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Sunk by German mine off north-west Orkney on 5 June 1916 with the loss of the UK Secretary of State for War, Lord Kitchener

The wreck of the 10,850-ton armoured cruiser HMS Hampshire lies 1.5 miles off the 200-foot sheer cliffs of Marwick Head at the north-west tip of the main island of Orkney. It is a very special and sensitive wreck for the people of Orkney – its memory deeply entwined in the fabric of Orkney itself. A total of 737 souls, including the UK Secretary of State for War, Lord Kitchener, and his staff, perished on the fateful night of 5 June 1916 as Hampshire sank quickly after striking a mine laid by a German submarine eight days earlier – part of German preparations for what would develop into the Battle of Jutland. There were only 12 survivors.

The 10,850-ton Devonshire-class armoured cruiser HMS Hampshire. (IWM)

Hampshire was laid down on 1 September 1902 by Armstrong Whitworth at its Elswick shipyard at Newcastle upon Tyne and launched on 24 September 1903. Fitting out afloat was completed on 15 July 1905. She was one of six such vessels in her class and displaced 10,850 long tons with a length overall of 473.5 feet, a beam of 68.5 feet and a deep loaded draught of 25.5 feet.

Hampshire was powered by two 4-cylinder triple expansion steam engines, each driving one of her two shafts and giving her a maximum speed of 22.4 knots. Her two manganese bronze propellers each weighed approximately 43 tons and had a diameter of almost 16 feet. Seventeen Yarrow and six cylindrical Scotch marine boilers provided the high-pressure steam for her two engines.

Hampshire’s main armament consisted of four 45-calibre breech-loading (BL) 7.5-inch Vickers Mk I naval guns mounted in four single-gun turrets, one on the centre line of the fo’c’sle forward of the bridge, two set one on either side of the bridge and the fourth on the centre line towards her stern. These guns fired a 200lb (91 kg) shell to a range of about 12,600 metres – almost 8 miles.

Her secondary battery at the time of construction comprised six BL 6-inch Vickers Mk VII naval guns that fired a 100lb common Lyddite or high explosive (HE) shell with a maximum range of approximately 11,200 metres – almost 7 miles. These guns were arranged in a single casemate on either beam amidships, and a vertical double casemate on either beam towards the stern. The four lower guns were found to be of limited use, particularly in a poor sea, and were demounted in 1916, given gun shields and set on the upper platform deck – replacing four of the Hotchkiss 3-pounders, which were landed. The lower casemate openings were then plated over to improve seakeeping. Hampshire was also fitted at the time of her construction with two single 12-pounder 8cwt guns that could be dismounted for service ashore.

As built, 18 quick firing (QF) 3-pounder Hotchkiss guns were set nine along either side of the mid-section of her beam between main and foremasts. These reliable QF guns were in use with the Royal Navy between 1886 and the 1950s, and during WWI they fired a 3.3lb common Lyddite shell and had a rate of fire of 30 rounds per minute with a range of 4,000 yards. They were intended as a defence against fast enemy torpedo boats or torpedo boat destroyers attacking her beam.

Two lateral submerged 18-inch torpedo tubes were fitted one either side of the vessel just forward of the bridge. Torpedo hatch doors in the hull plating opened to allow a ram to project laterally from the vessel’s beam for the full length of the torpedo, protecting the torpedo from the movement of the water down her side which could potentially jam the torpedo in the beam tube as it came out.

Bow aspect of HMS Hampshire. The top of the waterline vertical armour belt can be seen between the darker hull paintwork below and the lower row of portholes. The two upper fo’c’sle decks, each with a row of portholes, are unarmoured. (IWM)

The ship’s waterline main vertical armour belt ranged from a maximum thickness of 6 inches to 2 inches outwith the citadel, which was closed off at either end by 5-inch transverse bulkheads forward of the foremost 7.5-inch A turret and aft of the aftmost 7.5-inch Y turret. The horizontal deck armour ranged in thickness from 0.75 to 2 inches, whilst her conning tower, made of cast steel because of the complex shape, was 12 inches thick.

On completion in 1905, Hampshire was initially assigned to the 1st Cruiser Squadron of the Channel Fleet and later was assigned to the 6th Cruiser Squadron of the Mediterranean Fleet before being transferred to the China Station in 1912.

When World War I began in August 1914, she was in Wei Hai Wei, and was ordered south to the Dutch East Indies to search for the German light cruiser Emden, which was operating in the Indian Ocean. Ingeniously, the Emden’s captain had added a false fourth funnel en route as he passed through the neutral Dutch East Indies to make Emden look like a British light cruiser.

