crammag Head, was battered by westerly gales and declared a total loss. Today, her remains are scattered across a rocky slope in the Solway Firth. Notable features include her boilers and remnants of her granite cargo, which lie among the wreckage in a scattered condition.
Craigantlet
The crew of the Craigantlet were lifted off by a Royal Navy Sea King from HMS Gannet at Prestwick after she drove ashore beneath Killantringan Lighthouse in a storm before dawn in February 1982, while the Portpatrick lifeboat and cliff rescue teams stood ready and the coastguard at Ramsey, on the Isle of Man, directed the operation. Built in Finland by Reposaaren Konepaja in 1972 and owned in her last years by Skymar Navigation of Limassol, she had sailed from Belfast for Liverpool the evening before. Part of her cargo was hazardous chemical waste, and police closed off the shore around Portmaggie. Her back broke soon after she grounded, and further storms and the salvage work later split her in two. Years of North Channel seas have since worn her down to wreckage scattered across the bay, now almost entirely below the surface.
Daily Mail
Skipper Albert Heywood was bringing the steam trawler Daily Mail home to Fleetwood, her hold packed with fish, when she ran onto Crammag Head on a foggy night in May 1931. She had been built for the Boston Deep Sea Fishing & Ice Company. Her SOS brought a second trawler, the Tranquil, which took off all 14 men. Salvors made a start on her, but bad weather battered the hull further until refloating her no longer made economic sense. What is left of the Daily Mail is strewn among big boulders and rocks in the shallows of Portencorkie Bay.
Eidsiva
The Eidsiva's story is marked by the bravery of the Port Logan Rocket Brigade, who played a crucial role in the rescue of her crew. On 1st March 1894, while en route to Ayr to load coal for the West Indies, the wooden barque was caught in a fierce storm. Her tow rope broke, and despite Captain Obsen's efforts to reach Luce Bay, she was driven ashore in Clanyard Bay. The Rocket Brigade quickly arrived, and within thirty minutes, all eleven aboard, including the captain's young son, were safely brought ashore. Local families provided immediate care before they moved to the Shipwrecked Mariners’ Home in Drummore. The aftermath saw the Eidsiva abandoned and stripped of her valuable parts.
Enda
When her distress rockets went unseen, Captain McKellar's crew of the Enda, with a young mother and her child, climbed down onto the rocks near Gounie Point, south of Clanyard Bay, where a gale and blinding snow had driven her ashore on passage from Londonderry to Heysham with linen, dairy produce and livestock. Flares at first light were answered by the ICI steamer Sodium, anchored nearby, whose lifeboat took the mother, the child and some of the men to Stranraer; the Drummore Lifesaving Crew, arriving through deep snow, led the rest to the Shipwrecked Mariners' Home. Her radio call had been heard on ordinary household sets, and the Donaghadee lifeboat fought across the North Channel only to find the animals alone aboard. Salvors recovered some of her cargo before she broke up within weeks, and her remains lie close inshore north-east of Gounie Point.
Estrella de Chile
When the Board of Trade held its inquiry into the loss of the Estrella de Chile, it found her master at fault for errors of judgement. Lawrence Hill & Company had built the barque in 1867, and she was carrying 890 tons of steel rails for Rosario when she stranded on the Robin Rigg Sandbank in the Solway Firth. Heavy seas pounded her into a total wreck, and her crew climbed into the rigging to escape them. James Napier, her first mate, died. The other 14 men were taken off by a lifeboat that the tug Seahorse had towed out to her. Afterwards Alfred Gann & Company was given the contract to salvage the valuable cargo. Her anchor and what is left of the rails are still there.
Garnet
Scott & Company of Bowling launched the Garnet in 1889 for the fleet of William Robertson, and with her triple expansion steam engine she traded around the British Isles. On 2nd April 1890 she went onto the rocks in thick fog near Cardrain Farm, west of the Mull of Galloway. When Captain Johnstone and a Lloyd's agent reached her she was damaged and partly under water, and the man from the Glasgow Salvage Association judged her beyond saving. She was put up for auction by mid-April. Her remains are still at Carrickamickie Point, scattered on a rocky bottom in a gully about 10 metres deep among kelp and big boulders.
Great Ouse
Nobody knows what became of the men aboard the Great Ouse: reporting restrictions at the time meant their fate was never written down. She was a bucket dredger launched in 1893, a vessel of uncertain origins with no engine of her own. A large boiler raised steam to work her bucket chain, which dropped through an opening in her hull, while the spoil went over the side by chute into steam lighters; to move at all she had to be towed. She was under tow behind a steam tug whose name is not recorded when the pair ran into a storm, and her rolling parted the cable and left her adrift. Top-heavy as she was, the account of her loss holds that she must soon have capsized. The broken wreck lies upside down on flat sand off Dumfries and Galloway, her boiler near the stern standing highest and her bucket chain and gear lying to one side.
Jasper
The loss of the Jasper had a significant impact due to the disappearance of her entire crew. This tragic event occurred after she ran aground near the Isle of Whithorn in thick fog, leading to her eventual sinking in Portyerrock Bay. The steamship, built by Thomas Seath and Co Ltd., was carrying a cargo of steel rails from Workington to Glasgow when she met her fate. Despite her captain's familiarity with the route, the fog led to navigational errors, causing the ship to strike rocks and lose her rudder and propeller. Today, the wreck lies in the Solway Firth, with her shape still recognisable. Notable features such as her boilers and propeller remain visible; strong tidal currents and silt are reported at the site.
Kerrera
The cement that the Kerrera carried from Belfast is what marks her wreck out: the bags in her hold set solid on the seabed and now form neatly stacked blocks that keep the shape of the sacks. She was a small steel steamer launched by Burrell & Son at Hamiltonhill, Glasgow, in 1894, and in her last years she belonged to David Murray of Oban and worked for the Oban Slipway Company. Bound for Glasgow, she ran into bad weather off Crammag Head on the Galloway coast; her engine failed, she shipped a great deal of water and she foundered. The wreck lies roughly north to south on rock and stone, with the stern at the northern end. That stern is the most intact part, with engine, boiler and propeller still in place, and an unmarked bell has been recovered from her.
Paulina
Twenty-seven men left the stranded Paulina in two lifeboats, one under her master, Captain Rosales, and the other under the first mate. The mate brought his thirteen men ashore in Dally Bay at first light, while the captain's boat drifted for eight hours until the steamer Cairo picked them up. A Spanish steamer of 2,672 tons gross, built at Middlesbrough by Raylton Dixon and Company in 1909, she had been carrying iron ore from Santander to Troon when dense fog closed in off Black Head and she ran ashore at the north end of the bay. Lloyd's agent at Stranraer reported her hull buckling over the following days, and she seems to have been given up as a total loss. Salvage later removed much of her; what remains lies scattered among rocks and sand, her engine and boilers still standing clear of the seabed.
Pollux II
The Pollux II came ashore still ablaze, and the sea finished what her crew could not: water entering through the damage from the stranding and the fire gradually put out the flames in her holds, leaving a scorched hull on the rocks. She had begun as the cargo steamer Theodor, a 931-ton steel ship built by Howaldtswerke in 1890, and passed to Estonian owners in Tallinn as the Pollux, and was later chartered by the British Ministry of War Transport for convoy work. Bound from Newport to Londonderry with tobacco, medical supplies and metal, she caught fire off Port Logan; her crew abandoned her, and she drifted onto the south shore of Portencorkie Bay below Laggantulloch Head. Local people soon went to work on her cargo to stretch their wartime rations. Some salvage is thought to have followed in the 1960s, and pieces of her still lie among the boulders close inshore.
Princess Royal
The inquiry held at Stranraer after the Princess Royal was lost cleared her master, Captain McChlery, but the Privy Council for Trade disagreed with its finding. It faulted him for steaming at 14 knots through thick fog near the land and for relying on a newly adjusted compass, and although he kept his master's certificate he was made to bear the cost of his own defence. An iron paddle steamer built by Tod & MacGregor of Glasgow in 1841, she was bound from Liverpool to Greenock in 1856 when she struck Craig Laggan Rocks south of Corsewall Point in fog. Everyone aboard got ashore, and the steamer Herald carried them on to Greenock. Salvors recovered most of her general cargo, but weeks of bad weather broke her in two and she was declared a total wreck. Parts of her paddle box frames remain on the east side of the rocks.
Rockcliffe
The inquiry into the loss of the Rockcliffe found that her skipper, Thomas Perry, had not navigated with proper care, kept no proper lookout and knew nothing of the deviation of his compass, and that his third hand, Millross, should have acted sooner when land loomed ahead; both men had their papers suspended for six months. Built of steel at Aberdeen by J Duthie and Sons Ltd in 1906 and registered at Fleetwood, she was heading home past Rathlin with full holds when the skipper went below and left the course to Millross. In worsening fog and rain she held on, well east of where her crew believed her to be, and ran onto the shore at Carinbrock near Corsewall. Her crew scrambled off unhurt, but she could not be saved. In the 1980s Peter Miller recovered her nameplate and builder's plate from scattered wreckage in shallow water.
Roseneath
When the Board of Trade examined how the Roseneath was lost, it found her master, Captain Robert Browne, in default and the master of the tug Defiance blameless, yet it only reprimanded Browne, crediting his efforts to save life and his being the last to leave her, and let him keep his master's certificate. An iron sailing ship built by Barclay Curle & Co. Ltd of Glasgow in 1857 and later rigged as a barque, she was under tow from Dublin to Glasgow in ballast when the tow parted in a storm off the Copeland Islands. Unable to set sail, Browne tried to run for Portpatrick harbour, but squalls drove her ashore just south of the entrance, where she rolled onto her side. Six of the eleven aboard, among them the mate Duncan Taylor with his wife and child, were swept away; the Portpatrick Rocket Brigade brought off the others. She broke up the same day.
