RN:
Battleship
HMS Audacious. Date not recorded, but must be some time between 1913 and 1914.
HMS
Audacious was the fourth and last
King George V-class dreadnought battleship built for the
Royal Navy in the early 1910s. After completion in 1913, she spent her brief career assigned to the
Home and
Grand Fleets. The ship was sunk by a
German naval mine off the northern coast of
County Donegal,
Ireland, early during the
First World War.
Audacious slowly flooded and finally sank after the British were unable to tow her to shore, which allowed all of her crew to be rescued. However, a petty officer on a nearby cruiser was killed by shrapnel when
Audacious subsequently exploded. Even though American tourists aboard one of the rescuing ships photographed and filmed the sinking battleship, the
Admiralty embargoed news of her loss in Britain to prevent the Germans from taking advantage of the weakened Grand Fleet.
Repeated reports of submarines in Scapa Flow led Jellicoe to conclude that the defences there were inadequate and he ordered that the Grand Fleet be dispersed to other bases until the defences were reinforced. On 16 October, the 2nd Battle Squadron was sent to
Loch na Keal on the western coast of Scotland. The
squadron departed for gunnery practice off
Tory Island, Ireland, on the morning of 27 October and
Audacious struck a
mine at 08:45, laid a few days earlier by the German auxiliary
minelayer SS Berlin.
Captain Cecil Dampier, thinking that his ship had been torpedoed, hoisted the submarine warning; in accordance with instructions the other dreadnoughts departed the area, leaving the smaller ships behind to render assistance
The explosion occurred 16 feet (4.9 m) under the bottom of the ship, approximately 10 feet (3 m) forward of the transverse
bulkhead at the rear of the
port engine room. The engine room and the outer compartments adjacent to it flooded immediately, with water spreading more slowly to the central engine room and adjoining spaces. The ship rapidly took on a
list to port of up to 15 degrees, which was reduced by counter-flooding compartments on the starboard side, so that by 09:45, the list ranged up to only nine degrees as she
rolled in the heavy swell. The
light cruiser Liverpool stood by, while Jellicoe ordered every available
destroyer and
tug out to assist, but did not send out any battleships to tow
Audacious because of the supposed submarine threat. Having intercepted the stricken dreadnought's distress calls, the
White Star ocean liner RMS Olympic, arrived on the scene.
The ship could make 9 knots (17 km/h; 10 mph) and Dampier believed that he had a chance of making the 25 miles (40 km) to land and
beaching the ship, so he turned
Audacious south and made for
Lough Swilly. The ship had covered 15 miles (24 km) when the rising water forced the abandonment of the centre and starboard engine rooms and she drifted to a stop at 10:50. Dampier ordered all non-essential crew to be taken off, boats from
Liverpool and
Olympic assisting, and only 250 men were left aboard by 14:00. At 13:30,
Captain Herbert Haddock, the captain of
Olympic, suggested that his ship attempt to take
Audacious in tow. Dampier agreed, and with the assistance of the destroyer
Fury, a tow line was passed 30 minutes later. The ships began moving, but the line snapped as
Audacious repeatedly tried to turn into the wind.
Liverpool and the newly arrived
collier SS Thornhill then attempted to take the battleship in tow, but the lines broke before any progress could be made
Vice-Admiral Sir
Lewis Bayly, commander of the
1st Battle Squadron, arrived on the scene in the
ocean boarding vessel Cambria and took over the rescue operation. Upon learning that two ships had been mined in the area the day before, and that there was no threat from submarines, Jellicoe ordered the
pre-dreadnought battleship Exmouth to sail at 17:00 for an attempt to tow
Audacious. Dampier ordered all but 50 men to be removed at 17:00 and Bayly, Dampier and the remaining men on the ship were taken off at 18:15 with dark approaching
Just as
Exmouth was coming up on the group at 20:45,
Audacious heeled sharply, paused, and then
capsized. She floated upside down with the bow raised until 21:00, when an explosion occurred that threw wreckage 300 feet (91 m) into the air, followed by two more. The explosion appeared to come from the area of 'B'
magazine and was probably caused by one or more
high-explosive shells falling from their racks and exploding, then igniting the
cordite in the magazine. A piece of armour plate flew 800 yards (730 m) and killed a
petty officer on
Liverpool. This was the only casualty in connection with the sinking
The crew of
Audacious take to
lifeboats to be taken aboard
Olympic
The crew of HMS Audacious being taken off, 27 October 1914
Liverpool (left) and
Fury (centre), in combination with
Olympic, try to take
Audacious in tow (View from
Olympic)