Emden sighted the Hampshire off Sumatra but managed to elude her and go on to sink a succession of Allied vessels before being tracked and destroyed by the Australian light cruiser Sydney on 9 November near the British Cocos Islands. Once Emden had been destroyed, Hampshire was released, and on her return escorted an ANZAC troop convoy through the Indian Ocean and Red Sea to Egypt. She then returned to Britain to join the Grand Fleet where, serving with the 2nd Cruiser Squadron, she saw action at the Battle of Jutland on 31 May and 1 June 1916.

The series of defeats which had overwhelmed Russia on the Eastern Front during 1915 had made it imperative for a high-ranking British minister to go there and examine the situation. The British Secretary of State for War, Lord Kitchener, the creator of Britain’s new volunteer army and organiser of Western Front resistance, was chosen. Russia had demanded huge consignments of munitions, so the British Minster of Munitions and his staff would go as well – Kitchener had the experience to gauge how far Britain’s munitions factories could assist.

One of the famous World War I recruiting posters featuring Lord Kitchener’s image.

Lord Kitchener had been the driving force behind Britain’s recruitment campaign in the early years of World War I with his famous ‘YOUR COUNTRY NEEDS YOU’ poster. But by 1916, he was being openly criticised for his war tactics and beliefs. In the years following his death, a bitter controversy would rage about the sinking of the ship he had been on, the Hampshire. Was it really a mine, as per the official explanation – or was it a bomb planted by German, Irish or even British saboteurs? Great play was made of the fact that the Stromness lifeboat had not put to sea to pick up survivors, and that locals trying to get to the scene to help in a shore search were turned back at bayonet point.

At the beginning of June 1916, Kitchener travelled north up through Britain to the port of Thurso and on 5 June he crossed the stormy Pentland Firth from Thurso to Scapa Flow in the destroyer Oak. He was received aboard HMS Iron Duke by Admiral Jellicoe and the flag officers of the British Grand Fleet, and listened at lunch with interest as they recounted their exploits in the Battle of Jutland, which had taken place only a few days earlier.

The commander of the Hampshire, Captain Savill, had received his sailing orders the day before, on 4 June: Hampshire was to depart Scapa Flow on 5 June for Archangel in northern Russia – a journey of 1,649 nautical miles. She was to pass up the east side of Orkney on a route that was regularly swept for mines and to maintain a speed of not less than 18 knots. She was instructed to pass midway between the Shetlands and Orkney, and keep not less than 200 miles from the Norwegian coast on her journey north. She would have a protective screen of two destroyer escorts as far north as latitude 62°N, and from there on she would proceed alone at 18 knots, zigzagging to avoid torpedo attack.

Chart showing the proposed 1,649-nautical-mile route of the Hampshire from Scapa Flow past Shetland, up the Norwegian coast round the North Cape to Archangel in the White Sea.

Lord Kitchener,having arrived at Scapa Flow on 5 June 1916 aboard HMS Oak,crosses at 1225 to HMS Iron Duke for lunch with Admiral Jellicoe and his officers. It is already wet and windy. (IWM)

The initial proposed routing for Hampshire from Scapa Flow was up the east coast of Orkney. But as a result of strong easterly winds and reports of German submarines operating to the east, that route was abandoned in favour of a route up the west coast. Hampshire struck a mine off the 200-foot high cliffs of Marwick Head near Birsay at 2040 on 5 June 1916. She sank within 15 minutes, with the loss of737 souls. There were only 12 survivors.

On 5 June however, as final preparations were being made for the voyage, the weather worsened. By the afternoon, a gale was blowing from the north-east and a heavy sea was running along the east coast, which made minesweeping difficult. The Admiralty felt that the heavy sea would make it difficult for the Hampshire’s two destroyer escorts to keep up with the bigger and more powerful cruiser – and so the fateful decision was made to re-route Hampshire and send her along one of the routes up the west side of Orkney.

Of the two available west routes, it was decided to use the route set up in January 1916, which went past the western island of Hoy. This route was not regularly swept for mines, but it was thought that no German minelayer would dare to operate this close to the heavily protected main Grand Fleet base. It was believed that this route would give the two escort destroyers some shelter from the north-easterly gale and enable them to keep up with the Hampshire.

The fateful decision having been made, Hampshire slipped her mooring buoy and cleared the harbour at about 1640. She steamed south out of Scapa Flow through Hoxa Sound, and then turned westwards into the Pentland Firth to rendezvous with her escort destroyers, Victor and Unity, off Tor Ness on the south-west of Hoy. By 1745 she had picked up the two destroyer escorts, which fell into line astern of Hampshire at 18 knots.

The prevailing weather conditions had however been misinterpreted, for within an hour the storm centre had passed overhead and the wind backed sharply to the north-west and increased to a Force 9 severe gale.. The conditions now facing Hampshire and her escorts were exactly the opposite of what had been predicted.

At 1805, the smaller and less powerful destroyer, Victor, signalled that she could only maintain 15 knots.