Rowan
An encore set the Rowan's loss in motion. Calls for more from the Southern Syncopated Orchestra at Glasgow's Lyric Theatre made the band late, and Captain Brown held his ship at Greenock for nearly an hour so they could board for Dublin. Built by D and W Henderson in 1909 for the Laird Line, she had served the Admiralty through the First World War and returned to her owners afterwards. Slowed by fog off the Galloway coast, she was struck at the stern by the American steamer West Camak; the damage was slight, but Brown mustered everyone on deck with the lifesaving gear ready. Then the Clan Malcolm came out of the murk and hit her amidships, nearly severing her, and she sank at once. She lies upright on a rocky bottom some two miles off Dally Bay.
SS Oswald
The loss of the steamship Oswald in 1894 was a significant maritime disaster along the Galloway coast, part of a devastating storm that wrecked multiple vessels. The Oswald, a Whitby-registered iron steamship built in 1890, was travelling from Londonderry to Cardiff when she was driven ashore by the storm. Her reduced draught, as she was in ballast, rendered her propeller and rudder ineffective, leading to her being uncontrollable in the severe weather. The wreck was discovered near Port Gill, identified by debris bearing her name. Today, the remains lie in shallow water in the Solway Firth, with only part of the boiler still visible above the seabed. The site experiences strong tidal currents, which can affect conditions around the wreck.
SS Romeo
The Romeo, an iron steamship built by Earle’s Shipbuilding and Eng’g Co. in 1881, initially served under T Wilson and Sons Ltd., Hull. She was equipped to carry both first and second class passengers and was powered by a compound steam engine. In 1917, she became part of the Ellerman Wilson Line Ltd. During World War I, she was requisitioned by the Admiralty and tasked with delivering provisions to the British fleet. On 3rd March 1918, while returning to Liverpool in ballast, she was deceived by a German submarine's ruse and torpedoed, causing her to sink rapidly. Of her crew, only three survived. Today, the wreck of the Romeo lies broken in the Solway Firth, with notable features including boilers and a mast.
SS Socrates
The wreck of the Socrates was reported in 1977 near Clanyard Bay, resting among gulleys on a rocky seabed. The site, exposed to wave action, has been extensively salvaged, leaving the boiler as the highest point. Socrates was a steam trawler built in 1906 by Mackie & Thomson in Govan. She was powered by a triple expansion steam engine and had a gross tonnage of 295. On 6 January 1913, while returning to Fleetwood, she ran aground in thick fog and heavy rain. The crew abandoned her as she began to flood and moved to safety onshore. By dawn, Socrates had slipped into deeper water, partially submerged. The Liverpool Salvage Association inspected her but she was never refloated. Her registry was closed that year, and she remains a submerged relic in the Solway Firth.
The Prince
Nine of her crew walked ashore over the rocks at South Cairn once the tide had fallen; two others did not survive the attempt to reach land. The Prince, an iron vessel built at Paisley by J Fullerton in 1890 for John Hay and Co Ltd of Glasgow, was running in ballast from Sligo towards North Wales when a severe storm struck Scotland, wrecking or damaging dozens of ships along its coast. No longer answering her helm, she was carried onto the shore below Corsewall Lighthouse and left high on the rocks, which is what let most of her crew get clear. Her triple expansion engine came from Muir and Houston of Glasgow. The wreck was afterwards sold at auction and broken up where she lay.
Truda
The steamship Truda, managed by William Smith of Glasgow, met her fate during a fierce storm in February 1903. The vessel was grounded on Barlocco Island in the Solway Firth, Dumfries and Galloway. Captain MacLeod and four crew members survived the ordeal, thanks to the bravery of local men from Kirkcudbright who rowed through treacherous seas to rescue them. Sadly, four crew members drowned, and their bodies were later commemorated with a gravestone in Kirkandrews Old Kirkyard. The Truda was declared a constructive total loss and auctioned in March 1903, likely leading to her dismantling on site. Remnants of the wreck may still lie on the southern side of Barlocco Island.
Ulabrand
German First World War records later showed that the Norwegian steamship Ulabrand had been torpedoed by U-86 under Oberleutnant zur See Helmut Patzig, which had been lying inshore of her off the Galloway coast. Built at Copenhagen by Burmeister & Wain in 1899, the 2011-ton ship was running north in ballast from Rouen towards Glasgow in February 1918 when a single blast tore open her starboard side aft of midships, wrecking one lifeboat and the after deck structure. The port boat capsized as she settled, thirteen of her crew were lost, and the nine survivors drifted to land on a lashed-together boat, gig and raft. Her master, Olaf Bjønness, gave his account from memory, since the ship's papers had gone down with her. A wreck of matching length found near her last known position is very likely to be her.
Vanderbyl
Her crew got clear in the ship's boat when the Vanderbyl went aground in thick fog, almost within reach of her home port. A small iron steamer launched at Rutherglen in 1864 by Thomas B. Seath & Company for the Lundy Granite Company, she belonged from 1875 to a businessman of the Isle of Whithorn. On her last passage she was taking coal from Whitehaven to Port William when fog closed in off Burrow Head. Next morning villagers found her lying half sunk among the Screen Rocks, just west of the harbour mouth. Treated as a constructive total loss, she was struck from the register in 1890, and was probably salvaged where she lay; whatever remains of her is thought to be near that spot. Her owner bought the larger steamer Express to replace her in 1890, only to lose that ship off Whitehaven the following month.
Zafiris
It was a farmer, William McCulloch of Cardrain Farm, Drummore, who finally told the Coastguard where the Zafiris was. Her flares had gone unseen and a garbled SOS had sent lifeboats searching off the Isle of Man, while she lay ashore under the cliffs near the Mull of Galloway, driven in by heavy weather on a passage from Rouen to Belfast with grain. Her twenty-five Greek crew had already rigged a line and were ferrying themselves to the foot of the cliff in a rubber dinghy. Magnus Scollay of the rescue party climbed down a rope ladder and the men were helped up one by one; four went to hospital in Stranraer. One crewman had left on a life raft, and a sea and air search found only the raft. Built at Gothenburg by A/B Lindholmen in 1942, she was holed when she struck in 1965 and broke her back in the storms that followed; her remains lie on the rocky seabed there.
East Sussex(1)
Firth of Clyde(34)
Aarla
Hecate was her first name: a steel motor yacht that slid off the Meadowside yard of D and W Henderson in Glasgow on 27 May 1903. A second war brought a second career. The Admiralty purchased her in October 1939 to hunt submarines on patrol, and from 1942 her station was West Africa, where she operated out of Freetown and Dakar. Renamed Aarla, the British steam-powered vessel went down south of Ailsa Craig in June 1947 in circumstances nobody has explained. The SS Lairdsdale tried to help, yet no one was found alive, and what actually sank her is still unknown. Her remains have never been found, and ordnance lying in those waters makes the area hazardous.
Austria
The wreck of the steamship Austria underscored the necessity for improved navigational aids in the Firth of Clyde. Austria, built by H S Edwards and Sons and launched in 1884, was on a voyage from Fuime to Glasgow when she ran aground due to navigational errors by her captain and second mate. The subsequent inquiry led to the suspension of their master's certificates. The wreck, heavily salvaged and broken, lies scattered off the south coast of Ailsa Craig. While her remains are identifiable, the exact extent of the wreckage is uncertain, with debris found at varying depths. The site includes remnants of her cargo.
Beagle
The Beagle, a steamship built by Messers Tod & McGregor in 1864, was primarily engaged in passenger and cargo transport between Belfast and Glasgow. On 8th November 1865, she collided with the steamer Napoli near Skate Point, Great Cumbrae. The impact tore through her port side, leading to rapid flooding. Fortunately, all crew members were rescued by the tug Pearl, which was nearby. Despite the swift rescue, the Beagle sank within nine minutes. Today, her wreck lies broken on the seabed of the Firth of Clyde.
Bellevue
The Bellevue is notable for her unusual resting position, with her stern section pointing skyward from the seabed. This orientation is believed to be the result of a wartime mine encounter. Originally launched as the Escort in 1897, she was a steam-powered trawler built in Glasgow and later renamed Bellevue in 1922. Her final voyage ended in tragedy off the west coast, with the loss of all eight crew members. The wreck lies in the Firth of Clyde, where her triple expansion engine and stern section survive. Netting is reported on the wreck.
Captayannis
A long insurance dispute between the parties involved is the reason the Captayannis was never salvaged, even though much of her hull stands clear of the water in a shallow part of the Clyde. The Greek-registered motor ship, built in Denmark as the Norden, had brought sugar from Lourenco Marques and lay at anchor off the Tail of the Bank when a severe gale set her dragging. Before her engines could take her clear she was driven across the anchor chain of the BP tanker British Light, which tore open her port side. Flooding brought a list and a total loss of power, and she grounded on a sandbank between Greenock and Helensburgh; her crew, the captain among them, were taken off without injury. She rests on her port side, substantially intact, her starboard flank rising above the surface and heavily marked by seabirds.
Champion
A Board of Trade enquiry into the loss of the Champion found that the paddle steamer Caledonia had run north through dense fog at an excessive and improper speed, and it suspended her master, Captain Bell, for three months. The Champion, an iron steam paddle tug built at South Shields as the Flying Javelin and later owned in Greenock, had been carrying papers and mail to the piers below Dunoon. Captain Quintin Carsell was feeling his way south at a few knots, whistle sounding, when the Caledonia came out of the murk and drove into the tug's port sponson. The two vessels held together long enough for the tug's crew to cross over, and Carsell went back for the mail before she went down within minutes. She lies upright south of the Gantock Rocks, her stern intact and her starboard paddlewheel standing tall, while the hull forward of the engine room is broken.