At 1810, Unity then signalled that she could only maintain 12 knots, and shortly afterwards at 1818, signalled that she could only make 10 knots. At 1820, Hampshire signalled that Unity should return to base.

Shortly after this, Victor signalled that she could not maintain any speed greater than 12 knots, and so at 1830, Hampshire signalled that she should also return to base. Off the entrance to Hoy Sound, the two destroyers turned for home whilst Hampshire went on alone, fighting the fury of the Force 9 severe gale and its 7–10-metre-high swell.

Hampshire struggled to make progress up the west coast. Her bow dipped and crashed in the heavy seas and the bow splash billowed over her fo’c’sle – she was only able to make 13.5 knots.

At about 2040, when she was about 1.5 miles from shore between Marwick Head and the Brough of Birsay, a rumbling explosion suddenly shook the whole ship as she hit a mine. A hole was torn in her keel between her bows and the bridge, the helm jammed and the lights gradually went out as the power failed. With no power, she could not make radio contact with the shore to call for assistance.

The explosion seemed to have taken place on the port side, just forward of the bridge and according to survivors, seemed to tear the heart right out of the ship. Her bow immediately began to settle into the water and a cloud of brown, suffocating smoke poured up from the stokers’ mess forward, making it difficult to see on the bridge.

Most of the crew had been down below decks and most of the hatches were battened down and shored up for the night. The crew began to knock out the wedges and proceed to their stations. The after-hatch to the quarterdeck was open, and as the crew streamed aft away from the explosion, an officer was heard to call out: ‘Make way for Lord Kitchener.’ He passed by, clad in his greatcoat, and went up the after-hatch, just in front of one of the few survivors. He was last seen standing on the quarter deck of the Hampshire.

The cruiser was settling quickly into the water by the bows, heeling to starboard. As all electric power was gone, none of the larger boom boats could be hoisted out. Those smaller boats that were lowered into the water on davits were smashed to pieces against the side of the Hampshire by the force of the gale. No survivor saw any boat get clear away from the ship. The Times of Friday 9 June 1916 reported that Kitchener’s party were put in a boat that was subsequently swamped by the sea.

About 15 minutes after striking the mine, Hampshire was well down by the bows, heeling to starboard. Her stern lifted slowly out of the water and her propellers were seen clear of the water, still revolving slowly. She capsized to starboard and an explosion was reported as she went that brought smoke and flame belching from just behind the bridge. Then she sank from view.

Only three oval cork and wood Carley floats got away from the sinking ship. These rigid floats were made from a length of copper tubing divided into waterproof sections, bent into an oval ring, then surrounded by cork or kapok and covered with a layer of waterproofed canvas. The raft was rigid and could remain buoyant even if the waterproof outer skin of several individual compartments was punctured.

One Carley float had only six men in it and, faced with the severe conditions, it was flung over twice, jettisoning the men into the sea. Only two men were alive when it reached shore.

A second larger Carley float got away with 40 to 50 men on it. The men in the open rafts were drenched and badly affected by wind chill; most of them were soon suffering from exposure, losing consciousness or foaming slightly at the mouth. Those that lost consciousness never regained it. When the raft made the shore some four hours later at 0115, only four of its occupants had survived.

The third Carley float had about 40 men in it when it left the sinking ship, and another 30 were picked up from the water. Not all crew were wearing their life preservers and it is reported that as the raft couldn’t hold the number of men now on it, an officer ordered those men wearing life preservers to enter the water and swim for shore. None survived. Almost four hours later, when the raft finally surged up on to the rocks, there were only six men left alive on it.

The subsequent search at sea in the days that followed located 13 mines in the vicinity of the wreck site, laid at a depth of 3 to 9 metres – deep enough to let smaller vessels such as fishing boats sail over the top of them and designed to catch only the bigger vessels. On 22 June 1916, a Royal Navy minesweeper, HM Drifter Laurel Crown, hit a mine in the same minefield as she was sweeping, and sank with the loss of nine of her crew.

It was later revealed that 34 mines had been laid by the German submarine U 75 on 29 May as part of German plans for what had developed into the Battle of Jutland. The German High Seas Fleet had put to sea to lure the British Battlecruiser Fleet out of its anchorage in the Firth of Forth. Anticipating that the main elements of the British Grand Fleet based at Scapa Flow would also put to sea, German submarines would be waiting for it. Three minelaying submarines, including U 75, were also sent out to mine the likely areas the British fleet would pass – and German intelligence was aware of the route that would tragically be used by the Hampshire. U 75 sailed from Germany two days before Jellicoe even knew of Lord Kitchener’s proposed journey.