Christina Dawn
The crew of the Christina Dawn were taken off safely by the Troon lifeboat after the small steamship missed the narrow entrance to Irvine harbour in a south-westerly gale and went ashore near Ardeer. Built as Shotton, she had passed through several owners and names before her last owners renamed her. She was carrying carbide in drums from Port Talbot, and she lay jammed among rocks on the beach with her propeller and rudder gone. Early surveys gave hope of refloating her, but the carbide later exploded and fire swept her from the bunker to the bow while crowds watched from the harbour. The harbour was closed and precautions were taken at the Ardeer explosives works. What remained was a total wreck, later cleared by salvors, and nothing of her is now left at the spot just north of the harbour entrance.
Clyro
The steam trawler Clyro, originally launched as the armed trawler Thomas Twiney, became a fishing vessel after her decommissioning post-World War One. On the night of 13th August 1935, she ran aground on reefs near Culzean Castle. Local resident Edward Flynn and the Girvan lifeboat Lily Ann responded to distress signals, assisting in the rescue of her crew. Despite efforts to save the vessel, her skipper, Ernest Wood, eventually decided to abandon her due to severe damage. The crew transferred salvageable items to another trawler and left the site. A subsequent inspection confirmed the Clyro was beyond repair. Her registry was closed in October 1935. Today, her remains lie broken near Culzean Castle, with notable features such as her engine and boiler still visible.
Comet II
Captain Duncan McInnes was among the thirteen survivors of the Comet II disaster, which claimed around seventy-three lives. The paddle steamer, built by James Lang in 1821, collided with the Ayr off Kempock Point in the Firth of Clyde. The collision, attributed to the absence of navigation lights and a bow lookout, led to the Comet II sinking within minutes. Despite the Ayr's damaged state, her return to Greenock without attempting a rescue drew significant criticism. Captain McInnes faced charges of culpable homicide and received a three-month jail sentence. Efforts to salvage the Comet II began in December 1825 but faced delays due to poor weather. The wreck remained underwater until the following summer, when Mr. Brown of Aberdeen successfully raised and beached her on 21st July 1826. The Comet II's tragic loss marked one of the earliest steamship disasters on the Clyde.
Cuirassier
On 15th July 1894 the steamer Cuirassier was on a passage from Glasgow to Bonawe, with a load of machinery and horse bedding, when she ran onto the shore close to Little Cumbrae Lighthouse. The rising tide lifted her off and she went down. She lies in the Firth of Clyde, approximately 500 metres north of the lighthouse, spread down a steep slope of mud and shingle at depths of 30 to 36 metres. She is badly broken. The after part, from the boiler back to the stern, is the easiest to make out, and her engine and boiler are half sunk into the soft mud, standing only a little proud of the bottom.
Duke of Edinburgh
Captain Byrne, bringing the Duke of Edinburgh up the Firth of Clyde from Dublin in fog with thirty passengers, cattle and general cargo, took a fog bank on his port bow for Ailsa Craig and turned to starboard, only to run at thirteen knots into a second bank that hid the island itself. She struck its western shore so hard that more than half her length came to rest above high water. Vessels that heard the crash came to help, her crew calmed the passengers, and everyone aboard, the cattle included, was carried to the mainland. Already an unlucky ship, wrecked on her maiden voyage as the Earl of Dublin and rebuilt by Harland & Wolff, she resisted every attempt to haul her off until a south-westerly gale broke her in two amidships. Hull plates and ribs lying off Ailsa Craig may be hers, but nothing found there has confirmed it.
Europa
The fate of the Europa was sealed by a missed appointment. Her carpenter's absence led to a delay, placing her in the path of the SS Roseville. On the night of the collision, the Europa, under Captain Bushell, was en route to Malaga with a cargo of 850 tons. As she passed McInroy's Point, the Roseville was spotted too late, resulting in a near head-on collision. The Europa sank rapidly, taking Captain Bushell and four crew members with her. Survivors scrambled aboard the Roseville, which was also damaged and later beached by Captain Dove. The Europa's wreck now lies broken in the Firth of Clyde, east of Cloch Point.
FV Antares
The Antares sank in 1990. The Antares, a 16.5-metre trawler, was lost after her nets were snagged by HMS Trenchant, a nuclear submarine, resulting in the tragic deaths of her four crew members. The wreck was initially located on the seabed of the Firth of Clyde and later raised. After being displayed at the Scottish Maritime Museum, the vessel was dismantled in 2008 due to maintenance challenges. She was broken up at Troon, and no wreck remains on the seabed.
Glen Shiel
A formal investigation at Glasgow Sheriff Court laid the loss of the Glen Shiel, and of five of the six people aboard her, on her master's failure to make her ready for sea. Built at Peterhead by Livingston & Co Ltd, the motor coaster left Ayr under Tom West with coal for Portree, but the tarpaulins had never been put over her main hatch boards. Spray from a south-westerly breeze worked into the hold for about half an hour until she lurched over to port and went down. Of the three who got clear, the mate John McInnes and the second engineer were lost in the water, and James Scott, 21, of Portrush came ashore on Troon's South Beach hours later and recovered. She lies on her port side north-west of Ayr harbour, intact apart from her mast and propeller blades, taken off in 1977; her hull is now opening up and her coal lies spread around her.
Glenann
The Glenann went back to an old name before she took her last one: launched at Belfast as Theme, she became Volante and then Cultra, was Theme once more, and was renamed Glenann when the Antrim Iron Ore Company of Belfast bought her. Steam-driven and built of iron, she was bound from Belfast to Glasgow with empty holds to collect a cargo when fog put her ashore near Kilmory, on Arran's southern shore. The sea was calm, her crew got to land unaided, and as she lay almost undamaged along the beach there was hope of refloating her. Before the tug Strongbow could do so the weather turned, waves broke over her and flooded her holds, and within days she was plainly a total loss. Much of her has been salvaged since, but her propeller, rudder, shaft and pieces of frame and plating remain on the sand off Torrylinn beach.
Greenock
Three days after she went down, the Clyde Lighthouse Trust found the Greenock lying three-quarters of a mile southwest of the Cloch Lighthouse. She was intact, yet nobody tried to salvage her; her owners collected £10,000 from the insurers instead. William Simons & Company had built her in 1876 as a steam bucket dredger, and most of her working life was spent in the harbours of the Firth of Clyde. On 18th November 1902 the steamer Ape ran into her, and she capsized and sank. Every member of her crew but one came through. She sits upright on sand and mud, with her boilers, propeller and winch among her notable features. Two unexploded mines had rested on the wreck until July 1996, when the Navy destroyed them.
HMS Bayano
Only twenty-four of Captain Carr's crew on HMS Bayano were taken alive from two liferafts and an upturned lifeboat, hours after she went down, by Captain Foster of the Balmarino. Alexander Stephen and Sons had built her at Glasgow as a 5,948-ton banana carrier for Elders and Fyffes, and the Navy took her up as an armed merchant cruiser for the Northern Patrol. Heading back out of the Firth of Clyde before dawn, she was struck forward by a single torpedo from Bernd Wegener's U-27; her magazine exploded and she went down by the bow within minutes. The Belfast collier Castlereagh, first to reach the scene, steamed away when the same U-boat approached. ProjectXplore confirmed in 2025 that a deep wreck off Corsewall Point is hers.
Iona I
The two crews told opposite stories. Men from the Iona I said the newly launched Chanticleer came at them unlit and struck her starboard side aft of the paddle box; the Chanticleer's pilot said the Iona swerved across his bow. Built by James and George Thomson at Govan in 1855, the 325-ton paddle steamer had served William Hutcheson's Glasgow to Ardrishaig route before being sold, stripped, painted grey and loaded with coal for Nassau as a Confederate blockade runner. Her captain refused a passing tug's help unless the Chanticleer's master first accepted liability, and she went down stern first. Her midships section survives with paddles, engines and boilers, and the site is now a historic Marine Protected Area.
Iris
The crew of the Swedish-owned Iris abandoned her within ten minutes of being struck and were taken aboard the very ship that had hit her, the RFA Blue Ranger. Built of iron at West Hartlepool as Mercedes and later called Thrift, Grovedale and Torgerd, she was sixteenth of twenty-one ships in convoy WN53, which slipped through the Clyde boom in single file and passed down the Arran shore. Near the Pladda turning buoy the column ran into fog, and she slowed before swinging west with one blast of her whistle. Close astern, the Blue Ranger, loaded with fuel oil, saw her lights cross ahead and could not turn in time, and drove her bow into the Swedish ship's starboard quarter by the rear hatch. The Iris settled and went down south-east of Pladda. The wreck rests on mud largely intact, bow to the west, though most deck housings have gone and netting covers parts of the stern.
Lakemoor
The steamship Lakemoor, under the command of Lieutenant K J Powers, was part of a convoy carrying war supplies from Newport, Virginia to Glasgow. Onboard were ten officers and fifty-seven ratings, including Lieutenant Kirk Thomas, the second in command. As the convoy passed through the North Channel on 11th April 1918, the German submarine UB-64, commanded by Kapitanleutnant Otto von Schrader, targeted the Lakemoor. A torpedo strike caused the ship to sink rapidly. Tragically, five officers and forty-two ratings perished, while twenty crew members survived. The wreck of the Lakemoor now rests in the Firth of Clyde. Her remains are scattered, with notable features including her anchor, cargo remnants, and a triple expansion engine.
Longwy
Bound from Nantes for Bilbao, where she was to take on iron ore for Glasgow, the French steamer Longwy was off Corsewall Point in early November 1917 when the German submarine UC-75 torpedoed her. Captain Joseph Huet and twenty-eight of his men died, and the captain's body later came ashore at Girvan. Her masts still broke the surface, so a temporary Notice to Mariners went out and the Northern Lighthouse Board laid a lit buoy beside her as a warning to shipping; it was not lifted until October 1919. She now lies broken in the Firth of Clyde, her boilers, triple expansion engine and stern section still recognisable.
Louise
Her hatches could not be closed, and that decided the fate of the Louise: the casks of tar and ammoniacal liquor loaded at Rothesay stood too high in the hold for the covers to go on. The small iron steam lighter, launched at Maryhill in Glasgow in 1870, had spent her working life moving cargo around the upper Clyde for the Hay brothers. Bound for Falkirk under her master, John Steel, she met rough water as she cleared Bogany Point, and while turning back for shelter she was struck broadside by heavy seas that filled the open hold. She went down by the stern, pulling under the lifeboat she towed, and Steel came through by holding on to a floating hatch cover. Her remains lie low on a sandy slope off the point, her boiler the highest part and the rest of the hull silted and breaking up.
MV Kaffir
The wreck of the Kaffir is notable for her unusual grounding incident. In 1974, while moored in Ayr harbour, she was unexpectedly taken by John Henderson, a temporary crew member, who set out alone under the influence of alcohol. This unauthorised journey ended when the Kaffir ran aground just outside the harbour. Subsequent efforts to refloat her failed, and she was declared a constructive loss. Today, her remains lie broken in the Firth of Clyde, with sections visible at low tide. The wreck is split into two parts, with the stern closer to shore. The water at the site is silty from the nearby River Ayr. The wreck's cargo remains, mast, and stern section are among the notable features still present.
Margaret Niven
For her owners, Smith & Glendinning of Gourock, the loss of the Margaret Niven was a heavy blow. She went aground on the rock called 'Bald Heid' close to Barmore Island, and when attempts to save her came to nothing she was sold for £14 to McLean & Co., the Glasgow salvors. Efforts to raise her failed as well, and she is still on the bottom of the Firth of Clyde. Her stern points north and her hull is largely intact on a bed of shingle and mud. The single boiler stands out, and road granite from her cargo still partly fills the hull.
Marjorie Seed
Members of Irvine Sub-Aqua Club settled a long confusion over the Marjorie Seed in 1987, when they found a maker's plate on the nearby Ahdeek, which had been taken for her, and a bell inscribed Westhampton on her own remains. Westhampton was the name she was launched under at Sunderland; she later sailed as Elli, Amphion and Baron Cathcart before the Seed Shipping Company of Newcastle bought her. Bound from Rothesay Dock for Huelva with coal and coke, she struck Lady Isle at its north eastern point in clear, calm weather, and no adequate explanation of the error was ever given. Hopes of refloating her ended after a week of south westerly gales, and a later inspection found her port side holed, keel buckled and stern post broken. Salvors stripped her over the following years, and her broken plates and girders now lie scattered over rock and shingle.
Mary Anning
The Mary Anning, an iron steamship built by Palmer's Shipbuilding & Iron Company, was under the command of Captain T. Venables when she departed Glasgow with a coal cargo bound for Odessa. On the night of her departure, she anchored near Greenock. In the early hours, the coasting steamship Argus, captained by Reid, collided with her. The impact woke the Mary Anning's crew, who were mostly asleep, but they managed to escape onto the Argus. The Mary Anning sank shortly after. The extent of the salvage is unclear, but parts of the wreck remain in the Firth of Clyde, identifiable by sonar images. Notable features include her anchor and cargo remains.
Ovington
As the Ovington went down by the bow, a large explosion tore her apart, and part of her bridge, with its compass binnacle and bell, came ashore on Bute the next day. She was an iron steamship of 697 tons gross, launched at Sunderland by Osbourne & Graham in 1873. Bound from Glasgow for Hamburg with charcoal and ammonia, she had slowed to anchor off Toward Point in fog and snow when the steamer Queen Victoria, whose master took her stern light for the Skelmorlie Buoy, struck her on the port bow. Some of her crew climbed across to the other ship before she sank within minutes, and five were lost. She rests upright about a mile south of Toward Lighthouse, her port side breaking up, with bow and stern sections and an anchor recorded.
Penola
The Penola began life in France as the fishing schooner Alcyon, built by E. Bonne of Kerity in 1908, and later became a private yacht named Navaho. In 1934 John Rymill of Penola Station, South Australia, bought her for his expedition to Graham Land in Antarctica; her hull was strengthened, twin diesel engines were fitted and she took the name of his home. After the expedition, which was based on the Falkland Islands, she came back to Britain and was bought by the Vyner family, who used her to carry grain between Isle Martin in Loch Broom and Liverpool. Sailing up the Clyde, she collided with another vessel off Toward Point and, taking in water, was beached just west of the light, while her crew reached land in their lifeboat. She settled upright but later broke up, and engine parts and a section of keel have been found in shallow water close by.
Portland
The enquiry into the loss of the Portland laid the main blame on her own master, Captain Robert Jamieson, who turned to starboard after the oncoming steamer Welshman had already signalled a turn to port; the Welshman's master was also faulted for keeping up full speed after hearing a whistle in the fog. The iron steamship, built at Dundee by W B Thompson & Co Ltd for the Clyde Shipping Co, had left Greenock in hazy weather for Belfast and London with general cargo. Near the Cloch Lighthouse the Welshman struck her port side just aft of the bridge. Badly damaged herself, the Welshman stood by her, and the Portland went down a quarter of an hour after the impact. Her wreck lies north of the Cloch, reasonably intact and rising a few metres above the seabed.
Princess of Wales
Between fifty and sixty guests, workmen and crew were aboard the new paddle steamer Princess of Wales when she ran speed trials on the measured mile at Skelmorlie. Her pilot, James Barrie, altered course to match the Balmoral Castle, whose pilot James Parker kept edging further offshore, until the larger steamer sliced through her abaft the engine room. The women reached Skelmorlie in her one undamaged lifeboat, and yachts and boats from the shore came alongside for most of the others. Her stern went down at once with three workmen; the Adela took the bow in tow, but it capsized and sank off Wemyss Bay Pier. Built in 1888 by Barclay Curle & Co Ltd and still in the builders' hands, she was written off. The forepart was found in 1992 lying upside down on mud, and the stern has never been confirmed.
SS Arran III
Ayrshire Dockyard Co Ltd built the steel steamer Arran III in 1926 for Clyde Cargo Steamers Ltd, and for years she was a regular caller at the harbours and island piers of the Firth of Clyde. She was coming from Ardrishaig, loaded with empty beer bottles, when a south-easterly gale drove her onto Sgeir Leathann near Barmore Island. A tug was sent to help, but she had been badly holed, and as the tide came in she slid off into deeper water and her crew had to leave her. Much of her was salvaged afterwards. What remains lies broken on her port side on the rocky bottom, the stern at 12 metres and the bow at 5 metres; parts of the stern, the keel and the main ribs survive, along with some of her cargo.
SS Kintyre
Captain MacKechnie and engineer William Lennox were aboard the steamship Kintyre when she collided with the Maori on 18th September 1907. As the Maori's momentum drove her into the Kintyre's starboard side, most of the crew managed to escape to the Maori. Despite their efforts to beach the Kintyre, MacKechnie and Lennox were thrown into the sea as she sank. MacKechnie survived, but Lennox was lost. The owners of the Kintyre sought damages in court, but the ruling held them responsible for the collision. The wreck now lies in the Firth of Clyde, broken and partially collapsed. She rests on a steep slope, with her bow pointing towards the shore. The wreck's notable features include a winch and a dramatic clipper bow, now covered in anemones.
Saint Oran
Captain Mitchell noted that the Firth was murky as the Saint Oran left Troon with coal for Larne, and off Turnberry, after midnight, an inbound steamer loomed up too close to avoid. The Belfast steamer Eveleen struck and holed her, and while the coaster settled over the next two hours, the Eveleen, damaged only at the bow, stayed afloat and took her whole crew aboard before carrying them to Ayr. A day later one of her boats was found drifting south-east of Ailsa Craig holding a lifebelt along with her register, her official log and the book of her cargo. Built in 1911 and owned by J & A Gardner of Glasgow, the 237-ton steamship sank in 1920. She lies about four miles north-west of Girvan with her hull largely intact, though her funnel and mast have fallen and netting covers her bow.
Wallachia
Captain Walton had just enough warning to clear his men off the forecastle before the Norwegian steamer Flos loomed out of the fog and drove into the starboard bow of the Wallachia. She had left Glasgow for Trinidad and Demerara with twenty-one crew, one passenger and a general cargo of spirits, beer, acids and earthenware, and had already grounded briefly off Innellan. One lifeboat capsized as it was lowered, but everyone got away in the others and rowed to Toward Lighthouse. Twenty-five minutes after the impact she sank bow first with a violent explosion. She sits upright on mud, the collision gash still visible and her holds still carrying bottled McEwans beer and earthenware acid jars.
Highland(1)
Isle of Wight(1)
Isles of Scilly(3)
HMS Association
The wreck of HMS Association in 1707 had profound implications for maritime navigation. The catastrophic grounding on the Isles of Scilly, which also claimed three other ships, resulted in the loss of over 2,000 lives, including Admiral Sir Cloudesley Shovell. This disaster highlighted the need for accurate navigation, leading to the establishment of the Board of Longitude in 1714, which spurred the development of the marine chronometer. She met her end on 22 October 1707 due to navigational errors in the Celtic Sea. Rediscovered in 1967, the site has yielded artefacts like anchors and cannons, though much of the treasure was dispersed.
MV Cita
Scillonians woke in March 1997 to find their beaches strewn with cargo of every kind, from tobacco to computer parts, after gale-force winds had driven the Cita ashore on Newfoundland Point. The scenes that followed became a modern-day 'wrecking' sensation, and the national media covered the story. The ship herself broke apart and came to rest in two separate sections of very different character. Her bow section begins at just 8 metres and slopes down to 27, whereas the stern falls away as deep as 40 metres. Each of the two still holds a substantial amount of steel structure, cargo holds and passageways among it, and both lie in the Atlantic-washed waters that surround Scilly.
SS Hathor
The German Hathor, dragged helplessly from her tow across the Atlantic in 1920, came to rest directly on top of the British Plympton, wrecked in fog back in 1909. The tangled marriage of the two hulls creates a complex underwater landscape where it is genuinely difficult to tell where one vessel ends and the other begins. The Hathor's triple-expansion engines and twin boilers provide the main orientation points, clearing at around 25 metres with the seabed falling away to 33.