The Kitchener Memorial, a 48-foot-high stone tower, was erected by public subscription on Marwick Head, the closest land point to the scene of the disaster, and was unveiled in 1926 to remember Britain’s Secretary of State for War, one of the men who died. No other names appeared on the tower however, so when Orkney Heritage Society came to restore the memorial for the 100th anniversary commemorations on 5 June 2016, an adjacent low archshaped wall was constructed and engraved with the names of all those lost on the night of 5 June 1916. The names of the nine crew lost when His Majesty’s Drifter (HMD) Laurel Crown hit a mine in the same area were also inscribed upon it.

In 1933, reports of unofficial salvage work on the wreck of HMS Hampshire began to circulate. The Singapore Free Press and Mercantile Advertiser newspaper of 22 June 1933 reported that rumours of a secret salvage company formed to ‘loot’ the wreck were circulating in New York by a man called Charles Courtney who described himself as a ‘master Locksmith’.

In the 17 December 1933 edition of the British newspaper the Daily News it was subsequently reported that a German company was illegally salvaging the wreck of the Hampshire under the heading:

GERMAN7S SALVAGING HMS HAMPSHIRE

Kitchener’s Death-Ship Secretly Raided

The report stated that a German vessel was secretly salvaging the Hampshire and attributed the story to the Berliner Illustrate Zeitung. The report narrated that salvage operations were unsuccessfully commenced in 1931 and were restarted in April 1933. The salvage vessel was alleged to have approached Hampshire in great secrecy, the captain taking a roundabout route from Kiel to avert suspicion and cruising along the Norwegian coast before crossing to the Orkney Islands.

A celebrated American locksmith called Charles Courtney was claimed to have been employed by the salvage consortium to dive to the wreck, and it was further claimed that £2,000,000 of gold to help fund the Russian war effort was situated in six safes in a small room beyond the captain’s cabin.

Charles Courtney had his book Unlocking Adventure published in 1951 by Robert Hale Ltd, London, and it narrates a vivid, dramatised and possibly largely fictional account of the salvage attempt on the wreck that was located in ‘350 feet’ of water. The wreck was said to have been entered 26 times and gold recovered, by opening the safes down on the wreck, as grabs couldn’t reach them without dynamiting. Much of the dramatic account is unbelievable – such as when it is narrated that divers entered the room of the commander of the Hampshire: as the steel door was opened, the decomposed bodies of two British officers were said to have been found seated at a table in the airtight room. (The vessel is in fact upside down so this is incorrect.) As water swirled into the room, the bodies were said to have risen from chairs and, drawn by suction, floated past Courtney and vanished in the framework of the sunken ship. (Such a large compartment in a ship would never have remained airtight at that depth underwater for so long.)

It was claimed that divers worked by day and by night whilst the crew of the salvage vessel maintained a constant vigil lest the suspicions of passing vessels be aroused. It was claimed that using oxy-acetylene cutting apparatus, they raised £60,000 in gold along with personal papers relating to Lord Kitchener’s Russian mission. (Oxy-acetylene cannot be used at depths of more than 30 feet, so this part of the account also appears incorrect.)

Courtney narrated that the wreck was largely covered in sand and that water lifts had to be used to clear access to it. But Hampshire sits on an area of clean shale and historic glacial deposits – the wreck is completely free of any mud, sand or silt deposits, and there is no mud bank in the vicinity so the report is incorrect in that respect too.

The report continued that when three explosive salvage charges were set off, one caused a secondary detonation of some of Hampshire’s munitions that hurled the divers into the mud and caused a mudslide. Courtney claimed to have been flung against the side of the wreck and pinned there by a raging current for an hour, suffering a broken wrist and injured ribs as a result – and that as a result of it being so traumatic an event, his hair had turned white. Two salvage divers were killed and another suffered a serious case of the bends. Courtney returned to New York where he claimed he underwent four operations for ruptures.

In 1977, 1979 and 1983 the wreck was dived by commercial consortiums who obtained a licence to survey and film it from the UK MOD, and the Aberdeen oil field diving support vessel, the Stena Workhorse was engaged in the 1983 survey.

In 1997, I obtained permission from the UK MOD to lead an expedition to dive Hampshire with a view to expanding my first book Dive Scapa Flow to cover the deeper wrecks such as this one, which had now become within reach of divers using the new technical diving techniques and breathing gases that had begun to develop in the UK in the mid-1990s. In 2000, I was able to lead a further expedition with MOD permission to revisit the wreck.

In 2002, Hampshire, along with many other famous British naval wrecks received protection by legislation. She was designated as a Controlled Site under the Protection of Military Remains Act 1986 – the higher of the two types of protection under the statute. This meant that no diving whatsoever was permitted on the wreck or within 300 metres of it. Some other naval wrecks were designated as Protected Places, which meant that divers could visit them but not enter, interfere or tamper with the wreck in any way.

The designation of Hampshire as a Controlled Site meant it was now off limits to divers – and no diving was permitted on it in the years following 2002.