Kent(2)
HMS Bulwark
The destruction of HMS Bulwark had significant consequences, notably due to the tragic loss of 736 men, marking one of the largest accidental explosions in British naval history. The likely cause was overheating of cordite charges stored near a boiler room bulkhead. The wreck of Bulwark, now a protected site under the Protection of Military Remains Act 1986, lies in the waters off Kent. Diving on the site is generally prohibited without permission from the Ministry of Defence, preserving it as a war grave and a somber reminder of the lives lost.
HMS Princess Irene
The explosion of HMS Princess Irene on 27 May 1915 occurred during World War I. The disaster, which claimed 352 lives, highlighted the dangers of handling explosives and prompted investigations into potential sabotage, although no evidence of foul play was found. The ship, originally an ocean liner built by William Denny and Brothers Ltd in 1914, was converted into an auxiliary minelayer for the Royal Navy. While being loaded with mines in the Medway Estuary, she exploded, scattering debris over a wide area and causing additional casualties onshore. Today, the wreck of the Princess Irene lies scattered on the seabed of the North Sea, near Sheerness, Kent.
Northumberland(5)
MV Acclivity
The Acclivity was a small but purposeful motor tanker, designed specifically for vegetable oil and wine cargoes, that met her end in the unglamorous fashion common to many working vessels — a fouled propeller, a failed tow, and a winter sea that would not forgive. Loaded with linseed oil, she limped south of the Farne Islands in January 1952 before the North Sea claimed her. Storms have since rolled her from her original upright position onto her port side, burying half the hull in sediment, but what remains visible is a riot of colour. Her compact 39-metre length means a single circuit is entirely achievable, and the various holes and openings invite closer inspection.
SS Abessinia
She ran onto the rocks in September 1921 on her way home from Chile, and the reef has been digesting her ever since. Her boiler stands clear of the surrounding jumble at 18 metres as the main reference point, while the bow section — complete with anchor and chain — has slid down to the western side of the reef. Gullies criss-crossing the rock are stuffed with additional wreckage that rewards careful exploration. The rocks only show at low-water springs, so the reef's location is a navigational challenge in itself.
SS Chris Christensen
Longstone lighthouse — made famous by Grace Darling's 1838 rescue — watches over one of the Farne Islands' most dramatic underwater landscapes, and the Chris Christensen occupies pride of place at its base. This Danish steamer, running light from Aarhus to pick up cargo at Newcastle, misjudged the reef in February 1915 and came to grief on its south-eastern tip. Her remains have cascaded down an underwater cliff: the boiler and triple-expansion engine sit at around 30 metres, with wreckage tumbling over boulders down to 40. The nearby SS Coryton wreck adds a bonus target for those with gas and time to spare on the same descent.
SS Somali
The P&O cargo liner Somali was bound for Hong Kong with nine thousand tons of wartime supplies — everything from medical kits and batteries to toy lead soldiers and coins for the colony's banks — when Luftwaffe Heinkels found her off Beadnell in March 1941. Bombs ignited her holds, and the resulting explosion broke the ship in two. Four cylinder heads rise above the surrounding structure like industrial sentinels, while five boilers arranged in neat rows forward give scale to what was a substantial ship. Marine growth has transformed every surface into a living wall of colour.
St Andre
The St Andre arrived at the Farne Islands the hard way — hitting the Crumstone rock in October 1908, briefly floating free, then settling permanently at Staple Island with a belly full of pig iron. That dense cargo ensured she went down quickly and stayed put, and the heavy iron ingots still litter the seabed around the main wreckage like industrial confetti. Above the surface, Staple Island hosts one of the archipelago's densest seabird colonies — guillemots, razorbills, and puffins in season — so the boat ride out is half the experience.
Orkney(22)
Aorangi
The Scapa Flow 2013 Marine Archaeology Survey, funded by Historic Scotland, recorded the Aorangi by side-scan sonar as a hull roughly 109 metres long, bow to the southeast, with four boilers rising about 4 metres from the seabed as her highest point. She was a steel steamship of 117 metres, built at Glasgow by John Elder & Co in 1883 for the New Zealand Shipping Company, and later passed to the Union Steamship Company. In 1915 the Admiralty took her for use as a blockship and scuttled her in Kirk Sound against the stern of the Numidian. When the sound was reopened in 1920 she was refloated and shifted to where she now lies. Recorded on the remains are a steering arm and rudder post at the stern, sections of fallen mast with a crow's nest, a donkey boiler and wooden decking at the bow; her engine and propeller shaft are gone.
Clio II
The firing charge failed. Clio (II) had been brought to one of Scapa Flow's eastern approaches on 27 February 1915 to be sunk across it as a blockship; her anchors were let go in preparation, the charge did not fire, and she dragged east and settled in the channel where she blocked nothing. The Admiralty report survives, but she was marked only on the drawing of the blockships as sunk, never added to the chart, and afterwards vanished from the record — she is still routinely confused with Clio (I), scuttled in Water Sound the previous April. The 70-metre iron hull, built at Kinghorn in 1873, lies in about seven metres on sand and rock. The stern is scattered across a skerry, though shaft, rudder and a large winch are identifiable. The bow is the best of her: three metres proud, listing to port, with anchor chain still running from the starboard hawse pipe.
F2
A winter storm took the F2 to the bottom of Scapa Flow on 30 December 1946, more than a year after the war she had been designed for was over; she never fired a shot there. She was a Geleiteboot, an escort boat, and one of ten experimental ships given high-pressure Brown-Boveri turbines. Those temperamental engines could push her to 28 knots, but they also earned her a name for mechanical misery. In 1938 she was lengthened by four metres and given a new job recovering torpedoes. After her surrender to the Royal Navy in 1945, she was towed north to Scapa. Her stern rests upright in 16 to 18 metres, while the forward section lies listing on its side. A 30-metre line joins her to the salvage barge YC21, which went down close by in 1968 during an attempt to scrap her, and a 20mm gun taken off the F2 finished up aboard the barge: a small absurdity that ties the two wrecks together.
HMS Royal Oak
On the night of 14 October 1939, Kapitanleutnant Gunther Prien threaded U-47 through the supposedly impassable defences of Kirk Sound and put four torpedoes into a battleship at anchor. Eight hundred and thirty-five men — many of them boy sailors barely into their teens — died in the cold water of Scapa Bay. HMS Royal Oak now lies upturned in 33 metres, still weeping fuel oil after more than eight decades, marked by a green buoy bearing a simple request: respect their resting place. Every year, Royal Navy divers descend to replace the White Ensign on her hull, the only people authorised to visit a wreck protected under the highest classification of the Protection of Military Remains Act 1986. The sinking transformed Scapa Flow's defences: Churchill ordered permanent causeways across the eastern approaches, and Italian prisoners of war built the barriers that still carry Orkney's roads today.
HMS Vanguard
A little before midnight on 9 July 1917, a chain of blasts ripped through the anchorage at Scapa Flow, hurling debris onto ships lying half a mile off. HMS Vanguard had exploded where she was moored. Two of the 845 men aboard lived. No accident in the whole of the twentieth century cost the Royal Navy more lives. The Court of Enquiry put it down to cordite going off by accident: unstable propellant kept in magazines whose temperatures were badly controlled. So complete was the destruction that her remains, strewn over the seabed in 34 metres off the north coast of Flotta, look little like the St Vincent-class dreadnought she had been. The Protection of Military Remains Act 1986 makes her a war grave, as it does HMS Royal Oak, and diving on her is forbidden. Those of her dead who could be recovered are buried at Lyness Royal Naval Cemetery on Hoy, looking out over the water where they died.
James Barrie
Lother Rock, close to South Ronaldsay, is where the steam trawler James Barrie, launched as Benella, came to grief when she ran aground. She stayed stuck for two days, then lifted clear with nobody aboard and was carried out into the Pentland Firth. The lifeboat Grace Paterson Richie got a line on her and tried to bring her in, but she went down at the mouth of Widewall Bay. She now rests on her starboard side in Scapa Flow. Salvors have taken her bronze propeller and much of her brass, yet the masts, the winch and the starboard anchor are all still in place. The top of the steam engine can be seen, and the rudder lies on the seabed.
Lapland
When the Scapa Flow 2013 Marine Archaeology Survey, funded by Historic Scotland, ran side scan sonar over her expected resting place, it found no trace of the Lapland. Historical charts of the blockships put her remains under the third of the Churchill Barriers, and the 1972 Undermarine Operations surveys and later records noted wreckage sticking out of that barrier, but the recent work could not confirm it. She was a British steel steamship of 1,234 tons, built at Dundee in 1890 by W. B. Thompson & Co. Ltd. as the Ptarmigan for the Cork Steamship Co. Sold to Liverpool owners in 1903 and renamed Dauntless, she took the name Lapland in 1907 under the Liverpool & Hamburg SS. Co. The Admiralty requisitioned her in 1914, and she was later sunk deliberately to block East Weddell Sound.
SM UB-116
She never made it. British hydrophone operators tracked her approach and detonated a remote-controlled mine that killed all 34 crew — the last U-boat lost in the First World War. Raised in 1919, she broke free and sank again at the mouth of Pan Hope Bay; a controlled explosion later dealt with her remaining live torpedoes, and the blast left her barely recognisable as a submarine. What remains is a scattered field of torn steel and bent piping in 26 to 32 metres, with the conning tower standing as the only clearly identifiable feature. Orientation is challenging, but the story gives every twisted plate its weight. This is the physical full stop at the end of the U-boat war.
SMS Brummer
Brummer earned her name — "Growler" in German — in October 1917, when she and her sister Bremse ambushed a British convoy bound for Norway and left two destroyers and nine merchant ships on the seabed in a single action. A century on, she lies on her starboard side in Cava Sound, one of the few German warships that salvage teams never touched. Mine rails run along the deck where 400 contact mines once sat ready for deployment, and scattered arsenal pieces litter the seabed around the hull.
SMS Coln
She never fired a shot in anger. The Coln led the last class of light cruisers the Imperial German Navy was ever to build, and she came into service too late to fight. None of the cruisers still in Scapa Flow is in better condition: she rests on her starboard side with many prominent deck features in place. Ships of her class were 155 metres long and could make 27.5 knots, and they were armed for real work, with eight 15cm guns, torpedo tubes, and mine rails for 200 contact mines, and a complement of 559 men. Her starboard side lies in 34-36 metres, and the highest part of the hull is at 22 metres. Even on the bottom she still looks like a warship, down to her rivets and fittings, a relic of the navy that briefly challenged British supremacy at sea.
SMS Dresden
That versatility is no accident of geography — the Dresden lies on her port side along a natural gradient, the hull itself mapping out a progression from comfortable to challenging. Sister ship to the Coln and one of the last light cruisers the Kaiser's yards would ever launch, she carried eight 15cm guns, torpedo tubes, and rails for 200 mines at close to 28 knots.
SMS Karlsruhe
She sits at about 45 degrees, starboard side down, hull and fittings remarkably well preserved for a ship that has spent more than a century underwater in Orkney tidal waters. The Karlsruhe belonged to the Konigsberg class of 1915, with 60mm belt armour, eight 15cm guns, torpedo tubes, and mine rails: a ship designed to sprint at 27.5 knots, lay death in the water, and fight her way home.
SMS Konig
Ravaged by decades of industrial salvage, the Konig offers something none of the other Scapa battleships can: a cross-section through the guts of a WWI dreadnought. Where Metal Industries tore away hull plating and superstructure in the 1960s, the armoured citadel now stands exposed — twelve inches of dovetail-jointed steel that once protected the magazines. Seven casemate guns lie upside down on the seabed along the starboard side like fallen dominoes.
SMS Kronprinz Wilhelm
The real draw is the main armament: half of the original complement of 12-inch guns remain visible and reachable, turret after turret lined up along a hull that still measures 146 metres on the seabed.
SMS Markgraf
Often called the jewel of Scapa Flow, the Markgraf is the deepest and best-preserved of the three battleships still resting on the seabed. The reward is a warship that still looks like a warship: intact bow, stern, and rudders convey the sheer scale of a 175-metre dreadnought that once carried over a thousand men into the maelstrom at Jutland. Because the superstructure caught on the seabed before she could roll fully, much of the underside architecture remains visible rather than crushed.
SS Almeria
The SS Almeria was surveyed as part of the Scapa Flow 2013 Marine Archaeology Survey, revealing her condition and features. Originally built by Laing James & Sons Ltd. in Sunderland, she was a British steamship with a length of 89.3 metres and a beam of 11.6 metres. Initially launched as SS Patapsco, she underwent several name changes and ownership transfers before being purchased by the Admiralty in 1914. Intended as an accommodation ship, she was scuttled as a blockship in Skerry Sound in 1915. Today, the Almeria lies partially broken in Scapa Flow, with her stern section intermingling with the wrecks of SS Ilsenstein and SS Emerald Wings. Notable features include her propeller, triple expansion engine, and boilers. Although broken, sections of the hull remain upright, with the stern standing about 4 metres above the seabed.
SS Elton
The SS Elton, a British steamship, is notable for her use as a blockship in Scapa Flow, where she was deliberately scuttled in 1914. Built in 1888 by Gray William & Co., Ltd., she measured 91.4 metres in length and had a beam of 11.8 metres. Acquired by the Admiralty, she was sunk in Skerry Sound, where she rolled over and broke her back. Today, only three sections of the wreck remain exposed. These sections include the bow, a propeller shaft tunnel, and the stern. The bow section stands about 2 metres above the seabed, while the propeller shaft tunnel features an open door and is partially buried. The stern section is intermingled with the remains of another vessel, the SS Teeswood.
SS Emerald Wings
The SS Emerald Wings is notable for her mast and bow sections, which remain visible above the waterline at all tides in Skerry Sound, Scapa Flow. Originally built in 1920 as the SS Depute Pierre Goujon for the French government, she changed hands several times before being renamed Emerald Wings in 1936. In 1940, she was requisitioned by the British Admiralty and scuttled as a blockship. Today, her remains are scattered across the seabed, with features like her boilers, triple expansion engine, and propeller shaft still identifiable. Her anchor, winch and sections of her stern also survive.
SS Empire Seaman
The scuttling of the Empire Seaman in 1940 significantly contributed to the wartime defences in Scapa Flow, serving as a blockship to protect the naval base. Originally built in 1922 as the SS Morea for a German company, she was captured by the British in 1940 and repurposed. Her loss as a blockship marked a strategic move in the region's defence efforts during World War II. Today, the wreck lies in East Weddel Sound, with machinery and structural remnants still visible. Although extensively salvaged, notable features like the propeller shaft and sections of the mast remain. The wreck lies beside the Barrier, with parts visible above water at low tide.
SS Gartmore
In Scapa Flow's eastern approaches the third Churchill Barrier crosses East Weddell Sound, and the Gartmore lies a short swim off its northern shore in three to five metres of water — shallow enough to snorkel, close enough to walk in. She was already thirty-five years old and on her third name when the Admiralty bought her: launched on the Tyne as the Bedford in 1879, she became the Castilla, then the Gartmore, and on 14 September 1914 she was run into the sound and scuttled to help close an eastern approach the war had just exposed. She did not stay whole. Swimming west off the barrier you meet a large winch gear and a section of ladder, then the rudder and a single blade of a part-buried propeller; beyond them a long run of hull plating still encasing the propeller shaft lies north–south and comparatively intact, and further west again the crankshaft sits exposed on rock and sand. The remains are well dispersed rather than wrecked in one piece, but for a cargo steamer of 1845 tons there is a great deal of her left to find.
SS Ilsenstein
Workman, Clark & Co. Ltd. of Belfast launched this steamship in 1904 as the Matatua, and in 1928 she took the name Ilsenstein. She had been sold for scrap by 1939, but the Admiralty requisitioned her instead and, during 1940, sank her deliberately in Skerry Sound, Scapa Flow, as a blockship in place of the SS Cape Ortegal. A survey in 2013 found much of her hull buried in sand. She lies north to south beside Barrier 2, only partly exposed: the bow rises prominently from the seabed, while sand has largely covered the stern. A large triple expansion engine and several boilers can still be picked out among the remains, despite the years.
V83
When the order came to open the seacocks on 21 June 1919, British sailors boarded this torpedo boat destroyer and ran her aground before she could sink. Ernest Cox later pressed her into service during his audacious campaign to raise the battleship Hindenburg, and an unsuccessful attempt to refloat her in 1926 left her where she sits today — upright on a gentle slope, broken into two halves. The bow section is fragmented in about eight metres; the stern sits more recognisably in 15 to 16. There is rarely any current, and the maximum depth barely troubles a single-cylinder pony bottle.
Pembrokeshire(4)
MV Lucy
Standing bolt upright on the seabed with her mast still rigged, the Lucy looks less like a wreck and more like a ship that simply forgot to come back up. This Dutch coaster met her end in dramatic fashion in 1967: her calcium carbide cargo began reacting with seawater after she struck Blackstones Reef, threatening an explosion that forced the crew to abandon ship. The rising tide then prised her free and the current carried her to her final resting place north of Skomer Island.
SS Cambro
Twenty miles out from the Pembrokeshire coast, the Smalls lighthouse marks one of the most treacherous reefs in the Irish Sea — and the Cambro is its best-known casualty. This steel steamer, loaded with Spanish pyrites, was swallowed by fog in May 1913 and drove straight onto the rocks barely 150 metres from the lighthouse.
SS Dakotian
The Dakotian's end came with shocking speed. A Heinkel 111H bomber dropped a parachute magnetic mine into Milford Haven in November 1940, and when it detonated against the anchored cargo steamer she went down in barely three minutes — one of the earliest parachute mine casualties in Welsh waters. What the site lacks in crystal water it makes up for in atmosphere: swimming along a 120-metre hull canted on its beam ends, knowing how suddenly and violently her war ended, gives the Dakotian a sombre character that clear-water wrecks sometimes lack.
SS Dalserf
Grassholm is best known for its 36,000 pairs of nesting gannets — the third-largest colony in the world — but beneath the waves on the island's south-eastern flank lies the Dalserf, a Cardiff coal carrier that struck the rocks in July 1910. All 27 crew survived, though the ship did not. Salvors stripped her of non-ferrous metals long ago, but the triple-expansion engine with its distinctive three-cylinder arrangement and the boiler still mark the centre of the site at around 20 metres.
Scottish Borders(2)
HMS Pathfinder
On 5 September 1914, just weeks into the First World War, HMS Pathfinder made unwanted history as the first major warship ever sunk by a locomotive torpedo fired from a submarine. SM U-21, commanded by Otto Hersing, struck the scout cruiser's forward magazine, and the resulting explosion tore the bow clean off. Of her complement, 259 men were lost. She now rests upright in around 60 metres of water off St Abbs, her hull intact from stern to bridge area but the bow section scattered where the magazine detonated. A designated war grave under the Military Remains Act, she may be visited but not disturbed. Those who descend to her pay their respects to a moment that changed naval warfare forever.
SS Glanmire
She hit Black Carr Rocks in thick fog on a summer's day in 1912, carrying general cargo from Amsterdam to the Forth ports, and everyone on board survived. Now lying broken between 20 and 35 metres with her bow facing the coast, she sits within the St Abbs Voluntary Marine Reserve — an area renowned for its clear water and prolific marine life.
Shetland(26)
Anglo Dane
Pieces of DFDS crockery brought up from the seabed are what identified the broken wreck in the North Sea as the Anglo Dane, and her boilers, propeller and the remains of her cargo are all still there. Her career had begun awkwardly. The Anglo Danish and Baltic Steam Navigation Company Ltd ordered her, ran into money trouble, and in 1867 she was bought by Det Forende Dampskibs Selskab (DFDS). For close to forty years she worked the North Sea and the Baltic, and a major rebuild in 1874 enlarged her capacity. War did not stop her sailings, even as the dangers grew, and in 1914 she was in collision with a German torpedo boat. The end came near Shetland in October 1917, on her last voyage, when she ran onto a mine that UC-40 had laid. A single member of her crew died; the British torpedo boat Arab picked up everyone else.
Bohus
The figurehead known on Yell as the White Wife came ashore months after the Bohus was lost, and islanders set her on the headland above the wreck as a memorial; restored and long repainted by East Yell folk, she was later moved to the Old Haa Museum at Burravoe. Built at Alloa in 1892 by Grangemouth Dockyard Co. as the Bertha, the iron barque was serving as a German sail training ship when she left Gothenburg in ballast for Chile in 1924 with a crew made up largely of cadets, plus a stowaway. A navigational error put her far off course, and in a storm she was driven broadside onto the Ness of Queyon and broke up. Local men got a line aboard and brought many ashore, but four died, among them the cadet Josef Anton Eberth after he had saved four shipmates. Iron ribs, winches and an anchor lie scattered in the shallows.
Borodinskoye Polye
A severe gale was blowing on the night of November 17th, 1993, when the big factory ship Borodinskoye Polye went hard aground on Unicorn Reef, close to Lerwick. Lerwick's lifeboat, the Soldian, put out quickly with Coxswain Peter Thomson in command, and pilot vessels and a Coastguard helicopter joined her. Seventy-four crew had to be taken off a ship that was rolling on the rocks in dreadful conditions. Every one of them was brought to safety, through the work of Thomson, his lifeboat crew and the men of the helicopter. Afterwards, questions were asked about whether similar vessels working in the area were fit for sea. Because the ship had substantial quantities of oil aboard, an expensive operation followed to stop it harming the environment. Her remains, largely underwater and spread across the reef, still lie in shallow water at Unicorn Reef, where the grounding happened.
De Liefde
De Liefde was the third ship of the Dutch East India Company to carry the name, and both earlier holders of it had also been wrecked, one off Japan in 1600. Built for the company in 1698, the armed wooden sailing ship left the Dutch coast in 1711 bound for Batavia with soldiers, stores and a heavy general cargo. With the War of Spanish Succession making the Channel dangerous, her convoy took the northern route round Scotland, and off Shetland a violent storm scattered it. She was driven onto the Out Skerries and broke up quickly, and how it happened is unclear. Navy divers found the site again in 1964, and later salvors working under a Dutch licence used small charges to free coins from the concretion, raising an unbroken chest and thousands of silver pieces with some gold ducats.
Fraoch Ban
The Marine Accident Investigation Branch concluded that the Fraoch Ban most probably went over because her bulk catch of sand eels was not properly contained, shifting in a hold she had been tested and approved to load only with boxed fish. A faulty non-return valve between her fuel tanks may have made matters worse. She was trawling off the south-east coast of Bressay in August 1999, skippered by Brian Robb of Scalloway, who owned her, when a list to port grew until she rolled over in about five minutes. A borrowed liferaft had drifted off untethered, and two men swam out to bring it back. The Sarah Joan, the Sumburgh helicopter and the Lerwick lifeboat took all four off, and one man revived by first aid recovered fully in hospital. Built in 1978, she remains largely intact on sand in Hope Wick, heavily overgrown.
Glenisla
Captain Joseph Mitchell commanded the Glenisla with a crew of twenty-three men. On 24th November 1917, while en route from Newcastle to Slemmestad, Norway, the Glenisla carried a full cargo of coal. Her journey was interrupted, and she anchored near Kirkabister Light. During this time, she collided with the British steamship Glenelg, which had been damaged by a mine and was under tow for repairs. The collision fatally damaged the Glenisla, but fortunately, her crew escaped safely in the ship's boats. Today, the wreck of the Glenisla lies in the North Sea, off the Shetland region. She rests upright on a sandy seabed, with her boilers, engine, and a large spare propeller visible. A steel mast and deck gun are also present on the seabed, marking the site of her final resting place.
Goodwill Merchant
Brian Jones, winchman on a British Airways helicopter flown by Captain Steve Jowett, lifted every member of the Goodwill Merchant's crew off her as she lay on the rocks at Ness of Ireland, on Shetland's western shore. Built at Westerbroek in 1962, the motor coaster was carrying general cargo from Grangemouth to Lerwick under Captain T Fekkes when she went aground in calm weather, but her radio call placed her on Fair Isle. That vague report sent the Lerwick lifeboat on a six-hour search before daylight showed where she was. Nobody was injured, though her captain was treated for shock. Later that day she slid off the rocks until only her mast showed, and her cargo, which included cars, was beyond saving. Her exposed position soon broke her apart; her bell, raised in later years, is held by the Shetland Museum, and her remains are scattered down a steep rocky slope.
Grayfish
R Dunston Ltd built the steel motor fishing vessel Grayfish in 1960, and she was run by the Huxley Fishing Co Ltd of Lowestoft. By 1973 she had found work in the Shetlands as a standby vessel for the oil rigs. Her radar was faulty when she made for Lerwick on 21 December that year, and thick fog closed in, leaving her crew all but blind. Without realising it the skipper strayed off course, and she struck an offshore reef. Luck was with them: she fetched up near Point of Pundsta, just fifty yards out, close enough for coast rescue teams from Lerwick and Sandwick to reach her with little trouble and land all five men safely. There were hopes at first of refloating her, but heavy weather soon reduced the Grayfish to a total wreck. Her remains lie broken among the rocks on the North Sea shore there, some of them above the low-water mark and some below it.
Green Lily
A memorial near Grut Wick on Bressay honours Bill Deacon, the coastguard helicopter winchman who stayed on the deck of the Green Lily until her last ten crew had been lifted clear, and was then swept overboard. The refrigerated cargo vessel had sailed from Lerwick in November 1997 with frozen fish for West Africa when, in a rising south-easterly gale, a fractured seawater pipe was followed by the failure of her main engine. She drifted towards Bressay as two tugs got lines aboard and each saw them part, and a third held her anchor chain only until that broke too. The Lerwick lifeboat came alongside for a time, until the ship's rolling forced it away. She went ashore north of Bressay Light and broke up, and what is left of her, anchor and engine among it, lies scattered over a wide area.
HMS Asia
The sinking of HMS Asia had significant consequences during World War I. Originally a steam trawler built in 1905 by Earle's Shipbuilding and Engineering Co Ltd, she was requisitioned by the Admiralty in 1914 for use as a minesweeper. On 12th September 1917, while escorting a convoy into Lerwick harbour, she struck a mine laid by the German U-boat UC-40, resulting in the loss of seven crew members, including her commander, Lieutenant John Duxfield Benjamin. The wreck of the Asia now lies in the North Sea off Shetland. She rests at a depth of 69 metres, with her notable features including a triple expansion engine and anchor.
HMS Oceanic
Two captains stood on the bridge of HMS Oceanic, and they disagreed about her course on the night she was lost. The 17,272-ton liner, built in 1899 as Thomas Ismay's flagship, became an armed merchant cruiser in 1914 and patrolled between Scotland and the Faroes with her merchant master, Henry Smith, serving alongside a naval captain, William Slayter. Uneasy with the heading, Smith turned her west while Slayter was in his cabin; Slayter returned and reversed the order, and she ran onto the Shaalds of Foula, far off her reckoned position. The sea was calm, and the Aberdeen trawler Glenogil took her crew off. At the court martial the navigator, Lieutenant David Blair, was reprimanded while both captains were acquitted. A gale broke her up within weeks. Salvage in the 1920s and the 1970s took much of her metal; her engines and boilers lie among wreckage spread across the reef.
HMS Sarah Alice
The enquiry held after her sinking was a controversial one: it asked why the hired yacht Conqueror had stopped the steamer St Gothard at all, and why the ships had then lain stationary long enough to be ambushed, when standing orders required boarding vessels to keep their speed. In the end it blamed no one. Smith’s Dockyard Co Ltd built HMS Sarah Alice in 1911, a steamer driven by a triple expansion engine. She was escorting the St Gothard north west of Fair Isle when a torpedo from U-52 struck her, and she blew up and went down within minutes, taking Lieutenant Hugh Lovett and his crew with her; Conqueror and the St Gothard were sunk soon afterwards. The deep water has so far prevented any confirmed identification, but a wreck in two sections near the reported attack position is considered almost certainly hers.
Highcliffe
Captain Henderson, the Highcliffe's regular master, came from Reawick and knew western Shetland, and his route from Narvik to Immingham with iron ore ran close along that coast to keep clear of the U-boats to the east. Without radar, and with the weather closing in, he took a headland for the Neep of Norby when it was in fact Fitful Head, and soon afterwards the water shoaled abruptly and she ran onto rocks off Forewick Ness, Papa Stour, some fifteen miles from where he grew up. The Aith lifeboat stood by until he gave the order to leave, then took the crew off without loss. Built at South Shields in 1927 by John Redhead and Sons for the Cliffe Steamship Co, she swung broadside to the swell, broke in two, and by 1946 had gone from sight. Her remains are widely scattered, with her boiler and the gun she carried for wartime protection still recognisable.
Kennemerland
A team from Aston University found the remains of the Kennemerland in 1971, and some fifteen years of archaeological survey and recovery followed; in 1978 the site was designated a historic wreck. She was a wooden Dutch East Indiaman, bought by the Amsterdam Chamber of the VOC, armed with iron and bronze guns, and had completed a single trading voyage to the Indies. On her second, bound for Batavia with her sister Rijnland and a share of a large sum in coin, she took the northern route to avoid English warships, was driven by a southerly gale onto the Outer Skerries of Shetland and broke in two. Three lookouts in the foremast shrouds reached the rocks and were the only survivors. The Earl of Morton's men salvaged much of the coin, but Charles II claimed the wreck for the crown and the Earl lost his estates. Parts of the ship and some iron cannon remain in place.
Lastdrager
Almost everything known of the Lastdrager's last voyage rests on one man: Johannes Camphuijs, a nineteen-year-old crewman and the sole survivor, whose statement records how she was lost. The East Indiaman had left Texel to take the northern passage round Scotland. A gale near Fair Isle shredded her sails, and for three weeks she was carried helpless north and west of Shetland before striking rocks at Crooks Ayre on Yell. She split apart; the stern drifted off, and the bow, where the crew sheltered, was lifted by the tide and wrecked against the shore. Robert Stenuit's team found her cannon in 1971 and raised thousands of finds, mostly small fragments but including coins and navigational instruments, and noted pools of mercury in the rock crevices. Her stern, which drifted away when she broke, was not among the finds.
Leonatus
A salvage officer, a Chief Petty Officer and two hands from the whaler Beluga went aboard the stricken Leonatus to save her, and only three of the four got clear. She had come north from Swansea with coal and was waiting off Lerwick to join a small convoy for Norway when an explosion aft of her well deck stopped her two miles south of Bard Head. Records disagree on whether a torpedo or one of the mines laid nearby by UC-40 was to blame. Captain James Fenton sent his crew to the boats, and the whalers Balaena and Beluga picked them up. The tug Peewit then took her in tow, but she was settling, and she sank soon after the tow was slipped; the Chief Petty Officer went down with her. Built at Stockton-on-Tees by Richardson Duck and Co Ltd in 1903, she lies upright in two main sections, her propeller and stern gun still visible; the recovery of her bell confirmed her identity.
Lunohods-1
For three years after she was driven ashore, the Lunohods-1 stood largely whole and in plain sight off Kirkabister Ness, until the constant North Sea swell wore her down to a fragment showing only at low water. She was a steel diesel fishing vessel of 2,774 tons, launched at the Chernomorsky Shipyard in Nikolayev in 1971 for Zapryba and sold in 1991 to the Leipaja Ocean Fishing Fleet in Latvia. She came to Shetland each year to serve a fleet of trawlers working the nearby grounds. Two days after one such arrival, a force 10 gale set her dragging her anchor, and she went onto the rocks just south of the lighthouse, where her hull was holed within about an hour and she settled by the bow. Her crew abandoned her. The wreck now lies broken in two main sections down a steep rocky slope, the stern nearest the shore, with her engine block the largest piece left.
MFV Elinor Viking
What people remember about the Elinor Viking is the rescue. John Lewis and Sons Ltd built her in 1974, a British diesel trawler that fished the waters around Shetland, and in a storm she was driven onto the rocks of Vee Skerries, leaving her men in real danger. A British Airways helicopter crew, brought together on the spur of the moment, flew out into the severe weather and, in spite of the conditions, lifted the trawlermen to safety on their winch. Afterwards the trawler slid off the rocks and was a total wreck. Her remains lie along the eastern side of Reaerach, one of the reefs, and no recent reports describe their state.
MV Braer
Seawater had got into the Braer's diesel fuel, and when her engines failed in 1993 the tanker went ashore at Garths Ness, Shetland. Oshima Shipbuilding Company had built her in 1975, and she had 85,000 tonnes of crude oil on board; the damage to the coast turned out less severe than feared, because strong winds and heavy seas broke the oil up. At Garths Ness she has since been broken up and flattened in less than 10 metres of water, and hardly anything of her can now be recognised.
Pionersk
The Pionersk was a Soviet fish factory ship of 12,639 tons gross, 165.5 metres long, launched at Gdansk in 1963 and owned by Zapbrya. Ships of her kind, known in Shetland as Klondykers, lay at anchor offshore for weeks so that Russian trawlers could land their catch for processing without the long run home. She was moored off Bressay awaiting the fleet when a force 10 gale parted her lines and drove her ashore on the Ness of Trebister, south of Lerwick. The Lerwick lifeboat and a helicopter brought her whole crew safely to land. Oil from her tanks fouled the coast and fed island demands for tighter checks on such ships. She stayed on the rocks for nearly three months before a storm broke her up; her stern is the most intact part of the wreckage.
Samba
Captain Carl Blomberg and a crew of eight were bound from Rotterdam for Odda in Norway when a gale caught the tanker Samba in the North Sea. Seas flooded her engine room, her engines stopped, and she was driven north for three days while the salvage tug Noord Holland stood by; three tow lines were made fast and each one parted. Off Shetland six men got away on a life raft and were taken aboard the tug. The other three stayed at the stern as she drifted under the cliffs at the Ord of Bressay; guided there by the fishing boat Harvest Hope, the Lerwick lifeboat took them off at the sixth attempt. Abandoned, the Samba crossed Bressay Sound and went ashore at Ness of Sound, where surf broke up her hull over the following months. She lies well broken down a steep slope to 35 metres, her engine and propeller among the rocks.
Strathtay
The Strathtay, a steam trawler built by Hall Russell and Co Ltd in 1891, was lost with all nine crew members during a severe storm in February 1900. Departing from Aberdeen on 9th February, she headed towards the fishing grounds off Shetland. Tragically, none of her crew survived the storm, and no confirmed sightings of the vessel were made after her departure. A trawler was seen from Sumburgh Lighthouse attempting to anchor during the storm, but distress flares were the last signs before she vanished. The wreck, now scattered on a rocky seabed, includes her engine, anchor, and a spare propeller. The remains lie in the North Sea, near the southern tip of Scatness, in a condition described as scattered.
Tonis Chandris
Captain Andreas Cockinos and his crew of twenty-one were carrying manganese ore from Narvik to Barrow in 1940 when the Tonis Chandris struck the Vere Reef, off Unst, in thick fog; some accounts say a U-boat was chasing her. Her first distress call was too vague to place her, and the lifeboat Lady Jane and Martha Ryland waited at Balta Sound until a second message put her somewhere between Fetlar and the north of Unst. At first light the lifeboat found her on the reef and stood by until the tug St Mellons came out from Lerwick. The tow failed, her crew went aboard the tug, and later efforts to float her off after lightening her cargo also came to nothing. Built at Rostock in 1904 as the Hornburg, she had passed through German, British and Greek hands. Her wreckage lies down a slope to about 30 metres, with her engine, two boilers and propeller among it.
Ustetind
Captain Barmen commanded the Ustetind on her fateful journey from Porsgrunn to the Tyne, carrying 600 tons of telegraph poles. As she crossed the North Sea, a severe gale pushed her towards the rocky shores near Silwick, Shetland. On Christmas Day, she lost a propeller, and despite deploying anchors, the vessel was driven aground. Observers from a nearby village alerted the lifesaving crew, who braved a blizzard to rescue the crew using a line fired from the headland. The Ustetind settled deep in the water, her hull smashed, and was declared a total wreck by the next day. Over time, her wooden structure broke apart, with much of the wreckage washing ashore. Some remnants may still lie in the shallow waters of Silwick Bay, marked by her anchor and cargo remains.
Wendela
The loss of the Wendela had significant financial implications for the Danish East India Company, which was already struggling in its early years. The Wendela, a Danish East Indiaman, was carrying a valuable cargo, including silver bars and coins, from Copenhagen to Tranquebar in 1737 when she disappeared. Her loss was first indicated by debris and bodies found along the coast of Unst, and she was confirmed wrecked at East Fetlar. The wreck site, scattered among rocks, contained remnants of her cargo, including coins and metal. Despite salvage efforts, much of her treasure remained unrecovered. In 1971, a modern investigation found debris and a few silver coins, but the site remains largely unexplored. The Wendela's remains are scattered, and the exact amount of treasure still on the seabed is unknown.
Wrangels Palais
A Danish court of enquiry blamed her loss on Lieutenant Jorgen Liebendantz, concluding that he was sleeping below decks during his watch, yet he was given other commands within the year and eventually retired on a pension. Built in Holland in 1662, she had sailed as a Swedish merchantman and warship before Admiral Niels Juel captured her at the Battle of Moen and the Royal Danish Navy armed her with forty-six guns. In 1687 she was one of six ships under Vice Admiral Frederick Gedde sent north of Shetland against Turkish privateers. In dense fog she struck Lamba Stack in the Out Skerries under Captain Jacob Gabrielsen Roelack, and 152 of the 240 aboard reached the rocks. Her remains were found off Broad Skerry in 1990 and given protected status within days; later surveys recorded a spread of cast and bronze guns in a rock basin.
West Sussex(2)
HMS/m A1
Lying in 9 to 12 metres of water off Bracklesham Bay, HMS A1 holds a unique place in British naval history: she was the very first submarine designed and built in this country for the Royal Navy. Constructed by Vickers in 1903, she had already survived one sinking — a collision with SS Berwick Castle in 1904 that killed eleven crew before she was raised — when she was repurposed as an unmanned torpedo target. In August 1911, operating on automatic pilot, she sank for good off Selsey Bill. Tidal currents slowly dragged her five miles along the seabed to her present position. The hull is virtually intact, with the bow standing proud while the stern disappears beneath a sandbank.
SS Gascony
The Gascony presents a puzzle that rewards patient exploration. Attacked by UC-75 on 18 January 1918, this armed cargo steamer broke in two and sank the following afternoon near Selsey Bill, coming to rest upside down on the edge of the Owers — a notorious shallow bank that has claimed countless vessels over the centuries. Her inverted orientation makes navigation tricky: what should be the deck is buried, and you swim beneath the keel looking up at the hull plating. Among the scattered cargo, the wheels of army gun carriages poke through the wreckage, a reminder that she was doing war work when the torpedo found her.